1 Kings 9:4

Solomon was in danger of being puffed up with pride. He was so richly blessed as king of the most famous nation on earth, and he had built the most magnificent building ever built. So the Lord had to appear to him, to give him the sober, humbling sense that he was only a servant of the God of Israel.

God has always cared about how His saints walk. He wants His own character to show in them, so that in this way they may be for His pleasure and glory as they pass through the world. To Abraham God said, "I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless" (Gen. 17:1). At all times Abraham was to know that the eye of God was on him, taking pleasure in all that matched His mind and will. And he was to be sure in his heart that all the power of the Almighty would protect him and care for him.

I do not excuse the sin by speaking of the poor creature with whom I committed it, of my reputation before men that weighed so much with me, or even of the man I destroyed in order to hide my sin. I stand before You, in Your sight — bare and naked as the day I was born. Now there is nothing, no hope, no rest, no ground of confidence but in You, in Your tender mercies and Your loving-kindnesses… Until you know the practical meaning of this, you do not know what uprightness of heart before God is. You have some reserve, something you are not ready to have searched out, something you are trying to hold back in your heart. In short, you are not fully free with God.

All the training that David had was equally for Solomon, and God set David before him as the pattern for his walk. "If you will walk before me, as David your father walked, with integrity of heart and uprightness," etc. (1 Kings 9:4.) Who, remembering that through David's sin the sword should never depart from his house, would have held him up as a pattern to his son? It was because, in his darkest hours, he always put his trust in God. It is this faith that God calls "integrity of heart."

The answer which God gives establishes the house as the place in which He has set His name for ever. His eyes and His heart shall be there always. But at the same time, the enjoyment of the granted blessing rests on one condition: Solomon and his children must stay faithful to the Lord. That condition holds over the dynasty of Solomon, the people of Israel, and even the house itself… We see here how completely the fate of Israel hung upon their king.

In two verses God declares, without any condition, that His eyes and His heart shall be on this house forever. He also declares that He shall cast it out of His sight! Does God contradict Himself? Certainly not. The conditional warning came true to the letter, and the unconditional promise will come true to the letter as well. That will happen when the true king after God's heart has built Him a house, a temple on earth far more glorious than Solomon's.