Who’s Building a House for Whom?
Posted by Isaac Butterworth | Filed under Five Questions, Gospel
David wanted to build a house for God, but God told him that he (the Lord) would build a house for him (for David). You can read about this in 2 Samuel 7:1-17. In my last several posts, I have been looking at various Scripture passages by asking of each of them five questions?
- What’s the situation?
- How are we tempted to react sinfully?
- What does our reaction reveal about the human heart?
- How does the gospel address the heart?
- How may we respond with living faith and active love?
The common thread in all my stories is that I am made for beauty, fallen in sin, and redeemed for glory.” ~ Elizabeth Reynolds Turnage
A story of beauty | who we are
A story of sin and struggle | why it doesn’t work
A story of redemption | what God does about it
A story of hope | where it all leads
In this post, I would like to explore the passage from 2 Samuel, using these same five questions.
Text: 2 Samuel 7:1-17 (NRSV)
- What is the situation? What comes against you?
1 Sam. 7:1 | God had given David victory over all his enemies, and David was now “settled in his house.”
- What temptations does the situation provoke? Or, what sins do you commit in reaction to the situation? What rises within you?
1 Sam. 7:2-3 | David (and Nathan’s) sin seems to be one of presumption, as though God needed anything that David could do for him. Since David now had a palace to live in, he was considering building a temple in which God could live. Compare what Paul says in Acts 17:24f.: “The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things.” When David’s son, Solomon, actually did build a temple for the Lord, he prayed and said, “But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built!” (1 Kings 8:27). And Stephen, in his speech before his persecutors, claimed, “Yet the Most High does not dwell in houses made with human hands” (Acts 7:48).
When our theology is off the mark – when we do not regard God as he has revealed himself in the Scriptures – we are in danger of presumption. The Lord himself says in Isaiah 66:1: “Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is my resting place?”
When we begin to imagine what we will do for God, we forget that we can do nothing for him that adds to his glory. (By the same token, we can do nothing to him that detracts from his glory.) What is missing in David in this instance and in us, when we are full of pride, is humility.
- What does your reaction reveal about the condition of the human heart? What is the God-substitute?
Boasting about what we can do for the Lord exposes not only a false perception of God (a faulty theology) but also a false perception of ourselves (a faulty anthropology). We imagine that we are on an equal footing with God, that he needs us, and that we have the capacity to improve his situation. We exalt ourselves and become swollen with pride. John Calvin wrote: “For (such is our innate pride) we always seem to ourselves just, and upright, and wise, and holy [and, we might add, capable], until we are convinced, by clear evidence, of our injustice, vileness, folly, and impurity” (Institutes of the Christian Religion, 1.1.2).
So, what does this tell us about the heart? A helpful way to examine our hearts is to ask of ourselves two questions: (1) What do we desire? And (2) What do we fear?
In this instance, we may say that our desire is for significance and that our fear is of insignificance. We want to make a mark. We want to make a difference. So we display our ability, wanting others to admire or even envy us, afraid that, if they don’t admire or envy us, we will not matter.
- How does the gospel address the heart’s condition? How does God reveal himself?
In David’s case, God addressed his heart (through Nathan the prophet) by shifting David’s focus from what David can do for God to what God will do for David – and for us!
God reminded David of two things:
1 Sam. 7:4-7 | (1) He didn’t need a “house” to live in, and
1 Sam 7:8-9a | (2) David wouldn’t be where he was (on the throne in a palace) if God hadn’t put him there. Note:
(a) God elevated David from being a shepherd to being a king (v. 8)
(b) God accompanied David and defeated (“cut off”) his enemies (v. 9a)
God made promises to David:
1 Sam. 7:9b | (1) God would make David’s name great (which is to say, among other things, that God did not need David to make his name great!)
1 Sam. 7:10-11a | (2) God would secure David’s people in the land, safe from their enemies (just as he had done with David).
Then God made a promise that gets at the heart of the gospel. Essentially, God said: “You will not make a house for me, but I will make one for you!”
1 Sam. 7:11b-17 | “Moreover the LORD declares to you that the LORD will make you a house” (v. 11b).
What follows requires us to understand that the fulfillment of prophecy in the Scriptures often takes place in an unfolding pattern from lesser to greater fulfillment. There is sometimes, as here, a proximate fulfillment and an ultimate one. God said that he would place David’s son on the throne and that this son of David “shall build a house for my name” (v. 13).
In fulfillment of this promise, David’s son Solomon succeeded him and did, in fact, build a temple for God. That was the proximate fulfillment. The ultimate fulfillment came with the appearance of the Son of David (Son with a capital S), our Lord Jesus Christ, who, in a greater sense, is building a house for the Father’s name. The Apostle Peter wrote: “Like living stones, you yourselves are being built into a spiritual house…” (1 Peter 2:5, margin).
In verse 14, when God spoke of the “iniquity” of David’s son, he could mean only Solomon (and perhaps the other descendants of David who sat on the Davidic throne). Christ himself had no sin (Hebrews 4:15).
Likewise, when God said to David, regarding his son, “I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever” (v. 13), he was speaking of Jesus Christ, of whom John wrote: “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah, and he will reign forever and ever” (Revelation 11:15).
In summary, God reminded David that David needed him, not the other way around, and God promised David a great name and a great future. In other words, God would make David a house. God’s greatest promise, however, was that it would be a descendant of David who would make a house for God. Ultimately, this promise refers our Lord Jesus Christ, who would make possible for all who put their faith in him “a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (2 Corinthians 5:1).
- How do you respond with living faith expressed in active love?
David’s response was to pray, giving all glory to God and acknowledging that any “greatness” he had was “wrought” by God (1 Samuel 7:21). Again, Calvin wrote:
Should we once begin to raise our thoughts to God, and reflect on what kind of Being he is, and how absolute the perfection of that righteousness, and wisdom, and virtue, to which, as a standard, we are bound to be conformed, what formerly delighted us by its false show of righteousness will become polluted with the greatest iniquity; what strangely imposed upon us under the name of wisdom will disgust by its extreme folly; and what presented the appearance of virtuous energy will be condemned as most miserable impotence” (Institutes of the Christian Religion, 1.1.3).
David abandoned “the appearance of virtuous energy” (what he thought to do for God) and embraced the reality of his “most miserable impotence.” We are wise to respond in a similar way, humbling ourselves before God and focusing not on our capacity to do great things (even for him) but on his power to do great things for us.
Photo Credit: King David’s Statue by zeevveez
