First Kings 5:1-18 tells us that Solomon received aid from a Gentile king, Hiram of Tyre, through an alliance according to a treaty.
Solomon was provided with cedar timber and cypress timber by Hiram for the building of God's temple (vv. 1-12). Hiram offered this aid because of Solomon's God-given wisdom (vv. 7, 12). Solomon paid for Hiram's laborers and sent his laborers to help Hiram (vv. 6, 11).
Solomon was helped by Hiram also in preparing great and costly stones for the building of the temple (vv. 13-18). Solomon sent 30,000 levied forced laborers, 70,000 burden bearers, 80,000 stonecutters, and 3,300 chief officers to cooperate with Hiram's builders. The Gebalites (a people in the territory of Lebanon) participated in the preparation of the timber and the stones (v. 18).
We should not overly appreciate Solomon's glory. The Lord Jesus said of the lilies of the field, "I tell you that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed like one of these" (Matt. 6:29), and Peter said, "All flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass has withered, and the flower has fallen off" (1 Pet. 1:24). Solomon himself eventually admitted that what he had and did was vanity of vanities (Eccl. 1:2).
In order that we may have the proper appreciation of Solomon, I would like to point out that the Bible is composed of two sections. The first section, the Old Testament, contains types, shadows, and figures. The reality of the types, shadows, and figures is in the second section, the New Testament. Solomon's wisdom was a shadow of the real wisdom which was to come.
In the transition period between these two sections, the Lord Jesus said, "Among those born of women there has not arisen one greater than John the Baptist, yet he who is least in the kingdom of the heavens is greater than he" (Matt. 11:11). John the Baptist, a pioneer of the New Testament age, was greater than Solomon, but as New Testament believers we are greater still. This means that, in God's economy, we are greater than Solomon. No matter how much God did for Solomon and how much He gave him, Solomon did not have God Himself wrought into him. But we have God in Christ wrought into us that we might be the same as God in life and in nature. We may not have what Solomon had outwardly as a type, but within us there is a reality—the very God in Christ who has wrought Himself into our being. We may regard ourselves as insignificant, but we have God in Christ wrought into us. As those who have been born of God to be God's children, God's kind, members of God's family, we have become God in life and in nature (but not in the Godhead). We were born into mankind, but we have been regenerated, transformed, and uplifted to be another kind. We are not just men in the new creation; we are God-men.
At the time of Matthew 11, the disciples could not have fully understood the Lord's word concerning John the Baptist. Later He told them that the Spirit of reality would come and disclose all things to them (John 16:12-15). The mysteries of God's economy were disclosed mainly to Paul (Eph. 3:3-5). This is why the writings of Paul occupy such a large part of the New Testament. Today, if we would know the highest wisdom in the universe, we must come to Paul's Epistles. We must get into the intrinsic significance of the revelation of the Bible, especially the crystallization of the truths in Paul's Epistles. The real wisdom is God, and God is embodied in Christ, who has become our wisdom to be in us (1 Cor. 1:24, 30), making us one with God and making us God in life and in nature. What a wisdom this is!