Today's Reading

¹Then Solomon began to build the house of the Lord at Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the Lord appeared to David his father, which he prepared in the place that David had appointed, in the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

²He began to build in the second day of the second month, in the fourth year of his reign.

³Now these are the foundations which Solomon laid for the building of God's house. The length by cubits after the first measure was sixty cubits, and the breadth twenty cubits.

⁴The porch that was in front, its length, according to the breadth of the house, was twenty cubits, and the height one hundred twenty; and he overlaid it within with pure gold.

⁵The greater house he made a ceiling with fir wood, which he overlaid with fine gold, and ornamented it with palm trees and chains.

⁶He garnished the house with precious stones for beauty: and the gold was gold of Parvaim.

⁷He overlaid also the house, the beams, the thresholds, and its walls, and its doors, with gold; and engraved cherubim on the walls.

⁸He made the most holy house: its length, according to the breadth of the house, was twenty cubits, and its breadth twenty cubits; and he overlaid it with fine gold, amounting to six hundred talents.

⁹The weight of the nails was fifty shekels of gold. He overlaid the upper rooms with gold.

¹⁰In the most holy house he made two cherubim of image work; and they overlaid them with gold.

¹¹The wings of the cherubim were twenty cubits long: the wing of the one was five cubits, reaching to the wall of the house; and the other wing was five cubits, reaching to the wing of the other cherub.

¹²The wing of the other cherub was five cubits, reaching to the wall of the house; and the other wing was five cubits, joining to the wing of the other cherub.

¹³The wings of these cherubim spread themselves forth twenty cubits: and they stood on their feet, and their faces were toward the house.

¹⁴He made the veil of blue, and purple, and crimson, and fine linen, and ornamented it with cherubim.

¹⁵Also he made before the house two pillars of thirty-five cubits high, and the capital that was on the top of each of them was five cubits.

¹⁶He made chains in the oracle, and put them on the tops of the pillars; and he made one hundred pomegranates, and put them on the chains.

¹⁷He set up the pillars before the temple, one on the right hand, and the other on the left; and called the name of that on the right hand Jachin, and the name of that on the left Boaz.

¹Then he made an altar of brass, twenty cubits its length, and twenty cubits its breadth, and ten cubits its height.

²Also he made the molten sea of ten cubits from brim to brim, round in compass; and its height was five cubits; and a line of thirty cubits encircled it.

³Under it was the likeness of oxen, which encircled it, for ten cubits, encircling the sea. The oxen were in two rows, cast when it was cast.

⁴It stood on twelve oxen, three looking toward the north, and three looking toward the west, and three looking toward the south, and three looking toward the east: and the sea was set on them above, and all their hinder parts were inward.

⁵It was a handbreadth thick; and its brim was worked like the brim of a cup, like the flower of a lily: it received and held three thousand baths.

⁶He made also ten basins, and put five on the right hand, and five on the left, to wash in them; such things as belonged to the burnt offering they washed in them; but the sea was for the priests to wash in.

⁷He made the ten lampstands of gold according to the ordinance concerning them; and he set them in the temple, five on the right hand, and five on the left.

⁸He made also ten tables, and placed them in the temple, five on the right side, and five on the left. He made one hundred basins of gold.

⁹Furthermore he made the court of the priests, and the great court, and doors for the court, and overlaid their doors with brass.

¹⁰He set the sea on the right side of the house eastward, toward the south.

¹¹Huram made the pots, and the shovels, and the basins. So Huram made an end of doing the work that he did for king Solomon in God's house:

¹²the two pillars, and the bowls, and the two capitals which were on the top of the pillars, and the two networks to cover the two bowls of the capitals that were on the top of the pillars,

¹³and the four hundred pomegranates for the two networks; two rows of pomegranates for each network, to cover the two bowls of the capitals that were on the pillars.

¹⁴He made also the bases, and the basins made he on the bases;

¹⁵one sea, and the twelve oxen under it.

