1 Kings 8:54-66
1 Kings 8:54-66 AMP
When Solomon finished offering this entire prayer and supplication to the LORD, he arose from before the LORD’S altar, where he had knelt down with his hands stretched toward heaven. And he stood and blessed all the assembly of Israel with a loud voice, saying, “Blessed be the LORD, who has given rest to His people Israel, in accordance with everything that He promised. Not one word has failed of all His good promise, which He spoke through Moses His servant. May the LORD our God be with us as He was with our fathers; may He not leave us nor abandon us [to our enemies], that He may guide our hearts to Himself, to walk in all His ways [following Him] and to keep His commandments, His statutes, and His precepts which He commanded our fathers. Let these words of mine, with which I have made supplication before the LORD, be near to the LORD our God day and night, so that He will maintain the cause and right of His servant and of His people Israel as each day requires, so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the LORD is God; there is no one else. Therefore, your hearts are to be wholly devoted to the LORD our God, to walk in His statutes and to keep His commandments, as [you are doing] today.” Then the king and all [the people of] Israel with him [repeatedly] offered sacrifice before the LORD. Solomon offered as peace offerings to the LORD: 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheep. So the king and all the Israelites dedicated the house (temple) of the LORD. On that same day the king consecrated the middle of the courtyard that was in front of the house (temple) of the LORD; for he offered there the burnt offerings, the grain offerings, and the fat of the peace offerings, because the bronze altar that was before the LORD was too small to hold [all] the burnt offerings, the grain offerings and the fat of the peace offerings. So at that time Solomon held the feast, and all Israel with him, a great assembly, from the entrance of Hamath [on the northern border of Israel] to the Brook of Egypt [at Israel’s southern border], before the LORD our God, for seven days and seven more days [beyond the prescribed period for the Feast of Booths], fourteen days in all. On the eighth (fifteenth) day he sent the people away and they blessed the king. Then they went to their tents joyful and in good spirits because of all the goodness which the LORD had shown to David His servant and Israel His people.