“[David] said to the prophet Nathan,
“See now, I am living in a house of cedar,
but the ark of God stays in a tent.” – II Samuel 7:2
King David wants to do something beautiful for God.
David is settled in Jerusalem, the city of David. It is a time of peace.
He built a beautiful home for himself.
Perhaps it was gratitude, or perhaps it was guilt
but now David wants to build a house for the Ark of God.
The Ark is a kind of chest. It was carried by the people of God
as they moved through the desert and into the promised land.
It held holy, sacred things.
Now they are settled, the Ark is kept in a tent.
King David wants to build a fancy house for it. He tells Nathan.
Nathan is a prophet. Nathan says, “Go for it.”
“Do whatever you have in mind.”
But even prophets get it wrong.
That night Nathan had a dream.
God said “No!”
And like many dreams (even today)
Nathan’s dream held a pun.
It’s a pun on the word “house.”
God doesn’t want to be contained in a house;
God wants David’s house, his lineage, to contain God.
Our heart is God’s house.
There is goodness at our core, a divine imprint.
Love is an echo. Always sounding.
And we are always trying to find our way home.
That’s the beauty of the human spiritual journey.
Solomon, David’s son, eventually builds a House for God.
And generations have built houses for God.
But this is not only where God is.
Our heart is home to the Divine.
David wanted to do something beautiful for God. Where do you feel a desire to offer something beautiful
— your time, care, creativity, attention? Have you ever sensed God be inviting you to receive instead of giving?
The prophet Nathan had to learn that even good plans can be gently redirected. Have you ever experienced a loving “no” that later revealed deeper wisdom or freedom?
Draw or imagine a simple house. Instead of rooms, name the qualities you want to welcome within: peace, courage, forgiveness, compassion, hope. Something else? Place them in the “rooms” of your heart and offer them as a prayer and imagine how they are passed on through you for the well-being of others in the realm of Earth and beyond.
This brief but poignant reflection should be required reading for all who want to be part of a church community. So very, very important. So true.
At summer camp as a child, we were told a story entitled, “My Heart, Christ’s Home.” However unlike this one, there was a layer of guilt lining it. There were some rooms we didn’t want Jesus to go into. I felt a kind of shaming pressure in that story – that fear-based message that we were not “saved” unless we opened our whole heart to Jesus and not have some rooms “off limits” to him. It was also a camp that condemned being gay. Thank you for the message of welcoming affirmation and freedom.