We're turning back for our thinking today to that first Bible reading from 1 Kings chapter 8. And what we're looking at here really is the inauguration, is the opening of the temple, the first temple, Solomon's temple, the grandest and most impressive of the temples. There were three temples altogether. There were Solomon's that we're going to read about today. There was the rebuilt temple after it had been destroyed by the Babylonians or the Chaldeans. and then the captivity, and when some of the captives returned, they rebuilt the temple, and then in the fullness of time, Herod's temple, which was the one standing at the time of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so following the death of King David, of course Solomon, his son, became the king, and it was now a time of peace. You will know from David's record there was a lot of conflict, a lot of war with his neighbors, with the Canaanite people around him, enemies of Israel and so he was engaged often in the defense of the nation and so his attentions and his energies were directed there. He would love to have actually built the temple and he said so. but it was made very clear to him that it wasn't to be his privilege but it was to be his son's. So the time had arrived now where peace had arrived in the land and it was a right time, a propitious time for the building of the temple. The wealth of the nation grew. The energies of the people could be deployed in building the temple. And the plans were already given, of course, through Moses. And now the time arose that it was done. Prior to this, they did worship in the tabernacle, as you know, the tent, that moving place of worship, which had essentially the same components as the temple, but it was temporary. But it needed to be in the fullness of time in the promised land, a place of worship, which was to be the temple. Construction, we're told in the scriptures here, was begun in Solomon's fourth year as the king. And we're told also in the scripture this was 480 years after the exodus from Egypt. And the date is something like 957 BC. It took seven years to build. We won't spend time with that, but the detail is there. But this was a constant, ongoing effort. Can you imagine? Seven years. And thousands upon thousands of people were engaged in the work. There was a kind of conscription, actually, where large sections of Israel had to give their time for a month at a time to work. Materials were obtained from Hiram, King Hiram, who was the king of Tyre, and the cedar and the olive and so on, and the stone. All had to be transported, some of it by ship, down the coast. And gold covered so many things. So this was a most impressive edifice when it was finally made ready. But now was the time for the dedication. It was to be the time where Solomon stood up in front of the people. And we can read about that there in verse 14 of 1 Kings 8. And the king, Solomon that is, turned his face about and blessed all the congregation of Israel. And all the congregation of Israel stood. And then he gives a kind of speech, an inauguration speech. And it's really in an attitude of prayer. He is actually down on his knees. It's quite remarkable. So if you read, you needn't turn to it, but in verse 54, this is at the end of the proceedings in verse 54. And it was so that when Solomon had made an end of praying all this prayer and supplication unto the Lord, he arose from before the altar of the Lord from kneeling on his knees. with his hands spread up to heaven. So everything that we read about that Solomon is saying was actually in that position and it was essentially a prayer. Although I've said it was a speech, yes it was and it would have informed the people and they would have probably well known very much of what he was going to say. but it was a plea and a prayer that the Lord would hear their prayers and use that place of worship for the benefit, for the refuge, for the help of the people. So what was the temple for? Now, this is not going to be exhaustive. It's really just to introduce our thinking, to set the scene, because there's a particular verse I want to come to, and we'll dwell on that a little bit more when we get there. Well, it was to be the house of the Lord. It was to be the place to which people resorted and focused their worship, bowed their heads, came for remission of sins. There was the priesthood that operated there, the Levitical priesthood. It was to be a place of sacrifice. That was one of the main functions. There was to be the slaying of thousands upon thousands of animals. And actually in this time, and the period of inauguration, the opening of the temple, went on for many days. It wasn't just that day. Thousands upon thousands of animals were slain. Blood was shed. And as I'm sure we all know, and we read about it there in the letter to the Hebrews chapter 10, these things were only pictures. They couldn't achieve anything. But the nation of Israel and the world in turn, we are not Israelites strictly ethnically speaking, though we are if we're the Lord's Israelites in spirit. This is a lesson for all ages, not just for the people of those days. So that great powerful lesson. that there had to be the shedding