Would you take your Bibles and turn with me to the book of 1 Kings, chapter 8? 1 Kings, chapter 8. We only have two more messages here in what we've been talking about with the character and nature of God. And we've been talking about some of the different aspects of the covenants recently, and kind of bringing that really to a culmination today with a discussion on the promises of God and how God is the promise keeper. I would have you just draw your attention here in 1 Kings chapter 8. We're going to begin reading in verse 54 and then read through verse 61. Then what we'll do is look at some of the context of this, and then hopefully, Lord willing, tie it together in understanding what Solomon is saying to us here in 1 Kings chapter 8. I also want to thank all the guys that were able to work this week down at Sherry Griffin's home on the fence. I know a lot of you obviously had work obligations and weren't able to do it during the week, but the Lord brought to us just the right amount of guys that we needed to get that done. I thank my brother Andy for spearheading that and And that was just a good project. And that's one of the things, men, that as we look into the future, not only do we want to be involved in studying and praying together as men, we also want to be taking outside the walls of this place and just stepping up the ways that we minister in the community and in the church to those who have needs. And so we want to really be able to tie together some of those things as we come together next Saturday. And I hope that you can be here at that time. Notice with me 1 Kings chapter 8, we're going to begin reading in verse 54. It says, And so it was when Solomon had finished praying all this prayer and supplication of the Lord, that he rose from before the altar of the Lord, from kneeling on his knees with his hands spread up to heaven. Then he stood and he blessed all the assembly of Israel with a loud voice and he said, Blessed be the Lord, who has given rest to his people Israel, according to all that he promised, there has not failed one word of all his good promise, which he promised to his servant Moses. May the Lord our God be with us as he was with our fathers. May he not leave us nor forsake us. In order that he may incline our hearts to himself, to walk in all His ways, to keep His commandments, His statutes, His judgments, which He commanded our fathers. And may these words of mine, with which I have made supplication before the Lord, be near the Lord our God day and night, that He may maintain the cause of His servant and the cause of His people Israel as each day may require, in order that all the peoples of the earth may know that Jehovah is God, there is no other. Let your heart therefore be loyal to the Lord our God to walk in his statutes and to keep his commandments as at this day. Would you join me in a word of prayer? Father, we come before you, we thank you for your word. Father, we thank you that there has not failed one word of your good promise. not only that you have made with your people through Moses, but Father, more importantly, of what you made with your people through your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. You have kept your word. You have been faithful. So Father, as we study this today, and we think about your promises, the promises in your word, and we think about ways that we can stand upon those promises, even as we sang this morning, I pray that, Father, you would give us strength of soul, that we might fight the good fight, that we might follow you, that we might stand on your promises and claim them and live by them. And so we pray in Jesus' name, amen. God is the promise keeper. You, if you have been around any length of time, you remember the movement that was started in 1990 by a guy named Bill McCartney called the promise keepers. And probably a lot of you men in here were in one way or another impacted by their ministry. Like many ministries that kind of have their time, so to speak, kind of go through a heyday and then kind of decline. So too it was with Promise Keepers. But Promise Keepers was obviously a national organization that was dedicated to building men who were committed followers of Jesus Christ and would keep their promises. And so it was built upon a plank of the, you probably remember this, the seven promises of a promise keeper. Think about promises. We think about promises that we may make to other people. We think of promises that we have made. We come to terms with the reality that's sad to say, because we are sinners. Many times we don't keep our promises. And yet there is one, my friend, who always does. God is the promise keeper. He is the one who keeps His word, who does what He says. And so as we come to the word this morning, we are confronted with this story that unfolds around the dedication of the temple. As Solomon comes in prayer for the people of Israel and for himself, and he dedicates himself and the nation to God anew, and yet he goes right back repeatedly in this entire chapter And he returns to the promises, the promises that God has made. And we see here in the verses that we've just read, as he blesses the people in the name of the Lord, he says to the Lord, not one word of what you have promised has failed. Not one word of what you have promised has failed. I want you to notice with me the context of what