2026-09-26
1 Kings 5:4-5 But now the Lord my God has given me rest on every side. There’s neither adversary nor misfortune. And so I intend to build a house for the name of the Lord my God, as the Lord said to David my father, “Your son, whom I will set on your throne in your place, shall build the house for my name.”
While war with the Philistines had been constant and fierce in the times of Saul and David, King Solomon, on the other hand, dwelt in safety and calm all the days of his life. “…He had peace on all sides around him, and Judah and Israel lived in safety… all the days of Solomon” (1 Kings 4:24-25). Today’s Scripture, as quoted above, goes ahead to reveal the purpose for this peace and calm— it was so that Solomon would build a house for the name of the Lord his God.
In Elizabeth Elliot’s Shadow of the Almighty, Jim Elliot, in one of his journal entries writes:
Realized today that I am on a very stiff trial– it is the test of free time. The Lord took away all outward activity. No work. No money to spend, nothing to do. I fear lest I should waste such days. Spent this one in writing, reading, and a little prayer.
When our lives are so busy with work, school, and various tasks, we really do long for days of reprieve or for some idle hour for a nap or a moment’s rest. These moments do indeed come; several times we find that we have an hour or a day or a weekend or a week all to ourselves. But as the Bible says of Hezekiah in 2 Chronicles 32:31, that “…God left him to himself, in order to test him and to know all that was in his heart”, we too, with an hour to ourselves, are left to ourselves, in order to be tested, and Jim Elliot says it is a very stiff trial, and he fears lest he should waste such days.
“No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits,” Paul writes to Timothy, “since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him” (2 Timothy 2:4). When no one or nothing at all has claim to our time, attention, or energy, we should not presume such moments as our own to do with whatever we please. A morning with no scheduled lectures isn’t necessarily an opportunity to sleep, or watch a movie, or go out– though certainly these things could be done for a rest. But before we indulge any of them, we ought to discern what the will of Lord is for the moment, for the day, and for the season. What will he have us do with the minutes stretching before us? How would he want us to serve him in the stretch of time he has lovingly granted to us? And then, like Solomon, we just might that we in fact have a temple to build.
In days such as these ones in which there’s no end to distractions, in which there’s an endless array of choices and options to kill the time with, we who are the Lord’s must intentionally step back and discern our Master’s will. Free time isn’t really free time in the strictest sense of that word. It is a time to serve God, to live moderately and reasonably, to guide our hearts and minds, to avoid all corrupting indulgences. It isn’t a time to mind only ourselves or satisfy our desires, but to advance God’s kingdom on earth, serve his will, and fulfill his purpose. We should take our example from Jesus Christ who said that his Father was always working and that he too was working (John 5:17), and “We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work” (John 9:4).
All this business of having to do God’s work is bound to at first feel onerous and draining and, therefore, uninviting. But there really isn’t any other way of looking back and being glad or feeling fulfilled for how we lived and spent our time except only in so far as we served God and not ourselves. A free hour might just be the right time to study one of Paul’s epistles, or to read a chapter or two of C. S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity, or to do the dishes on behalf of a roommate, or to visit a brother who hasn’t shown up for the fellowship in a long while. We have nothing which God hasn’t given. Even our free time is His, and the only way to make the best out of it is to give it back to Him. In his service. Do you have God’s house to build? Then please be at it.
Prayer:
Dear Lord, we are grateful for every second of our lives which you have graciously and generously given. A man cannot have one thing unless it is given to him from heaven. Thank you for our free hours and free days, may we not just please ourselves at such times but gladly and committedly serve your will and purpose as you grant us grace and give us ability. All this for your praise and glory of your name. In Jesus Name. Amen.