3 And Solomon, in his love for the Lord, kept the laws of David his father; but he made offerings and let them go up in smoke on the high places.
O have love for the Lord, all you his saints; for the Lord keeps safe from danger all those who are true to him, and gives the workers of pride their right reward.
And the Lord your God is to be loved with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
In giving you orders today to have love for the Lord your God, to go in his ways and keep his laws and his orders and his decisions, so that you may have life and be increased, and that the blessing of the Lord your God may be with you in the land where you are going, the land of your heritage.
And if you go on in my ways, keeping my laws and my orders as your father David did, I will give you a long life.
In loving the Lord your God, hearing his voice and being true to him: for he is your life and by him will your days be long: so that you may go on living in the land which the Lord gave by an oath to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
And now, Israel, what would the Lord your God have you do, but to go in the fear of the Lord your God, walking in all his ways and loving him and doing his pleasure with all your heart and all your soul,
And the Lord was with Jehoshaphat, because he went in the early ways of his father, not turning to the Baals, But turning to the God of his father and keeping his laws, and not doing as Israel did. So the Lord made his kingdom strong; and all Judah gave offerings to Jehoshaphat, and he had great wealth and honour.
Jesus said in answer, The first is, Give ear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; And you are to have love for the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.
He who has my laws and keeps them, he it is who has love for me: and he who has love for me will be loved by my Father, and I will have love for him and will let myself be seen clearly by him.
And we are conscious that all things are working together for good to those who have love for God, and have been marked out by his purpose.
Give ear, my dear brothers; are not those who are poor in the things of this world marked out by God to have faith as their wealth, and for their heritage the kingdom which he has said he will give to those who have love for him?
We have the power of loving, because he first had love for us. If a man says, I have love for God, and has hate for his brother, his words are false: for how is the man who has no love for his brother whom he has seen, able to have love for God whom he has not seen?
The high places, however, were not taken away: but still the heart of Asa was true to the Lord all his life.
And David gave comfort to his wife Bath-sheba, and he went in to her and had connection with her: and she had a son to whom she gave the name Solomon. And he was dear to the Lord. And he sent word by Nathan the prophet, who gave him the name Jedidiah, by the word of the Lord.
And keep the orders of the Lord your God, walking in his ways, keeping his laws and his orders and his rules and his words, as they are recorded in the law of Moses; so that you may do well in all you do and wherever you go, So that the Lord may give effect to what he said of me, If your children give attention to their ways, living uprightly before me with all their heart and their soul, you will never be without a man to be king in Israel.
As for you, if you will go on your way before me, as David your father did, uprightly and with a true heart, doing what I have given you orders to do, keeping my laws and my decisions;
For it came about that when Solomon was old, his heart was turned away to other gods by his wives; and his heart was no longer true to the Lord his God as the heart of his father David had been.
But I will not take the kingdom from him; I will let him be king all the days of his life, because of David my servant, in whom I took delight because he kept my orders and my laws.
And if you give attention to the orders I give you, walking in my ways and doing what is right in my eyes and keeping my laws and my orders as David my servant did; then I will be with you, building up for you a safe house, as I did for David, and I will give Israel to you.
And the Lord your God will give to you and to your seed a circumcision of the heart, so that, loving him with all your heart and all your soul, you may have life.
He did as Asa his father had done, not turning away from it, but doing what was right in the eyes of the Lord; but the high places were not taken away: the people went on making offerings and burning them in the high places.
But still the high places were not taken away; the people went on making offerings and burning them in the high places.
But he did not take away the high places, and the people still went on making offerings and burning them in the high places.
He had the high places taken away, and the stone pillars broken to bits, and the Asherah cut down; and the brass snake which Moses had made was crushed to powder at his order, because in those days the children of Israel had offerings burned before it, and he gave it the name Nehushtan.
And if you say to me, Our hope is in the Lord our God: is it not he, whose high places and altars Hezekiah has taken away, saying to Judah and Jerusalem that worship may only be given before this altar in Jerusalem?
So now, before the eyes of all Israel, the people of the Lord, and in the hearing of our God, keep and be true to the orders of the Lord your God; so that you may have this good land for yourselves and give it for a heritage to your children after you for ever. And you, Solomon my son, get knowledge of the God of your father, and be his servant with a true heart and with a strong desire, for the Lord is the searcher of all hearts, and has knowledge of all the designs of men's thoughts; if you make search for him, he will be near you; but if you are turned away from him, he will give you up for ever.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on 1 Kings 3
Commentary on 1 Kings 3 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 3
Solomon's reign looked bloody in the foregoing chapter, but the necessary acts of justice must not be called cruelty; in this chapter it appears with another face. We must not think the worse of God's mercy to his subjects for his judgments on rebels. We have here,
1Ki 3:1-4
We are here told concerning Solomon,
1Ki 3:5-15
We have here an account of a gracious visit which God paid to Solomon, and the communion he had with God in it, which put a greater honour upon Solomon than all the wealth and power of his kingdom did.
1Ki 3:16-28
An instance is here given of Solomon's wisdom, to show that the grant lately made him had a real effect upon him. The proof is fetched, not from the mysteries of state and the policies of the council-board, though there no doubt he excelled, but from the trial and determination of a cause between party and party, which princes, though they devolve them upon their judges, must not think it below them to take cognizance of. Observe,