we see here. Notice with me the beginning of the chapter. We want to lay some groundwork for where we're going this morning. At the beginning of the chapter, in chapter 8, verse 1, it says, Now Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the chief fathers of the children of Israel, to King Solomon in Jerusalem, that they might bring up the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord from the city of David, which is in Zion. Therefore all the men of Israel assembled with King Solomon at the feast in the month of Ethanim, or this is also the month Tishri. It is the seventh month. So all the elders of Israel came and the priests took up the ark. And they brought up the ark of the Lord in the tabernacle meeting, and all the holy furnishings that were in the tabernacle, the priests and the Levites brought them up. Also King Solomon and all the congregation of Israel who were assembled with him were with him before the ark and they were sacrificing sheep and oxen that could not be counted or numbered for multitude. And the priest brought in the ark of the covenant of the Lord to its place into the inner sanctuary of the holiest of holies in the temple. And it was placed under the wings of the cherubim. for the cherubim spread their two wings over the place of the ark and the cherubim overshadowed the ark and its poles. And the poles extended so that the end of the poles could be seen from the holy place in front of the inner sanctuary, but they could not be seen from the outside. And they are there to this day. Nothing was in the ark except the two tablets of stone which Moses put there at Horeb," or on Mount Sinai, when the Lord made a covenant with the children of Israel when they came out of the land of Egypt. And it came to pass when the priests came out of the holy place that the cloud, the Shekinah glory cloud of God that had followed the children of Israel and led them in the wilderness for 40 years, that Shekinah glory cloud of Israel filled the house of the Lord. so that the priest could not continue ministering because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord. When Solomon spoke, the Lord said he would dwell in the dark cloud. I have surely built you an exalted house and a place for you to dwell in forever. And the king turned around and he blessed the whole assembly of Israel, with all the assembly of Israel standing, and he said, blessed be the Lord God of Israel who spoke with his mouth to my father David. With his hand he has fulfilled it, saying, since the days that I brought my people Israel out of Egypt, I have chosen no city from any tribe of Israel in which to build a house. That my name might be there, but I chose David to be over my people Israel. Now it was in the heart of my father David to build a temple for him, for the Lord God of Israel. The Lord said to my father David, whereas it was in your heart to build a temple for my name, you did well that it was in your heart. Nevertheless, you shall not build the temple, but your son who will come from your body, he shall build the temple for my name. So the Lord has fulfilled his word which he spoke, and I have filled the position of my father David, and I sit on the throne of Israel as the Lord promised, and I have built a temple for the name of the Lord God of Israel. And there I have made a place for the ark, in which is the covenant of the Lord, which he made with our fathers when he brought them out of the land of Israel. So Solomon stood before the altar of the Lord in the presence of all the assembly of Israel, and he spread out his hands towards the heavens, and he said, Lord God of Israel, there is no God in heaven above or on earth below like you, who keeps your covenant and mercy with your servants, who walk before you with all their heart. You have kept what you promised your servant David, my father. You have both spoken it with your mouth, and you have fulfilled it with your hand, as it is this day. Therefore, Lord God of Israel, keep what you promised your servant David, my father, saying, you shall not fail to have a man sit before me on the throne of Israel, only if your sons take heed to their way, that they walk before me as you have walked before me. And now I pray, O God of Israel, let your word come true. which you have spoken to your servant, David, my father. But will God dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain you, how much less this temple which I have built. That kind of lays the groundwork for the chapter and all through the rest of the chapter we have this extended prayer of Solomon as he prays for his people and he prays for himself that if they are in any distress, if they have forsaken God and they are out in exile because of their sin, yet if they will repent of their sin and they will turn and they will pray. Remember how even Daniel, when he is in exile, he would throw open the windows of his home three times a day and he would pray towards what? Jerusalem. And so Solomon says, if we will pray towards this place, will you hear our prayer and forgive? But all through what we read, Solomon keeps going back and he keeps saying, Lord, you have fulfilled your word. You have kept your promise. Let's just consider some things that are in the text. Let's consider the occasion. This happens, we already read this, it happens in the month Ethonym or Tishri. This is the month