Acts 7:47

‘But Solomon built him a house.’

But it was Solomon who went about it. And what did he do? He built Him a house. And yet even Solomon had recognised that God did not dwell in a House made with hands, because He is Lord over all (1 Kings 8:27). How foolish then to build such a house which could only give his people the wrong idea about God.

Solomon’s Temple (like Herod’s Temple) was a perfect example of what Stephen was drawing attention to. It was grandiose, it was designed by a foreigner, it was on a distorted pattern, and it was permanently fixed in one place, totally the opposite of the Tabernacle.