Today's TRC DB 2 Chronicles 2 w/ Lena's Journalin' too

Scripture selections are taken from the Rock Church Daily Bread Reading schedule for each month. “Lena’s Journalin’” are Lena’s comments on the specific passages from her Daily Journal.

If the e-mail text you receive is encrypted at all, just scroll down to the end of all of the text and click on Lena’s Journalin’ , which will take you directly to the web-page where you will be able to read the text quite clearly in it’s purposed form.


2 Chronicles 2:1-18
Preparations for Building the Temple
1Solomon now decided that the time had come to build a Temple for the LORD and a royal palace for himself. 2He enlisted a force of 70,000 common laborers, 80,000 stonecutters in the hill country, and 3,600 foremen. 3Solomon also sent this message to King Hiram F8 at Tyre:
"Send me cedar logs like the ones that were supplied to my father, David, when he was building his palace. 4I am about to build a Temple to honor the name of the LORD my God. It will be a place set apart to burn incense and sweet spices before him, to display the special sacrificial bread, and to sacrifice burnt offerings each morning and evening, on the Sabbaths, at new moon celebrations, and at the other appointed festivals of the LORD our God. He has commanded Israel to do these things forever.
5"This will be a magnificent Temple because our God is an awesome God, greater than any other. 6But who can really build him a worthy home? Not even the highest heavens can contain him! So who am I to consider building a Temple for him, except as a place to burn sacrifices to him?
7"So send me a master craftsman who can work with gold, silver, bronze, and iron; someone who is expert at dyeing purple, scarlet, and blue cloth; and a skilled engraver who can work with the craftsmen of Judah and Jerusalem who were selected by my father, David. 8Also send me cedar, cypress, and almug F9 logs from Lebanon, for I know that your men are without equal at cutting timber. I will send my men to help them. 9An immense amount of timber will be needed, for the Temple I am going to build will be very large and magnificent. 10I will pay your men 100,000 bushels of crushed wheat, 100,000 bushels of barley, F10 110,000 gallons of wine, and 110,000 gallons of olive oil. F11 "
11King Hiram sent this letter of reply to Solomon:
"It is because the LORD loves his people that he has made you their king! 12Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, who made the heavens and the earth! He has given David a wise son, gifted with skill and understanding, who will build a Temple for the LORD and a royal palace for himself.
13"I am sending you a master craftsman named Huram-abi. He is a brilliant man, 14the son of a woman from Dan in Israel; his father is from Tyre. He is skillful at making things from gold, silver, bronze, and iron. He also knows all about stonework, carpentry, and weaving. He is an expert in dyeing purple, blue, and scarlet cloth and in working with linen. He is also an engraver and can follow any design given to him. He will work with your craftsmen and those appointed by my lord David, your father.
15"Send along the wheat, barley, olive oil, and wine that you mentioned. 16We will cut whatever timber you need from the Lebanon mountains and will float the logs in rafts down the coast of the Mediterranean Sea to Joppa. From there you can transport the logs up to Jerusalem."
17Solomon took a census of all foreigners in the land of Israel, like the census his father had taken, and he counted 153,600. 18He enlisted 70,000 of them as common laborers, 80,000 as stonecutters in the hill country, and 3,600 as foremen.
FOOTNOTES:F8: Hebrew Huram, a variant name for Hiram; also in 2:11, 12. F9: Hebrew algum, a variant name for almug; compare 9:10-11 and parallel text at 1 Kgs 10:11-12. F10: Hebrew 20,000 cors [3,640 kiloliters] of crushed wheat, 20,000 cors of barley. F11: Hebrew 20,000 baths [420 kiloliters] of wine, and 20,000 baths of olive oil.

Copyright Statement: Holy Bible, The New Living TranslationCopyright © 1996 by Tyndale Charitable Trust. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers. All rights reserved.