October. You'll notice that in what we read at the beginning of the chapter. He also says that because it is that month, he convenes these people, the elders of all the tribes as well as any men of the tribes would come because this is the feast, it is the feast of trumpets. Isn't it ironic that we just studied that this week? If you were here Wednesday night and you were here when Dr. David Sadaka from Chosen People's Ministries was here, he was talking about the Fall Feast of Israel. And we went through the Feast of Trumpets, and we went through Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, and then we talked about how that all culminates in the Feast of Tabernacles, or the Feast of Tents. Isn't it ironic that as we come to this, the Lord and Solomon bring together the building of the temple at a time when you have the Feast of Tabernacles, and you have the Feast of Trumpets, and all those things are together, and literally they are going from a tabernacle, a tent, into a temple or a building. In chapter 6 verse 1, it tells us that these events happen 480 years after the Exodus. Remember, the people of Israel were in slavery in Egypt for 500 years. And during that time, God brings together a nation, and then God sends to them a deliverer, Moses, and they come out of Egypt, and they come out and they go through the Red Sea, and they wander in the wilderness, and then they come into the land. And God gives them an inheritance in the land. And now 480 years after that event, they build a temple. We also find in the extended text, not what we read this morning, but earlier in the book, it took seven years to build this building. If you remember, there was not heard the sound of a workman as the temple is being erected. There are no hammers and chisels being used, but everything has been assembled off-site, and everything has been cut to order, and then it's brought and they put it together. If you've ever done building, you can only imagine how hard that is. especially with stones. You know, it's one thing if you make an error on a board and you cut it like a quarter inch too long and you can just trim it off a bit and make it fit. But you are talking massive stones that have been chiseled out and then they've taken all the wood from up in the region of Lebanon and they brought it in rafts, they floated it down in the ocean. and they've landed it and brought it in and they've got everything pre-cut and ready to go and it takes them seven years to assemble it. This is a massive structure and it is very ornate. It is a beautiful building and now that it is finished, they come to the moment when it is to be dedicated. Now, also consider with me the travels to the tent. Remember, when we say the tabernacle, the Old Testament tabernacle, we refer to it in kind of that big word from the King James Version. We call it a tabernacle. Yeah, I remember when I was down south going to school, I remember just down the street from the school where I went, there was a Baptist church. It was called Tabernacle Baptist Church. There it is, a building. A tabernacle is not a building. A tabernacle is a what? It's a tent. And so we have the travels of the tent. By the way, there's a beautiful picture here as Dr. Sadaka brought out the other night between the reality of the tent that we dwell in now, which is a temporary dwelling place. And Gail traded that temporary body in for the temple where she resides now, the house where she resides in glory. Although her body is still in the grave awaiting the final resurrection. So all these things are picturesque of that, but we have the travels of the tent. You remember, it's built at Sinai. It tells us in the book of Hebrews, in chapter 9, that while Moses was up on the mountain, God showed him a pattern to build this to, the very specks. Moses does not dream this up. It does not come from the mind of Moses. God shows him the temple that is in eternity, that is in heaven. And he says, this is the pattern and you build the earthly tabernacle this away. So it is built in Sinai. It goes through the wilderness wanderings for 40 years. For this extended period of time while the children of Israel are being chastened for their lack of faith and not going in under Mosaic leadership, going in and inheriting the promises, the entire generation dies off. Finally, they go in under the leadership of Joshua and the tabernacle is taken to a place called Shiloh. It is at Shiloh during the days of Eli. Remember in 1 Samuel? You remember the story of Eli the priest and Elkanah and Hannah and all the things that go there as God gives Samuel to Hannah in answer to prayer? But that is where the tabernacle is resting. The word Shiloh literally means a place to rest. How many of you ever gone on a pack trip? Have you gone on a pack trip in the mountains? Yeah, it's wonderful, isn't it? It's a fun thing to do. Think about doing that for 40 years. Think about for 40 years, every time God decides it's time to move and the glory cloud goes before you, you got somewhere near a million and a half Jewish people tearing down tents, tearing, if you're a Levite, the whole tabernacle structure has to be taken down packaged together in the very way God precisely told them to do it, carried in the very manner that God told them to carry it, and then you went to the next camping spot where the Shekinah glory cloud stopped, and