9/29/26
We have all heard the saying "idle hands are the devil's workshop. It is a phrase that has been handed down for generations and changed slightly over time, until a paraphrase took it and presented it as an inaccurate version of true scripture. While Satan will use idol hands, he will also use busy hands if they are not controlled by a soul that is completely submissive to the Lord.
We see an example of this in King Solomon.
Solomon was sold out and dedicated to serving the Lord. He worked to lead the people in the ways of the Lord and to build a temple for the Lord's name and glory. However, during the time of His busy hands working for the Lord, his eyes were distracted by the lust of his eyes. The pharaoh of Egypt offered up his daughter to be Solomon's wife. Solomon accepted what was not of God and brought her to Jerusalem. A portion of his soul was diverted from God. While the rest continued on in guiding his busy hands in the way of the Lord.
God knew what was going on and gave Solomon a warning when he finished the Lord's work. It is our text today. 1 Kings 9:6-7 NASB95 “But if you or your sons indeed turn away from following Me, and do not keep My commandments and My statutes which I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will cut off Israel from the land which I have given them, and the house which I have consecrated for My name, I will cast out of My sight. So Israel will become a proverb and a byword among all peoples.
The Lord is warning Solomon. You have already started; now turn back before you are wiped out. However, Solomon did not let his hands be idle. Instead, he went right from work for the Lord into building other things.
Could it have been that he desired to bring the people to the temple? So he built roads so they could come and worship? Could it be that he provided places for the priests and the Levites to stay as they traveled and shared God's word with the nation? Could it be that he built instruments of worship for the people to play as they worship at the temple?
No, instead Scripture tells us that he rebuilt the cities in the land that he had received from Pharaoh as a wedding gift with his daughter. And the walls around Jerusalem and the citadel or Millo. Plus everything that pleased him, not the Lord, but him. 1 Kings 9:15-19 NASB95 Now this is the account of the forced labor which King Solomon levied to build the house of the LORD, his own house, the Millo, the wall of Jerusalem, Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer. For Pharaoh king of Egypt had gone up and captured Gezer and burned it with fire, and killed the Canaanites who lived in the city, and had given it as a dowry to his daughter, Solomon’s wife. So Solomon rebuilt Gezer and the lower Beth-horon and Baalath and Tamar in the wilderness, in the land of Judah, and all the storage cities which Solomon had, even the cities for his chariots and the cities for his horsemen, and all that it pleased Solomon to build in Jerusalem, in Lebanon, and in all the land under his rule.
Not only had his lustful eyes been drawn from God. Now the pride of life was his desire and what his hands were used for.
They were never idle, but they listened to a soul that was less and less focused on the Lord.
We must always read Scripture in context. Here is an example of why. By reading on, we find out in 1 Kings 9:24 (NASB95): " As soon as Pharaoh’s daughter came up from the city of David to her house which Solomon had built for her, then he built the Millo.
This verse actually reveals that the first thing his busy hands actually built after the temple was a house for the woman who had drawn his lustful eyes away from God. He didn't check with God even after the warning. He just said, She pleases my lustful flesh. I will put my busy hands to work in pleasing her, instead of the Lord.
So we see that it is true that we need to be busy. However, it is not our hands Satan desires to work in; it is our soul. The place where the Lord breathed life into us. Because it is here that he initiated death in the Garden. So we must make sure our soul is busy, focused on the Lord. If it is and stays, then our hands will remain a tool of God!
Love Brother Scott