1 Kings 8:1-11
"8 Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the leaders of the fathers' houses of the people of Israel, before King Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of the city of David, which is Zion. 2 And all the men of Israel assembled to King Solomon at the feast in the month Ethanim, which is the seventh month.3 And all the elders of Israel came, and the priests took up the ark. 4 And they brought up the ark of the Lord, the tent of meeting, and all the holy vessels that were in the tent; the priests and the Levites brought them up.5 And King Solomon and all the congregation of Israel, who had assembled before him, were with him before the ark, sacrificing so many sheep and oxen that they could not be counted or numbered. 6 Then the priests brought the ark of the covenant of the Lord to its place in the inner sanctuary of the house, in the Most Holy Place, underneath the wings of the cherubim. 7 For the cherubim spread out their wings over the place of the ark, so that the cherubim overshadowed the ark and its poles. 8 And the poles were so long that the ends of the poles were seen from the Holy Place before the inner sanctuary; but they could not be seen from outside. And they are there to this day. 9 There was nothing in the ark except the two tablets of stone that Moses put there at Horeb, where the Lord made a covenant with the people of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.10 And when the priests came out of the Holy Place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord, 11 so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord."
The association of the Ark of the Covenant with the manifestation of the glory of the Lord has a real significance for us today. The ark was the chest which contained the tablets of stone inscribed with the law of God. Ever since its construction in the time of Moses it was regarded with sacred awe - although there were periods in which it was grievously neglected, to the detriment and loss of Israel and in those early days, it was associated with the coming of the Lord to His people, the place where He was wont to commune with them (Exodus 25:21, 22). At the completion of the temple, when Solomon brought the ark into its rightful, central place, the glory of the Lord filled the house. The implication for us is very clear and plain. Would we know the glory of the Lord descending upon the worship of the Church? Would we seek a similar manifestation of His presence in the work of the Gospel? Then the ark, His holy Word must be established in the centre of all our thinking, of our worship and witness, and of our congregational life. There is no other way; it is His Word that God has promised to honour, and when the Word of life is at a discount in the life of the Church, as it has been for so long in our day, it is little to be wondered at that God has become as a stranger in the land. Have we as yet begun to learn what must have priority in the churches of our land?