18 And Yahweh said unto David my father, Whereas it was in thine heart to build an house unto my name, thou didst well that it was in thine heart.

The "devising of liberal things" is always acceptable to God. We have here a possibility of reaching a high mark in His favour. It is much decried in our day. Spiritual enterprise is quenched by the children of the flesh under various specious pleas.

"Big ideas and small purses don't go well together."

This is the sort of water-hose they turn on. But the fire kindled from the altar cannot be put out. ... What is in the heart will struggle even through a small purse sometimes. It is not the big purses and small ideas that do the work or give pleasure to God.

Out of David's voluntary scheme for honouring God came a result of recompense which was David's comfort to the day of his death, and in which we have a personal interest by the gospel. David referred to it in his "last words."

"God hath made with me an everlasting covenant, which is all my salvation and all my desire."

The Christadelphian, Nov 1886

32 Then hear thou in heaven, and do, and judge thy servants, condemning the wicked, to bring his way upon his head; and justifying the righteous, to give him according to his righteousness.

I have great faith in the formative power of the truth. I would have the truth spoken or read, do every thing; human authority nothing. Let the truth act upon men's hearts after the similitude of a magnet on steel. It is essentially attractive, and will in the end bring all honest and good hearts to an enlightened union with the name which is above every name.

You all know what my practice has been. When I came to understand the things of the kingdom and name of Jesus, in other words, the gospel, some fifteen years after an immersion in times of ignorance, I was immersed again. Not that I believed a plurality of immersions is necessary for one baptism.

I believe no such thing; but this I do regard as a self-evident truth, that it is an intelligent, docile and humble appreciation of the gospel of the kingdom in the name of Jesus as the Christ before immersion, that constitutes said immersion the one baptism, or obedience to faith.

How can an immersion be "obedience to the faith" while the subject is ignorant of "the faith?" It is the faith which justifies, but it justifies in the act of union to the name: still it is the faith, and not the uniting, which is counted to us for righteousness.

No one should "go to the water every time they receive a little fresh light."

...No immersed man can "lay the first principles over again" who has come to the knowledge of the truth subsequently to his immersion. The first principles are contained in the things of the kingdom and name conjointly. "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.

‭"‬Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, May 1851

34 Then hear Thou in heaven [Shomayim], and forgive the sin [chattat] of Thy people Israel [Yisroel], and bring them again unto the land [HaAdamah] which Thou gavest unto their fathers [Avot].

Now the triumph of the enemy would proximately be a natural affair; but Solomon allows that Elohim would participate in the event by allowing it, in punishment of the sins of His people. He supposes also the withholding of the rain for a similar reason (verse 35); and therefore teaches that nature's operations may be so affected by the divine volition as to become a direct expression of His mind towards those affected.

He anticipates the prayers that would be addressed towards the temple of Yahweh's dwelling in their midst, and requests that by whomsoever presented, whether by one man or all the people, or by the stranger from a far country, Yahweh would "hear and forgive, and DO according to all that the stranger calleth to thee for, and give to every man according to his ways," "knowing, as He only knows, the hearts of all the children of men" (verse 39).

In this he recognises the providential dealings of Elohim with men, in the ordinary occurrences of life. He supposes the case of Israel going out to battle against their enemies, the prayer that Yahweh would "maintain their cause" indicating a recognition of the principle that Elohim may incline the scale of natural events without appearing to do so and lead to issues that would not otherwise come...

...Where Elohim is feared, His promises believed and His Commandments obeyed, there is a providence at work, shaping natural circumstances, to give them an appointed issue for good though the road travelled may be apparently evil.

"The eyes of Yahweh are over the righteous: His ears are open to their cry."

Ways of Providence Ch 18.