“I will give you a wise and discerning heart” (1 Kings 4:12).
If you were super smart, would you study technology, math, economics? Here’s what the wisest man who ever lived chose.
Nature.
Solomon was a man who lived his life based on God’s laws. When Solomon became King of Israel, God appeared to him in a dream, offering him whatever he wanted. Solomon asked for a discerning heart to rule God’s people. God replied, “I will give you a wise and discerning heart” (1 Kings 4:12).
There were many options for Solomon’s intellectual pursuits. As the son of one of Israel’s greatest commanders, he could have studied military strategy. As King, he could have pursued politics or languages. But he also investigated the world God made. Perhaps he inherited a love for nature from his father David, who tended sheep in the wild, “a man after God’s own heart.”
Solomon found endless material to draw his interest. He studied all kinds of plants—from the medicinal hyssop to the stately cedars of Lebanon. He taught others about animals, birds, reptiles, and fish. Word spread about his wisdom; kings from all nations sent representatives to learn from him (1 Kings 4:32-34).
I believe Solomon discovered that true wisdom leads us from nature to our Creator who gave us this world. As Lee Strobel says in The Case for a Creator, “I think God intentionally created a habitat for us that allows us to see Him through the creation He’s left behind.”
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Prov. 9:10).