¹⁶Huram his father also made the pots, the shovels, the forks, and all its vessels for king Solomon for the house of the Lord of bright brass.

¹⁷The king cast them in the plain of the Jordan, in the clay ground between Succoth and Zeredah.

¹⁸Thus Solomon made all these vessels in great abundance: for the weight of the brass could not be found out.

¹⁹Solomon made all the vessels that were in God's house, the golden altar also, and the tables with the show bread on them;

²⁰and the lampstands with their lamps, to burn according to the ordinance before the oracle, of pure gold;

²¹and the flowers, and the lamps, and the tongs, of gold, and that perfect gold;

²²and the snuffers, and the basins, and the spoons, and the fire pans, of pure gold: and as for the entry of the house, the inner doors of it for the most holy place, and the doors of the main hall of the temple were of gold.

¹Thus all the work that Solomon did for the house of the Lord was finished. Solomon brought in the things that David his father had dedicated, even the silver, and the gold, and all the vessels, and put them in the treasuries of the house of God.

²Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel, and all the heads of the tribes, the princes of the fathers' households of the children of Israel, to Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of the city of David, which is Zion.

³And all the men of Israel assembled themselves to the king at the feast, which was in the seventh month.

⁴All the elders of Israel came: and the Levites took up the ark;

⁵and they brought up the ark, and the Tent of Meeting, and all the holy vessels that were in the Tent; these the priests the Levites brought up.

⁶King Solomon and all the congregation of Israel, that were assembled to him, were before the ark, sacrificing sheep and cattle, that could not be counted nor numbered for multitude.

⁷The priests brought in the ark of the covenant of the Lord to its place, into the oracle of the house, to the most holy place, even under the wings of the cherubim.

⁸For the cherubim spread forth their wings over the place of the ark, and the cherubim covered the ark and its poles above.

⁹The poles were so long that the ends of the poles were seen from the ark before the oracle; but they were not seen outside: and there it is to this day.

¹⁰There was nothing in the ark except the two tables which Moses put at Horeb, when the Lord made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of Egypt.

¹¹It happened, when the priests had come out of the holy place, (for all the priests who were present had sanctified themselves, and did not keep their divisions;

¹²also the Levites who were the singers, all of them, even Asaph, Heman, Jeduthun, and their sons and their brothers, arrayed in fine linen, with cymbals and stringed instruments and harps, stood at the east end of the altar, and with them one hundred twenty priests sounding with trumpets;)

¹³it happened, when the trumpeters and singers were as one, to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking the Lord; and when they lifted up their voice with the trumpets and cymbals and instruments of music, and praised the Lord, saying, "For he is good; for his loving kindness endures forever," then the house was filled with a cloud, even the house of the Lord,

¹⁴so that the priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud: for the glory of the Lord filled God's house.

¹Or do you not know, brothers (for I speak to men who know the law), that the law has dominion over a man for as long as he lives?

²For the woman that has a husband is bound by law to the husband while he lives, but if the husband dies, she is discharged from the law of the husband.

³So then if, while the husband lives, she is joined to another man, she would be called an adulteress. But if the husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is no adulteress, though she is joined to another man.

⁴Therefore, my brothers, you also were made dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you would be joined to another, to him who was raised from the dead, that we might bring forth fruit to God.

⁵For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were through the law, worked in our members to bring forth fruit to death.

⁶But now we have been discharged from the law, having died to that in which we were held; so that we serve in newness of the spirit, and not in oldness of the letter.

⁷What shall we say then? Is the law sin? May it never be! However, I would not have known sin, except through the law. For I would not have known coveting, unless the law had said, "You shall not covet."

⁸But sin, finding occasion through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of coveting. For apart from the law, sin is dead.

⁹I was alive apart from the law once, but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.

¹⁰The commandment, which was for life, this I found to be for death;

¹¹for sin, finding occasion through the commandment, deceived me, and through it killed me.

