Day 137: 1 Kings 9, 2 Chronicles 8, Proverbs 25-26

After 20 years Solomon was finished building both his palace and the Temple. He and God had an agreement. There were promises on God's part if Solomon (and all Israel) met certain conditions:

     “As for you, if you walk before me faithfully with integrity of heart and uprightness, as David your father did, and do all I command and observe my decrees and laws, I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever, as I promised David your father when I said, ‘You shall never fail to have a successor on the throne of Israel.’
      “But if you or your descendants turn away from me and do not observe the commands and decrees I have given you and go off to serve other gods and worship them, then I will cut off Israel from the land I have given them and will reject this temple I have consecrated for my Name. Israel will then become a byword and an object of ridicule among all peoples. This temple will become a heap of rubble. All who pass by will be appalled and will scoff and say, ‘Why has the LORD done such a thing to this land and to this temple?’ People will answer, ‘Because they have forsaken the LORD their God, who brought their ancestors out of Egypt, and have embraced other gods, worshiping and serving them—that is why the LORD brought all this disaster on them.’” (1 Kings 9:4-9)

It's a little ominous reading this because I know that in time neither Solomon nor the people keep their end of the deal and the things God says will happen actually do come to pass.

I also find it interesting that Solomon used slave labor to build the great buildings he built. I never really noticed this before:

There were still people left from the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites (these peoples were not Israelites). Solomon conscripted the descendants of all these peoples remaining in the land—whom the Israelites could not exterminate—to serve as slave labor, as it is to this day. (1 Kings 9:20-21)

I wonder who would have built it if they had actually run all these people out and exterminated them the way God had commanded. Also, I'm wondering how this fits with what Solomon wrote in Proverbs...

If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat;
   if he is thirsty, give him water to drink.
In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head,

Saved

   and the LORD will reward you. (Proverbs 25:21-22)