of blood, there had to be the punishment, but it was only picture language, it was to teach and prepare the people so that they understood that there had been great offence and that there must be an atonement, there must be someone else to pay the price and the people themselves couldn't pay the price. And within the tabernacle also, there was a chamber, a room, called the Holy of Holies. And that was not to be entered in at all, except once a year by the high priest. And he himself had to offer sacrifice for his own sins. And so that was a representation, again, that there is a priesthood. There's a way in which you and I can access the holy God. But he is holy. It's an excluded place and we are excluded from God's presence whilst we are sinners, before our sins are forgiven. And so the Holy of Holies teaches us that. There were the cherubim there with their angel wings spread over. the Ark of the Covenant, that chest which contained the Ten Commandments. And that is a lesson to us also. I must just be very brief with these things. But the Ten Commandments are the representation of God's standards. And actually they're designed for us. God doesn't, in a sense, require those. He fulfills them without any question. And the Lord Jesus Christ would have done so too. They were for us. They were designed for mankind. They were the way in which if we followed them and lived by them, we would have much peace, much help, much health, much prosperity. There would be the right worship to God, the right attitude and view of one another, of society. But sadly, as we all know, they only now represent to us a standard that we can't keep. We were unable to keep them. So that there, in a sense, is also the lesson of the temple. God is holy. We cannot approach him without sacrifice, without the priesthood, without the shedding of the blood. And so all of these things were teaching aids for us. But magnificent though the building was, Solomon actually was very aware. that it was only a picture. It was only a symbol. A powerful one, of course. We're speaking about it today. And its lessons are very clear to us. But he knew full well God is not limited to a place, to a building. He's not a parochial God. If you look across world religions, very often the gods are They belong to a mountain or the sea or the clouds or whatever, the sun or the moon. But our God is beyond all these things. So you could read in verse 27 that Solomon understood this full well. But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain these, how much less this house that I have built it. And there is the right spirit and attitude. This was a magnificent, impressive building. But they weren't glorying in it, or shouldn't do. Maybe some did. They weren't saying, look at us, look at our building prowess, look what we've achieved. No, Solomon knew that. He said, this cannot contain God. I've built this house. I've had the great privilege to do so. But God is above all these things. And so we gain a view, even from what Solomon was praying here, that the people should understand that God is supreme. He's transcendent. He is outside of time and outside of the universe and within it everywhere. That's the God whom we worship. and really we cannot fully comprehend, we can barely comprehend these things. So these things were all taught and people understood them. And then he began to explain through his prayer what some of the other purposes of the temple were to be. It was to be a place where the people would go to in their need for their different situations. And so, for example, in verse 30, where he introduces it here, Harken thou to the supplication of thy servant and of thy people Israel, when they shall pray toward this place, and hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place, where thou hearest forgive. And so he was teaching them that this was a place to which they would come and offer their prayers. realizing that it was only as I've already said just a symbol of God's presence that he was above and beyond those things but it was a place that they would come to for forgiveness and that's primary here it is right here the prayers and when thou hearest forgive and then he touches upon a number of scenarios, I won't go into them in detail, when someone's made an oath and they've perhaps failed to keep it, and there's difficulties, they've got to go to the temple. Verse 33, when they're smitten down by their enemies, and that would happen, and the Lord would allow from time to time the enemies to disturb the people and trouble them, because they'd sinned. because they'd taken their eye off the living God, because they had perhaps begun to worship the vain gods, which they did, sadly, as we well know. And then the Lord would deal with them, and they would come to that place when they were smitten down. It doesn't specifically say what that smiting is, but they then would come. And when the heaven is shut up, another example, verse 35, when there's no rain, And there would have been drought and periods of few things and difficulty. And that's again because they've sinned against you. And then if they pray, hear their prayers is what he says. And then there's a kind of summary of