SOLOMON

Solomon is one of history’s best-known personalities.  He is remembered for his wisdom at an early age as well as his great personal wealth.  His wisdom was displayed when the Lord ask him at the age of eighteen what he wanted as he began to reign over the nation of Israel.  The Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream and said, “Ask what I shall give thee” (I Kings 3:5).  Put yourself in Solomon’s place.  What would you have ask for?  Money? The total defeat of your enemies?  A long, healthy, happy life?  The Lord commented that Solomon could have asked for any of these things, but he did not.  Instead Solomon responded in part,

I am but a little child: I know not how to go out or come in.  And thy servant is in the midst of thy people which thou hast chosen, a great people, that cannot be numbered nor counted for multitude. Give therefore thy servant an understanding heart to judge thy people, that I may discern between good and bad: for who is able to judge this thy so great a people?” (I Kings 3:7-9).

Imagine such an attitude in a teenager.  He already appears wise, yet God granted his request giving him “a wise and understanding heart; so that there was none like thee before thee, neither shall there any arise like unto thee” (I Kings 3:12).

His wisdom was demonstrated early in his days as king as he settled disputes between the people as well as his dealings with some political rivals.  But something happened to Solomon, as he grew older, his wisdom failed him.  How?  Apparently he became too wise to heed God any longer.  First he had horses from Egypt which God had clearly forbidden in Deuteronomy 17:16.  Then he took for himself multitudes of wives also forbidden (see Deuteronomy 17:17).  Then built pagan temples for his foreign wives, and began to attend worship with them.  When God stirred up adversaries to get his attention he attempted military solutions. Then when God revealed the plan to take ten tribes away from Rehoboam his son and give them to Jeroboam; Solomon’s solution was the assassination of Jeroboam.  Solomon, of course, was not able to prevent the Lord’s will from completion by his various attempts.  But what happened to that humble young man asking for an understanding heart?

As he grew older he came to rely more on his own wisdom and less upon God’s revealed will until he came to believe he could overturn the Lord’s will.  That is the potential problem with human wisdom; it can begin to influence people to act contrary to God’s revealed will (see I Corinthians 1:18ff).

—Denny