~ Lena’s Journalin’~
Solomon means peace, Shalom kind of peace God’s Kingdom kind of peace.
completeness, soundness, welfare, peace
completeness (in number)
safety, soundness (in body)
welfare, health, prosperity
peace, quiet, tranquillity, contentment
peace, friendship
of human relationships
with God especially in covenant relationship
peace (from war)
peace (as adjective)
So those who have God’s kingdom peace, are made complete in Him, trust in Him safely and are made whole decided to make a house for God and set up a house for their own “families” also.
I looked at the words for house (temple, palace). It says a place, an abode, a habitation where light and darkness are distinct, a home where those of the same family come together in an organized body, making inward preparations.
That made me think of our churches as family units in preparation towards a purpose, the purposes of God. Then I thought of how we speak of homes being in order. Why? As preparation also. Maybe this is the place where we are inwardly prepared to go out into a greater body who is being prepared to go into the world bringing what was inside of these houses out to a disorderly world.
Why are these things always so specific, why does God seem to require so much and so many people to get the job done? He is a family “man”. He does not desire to be alone, work alone and live alone. Neither does He desire for any of us to dwell and work alone. He makes the “jobs” too big for just one person to do “on purpose”.
Isn’t it just mind boggling how many people were assembled to do just this one work of making a visible home of God on earth? It takes one whole body of Christ with many many members to show the one Him, Jesus Christ to our world.
Isn’t it quite impressive when we see a family that seems to be in order? The husband and wife are in love and being loving, the children are respectful, the house is clean…If that is impressive to any of us, what impression does the world have of God’s house, His church in the earth? Is it orderly, where people willingly work together? Is it a peaceful place? Is it clean and inviting? Or is there division, and all of the works of disorderly flesh?
How can one assemble as many as Solomon did and still have order? I mean we in the great USA have trouble getting along or following orders from just one boss or one family member, how can 80,000 + people be at peace?
One purpose.
Many members, many talents, many ideas, one purpose.
One purpose expressed and heard clearly. Outlined and followed.
Are we following after the same thing or are we trying to decide? Once decided, can we work with someone who is not like us and doesn’t think as we do, and then won’t do the project as we would do it?
Are we unified in spirit sacrificing our own ideas and ways for the great purpose of God, to build a house unto Himself, and a household of order.
What does it take to get us towards this kind of unity? Clarity of purpose. Does God call us and we come, or do we have to go sort out a bunch of things first and then think about it awhile before we give our word to Him and join His work? What does it take for Him to recruit us? Does it take tragedy? Despair? Destitution? Or a wiling and obedient heart?
Which one are we?
The palace was built to offer incense, display sacrificial bread, and to burn offerings each morning and each evening forever……
Incense is the mixing of these 80,000 + people together for the same work and igniting their lives with a same passion for God, a work unto Him together, not a complaining session, where we get that taken out of us, by the firey trial of being and working together, what a smell that would bring up to God, dead flesh being burned up- peuuuuu. Incense is a sweet smell, the sweetness of purpose coming together as one for Him and in Him and with Him. Emmanuel, God with us, all.
Sacrificial bread. Picture Jesus the bread of life lain on the cross, all beaten up and dying there for you and me. He was the example of bread broken for the world, the blood covenant sacrifice displayed for all the world to see. What does the world see when they see us, a lot of us, or a lot of Him in us? Do they call us Christians? Do they say, wow look at that “family”, they look like Christ? Is the sacrifice of the tendencies of the old me what is on display or the crucified mixed together with other members of Christ’s body what they see, do they see me a member of another’s purposes or a person with a whole lot of my own purposes to fulfill?
Who is the Master Craftsman who makes all of this oneness work? The Holy Spirit is. The Son is Jesus, and do we know the Father? J We can’t see Him, or can we? Can we see Him through the Son and by the spirit, yes we can and we can also manifest Him in joining in with His purpose and plan.

Daily Repetitive Verses:

Proverbs 27:17-19
17 You use steel to sharpen steel, and one friend sharpens another. 18 If you care for your orchard, you'll enjoy its fruit; if you honor your boss, you'll be honored.
19 Just as water mirrors your face, so your face mirrors your heart.
Psalm 122:1
1 When they said, "Let's go to the house of God," my heart leaped for joy.