Building: How God Perfects our Prayers Beyond our Expectations 2 Samuel 7.1-17
By Michael A. Milton
The answer, I say again, is not just "No". It's "exceeding abundantly above all" that David and Nathan could ask or think. But it was "according to the power' that was working in them". It started with that quiet time. Look what it leads to: The Lord shows David that ...
2. God will glorify Himself through something more eternal than brick and mortar. (
vv. 12-16).
The Lord turns the tables on David. It seems that hearings for building permits always bring some sort of surprise, some amendment to the original plans.
In
verse 10 God says "I will appoint a place for My people Israel, and will plant them ..." Then God tells Nathan to tell David, "Also the Lord tells you that He will make you a house."
Advertisement
You want to talk about construction projects? God tells David "you know nothing about building plans. I don't need a house. You do. You and the world need a place that is safe." He says Israel will be planted in a place of their own and move no more, nor shall the sons of wickedness oppress them anymore. He says that David is going to have a house, a kingdom that will come from his line.
The protection and permanence for God's people are not found in a building or a physical location or in a security system; they are found in Jesus Christ. Everything else is really idolatry. This is the message of the early Church: "The God who made the world and everything in it, He who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things" (
Acts 17:24-25).
This was the message of
Hebrews 11. As the divinely inspired writer of the Book recounts the faithful of old, he shows that they were not embarked upon a pilgrimage to some holy shrine made by human hands but were seeking for that spiritual home: "All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; indeed, He has prepared a city for them" (
Heb. 11:13-16).
What God is doing in
2 Samuel 7 is renewing the covenant made with Israel. God made a covenant with Adam and Eve that there would come a redeemer. God made a covenant with Abraham. God renewed that covenant with Moses. God here renews it with David. The covenant promise is that God is going to establish an eternal kingdom. There will come leaders in the covenant who may violate the terms of the covenant, as God declares in
verse 14, but God will still be their Father. But, it is going to finally be fulfilled in one who will be God's Son raised up from David.