A House for His Name: The Grammar of Glory Text: 1 Kings 6:1-6
Introduction: Building as Theology
We live in a pragmatic and, frankly, ugly age. When modern Christians think about a church building, if they think of it at all, they tend to think in terms of utility. Does it have enough parking? Is the roof sound? Can we fit the Sunday School classes in the basement? We think like building managers, not like theologians. But our forefathers in the faith understood something we have largely forgotten: architecture preaches. A building speaks. It makes a theological statement. You cannot build in architectural silence. And when God’s people are stirred up, one of the first things they do is build.
The construction of Solomon’s Temple is not just a quaint episode from the Old Testament about an ancient building project. It is a monumental event in the history of redemption. It is a sermon in stone and timber. After centuries of wandering, of dwelling in tents, of a mobile sanctuary, God is finally putting down permanent roots in the promised land. The Tabernacle was the house of God for a people on the move. The Temple is the house of God for a people who have entered their rest. This transition from a tent to a temple is a profound statement about the progress of God’s kingdom in the world. It is a postmillennial act. It is the consolidation of victory, a move from the wilderness camp to the capital city.
David, the man of war, conquered the territory and gathered the materials. But it was Solomon, the man of peace, whose name means peace, who was qualified to build the house. This is a pattern. The gospel comes with the sword of the Spirit, conquering hearts and nations, and then the peace of Christ settles in to build, to establish, to create a culture, a Christendom. The Temple, therefore, is not just a building. It is the epicenter of the world, the place where Heaven and Earth met, the dwelling place of the Name of Yahweh. And every detail of its construction, every cubit, every beam, every window, is pregnant with meaning. It is a scale model of the cosmos, a picture of God's ordered reality, and a glorious type of the greater temple to come, the Lord Jesus Christ and His body, the Church.
The Text
Now it happened in the four hundred and eightieth year after the sons of Israel came out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv which is the second month, that he began to build the house of Yahweh. As for the house which King Solomon built for Yahweh, its length was sixty cubits and its width twenty cubits and its height thirty cubits. And the porch in front of the nave of the house was twenty cubits in length, corresponding to the width of thehouse, and its depth along the front of the house was ten cubits. Also for the house he made windows with artistic frames. And he built, against the wall of the house, stories encompassing the walls of the house around both the nave and the inner sanctuary; thus he made side chambers all around. The lowest story was five cubits wide, and the middle was six cubits wide, and the third was seven cubits wide; for on the outside he made offsets in the wall of the house all around in order that the beams would not be inserted in the walls of the house.
(1 Kings 6:1-6 LSB)
God's Perfect Timing (v. 1)
We begin with the anchor point in history.
"Now it happened in the four hundred and eightieth year after the sons of Israel came out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv which is the second month, that he began to build the house of Yahweh." (1 Kings 6:1)
The Holy Spirit does not deal in vague generalities like "once upon a time." He gives us names, dates, and precise chronologies because our faith is rooted in actual history, in space and time. This is not mythology. This happened. The date given is profoundly significant. Four hundred and eighty years after the Exodus. This number is not accidental. It is 12 multiplied by 40. Twelve is the number of God's people, the tribes of Israel. Forty is the number of testing, trial, and transition, the years in the wilderness. This dating formula ties the building of the Temple directly back to the redemption from Egypt. It says that the entire period from the Exodus to this moment was one coherent story, guided by one sovereign hand. God was not making it up as He went along. The Tabernacle was phase one; the Temple is phase two. This is the culmination of a long period of God's patient faithfulness through generations of sin, rebellion, judges, and battles.
This is a picture of God's covenantal faithfulness over the long haul. We are often impatient. We want the kingdom to come in its fullness by next Tuesday. But God builds His house over centuries. He is patient. He laid the foundation in the Exodus, and now, nearly five centuries later, the permanent structure is going up. This is a great encouragement to us. We are living in the middle of God's great building project, the construction of the Church. Sometimes it feels like we are making no progress. But God has His timetable, and it is perfect. The fourth year of Solomon's reign, the month of Ziv. God is a God of details. He is sovereign over the calendar. The work began exactly when He intended it to begin.
The Divine Proportions (v. 2-4)
Next, we are given the basic dimensions and features of the main structure.
"As for the house which King Solomon built for Yahweh, its length was sixty cubits and its width twenty cubits and its height thirty cubits. And the porch in front of the nave of the house was twenty cubits in length, corresponding to the width of the house, and its depth along the front of the house was ten cubits. Also for the house he made windows with artistic frames." (1 Kings 6:2-4 LSB)
At first glance, this might seem like nothing more than an ancient architectural blueprint. But these numbers are theological. The dimensions of the Temple are precisely double those of the Tabernacle. The Tabernacle was 30 by 10 by 15 cubits. The Temple is 60 by 20 by 30. This is a direct statement of continuity and amplification. God is not doing something entirely new; He is taking what He established in the wilderness and magnifying it. The kingdom has grown, and the house of the King is growing with it. This is the nature of the kingdom of God. It starts small, like a mustard seed, and grows into a great tree. It starts as a mobile tent and becomes a glorious, permanent edifice.