these things. We read it in verse 37. We'll come to our text now in a minute. But verse 37, if there be in the land famine, if there be pestilence, blasting, mildew, these are things that affect the crops, locusts, or if there be caterpillar eating away at the plants, if their enemy besiege them in the land of their cities, whatsoever plague, whatsoever sickness, you see all of these scenarios. What prayer and supplication so ever be made by any man or by all thy people Israel? And then it says in verse 39, then hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place and forgive. But we come to our text now, and I've skipped over the words intentionally, but we'll come back to it. Let me read verse 38 again for right through what prayer and supplications to ever be made by any man Or by all thy people Israel, which shall know every man the plague of his own heart and Then the prayer spread forth his hands towards this house. And so up until this point I think it's fairly clear that the prayer has been general and So that the nation of Israel, the people in general, afflicted as a community, as a people, by lack of rain, by the crops failing, by troubled by the enemies, by sickness, generally if you come to the temple and pray, God might give you as a people, as a nation, relief from these things. But there's a change now because now it's focused on the individual. And really that's very important, and that's what true religion always is, and that's what the gospel is always about. It's not about reforming a people altogether. That can happen if the individuals are changed. But the gospel message, the message of the Bible from God through Jesus Christ, is to people, individuals. Look how often the Lord Jesus dealt. He spoke to crowds, of course. But how many individuals came to Him? The leper, the woman with the issue of blood, the demoniac. You can multiply them, but they're individuals. And God deals with us one by one. And so perhaps there's a little caution here to us that we should never think that we're just in the crowd. We're in the family. My family are Christian. I go to church. I'm in the congregation. I've been brought up in a Christian country. I should be okay. God doesn't see me. I don't do anything too terrible. But he does, actually, and the Bible tells us so in just a few verses on, words on from where we are. And so the change is here. Or whatsoever prayer and supplication be made by any man, so first of all you see that there, halfway through verse 38, any man, or woman of course, or by all the people Israel, next breaking them down into individuals, which shall know every man, again you see, just to underline and emphasize it, that this message is for you, for me, personally, individually. And that, in a sense, helps us not to evade the focus and the notice of God, but on the other hand, is the kindness of God. How many dignitaries, people in high position, know you or notice you? A face in the crowd, perhaps royalty when they pass, the crowds they might shake a hand here and there and that's very nice a gesture of goodwill nothing wrong with that they don't know you they don't know your name your background your needs but God does he knows all about you and me and it says so here we'll get to that well I'll read it now as we're speaking about it And it's halfway down in verse 39, whose heart thou knowest, for thou even thou only knowest the hearts of the children of men. And it says God only actually knows the hearts of the children of men. We have some idea. of one another's hearts, motives, thinking. Yes, we have some insights, but only God really knows the depths of our needs, probably things we're not even aware of. I think most of us, almost certainly I can say, don't really know the depths of our sins, the seriousness of it. the hardness of our hearts, the unbelief. We're so used to it, we're so accustomed to it, but God sees it in all of its offense. But then we come back to, and I want to spend time focusing on what will be the main verse. We're talking about the plague. That's how Solomon describes it. Solomon's words, God's words as the inspirer of scripture, which shall know every man a plague. of his heart. This is of course not a physical plague, a malady. It is a spiritual illness and it's of the heart. It's not that organ that pumps blood around the body. It's the person, the inner you, the inner me. But there's a plague. It's diseased. People sometimes have symptoms and they go to hospital and they examine and they've had some trouble with their heart and sometimes they open it up and the surgeons are horrified. This heart is barely functioning. How are you even alive? It's scarcely pumping blood around. It's in desperate need of help. Well our spiritual heart much more so. And so we begin to look at these things and we need to pray about these things. So this is all of us. We're all sinners. