Solomon finishes building the temple and the glory of the Lord fills it. It is an awe-inspiring moment, Solomon prays to dedicate the temple and the people make sacrifices to the Lord and good times are had by all. Then God appears before Solomon in a theophany and says that He has heard the prayers and petitions of the people, that he will protect the people from devastation if they humbled themselves and seek Him. He then re-affirms the conditional covenant made with David, then ends with the final half being a rather dire warning, for which no particular reaction or reflection on the part of Solomon is recorded.
When I was a teen my youth pastor used to take me to a youth convention called “Historymaker”. It was pretty rad. And there was such a powerful presence of God there and times of prayer and vulnerability and just being surrounded by so many students who wanted to be closer to God was inspiring. I wanted to press into God more deeply as a result of these events. And I was not alone. All my youth group friends were the same way. But the effects of that were tamped down and faded away once we left that “sacred” environment and returned to our “secular” lives. I dubbed this phenomenon the “Historymaker High”. The problem being that we wanted the FEELING of closeness with God to continue, but we were no longer spending 10+ hours every day in worship, prayer, and bible study… in fact I would wager that most of us were doing REALLY WELL if we spent 10+ hours a MONTH in worship, prayer, and bible study1!
We wanted the relationship to remain strong while we did nothing to nurture it. We did not stay close to God. Despite our pastor’s encouragement, we rarely cracked open our bibles, I doubt many of us even knew where the one we had WAS. And so as we casually, carelessly withdrew, we wondered why God felt to far away.
I see something similar happening with Solomon. Most of God’s message was warning. But Israel was pleased with His presence and approval of the temple that the warning seems to have gone almost unnoticed. Like they are hearing what they WANT to hear rather than taking heed of the rather intense warning on offer.
I’ll just come out and say it: how you start almost doesn’t matter. How you finish matters. I’ve seen so many. So. Many. Christians start out strong, on fire, excited! But once the ‘high’ wears off so does the passion. And that passion is what sustains you through the valleys when life is hard.
If you want to finish well, there are three simple things you need to do. Just three. Prayer, Scripture, and Fellowship. Prayer: talk to God, follow the ACTS pattern (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication). Scripture: Spend time in the Word. Every day. Even just 15 minutes. Watch the changes that happen! Fellowship: “It is not good for the man to be alone”, God Himself said it. Surround yourself with other Christians. Good ones. One who will tell you when you are being a moron and ones who expect the same from you.
It’s not rocket surgery, but it does take effort. I have found it to be more than worthy of that effort.
- I figure 1 hour at youth group and 1 hour at church per week works out to an average of 8 hours a month. ↩︎