In these verses Solomon continues to describe for the people the history that lay behind the building of the temple. He relates that David came to the conclusion that he needed to build a temple to the Lord. The parallel passages in 2 Samuel 7:1–17 and 1 Chronicles 17:1–15 tell us something of David’s thought process in this regard. There, in Chronicles, we are told that David was not easy in his conscience with the fact that, while he lived in a palace, the Lord God of Israel lived in a tent.
You will see from this that David’s thinking was not about his own glory but about what was due to his God. Yet, though this manner of thinking pleased the Lord in its humility, it was not completely accurate. The concept of God that it illustrated was one that appeared to conceive him as needing a house to live in. As we will see in Solomon’s prayer of dedication, God cannot be contained in any building not even in all creation.
17 Now it was in the heart of David my father to build a house for the name of the LORD, the God of Israel.