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The LORD’s Response to Solomon

(2 Chronicles 7:11-22)

¹ Now when Solomon had finished building the house of the LORD and the royal palace, and had achieved all that he had desired to do,² the LORD appeared to him a second time, as He had appeared to him at Gibeon.³ And the LORD said to him, “I have heard your prayer and petition before Me. I have consecrated this temple you have built by putting My Name there forever; My eyes and My heart will be there for all time.⁴ And as for you, if you walk before Me as your father David walked, with a heart of integrity and uprightness, doing all I have commanded you, and if you keep My statutes and ordinances,⁵ then I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever, as I promised your father David when I said, ‘You will never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel.’⁶ But if indeed you or your sons turn away from following Me and do not keep the commandments and statutes I have set before you, and if you go off to serve and worship other gods,⁷ then I will cut off Israel from the land I have given them, and this temple that I have sanctified for My name I will banish from My presence. Then Israel will become an object of scorn and ridicule among all peoples.⁸ And though this temple is now exalted, all^(a) who pass by it will be appalled and will hiss and say, ‘Why has the LORD done such a thing to this land and to this temple?’⁹ And others will answer, ‘Because they have forsaken the LORD their God who brought their fathers out of Egypt, and have embraced other gods, worshiping and serving them. Because of this, the LORD has brought all this disaster upon them.’”

Solomon’s Numerous Achievements

(2 Chronicles 8:1-18)

¹⁰ Now at the end of the twenty years during which Solomon built these two houses, the house of the LORD and the royal palace,¹¹ King Solomon gave twenty towns in the land of Galilee to Hiram king of Tyre, who had supplied him with cedar and cypress logs and gold for his every desire.¹² So Hiram went out from Tyre to look over the towns that Solomon had given him, but he was not pleased with them.¹³ “What are these towns you have given me, my brother?” asked Hiram, and he called them the land of Cabul^(a), as they are called to this day.¹⁴ And Hiram had sent the king 120 talents^(a) of gold.

¹⁵ This is the account of the forced labor that King Solomon imposed to build the house of the LORD, his own palace, the supporting terraces^(a), and the wall of Jerusalem, as well as Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer.¹⁶ Pharaoh king of Egypt had attacked and captured Gezer. He had set it on fire, killed the Canaanites who lived in the city, and given it as a dowry to his daughter, Solomon’s wife.¹⁷ So Solomon rebuilt Gezer, Lower Beth-horon,¹⁸ Baalath, and Tamar^(a) in the Wilderness of Judah^(a),¹⁹ as well as all the store cities that Solomon had for his chariots and horses^(a)—whatever he desired to build in Jerusalem, Lebanon, and throughout the land of his dominion.²⁰ As for all the people who remained of the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites (the people who were not Israelites)—²¹ their descendants who remained in the land, those whom the Israelites were unable to devote to destruction—Solomon conscripted these people to be forced laborers, as they are to this day.²² But Solomon did not consign any of the Israelites to slavery, because they were his men of war, his servants, his officers, his captains, and the commanders of his chariots and cavalry.²³ They were also the chief officers over Solomon’s projects: 550 supervisors over the people who did the work.²⁴ As soon as Pharaoh’s daughter had come up from the City of David to the palace that Solomon had built for her, he built the supporting terraces.²⁵ Three times a year Solomon offered burnt offerings and peace offerings on the altar he had built for the LORD, burning incense with them before the LORD. So he completed the temple.²⁶ King Solomon also assembled a fleet of ships at Ezion-geber, which is near Eloth in Edom, on the shore of the Red Sea^(a).²⁷ And Hiram sent his servants, men who knew the sea, to serve in the fleet with Solomon’s servants.²⁸ They sailed to Ophir and imported gold from there—420 talents^(a)—and delivered it to Solomon.