2 Chronicles

2 Chronicles 2: No house can hold God

Begin in prayer

Before you open 2 Chronicles 2 and read about the house Solomon planned, pause and ask God to show you how great He is. Ask Him to lead you to see Christ.

Yahweh says, “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build to me? Where will I rest?

Isaiah 66:1

Father in heaven, please open our eyes as we read Your Word. Show us that You are greater than all gods and that heaven cannot hold You. Help us to see Jesus. Make us more like Jesus. And please bless our family as we worship You together. In Jesus' name, Amen.

See where we're going

Solomon decides to build a house for the name of the LORD, and a house for his own kingdom. He sets seventy thousand men to carry loads and eighty thousand to cut stone. Three thousand six hundred oversee them. He writes to Huram, king of Tyre, who had sent cedar to David, and asks for cedar and a skilled craftsman. Solomon says the house will be great because his God is greater than all gods, and heaven cannot contain Him. Huram answers that the LORD made heaven and earth, and he sends a skilled man and promises to float cedar to Joppa. Solomon counts the foreigners in Israel and puts them to work on the house.

As you read 2 Chronicles 2, look for the answers:

Reflect together

Key truth

The LORD is greater than all gods, and heaven itself cannot contain Him.

Solomon planned a house for the LORD's name, and asked Huram of Tyre for timber and a craftsman (verses 1 to 8). He said the house was for incense, the show bread, and burnt offerings each morning and evening (verse 4). Then he said that the house would be great, because the LORD is greater than all gods (verse 5). He asked who could build the LORD a house, since heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him (verse 6). The heaven of heavens means the highest heaven of all. The house was a place for the LORD's people to worship Him, and Solomon knew it could not hold Him. Huram, a foreign king, answered that the LORD made heaven and earth (verse 12). This matters because the God we worship is the Maker of everything, and He is far higher than any idol. It shows a God who is above every false god and above the heavens themselves.

How does 2 Chronicles 2 show us that the LORD is greater than all gods, and that heaven itself cannot contain Him?

Solomon planned a house for the LORD's name.

Solomon decided to build a house for the name of the LORD (verse 1). He counted out workers to carry loads, to cut stone, and to oversee them (verse 2). The house would hold incense, the show bread and the burnt offerings morning and evening (verse 4).

The LORD is greater than all gods.

Solomon told Huram that the house would be great, for their God is greater than all gods (verse 5). Huram answered that the LORD is the God of Israel, who made heaven and earth (verse 12). He also wrote that the LORD loves His people (verse 11). These are the words of a king of Tyre, who was not an Israelite.

Heaven and the highest heaven cannot hold the LORD.

Solomon asked who could build the LORD a house, since heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him (verse 6). Then he asked, “Who am I then, that I should build him a house, except just to burn incense before him?” (verse 6). Solomon did not think the house could keep God inside it. It was a place to worship Him.

In Jesus the God no house can hold came near.

John says the Word became flesh and lived among people (John 1 verse 14). Paul says all the fullness of God lives in Christ in bodily form (Colossians 2 verse 9). Jesus spoke of the temple of His body (John 2 verse 21). The God whom heaven cannot contain came near to sinners in Jesus.

Memorise

The house which I am building will be great; for our God is greater than all gods.

2 Chronicles 2:5

Looking to Jesus in my life

Ask yourself in your heart, how can I come to a God so great, and have I gone to Jesus?

Solomon asked, “Who is able to build him a house, since heaven and the heaven of heavens can’t contain him?” Jesus is God come near, for the Word became flesh and lived among people (John 1 verse 14).

We have sinned against a God this great, and no temple, no gold and no offering of ours can pay for it. Jesus went to the cross, and there He died for His people and paid for their sin once for all. He rose, and He lives forever.

So come to Him. Turn from your sin and put your trust in Jesus. Everyone who trusts Him is forgiven, and a holy God receives that person as His own.

Parent's note

Tell your children that the LORD is greater than all gods, and that Jesus is God come near to sinners. Parents, please explain that the temple was a place to worship, and that God Himself was never shut inside it. Please do not tell them they are saved just because they grew up in a Christian home. Call each child to turn from sin and trust Jesus, and pray that God would give them a new heart.

Pray together

Now please close your time together in prayer. Thank God that He is higher than the heavens, and bring the heart question to Him. Every child can pray, so let each one say a short prayer if they want to.

Yahweh is high above all nations, his glory above the heavens.

Psalm 113:4

Great God, thank You that You are higher than all the heavens. Thank You for sending Jesus to bear sin on the cross. Please lead each of us away from sin to trust Him, and help us to worship You this week. Amen.