THURSDAY
Yesterday, we left off with the revelation God gave to Solomon, warning him that if the people turn from God’s commands and worship other gods then God will destroy the temple Solomon just built and dedicated. That’s exactly what happened in 586 BC when Babylon came and destroyed the temple. This was a punishment for Israel’s failure to repent from their sin.
The prophet Jeremiah prophesied in the years just prior to the invasion from Babylon. The temple itself became an idol. The people of Israel often worshipped the temple instead of the living God it pointed to. In chapter 7 Jeremiah preaches his famous temple sermon.
Jeremiah 7:1–26 (NIV) 1 This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: 2 “Stand at the gate of the Lord’s house and there proclaim this message: “ ‘Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah who come through these gates to worship the Lord. 3 This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Reform your ways and your actions, and I will let you live in this place. 4 Do not trust in deceptive words and say, “This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord!” 5 If you really change your ways and your actions and deal with each other justly, 6 if you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow and do not shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not follow other gods to your own harm, 7 then I will let you live in this place, in the land I gave your ancestors for ever and ever. 8 But look, you are trusting in deceptive words that are worthless. 9 “ ‘Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury, burn incense to Baal and follow other gods you have not known, 10 and then come and stand before me in this house, which bears my Name, and say, “We are safe”—safe to do all these detestable things? 11 Has this house, which bears my Name, become a den of robbers to you? But I have been watching! declares the Lord. 12 “ ‘Go now to the place in Shiloh where I first made a dwelling for my Name, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people Israel. 13 While you were doing all these things, declares the Lord, I spoke to you again and again, but you did not listen; I called you, but you did not answer. 14 Therefore, what I did to Shiloh I will now do to the house that bears my Name, the temple you trust in, the place I gave to you and your ancestors. 15 I will thrust you from my presence, just as I did all your fellow Israelites, the people of Ephraim.’ 16 “So do not pray for this people nor offer any plea or petition for them; do not plead with me, for I will not listen to you. 17 Do you not see what they are doing in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? 18 The children gather wood, the fathers light the fire, and the women knead the dough and make cakes to offer to the Queen of Heaven. They pour out drink offerings to other gods to arouse my anger. 19 But am I the one they are provoking? declares the Lord. Are they not rather harming themselves, to their own shame? 20 “ ‘Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says: My anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place—on man and beast, on the trees of the field and on the crops of your land—and it will burn and not be quenched. 21 “ ‘This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Go ahead, add your burnt offerings to your other sacrifices and eat the meat yourselves! 22 For when I brought your ancestors out of Egypt and spoke to them, I did not just give them commands about burnt offerings and sacrifices, 23 but I gave them this command: Obey me, and I will be your God and you will be my people. Walk in obedience to all I command you, that it may go well with you. 24 But they did not listen or pay attention; instead, they followed the stubborn inclinations of their evil hearts. They went backward and not forward. 25 From the time your ancestors left Egypt until now, day after day, again and again I sent you my servants the prophets. 26 But they did not listen to me or pay attention. They were stiff-necked and did more evil than their ancestors.’
That’s quite the sermon that Jeremiah was called to deliver at the temple gate! As you can imagine, it was not received well.
In verse 4 Jeremiah is speaking to what would likely be a rebuttal to his pronouncements of judgment. The people would likely think, “This is where God lives. God wouldn’t let his house be destroyed.” They had been worshipping the temple, not the one the temple points to. They put their trust in sacrifices with no regard for obedience. From the beginning of God’s relationship with his people, God required obedience. They were not to willingly and carelessly continue sinning, thinking that their sacrifices will atone for their sin. They were trying to game God’s system and that just doesn’t work with God.
Jeremiah points to the city of Shiloh, where the tabernacle initially rested when the people of Israel came into the promised land (Jos. 18:1). Eli’s sons, however, profaned the sacred space of the Lord by “treating the offering of the Lord with contempt.” (1 Sam. 2:17) The ark was taken from the tabernacle in Shiloh and into battle where it was captured and lost, the people wrongly thinking that it would bring them victory in war like a magic trinket (1 Sam. 4:1-11). When the ark was recaptured it wasn’t returned to Shiloh but to Kiriathjearim (1 Sam. 7:1-2). Some scholars think that the city was destroyed in that battle with the Philistines, around 1050 BC. There is no way to know for certain, but archeological digs have suggested that the city remained active and flourishing after that time. The Bible also suggests that the city continued to exist after that time (see 1 Kgs. 14:2, 4; 11:29; 12:15; 2 Chr. 9:29; 10:15). The town was likely decimated in the Assyrian invasion of 722 BC. Jeremiah may be referring to God’s removal of his protection, allowing the ark to be captured. He could be referring to his punishment of Eli’s sons for their sins. He could be referring to the more recent destruction of the northern kingdom of Israel, which included the city of Shiloh, by the Assyrians, as well. Regardless, if God could remove his presence from Shiloh, where his tabernacle first dwelt, why would Jerusalem be impermeable to that same treatment?
During Jeremiah’s prophetic career, the temple was destroyed by the Babylonians. When the people of Israel returned from exile, they built a new temple (the Second Temple), but it paled in comparison to Solomon’s Temple. Ezra 3:12 reports that many older people wept when they saw the foundations of the Second Temple being laid. This temple stood for almost 500 years, but little is known about it because it was in the intertestamental period. The ark was never recovered or replaced. Later on King Herod rebuilt the temple, and it was massive compared even to Solomon’s Temple. This is the temple that stood in Jesus’ time. Construction finished around 9 BC, but the work continued on until about 64 AD. Then in 70 AD the Romans, under general Titus, destroyed Herod’s Temple for good. It has never been rebuilt. Now the Dome of the Rock (a Muslim monument) sits on the site that the temple once sat on in Jerusalem.
The destruction of the temple reveals a couple of important things for us today.
- We need to be careful that we are worshipping the living God, not just the representations of the living God’s presence. This is difficult because we can’t see God like we can see the beauty of the temple. We can’t touch God like we can touch the artifacts of the temple. We can’t smell God like we smell the burning sacrifice on the altar or the incense in the Holy Place. We can’t taste God like we taste the bread of the presence or the meat from the sacrifices. People are constantly drawn to what we can experience with our senses instead of what we experience with our spirits. “God is spirit,” Jesus says, and we are to worship him “in spirit and in truth.” (Jn. 4:24)
- God desires obedience, not just sacrifice. Yes, all of our sins are forgiven when we believe in Jesus. But if we are deliberately, continuously living in sin after professing faith in Jesus, it calls into question the authenticity of our profession of faith.
Hebrews 10:26–29 (NIV) 26 If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, 27 but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. 28 Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. 29 How much more severely do you think someone deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified them, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace?
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