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And it's in the Bible. It's right here also. If they sin against thee, verse 46, for there is no man that sinneth not. Isn't it fascinating? It is to me that through the scriptures, what you might say are the Pauline doctrines or the New Testament doctrines, they're all here. The scriptures condemns and includes all men, all women, for there is no man that sinneth not. And the self-righteous need to take note of that. Those people of Israel of old and during Christ's times who thought, well, I'm not a sinner. I'm not like other men. Well, that cuts through. Every single one of us is guilty before God. So sin, of course, is the plague. It's simple. That's what the plague of our heart is. And a plague, of course, is going to rob you of well-being and of vitality and of hope. Of course, the best-known plagues that we're probably aware of in this country and in the West were the plagues in Europe in the 1300s and in the 1600s in this country and beyond. which decimated populations, where the dead were carried away daily in carts, where hardly a family was unaffected. Plague. That was the bubonic plague. There are other forms of that same plague also, but that was perhaps the best known plague. And once you knew it, perhaps at first, perhaps for a time, symptoms might not have manifested themselves straight away, maybe some days or even weeks, you thought all was well. I've escaped it. I see this person. My neighbor has died. I hear about the next town. There are many dead. Thankfully, so far, I'm okay. But you don't know that. and it's the same with us we might think we're okay but sin is progressing in our souls we may be well we may have good health thank god for that outwardly But in our souls, we're ill. We don't understand what this life is all about. We shut off any appeal for our needs. We refuse the gospel. We prefer those things that are to our tastes. to this world's fallen tastes and appetites. We want to pursue those things. We want to live as if there was no God, is no God, and that view is so prevalent, is it not? Mind you, as an aside, I'm hearing now, there's quite a stirring amongst many young people who are sensing some dissatisfaction, something wrong with this world, starting to go into churches here and there. I'm not saying it's revival, but it is an encouragement. I wonder if you've heard that. But generally speaking, in public life, there is the shouting against God. There is no God. We are the rulers of our own lives. That's the plague of the heart. And it disturbs the mind. You know, we were made to relate to God. We were made so that our thinking might be free, so that we might see and discern what God has done for us. It's actually liberation from the bondage of wrong thinking, from darkness. It's the whole package. Our mental well-being, our physical well-being even, to some extent, is tied up in what our heart is towards God. But it's a plague, here it is, the plague of our heart. And of course it spreads, it's infectious. It came in the boats apparently to this country years ago on the rats, and actually it was the fleas that contained, it was a bacteria, not a virus. And when people were bitten, this bacteria would grow and take over their systems. compromise them until life was no longer viable. It's progressive. And that's what sin is for us. It progresses. We get more cynical. We get more attached to this world. We're less inclined to believe that there is a God or any good thing. And we are just resigned to our fates. And we just accept what we can get in this world. And we infect one another. Haven't we seen it? I've seen it. Perhaps you've been the carrier of that contingent. Have you affected other people with your sins? Perhaps someone for a while thought, oh, I can't do that. I've been brought up in such and such a way. But then their friends say, don't be foolish. Come, do this, do that. and they become infected and they follow that way and they become worse and worse and they infect others. It's infectious like this plague was and it's weakening and it's disfiguring. The victim's plague would have withered away. They wouldn't have looked appealing. There would have been no shine in their face and their eyes. Perhaps you would turn away from them in the last stages. They were so gaunt. There was no hope. There was death in them. And spiritually, we are like that. We may not see it outwardly, but God sees that withering soul, that withering heart. And that's what sin has done to us. We make light of it. But look how the Bible describes it. What else is Solomon talking about? It's sin. It's not a physical disease. He's spoken about plague and other afflictions. He's spoken about the outward things. This is the plague of the heart. But there's got to be help. What happened? Well, these days, of course, we live in much better hygiene and health. We have access to such good medical care. There's so many advances that many of the things that people did ignorantly that made them Vulnerable to diseases? Well, we know about them now. And so we might think, well, we're unaffected. Mind you, something like COVID reminds us from time to time, we're not immune from these things. Well, back in 1897, apparently in British India, a vaccine was developed for the plague, for bubonic plague. It's actually still around, but it's hardly anything like as prevalent. Here and there, there's still plague, bubonic plague. But a vaccine was developed and many, many thousands in that region were