Passage Read: 1 Chronicles 27 - 2 Chronicles 1
Meditation Verses: 2 Chronicles 1:7-12
Thought
This was an amazing offer: Solomon could ask for anything, and it would reveal what was uppermost in his heart, at the time. Early on, of course, he was overwhelmed with the task of governing God's people. So he asked for wisdom, and that was the best thing any ruler could ask for. God reminded him in His response that the people were His, not the king's. The king was to lead and rule over the people for God's purposes, not his own. He was a shepherd, expected to care for the people and lead them in God's ways. And Solomon had enough sense to know that he needed wisdom from God to do so. But he didn't really need magic wisdom, supernatural wisdom, but rather he only needed to know and obey the Law of the Lord! And that was his downfall. He came to depend more on his own wisdom than on God's Word.
Application
God gave Solomon a simple test: Ask for whatever you wish. And Solomon asked for wisdom to lead God's people in His ways, rather than riches or power or the death of his enemies or long life. He asked for what he truly needed and what God wanted him to seek, so the Lord was pleased to give him that and everything else he didn't ask for. Yet David gained all these without having asked for wisdom, but simply because he loved and honored the Lord and walked in His ways all the days of his life. That's a better wisdom than Solomon's. Like Solomon, I should want wisdom to walk in God's ways and to lead others in them, but that doesn't require a special gift of wisdom from God, but just a heart dedicated to walking in obedience to God's Word. Real wisdom is not so hard to attain; it just takes time and diligence to know and do the commands of God.