The proportions are also significant. The main hall, or nave, was a 2:1 rectangle on the floor (20x40, after accounting for the inner sanctuary), and the overall structure has a simple, profound harmony. This is a house built according to divine geometry. God is a God of order, proportion, and beauty, not chaos. The universe He made is structured and mathematical, and the house where He would dwell reflects that same character. This repudiates all forms of Gnosticism that despise the material world. God is interested in cubits and cedar beams. He cares about craftsmanship and beauty. An ugly church building is lying about the nature of our salvation, which is glorious.
The porch, or ulam, at the front served as a grand entrance, a transitional space before entering the holy place. Its width matched the house, creating a sense of majestic stability. And notice the windows. These were not large, clear panes of glass for letting in maximum sunlight. The Hebrew suggests they were narrow on the outside and wider on the inside, likely high up on the walls. They let in some light, but their primary purpose was theological. They symbolized that the light of this house was not primarily from the outside world. The true light of this house was the glory of God within. Yet, it was not a completely sealed box. It had a connection to the world, a means by which the light of God's presence could, in a sense, shine out. This is a picture of the church. We are to be in the world, but the source of our life and light is from God within us, not from the culture around us.
Growing the House of God (v. 5-6)
The final verses of our text describe the structure built around the main temple walls.
"And he built, against the wall of the house, stories encompassing the walls of the house around both the nave and the inner sanctuary; thus he made side chambers all around. The lowest story was five cubits wide, and the middle was six cubits wide, and the third was seven cubits wide; for on the outside he made offsets in the wall of the house all around in order that the beams would not be inserted in the walls of the house." (1 Kings 6:5-6 LSB)
Around the central sanctuary, Solomon built a three-story complex of side chambers. These rooms were for storage, for the priests to prepare, and for the treasury. They were the administrative and support structures for the central act of worship. This is a crucial picture. The central purpose of the church is the worship of the triune God. But that central worship requires support. It requires deacons and administration, treasuries and service. These side chambers are essential to the functioning of the Temple, but they are not the Temple itself. They cling to the outside; they serve the central reality.
Notice the clever engineering. The chambers got wider as they went up. The lowest floor was five cubits, the middle six, and the top seven. This was achieved by making the main temple wall thinner at each level, creating ledges or "offsets" for the floor beams to rest on. The beams of the side-chambers did not penetrate the walls of the sanctuary. This is a beautiful architectural metaphor. The life of the church, its administration and ministries, must be supported by the central structure of God's house, but it must not violate its integrity. The practical business of the church must never compromise the holiness of the sanctuary. The support structures are built upon the foundation of the house, but they do not pierce its sacred walls. The holy place remains distinct, inviolate.
This expanding structure also gives us a picture of growth. The house of God is designed to grow, to add rooms, to expand its influence and its functions. It is not a static monument but a living center of operations. The foundation is sure, the central sanctuary is holy, and from that stable core, the work of the kingdom expands outward and upward.
The Temple and the Church
As with all things in the Old Testament, we must read this with New Testament eyes. This entire glorious building was a shadow, a type, a placeholder for the true Temple. Jesus Christ stood in the courtyard of Herod's temple and said, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up" (John 2:19). He was speaking of the temple of His body. He is the true place where God dwells with man. He is the reality to which Solomon's stones pointed.
But the story doesn't end there. Through faith in Him, we are united to Christ. We become part of His body. And so the Apostle Paul can say, "Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?" (1 Cor. 3:16). We, the Church, are now the house of God, a spiritual house being built up with living stones (1 Peter 2:5).
The principles we see in Solomon's construction apply directly to us. God is building His church with perfect timing, according to His sovereign, covenantal plan. He is building it with divine proportion and beauty, a holy and ordered reality in the midst of a chaotic world. And He is building it to grow. We are the side chambers, the ministries that cling to the central reality of Christ. Our lives must be supported by Him, built upon the ledges of His faithfulness, without ever violating the holiness of the gospel. We are to be a house that supports the central act of worship, expanding outward to serve the King.
Solomon's Temple was eventually destroyed because of Israel's sin. But the Temple that Christ is building, the Church, is indestructible. The gates of Hell will not prevail against it. This project began not 480 years after the Exodus, but in eternity past, and it will not be complete until the New Jerusalem, which is the Church, the bride of Christ, descends from heaven, and the whole earth is filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea. We are not just working on a building; we are the building. And the Master Builder is making no mistakes.