1 Kings 8:22-30, 35-53
A Repeated Practice of Repentance

Then Solomon stood before the altar of the LORD in front of the whole assembly of Israel, spread out his hands toward heaven and said:

"O LORD, God of Israel, there is no God like you in heaven above or on earth below--you who keep your covenant of love with your servants who continue wholeheartedly in your way. You have kept your promise to your servant David my father; with your mouth you have promised and with your hand you have fulfilled it--as it is today.

"Now LORD, God of Israel, keep for your servant David my father the promises you made to him when you said, 'You shall never fail to have a man to sit before me on the throne of Israel, if only your sons are careful in all they do to walk before me as you have done.' And now, O God of Israel, let your word that you promised your servant David my father come true.

"But will God really dwell on earth? The heavens, even the highest heaven, cannot contain you. How much less this temple I have built! Yet give attention to your servant's prayer and his plea for mercy, O LORD my God. Hear the cry and the prayer that your servant is praying in your presence this day. May your eyes be open toward this temple night and day, this place of which you said, 'My Name shall be there,' so that you will hear the prayer your servant prays toward this place. Hear the supplication of your servant and of your people Israel when they pray toward this place. Hear from heaven, your dwelling place, and when you hear, forgive.



"When the heavens are shut up and there is no rain because your people have sinned against you, and when they pray toward this place and confess your name and turn from their sin because you have afflicted them, then hear from heaven and forgive the sin of your servants, your people Israel. Teach them the right way to live, and send rain on the land you gave your people for an inheritance.

"When famine or plague comes to the land, or blight or mildew, locusts or grasshoppers, or when an enemy besieges them in any of their cities, whatever disaster or disease may come, and when a prayer or plea is made by any of your people Israel--each one aware of the afflictions of his own heart, and spreading out his hands toward this temple--then hear from heaven, your dwelling place. Forgive and act; deal with each man according to all he does, since you know his heart (for you alone know the hearts of all men), so that they will fear you all the time they live in the land you gave our fathers.

"As for the foreigner who does not belong to your people Israel but has come from a distant land because of your name--for men will hear of your great name and your mighty hand and your outstretched arm--when he comes and prays toward this temple, then hear from heaven, your dwelling place, and do whatever the foreigner asks of you, so that all the peoples of the earth may know your name and fear you, as do your own people Israel, and may know that this house I have built bears your Name.

"When your people go to war against their enemies, wherever you send them, and when they pray to the LORD toward the city you have chosen and the temple I have built for your Name, then hear from heaven their prayer and their plea, and uphold their cause.

"When they sin against you--for there is no one who does not sin--and you become angry with them and give them over to the enemy, who takes them captive to his own land, far away or near; and if they have a change of heart in the land where they are held captive, and repent and plead with you in the land of their conquerors and say, 'We have sinned, we have done wrong, we have acted wickedly'; and if they turn back to you with all their heart and soul in the land of their enemies who took them captive, and pray to you toward the land you gave their fathers, toward the city you have chosen and the temple I have built for your Name; then from heaven, your dwelling place, hear their prayer and their plea, and uphold their cause. And forgive your people, who have sinned against you; forgive all the offenses they have committed against you, and cause their conquerors to show them mercy; for they are your people and your inheritance, whom you brought out of Egypt, out of that iron-smelting furnace.

"May your eyes be open to your servant's plea and to the plea of your people Israel, and may you listen to them whenever they cry out to you. For you singled them out from all the nations of the world to be your own inheritance, just as you declared through your servant Moses when you, O Sovereign LORD, brought our fathers out of Egypt."

New International Version

The occasion of this scripture passage is the dedication of the first temple built in Jerusalem, which was done during the reign of King Solomon. Solomon's prayer of dedication for the temple is timeless in its portrayal of the human condition, as Solomon repeated our urgent need for repentance and God's faithfulness to respond to our sincere prayers for forgiveness.

Solomon accurately described us as he admitted there is no one who does not sin. Solomon also accurately described our stubbornness to acknowledge our sin, for he recounted a number of ways that God used to convince the Hebrew people that they needed to change their ways. They, like us, did not want to admit they were wrong, that they were not in control, that they could not manipulate God. Knowing this, Solomon recounted the famines, the invasions, the droughts, and the plagues that had marked the people's most serious rebellions, and thanked God for forgiveness and restoration each time. Sadly, the history of the Hebrew people shows that they did not learn easily from these painful lessons.

Solomon cautioned the people that they needed to learn from God how to live as they admitted their wrongdoing. The essence of sin is that we want to live life our own way and to make our own rules. Turning from our sin means we must turn to and submit to God's will, and we must learn to follow God's way and trust God to guide us.

Solomon warned them and us that we cannot deceive God with pretty words. Solomon observed that God alone knows the hearts of people, and by that, Solomon meant that God knows the way we think, what we feel, and how we decide to be faithful or to rebel. We cannot lie to God, any more than Adam and Eve could hide their nakedness from God in the Garden of Eden. Still, we keep trying to deceive God by trying to filter what we want God to see in us. Asking for forgiveness requires an honest commitment of all our heart and soul to God.

I also see that Solomon offered in his prayer the reason why God would continue to forgive the Hebrew people, and the foreigners who hear and believe. That reason has nothing to do with our worth or our merit--the reason God is faithful to us is that we belong to God. Solomon saw this as the covenant with Abraham's children, and we see this as the covenant in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and the same unbalanced equation holds in both covenants: our forgiveness is exclusively because of God's Goodness, and that is enough.

Our pride wants us to believe we can earn God's forgiveness, that there is some kind of negotiation we can do with God to gain our pardon, but there is not. Our pride wants us to consider "better" ways to live our lives, and reject the Wisdom of the One who made us. Our pride wants us to defend our sinful actions by explaining them away, by reinterpreting our failures, by comparing ourselves favorably to others, by philosopically distancing ourselves from the reality of our sin, by appealing to common sense, or even by misapplying God's Grace as if it were permission to sin. We don't like to set down our will and surrender to God. But we must, over and over again, until our practice of repentance allows God to fit us more and more into God's perfect Will for us.