Becoming A Vessel Of Honor Rebecca Brown

150 Let us go back now and look at the defilement of Solomon’s temple. Here is a sketch of the temple. The temple itself faced north. (Ezekiel 8:14) It was surrounded by a wall which had two gates in it. One in the north wall and one in the east wall. The brazen altar which was used for the sin offerings and the sea sat in front of the temple. The temple itself was divided into two parts. The front part was called the inner court, and the back part was called the "holy of holies." The presence of God dwelt in the holy of holies over the mercy seat. The high priest could enter this part of the temple only once per year. After Solomon’s death, his son Rehoboam took the throne. But Rehoboam refused godly counsel and oppressed the people so that they rebelled and the nation of Israel was split into two parts. The city of Jerusalem was in the part called Judah, the other half of the country was called Israel. The evil king Manasseh set up altars right inside the temple to his demon gods. From that time, the Lord tarried nearly 100 years with prolonged periods of defilement of His house before removing-His presence from the temple. The Israel half was carried off into captivity before the Judah half. Ezekiel prophesied from captivity in Babylon contemporary with Jeremiah who prophesied in Jerusalem. In Ezekiel chapters 8-10 the Lord transported Ezekiel in spirit from Babylon to Jerusalem to show him the defile ment of His temple. (Figure 9-4) "And he built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the Lord." II Chronicles 33:5

"And he put forth the form of an hand, and took me by a lock of mine head; and the spirit lifted me up between

Chapter 9 Defilement of God’s Temple