you set it up again. And you hoped that God kept you there for a week. Right? I mean, can you imagine doing that for 40 years? I love to go on a pack trip, but I love going Home. When the priests set it up in Shiloh, hallelujah. It's a day of rest, right? We're here to stay. We are in the promised land. It's hard for us. You know, when we just read through the scriptures, sometimes we don't think about those things. But think about the realities in people's lives. It's there for a period of time until the Philistines take the Ark of the Covenant. Now here we're talking specifically about the Ark of the Covenant. The Israelites begin to look in the Ark like it's some good luck charm, right? So they're going to go to battle against the Philistines. And you remember the sons of Eli were bums. You read the story. And they think they're going to go to war against the Philistines and God's going to take care of them just because they have the good luck charm with them. That's like thinking, you know, I can live any old way I please. As long as I got my cross around my neck, I'm good to go. And they look at the Ark of the Covenant like some good luck charm. And so they go down to battle. They're all excited to go into battle against the Philistines. And the Philistines rout them and take the Ark of the Covenant captive. God chastens them. We can't go into this whole story this morning, but it's there for a period of time. They put it in the temple of Dagon, and you remember the story, and then read it sometime. It's really hard to figure this out, but it talks about, in the old King James Version, God strikes them with emeralds. And so they put in this basket, when they take it back to the Israelites, these emeralds, and nobody really knows what that was. In fact, in most translations of the Bible now, it's what word? Hemorrhoids. Can you imagine dying of that? I mean, these people are under judgment of God, and the Philistines are. They send the covenant back. It shows up at a place called Bethshan. When he gets the best sham, what happens? Do you remember? The men are so excited to see it. What do they do? They go down and they're gonna look inside and make sure everything is there. And what happens? God strikes them dead. Scared to death, they don't know what to do. the men of Kiriath-Jerim come and take it. And the Ark of the Covenant, and we would figure from that, because wherever the Ark is, that is where the tabernacle will come. At Kiriath-Jerim, the Ark is housed there for an extended period of time. until David decides it's time to bring it to Jerusalem. And there again, it would take us much more time than we have to go through the whole history, but you remember, David, in moving the Ark of the Covenant, mimics who when they moved it? The Philistines. The Philistines put it on a new cart. That's how they moved it. God did not judge them for that. Why? They didn't have the scripture. David does it, instead of having the priest carry it, he puts it in a new cart and a man loses his life because of David's disobedience. It shows up in Jerusalem, there it stays. David says, I am going to build a temple for the Lord. And God says, no, you are a man of blood. Solomon even says here, God said, what of him? Because it was in your heart, it was a good thing. You know, God may put something in your heart that he doesn't give you the ability to do. That's okay. It's good it's in your heart. It's good it's in your heart. God knows the heart. This is what Solomon is talking about. And as a result of this, and finally Solomon builds the temple after seven years it is done. And now it is time for the dedication service. I want us to notice one thing that is very interesting in the text. Solomon builds new everything for the temple except one piece of furniture. There is one piece of furniture that Solomon does not replace. It is what? The Ark of the Covenant. That is the only piece from the old tabernacle that goes into the temple. There is a new table of showbread, there's a new candelabra, there's a new laver, a new altar, but the Ark is the same one. Why? Because it is the continuity of the covenant. And so it goes in and it goes into the New Temple. It's interesting and also notice in chapter 8 verse 9 here, it says specifically that the only thing that is in the Ark of the Covenant is the two tablets of the law. We know that originally there were three different things that were in the ark. The two tablets of the law, there was a pot of manna, and there was Aaron's rod that budded almond blossoms. And yet by this time, those other things are not there. We don't know why. There's no explanation of it, but it tells us specifically that the only thing that is in the ark is the two tablets of the law. Now, I want you to go with me to verse 54. Go to verse 54, because this is really the meat of the message, and we've got to get through this here today. And this is what I want us to really hang our hats upon, is this idea now of what happens when Solomon blesses the people at the conclusion of his prayer. And I want you to notice there are various things that are in this portion of Scripture. There is praise, there is petition, there is purpose, there is a plea. But then we see the continuing plight of the people of God. Now, let's just look at these things real quickly. Notice, first of all, these are things that are