Temple of God

1 Kings 6:38 And in the eleventh year, in the month of Bul, which is the eighth month, the house was finished in all its details and according to all its plans. So he was seven years in building it. 1 Kings 7:1

But Solomon took thirteen years to build his own house; so he finished all his house.

One of the greatest achievements of Solomon was that he built the temple of God. If you read the description of the temple in 1 Kings 6 you can see how awesome the temple must have been. Solomon put in a lot of effort and work to build the house of God. It was not an easy task and surely it was not a job you can finish in a short period of time. In fact, the last verse of chapter 6 tells us that it took 7 years to build the temple of God.

The next verse, which is chapter 7 verse 1, starts with the word “But.” And it says that it took 13 years for Solomon to build his own house (compared to the 7 years for the Temple of God. 7 is a symbol of completeness in the Bible though). I wondered at why the verse would start with the word “But,” when you can also start the verse with other words such as “And” or “Then” or “Next” or “After that.” The author chose to start the verse with the word “But.” The Bible does not mention or indicate whatsoever that building your own house for a longer period of time than the length of time spent in building the God’s house is wrong. It does not say that Solomon was wrong in doing so. We don’t know what Solomon’s intention was.

Whatever Solomon’s motive or the intention was, I imagined to myself what mine would have been if I were Solomon. It is easy for us as selfish humans to value mine over God’s. After all, if you really think about it, everything you have is from God. We should always be able to put God’s things first over my own personal agenda. We should always learn to set our priorities straight.

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Dwelling Place

Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers doing business. When He had made a whip of cords, He drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers' money and overturned the tables. And He said to those who sold doves, "Take these things away! Do not make My Father's house a house of merchandise!" John 2:13-16

Temple is a place for people to come and meet God. Temple is a place where God dwells. So when you come to a temple you come and worship! But during this time of Passover, the temple lost its function and it turned into a market for personal profit! Think of how sad God would have been when He was waiting for His people to come and spend time with Him, but instead they were only interested in making money for themselves.

God tells us that our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Our body is a place where the Holy Spirit dwells. It is sacred and important. The above text tells us how important it is for us to take care of ourselves. God wants to dwell among us. He wants to spend time with us. We need to practice in thinking Godly things, not worldly things. It's important for us to make sure that we gain on Godly matters, not selfish personal matters.

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Right Back

"After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.” Acts 1:9-11

So, back when we first got married we were living in California. Due to visa matters, my wife had to go back to Korea for about a month. Because we were on our honeymoon and I loved her, I didn't want her to go, but just have her stay at my side all the time. Hey, but the good news was that she would be coming back in about a month's time. We had bought a round trip ticket so she would come back for sure.

As I was thinking about this, I thought about the disciples when they saw Jesus rise up back to heaven. Jesus had been crucified and resurrected. The disciples were glad to have Jesus back yet He couldn't be with them forever. Jesus' mission was done on earth and He had to return back to heaven to finish the whole mission. Jesus went back to heaven in front of the eyes of the disciples. But the angels showed up and promised that Jesus is coming back!

Jesus promised to come back. Just as I knew that Hyemi was going to come back from Korea, the promise of Jesus told by the angels stands true! All we have to do is believe in Jesus and wait for His coming! I think Jesus loves us so much that He wants to come back right away, but there is still unfinished business so we have to wait just a little bit more, but He will come soon!

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