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been anointed king in his father's lifetime, to insure his suc- cession to the throne; and, as if by a miracle, his father rises from what had seemed his death-bed, and, endued with almost supernatural strength, commits to his well-beloved son the great work for which he had gone on making preparations so long as health and life served him, but which he now feels that the hour has come for him to resign into other hands.
3. The occasion is an august one. Spectators stand round the princes and chief men of Israel, the great in peace, the mighty in war, representatives of the whole nation. Vast stores of gold and silver from the royal treasury are ready to be given over to meet the expense of the temple-building; costly marbles and precious stones are prepared for its adornment, and the divinely inspired plan of the future work is in the old king's hand. The aged king rapidly reviews his own early wish to build the temple, God's appointment of Solomon in his place, and the condition of obedience to the law on which that successor and his descendants are to hold the kingdom. Then, turning to the young king by his side, he gives him his parting charge : " And thou, Solomon, my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind ; for the lord searcheth all hearts, and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts : if thou seek him, he will be found of thee ; but if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off for ever." After this follow directions for the building, ending with the words, " The work is great : for the palace is not for man, but for the Lord God."
^ The whole picture is one of serene beauty. It shows ua that by God's grace no error is irretrievable, no crime inexpiable. No blot rests on the fair fame of our own English kings Henry ii. and Edward ill. (even allowing, as we ought to do, for the raising by the Gospel of men's moral standard) equal in darkness to that which left its indelible stain on David. Yet how like to his afflic- tions from his rebellious son were the sorrows of Henry's latter years ! how easily might David's last days have resembled those of Crecy's conqueror, as depicted by the poet ! —
Mighty victdr, mighty lord,
Low on his funeral couch he lies! No pitying heart, no eye, afford A tear to grace his obsequies.
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Is the sable warrior fled ?
Thy son is gone. He rests among the dead.
The swarm that in thy noontide beam were born?
— Gone to salute the rising morn.
Whence comes it then that with David, instead, " at evening time it is light," — that he cheerfully directs the hopes of his subjects, the devotions of his servants, to another than himself; and, complaining of no desertion, fearing no evil, dies with his eyes fixed in rapture on the temple of the future, and the king whose wealth and power were to eclipse his own ? Simply because he knew that his sin was pardoned ; because he could say, " In thee, ( 0 Lord, do I put my trust : let me never be put to confusion " ; because God had been his " trust from his youth," and was his " strong refuge " in his age ; because, by what God had done for him already, he well knew what God could do for him in time to come — so that, standing on the grave's brink; he could say, with assured faith, " Thou, which hast shewed me great and sore troubles, shalt quicken me again, and shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth." ^
4. It was a high destiny to which Solomon was called. He was called to build a temple to the Lord. But is it not the very destiny to which each of us is called, only higher in degree, inasmuch as the spiritual temple is higher than the material ? This is the great purpose of our life — the building of God's^ spiritual temple. It rests on the foundation of prophets and) apostles, " Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone." And the time will come when the fire will try every man's work therein, of what sort it is. Let us therefore take our share in the honour of that work, lest we should then suffer shame. For us, as for Solomon, provision has been made, a pattern has been given, and it only remains for us to serve in the work with a perfect heart.
5. Two things are spoken of as necessary to the fulfilment of \J this high calling — Knoidedge and Service.
(1) It is pitched on a lofty key of spiritual religion, for it lays " Know thou the God of thy father " as the foundation of every- thing. That knowledge is no mere intellectual apprehension, but, as always in Scripture, personal acquaintance with a Person,
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which involves communion with Him and love towards Him. For us, too, it is the seed of all strenuous discharge of our life's tasks, whether we are rulers or nobodies, and it means a much deeper experience than understanding or giving assent to a set of truths about God. We know one another when we summer and winter with each other, and not unless we love one another ; and we know God on no other terms.