all important when we pray. When we pray, when you pray, don't just go to God and ask him for stuff. It is so easy for us to do that. We go to God with our list, we go to God with our needs, with everything we want from God, and we treat God like He's a genie in the lamp, and if we just rub Him right, He'll give us three wishes. That is not prayer. Prayer is composed of many different things, and I think in every biblical prayer that you see in the Word of God, you see that true prayer begins with praise. When we come to God and we exalt Him for who He is, and we see this repeatedly in the prayer of Solomon, and we see it in this concluding section in verse 54 when he says, Blessed be the Lord who has given rest to His people Israel according to all that He promised. There was not failed one word of all His good promise which He promised. to his servant Moses. He praises God. You know, it is so important for us to begin our prayers with thanks, with gratitude, to say, blessed be the Lord, no matter what happens in my life, no matter what comes my way, even like we thought of this morning when we thought of a song like Even If, God can do anything, can he? God can do anything. He, but he does not always choose to. And how do we respond? We say blessed. Blessed be the Lord, no matter what happens in my life, he is blessed. And so Solomon begins where we should always begin our prayers, and that is with praise. He then moves to petition. I think it's interesting, he doesn't even have a list like you and I would pray. You look at the prayers of Paul in the New Testament for the different churches. He prays for things like spiritual health. He prays for things like, may the eyes of our understanding be opened, that we may really understand the riches of what he's given us. These are the prayers of Paul. That doesn't mean that it's wrong for us to pray for people, that it's wrong for us to pray for physical. It doesn't mean anything like that, because we do see that in the New Testament. The church gathers to pray that Peter would get out of prison. But what I want us to think is we need to think deeper and we see here that Solomon is praying for the people, not that they'll just have health and wealth and prosperity, he is praying that God would do something in their lives. He prays that God would incline their hearts to himself. In Philippians, we find it is God who works in us to will to do his good pleasure. It is God who works in us, and so we need to pray for each other that God would incline us to do His will, and this is the prayer of Solomon. And he prays that in his petition in verse 57 to 59. What is the purpose that he prays for? Notice in verse 60. He prays in verse 60 that all the peoples of the earth may know that the Lord is God, there is none other. That is the purpose of everything that he is praying for. That people would see that the God that we worship, the God that we pray to, He alone is God and that He is to be glorified. And so he prays for that. He closes kind of with a plea to the people in verse 61 when he says, Therefore, let your heart be loyal to the Lord your God. That should be our plea, not only to God, but to one another. that our hearts would be loyal, that we would be covenant keepers, that we would be promise keepers, that when we have given our word to God concerning a thing, that we would follow through, that He would incline our hearts to be able to do so. And yet we see that they, like us, are guilty of the sad reality of the plight, and that is, if you go further in the book, if you get to chapter 11 and you look in verse 9, this man who prays this prayer, In Hebrews 11 verse 8, he goes and he takes foreign wives, he burns incenses, and he sacrifices to their gods, and the Lord becomes angry with Solomon because his heart had turned from the Lord God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. That's the plight of it. God is a God of grace. It's amazing to me. Here you got this man Solomon who builds this temple. He sees the glory of God fill the temple with all the priests running and scattering out of it because they can't serve there because of the presence of God. He knows that the Lord God is God and there is no other. And yet later in his life, he abandons God. Oh, my friend, how easy it is for us to start out good. and to end somewhere else. Would God give us grace that this doesn't happen to us? That we don't wash out on life's journey. but that we keep our promise that we make to God. I want us just to, we gotta close here, but I want us just to consider some things real quickly about the promises of God. Hebrews chapter six, verse 13 to 20 tells us concerning the promises of God that God made promises so we would have a strong consolation. Now, I want us to realize something. When you read your Bible, everything in it is true, but not all scripture is promised. Now, that doesn't mean that you can't take something that God says that's true and hinge your prayer on it. But I want us to think specifically about a promise. A promise itself. You remember when you were on the playground when you were a kid, and you were gonna make a promise, you know, you're gonna be my best friend for life. And what did you say? Cross my heart, hope to die. Right? Cross my heart, hope to die. You remember doing that. Not everything in the Bible is promised that way. When do you give