First step toward wisdom - 2 Chronicles 1-5

Parents get really excited about the first step their baby takes. It doesn't matter how many children you have, the baby's first step is the most exciting. It doesn't matter that when they are two you just wish they would quit running around, when they are crawling you can't wait until they walk. So, too, God must fill about us. When we take our "first" step of faith that must be a great thing for God to see. We see a baby take a step and we unfold in our mind a future of steps. Steps to kindergarten; steps to his/her first soccer game; steps to junior high; steps across the stage at high school graduation; steps down the isle for marriage. When God sees our first step of faith toward Him, He sees our life of faith unfold for Him. That is what this section about Solomon and the temple is all about: Solomon's first steps of faith. When asked by God, "what can I give you?" Solomon steps out in faith. He asks God for Wisdom and knowledge to judge the nation he is about to lead. That is his first recorded step of faith. We know the story after this. We know about Solmon's extraordinary wisdom and how he used it for God and recorded it in the Proverbs for us. But, do we see where all his wisdom came from? It came from that one time act of faith that God would provide wisdom to him like God provided manna from heaven for his fathers in the wilderness. His act of faith for wisdom was God seeing his first step of faith. Wisdom begins with a step of faith that God will provide it. It doesn't come from our own work or accumulation of exercise in Christian catechism. It comes by asking God to proivde and believing that He does and did. It is a step of faith.