1 Kings 8:1-13 ~the LORD'S glory had filled the temple of the LORD

1 Kings 8:1-3 ~ (New American Bible) Listen

1 At the order of Solomon, the elders of Israel and all the leaders of the tribes, the princes in the ancestral houses of the Israelites, came to King Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the LORD'S covenant from the city of David (which is Zion). 2 All the men of Israel assembled before King Solomon during the festival in the month of Ethanim (the seventh month).

3 When all the elders of Israel had arrived, the priests took up the ark; 4 they carried the ark of the LORD and the meeting tent with all the sacred vessels that were in the tent. (The priests and Levites carried them.) 5 King Solomon and the entire community of Israel present for the occasion sacrificed before the ark sheep and oxen too many to number or count.

6 The priests brought the ark of the covenant of the LORD to its place beneath the wings of the cherubim in the sanctuary, the holy of holies of the temple. 7 The cherubim had their wings spread out over the place of the ark, sheltering the ark and its poles from above. 8 The poles were so long that their ends could be seen from that part of the holy place adjoining the sanctuary; however, they could not be seen beyond. (They have remained there to this day.) 9 There was nothing in the ark but the two stone tablets which Moses had put there at Horeb, when the LORD made a covenant with the Israelites at their departure from the land of Egypt.

10 When the priests left the holy place, the cloud filled the temple of the LORD
11 so that the priests could no longer minister because of the cloud, since the LORD'S glory had filled the temple of the LORD.

12 Then Solomon said, "The LORD intends to dwell in the dark cloud; 13 I have truly built you a princely house, a dwelling where you may abide forever."


~ the LORD'S glory had filled the temple of the LORD


2 Samuel 22:10-12
He parted the heavens and came down;
dark clouds were under his feet.
He mounted the cherubim and flew;
he soared on the wings of the wind.
He made darkness his canopy around him—
the dark rain clouds of the sky.

What a sight to behold.



Solomon built more Cherubim into the room built to be the Holy of Holies, this passage is describing them as the Ark is placed in the Sanctuary. The descriptions of the Ark being built describe a Mercy Seat existing between the two Cherubim on the Ark. The Ark is referred to once as a throne. Our pictures of the Ark, never have it remotely look like God's Throne, but instead a decorative box holding sacred relics instead of Throne of the Living God.

Solomon proclaimed God would live in the Temple of the Lord forever. After Jesus was resurrected, John had a vision of the Heavenly Kingdom to come:

Revelation 21:22-26
And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there. They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.

Man keeps trying to have permanence of eternity on earth. God designs eternity for His Heavenly Kingdom. God gives us glimpses, He gives us beautiful glimpses, of what is to come.

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