a promise? When do you give a promise? I mean, our words should be good, right? Jesus said, let your yes be yes and your no be no. When you give your word, you do it. But when do you give your promise? Think about that for a minute. When do you give someone a promise? when you know that the other person is gonna be tempted to doubt your word because of either difficulty or time. You know that there's gonna be some difficulty that could cause you or the other person to doubt whether what you said was true. Or because of time, that it's gonna be a long time until it's fulfilled. So the person on the other end is really wondering whether you're gonna do it. What do you do? You give a promise. And your promise is a confirmation of your word. And so promises are given to strengthen the force of the words when we speak. And I think it's amazing how in Hebrews chapter 6, he says, you know, God cannot lie. And everything that God says is true. But in order that we would have a strong consolation, there are times when God says, I swear. I give an oath. That is the word promise, by the way. The word promises is a word that we should take very seriously and very solemnly, because when we give a promise, it is as though we are saying, I swear. I give an oath. And God did that for us in many different places in different ways. And the language of a promise, when you're looking in the Bible and you're thinking, is this just true or is this a promise, the language of a promise begins with a phrase, and it's this, I will. When God says, I will, he is making a promise. Not that everything else isn't true. Hear me out on that, right? Do you understand what I'm saying? So let's look at it this way. Romans 8, verse 28 is a truth. What does it say in Romans 8, 28? Quote it with me. Are you awake? We know the what? God is at work in all things for the what? The good of those who love him who are called according to his purpose. That's the truth. It's not really a promise. No, we use it that way many times. It's not really a promise. It's just a truth. Everything that happens, God is working for your good and for his glory. Everything. But when you go to Hebrews chapter 13, in Hebrews chapter 13, he says this, be content with what you have. Don't covet. And then he goes on and he says, because he has said, I will never, what? Leave you, I will never forsake you. That's a promise. He is swearing an oath. He is saying to you, I will never leave you, I will never forsake you. He ties that to the covenant. What's part of the covenant? Don't covet. And a part of the promise in the covenant is, I will never leave you, I will never forsake you. So he says, don't covet because he's never gonna leave you and he's never gonna forsake you. And the force in the Greek language is so strong. He puts a double negative there, something we never do unless you're a redneck. I ain't never gonna, right? I ain't never gonna do that. God says there in the Greek language, I will never, no, never leave you. I will never, no, never forsake you. And then he says, because of that, so we can boldly say, the Lord is my helper, I will not fear. What can man do to me? If God is on my side. See, that's a promise. That's a promise in the word of God. Abraham talks about it. You know, all these things are fulfilled in Christ. In Romans chapter 1 verse 1 to 6, we'll close with this. It says, he promised long ago. See the word promise? He promised long ago through his prophets and the Holy Scriptures, and all these promises concerned his son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who was a descendant of David according to the flesh. He has been declared to be the powerful son of God by the resurrection from the dead according to the spirit of holiness. And so Jesus is the seed of Abraham. Jesus is the sacrifice for sin of Moses. Jesus is the son of David. And all of these things, all of the promises are yes and amen in Jesus. And it all comes together in him. And there has not been one word of the promise that God has made to us in Jesus that has fallen to the ground. He has not kept. He's kept it all. So what are some of the promises of God that are special to you? I hope that as you read the word of God, you internalize it. You look at it and you look at, this isn't just God speaking to everybody else. This is God speaking to me. I will. God says to us, whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord, I will save him. Have you trusted him? Have you put your hope in him? God, my friend, is the promise keeper. Let's close our time in a word of prayer. Father, we thank you for your word. Father, thank you that you never renege on your word. You keep your word. Father, you tell us in your word that you have exalted your word above your very name. We thank you that you have given to us promise that we have a strong consolation. Those of us who have fled to Christ to find refuge in him. Father, when the evil one comes to us and he assails our conscience or he causes us to doubt, may we run into Christ. May we return to the promise. I pray that there's someone here that's struggling with an assurance of salvation, that wonders whether or not their sins have really been forgiven, whether they've done enough, whatever the case may be. Father, may you just point them to the promise of Christ and that you have kept your word. So we pray in Jesus' name, amen.