¹²Therefore the law indeed is holy, and the commandment holy, and righteous, and good.

¹³Did then that which is good become death to me? May it never be! But sin, that it might be shown to be sin, by working death to me through that which is good; that through the commandment sin might become exceeding sinful.

¹⁴For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am fleshly, sold under sin.

¹⁵For I do not know what I am doing. For I do not practice what I desire to do; but what I hate, that I do.

¹⁶But if what I do not desire, that I do, I consent to the law that it is good.

¹⁷So now it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwells in me.

¹⁸For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing. For desire is present with me, but to do that which is good is not.

¹⁹For the good which I desire, I do not do; but the evil which I do not desire, that I practice.

²⁰But if what I do not desire, that I do, it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwells in me.

²¹I find then the law, that, to me, while I desire to do good, evil is present.

²²For I delight in God's law after the inward man,

²³but I see a different law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin which is in my members.

²⁴What a wretched man I am! Who will deliver me out of the body of this death?

²⁵Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! So then with the mind, I myself serve God's law, but with the flesh, the sin's law.

¹ If it had not been the Lord who was on our side, let Israel now say,

²if it had not been the Lord who was on our side, when men rose up against us;

³then they would have swallowed us up alive, when their wrath was kindled against us;

⁴then the waters would have overwhelmed us, the stream would have gone over our soul;

⁵then the proud waters would have gone over our soul.

⁶Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us as a prey to their teeth.

⁷Our soul has escaped like a bird out of the fowler's snare. The snare is broken, and we have escaped.

⁸Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

¹The words of king Lemuel; the oracle which his mother taught him.

²"Oh, my son! Oh, son of my womb! Oh, son of my vows!

³Do not give your strength to women, nor your ways to that which destroys kings.

⁴It is not for kings, Lemuel; it is not for kings to drink wine; nor for princes to say, 'Where is strong drink?'

⁵lest they drink, and forget the decree, and pervert the justice due to anyone who is afflicted.

⁶Give strong drink to him who is ready to perish; and wine to the bitter in soul:

⁷Let him drink, and forget his poverty, and remember his misery no more.

⁸Open your mouth for the mute, in the cause of all who are left desolate.

⁹Open your mouth, judge righteously, and serve justice to the poor and needy."

¹⁰Who can find a worthy woman? For her price is far above rubies.

¹¹The heart of her husband trusts in her. He shall have no lack of gain.

¹²She does him good, and not harm, all the days of her life.

¹³She seeks wool and flax, and works eagerly with her hands.

¹⁴She is like the merchant ships. She brings her bread from afar.

¹⁵She rises also while it is yet night, gives food to her household, and portions for her servant girls.

¹⁶She considers a field, and buys it. With the fruit of her hands, she plants a vineyard.

¹⁷She girds her waist with strength, and makes her arms strong.

¹⁸She perceives that her merchandise is profitable. Her lamp doesn't go out by night.

¹⁹She lays her hands to the distaff, and her hands hold the spindle.

²⁰She opens her arms to the poor; yes, she extends her hands to the needy.

²¹She is not afraid of the snow for her household; for all her household are clothed with scarlet.

²²She makes for herself carpets of tapestry. Her clothing is fine linen and purple.

²³Her husband is respected in the gates, when he sits among the elders of the land.

²⁴She makes linen garments and sells them, and delivers sashes to the merchant.

²⁵Strength and dignity are her clothing. She laughs at the time to come.

²⁶She opens her mouth with wisdom. Faithful instruction is on her tongue.

²⁷She looks well to the ways of her household, and doesn't eat the bread of idleness.

²⁸Her children rise up and call her blessed. Her husband also praises her:

²⁹"Many women do noble things, but you excel them all."

³⁰Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain; but a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised.

³¹Give her of the fruit of her hands! Let her works praise her in the gates!