Observation: As Solomon begins building the temple, he sends a letter to King Hiram of Tyre to ask for both supplies and workers. He reveals he is building a temple for Yahweh, and we know that it will actually be the grandest building in the ancient world. However, Solomon describes its purpose much more humbly than others would state.
Others declare it as the place the Lord dwells, and state that the Lord himself sits on top of the cherubim that decorate the lid of the Ark of the Covenant that is placed in the Holy of Holies. The Lord doesn't state that as the purpose. In fact, the Lord says he doesn't need a temple, but if built it will be the place where his name dwells ... in other words, it is a place people can see and thus declare the Lord's greatness. In his letter to Hiram, Solomon is even more humble than that. He has plans to build the grandest structure on earth, and says it will be a worthy place to ... burn incense, and maybe stack some bread.
Solomon understands that the temple will not be the Lord's residence, but will be a symbolic gateway to heaven. The temple actually exists for people, so they have something grand to look upon and thus consider the Lord's greatness. Since others will interpret its importance, it must be worthy of bringing honor to the Lord within the minds of people, but the fact is it could never be worthy of the greatness of the Lord's presence, who has all of creation as his footstool.
This is the greatness of the Lord ... the most wonderous things that we humans can even imagine are insignificant to the Lord, to the point that their best-case scenario is as really expensive symbolism.
Application: The Israelites had the same problem all people have, which is that they struggled to interact with the Lord in the spiritual realm, so they needed to create a physical experience. The temple was to inspire visually, and then be a destination for connecting with Yahweh through sacrifice and rituals and celebrations. Today, we like seeing symbols like crosses, then attend church so we can worship and experience connecting with the Lord. It isn't that people who don't go to church automatically aren't Christians, however they do drift away because, on their own, they cannot connect and grow as disciples and believers.
This is a fascinating component of humans' relationship with the Lord. We struggle to connect with him through the Holy Spirit when we don't have anchor points within physical creation to remind and inspire us, and we often seek to create those anchor points using earthly concepts. However, we also discover that these anchor points themselves are meaningless, and eventually disillusionment in these places and things causes us to question the Lord himself.
We need to all stop caring about connecting to symbols, and find better ways to connect with the Lord and with Jesus through the Holy Spirit. I know this is my biggest challenge ... I just can't connect with the Holy Spirit well enough (likely because I ignore him or drive him away by my thoughts and actions). I need to realize more and more often that the Lord is literally everywhere - the world is his footstool - and he is not just sitting in some building, or near some river, or on a beach, waiting for me to come and say 'hello'.
Prayer: Lord, may I find your spirit here with me today and every day, and may I not drive it away, or go seeking it in some manmade place. Amen.
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