vaccinated and so protected from the plague. But there's no vaccine for sin. There's no quick fix. There's no counseling. There's no reformed 12-step program. There's no guru, there's no transcendental religion, no power of positive thinking, no self-effort will touch that condition. We need radical help and that's what the temple is all about. That's the lesson of the temple. It says so. Come, spread your arms out. Look at the whole attitude that was exhorted of the people. They were to do so with their arms spread. This is how they are to pray. Halfway through, verse 38, person who knows about the plague of his heart, and spread forth his hands toward this house. That gesture says a lot, doesn't it? It says, I have nothing in my hands. I can't do anything. My appeal is entirely to you. Help me. I'm exposed. You don't come proudly. Well, I'll go to the temple. Not as bad as him. I've got a few little issues. I'll have a private word with God. He'll see me right. No, this is how we to pray, isn't it? With his hands toward his house and Solomon prays on their behalf and he prays on our behalf. Verse 39, then hear thou in heaven, thy dwelling place. Temple wasn't his dwelling place. Oh God, he was everywhere and all powerful. Hear our prayers and forgive, forgive us. And give to every man according his ways to his ways whose heart thou knowest forgive us You see the temple spoke. I've already mentioned it Of sacrifice, how could we be forgiven? Could god just say well fair enough We'll just cancel that sin It doesn't work like that. It doesn't work like that in our world We can't just go to court, someone's charged with a serious offence, murder, robbery, and the victim just says to the judge, I'll tell you what, I'm not bothered, you can forgive him. Certainly not for murder. That's not going to happen. The law's got to take its course. An offence has been committed. That person must be charged and tried regardless of what the relatives and so on think. And it's the same with God's justice. He has to, someone has to be punished. There is a penalty. And if we're not to bear it, then someone else would. Why else the thousands upon thousands, how much blood was shed? How much sudden death came to those animals? Whatever was that for? It was never enough, really, to point to the Savior who would come in the fullness of times. And we read in Hebrews 10, it's actually, when you read it, it's so plain, so well explained, what's going on here, that the temple could never achieve those things. But in the fullness of time, lo, it is written in the volume of the book, Christ was prophesied, a body that he was given, and he offered up that body It says in Hebrews 10, for it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins. It wasn't possible. That wasn't its purpose. It was a reminder year by year, perhaps speaking particularly of the annual entrance into the Holy of Holies of the high priest. But then there in Hebrews chapter 10, 11, but Christ offered one sacrifice for sins forever. Isn't that wonderful? Isn't that marvelous? Isn't that real? Hasn't that happened? Have you not felt that relief, that burden lifted to know that you are no longer culpable? You are no longer to be held responsible for your sins, for my sins. But you've got to believe in him. You've got to have that prayer. You've got to ask for it. If you're hardening your heart, if you're not interested, then there's no blessing for you. The plague of your heart will continue. What is the end of the plague? It's death. What is the end of the plague of the heart? It's spiritual death, which doesn't mean annihilation. It means eternal separation from God. It says so in the scripture, from cover to cover. But here, This is Solomon appealing to the people of his day. And he is in a sense appealing to us also. But we now know the detail. We know that Christ came. We know that he offered himself up on Calvary. And that's where we look now. He is the temple. Christ is our temple. He is our high priest. Will you call out to him? Will you trust with all of your heart? There's counsel here about how to pray. Verse 48, and so return unto thee with all their heart and with all their soul. He instructs them how to pray sincerely. You've got to mean it. You've got to trust in him. And then absolutely, you will be forgiven. You will be delivered from that plague. You will feel spiritual health coursing through your spiritual veins. You'll have a new energy. I don't mean you're not going to get tired. You won't get sick, I'm not saying that, but in your soul, in your mind, in your center of well-being, you will know that God has lifted that curse from you, born it himself. He is now your father, your friend, your guide. He'll lead you home to glory. That where he is, you will also be. We shall be cured. And we give thanks and praise for these things. We'll finally then just hear the wisdom of Solomon, the greatest, wisest man that ever lived. There is a greater Solomon, as the scripture says, Christ. It's him, essentially, who's appealing to you, not the preacher, not even Solomon. They're just the mouthpiece, just the messenger. The Lord is appealing to you to come to him for relief of your spiritual need.