1 Kings 9:3

I have heard. Solomon was given the assurance that his words of earnest entreaty had been heard. He had done everything within his power to encourage the people to be faithful to the Lord and His commands. God honored his spirit and his purpose, and now gave him a new assurance of divine favor. How often the Lord gives His children renewed expressions of confidence, fresh appearances from on high, commendations for the services of earlier days, and promises of favor and blessing for days to come.

I have hallowed. God alone can sanctify. His presence makes things holy. The Temple was holy because God was there. Outwardly it had the same appearance as a structure of wood and stone built by the hands of men, a place of splendor and beauty, but now it was sanctified, a sacred house adorned with the unseen presence of a holy God. Holy things are only spiritually perceived. Calloused men with hardened hearts may see no difference between the sacred and the profane. The holy Sabbath, the Word of God, the house of worship, may appear to them no different from the usual things of earth. Heaven may be very near, but they discern it not. The emphasis that is placed in this vision on “this house, which thou hast built,” “this place,” suggests that the vision was given in the sacred precincts of the Temple, even as the site of the first vision was the “great high place” at Gibeon, where Solomon had gone to sacrifice (1 Kings 3:4).

For ever. It was not God’s purpose that the Temple at Jerusalem should ever be destroyed. Had the Temple remained holy, it would have stood forever. If Israel had continued faithful to the Lord, His name and His presence would have been there forever, as a witness to all the world that Israel was the chosen of the Lord, His “peculiar treasure” ... “above all people” (Ex. 19:5; see PK 46). As to the meaning of “for ever,” see on Ex. 12:14.