Those of you who were here, last Thursday evening, will recollect that I spoke to you upon our Saviour’s words, “The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here.” I tried then to prove that the queen of Sheba is a condemning sign* to those in this generation who take no interest in Christ,-to those who do not believe our report concerning him, or who do not act upon it so as to seek his face, and learn the true heavenly wisdom at his feet. To-night, we will follow the queen of the south a little further.

As our Lord has given her for a sign, it would be unbecoming if we did not try to learn all that we can from that sign. She came “to hear the wisdom of Solomon;” but Christ is “greater than Solomon” in every respect. He is greater in wisdom; for, though Solomon was wise, he was not Wisdom itself, and that Jesus is. In the Book of Proverbs he is referred to under the name of Wisdom, and the apostle Paul tells us that he is made of God unto us wisdom. They who really know him know something of how wise he is, and how truly he may be called Wisdom. Because he is with the Father, and knows the Father, he has such wisdom as no one else can have. “No man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.” He knows the deep things of God, for he came down from heaven bringing his Father’s greatest secrets in his heart. To him, therefore, men ought to come if they wish to be wise, and ought we not to wish for wisdom? To whom else can we go if we go not to him “in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge”?

In speaking of the queen of Sheba coming to Solomon as a type of our coming to Christ, I will, first, call upon you to admire the queen’s mode of procedure; then, secondly, we will try to imitate it in reference to Christ; and, then, thirdly, we will close by ourselves answering certain questions of a truly practical character.

First, then, I call upon you to admire this queen’s mode of procedure when she came to Solomon. We are told, in the text, that “she came to prove him with hard questions.”

She wanted to prove whether he was as wise as she had been led to believe, and her mode of proving it was by endeavouring to learn from him. She put difficult questions to him in order that she might be instructed by his wisdom; and if you want to ascertain what the wisdom of Christ is, the way to know it is to come and sit at his feet, and learn of him. I know of no other method; it is a very sure one, and it will be a very profitable and blessed one if you adopt it. He has himself said, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”

Jesus came forth from God to be “the faithful Witness” to the truth, and therefore we are bound to believe what he says; and, certainly, we shall never fully appreciate his wisdom unless we are willing to receive his testimony. The psalmist says, “O taste and see that the Lord is good;” but, in this case, we must test and prove that the Lord is wise. There are some who despise the wisdom of Christ; and if you probe them, you will discover that they were never willing to learn of him. His own words are, “Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.” The wisdom of Christ cannot be known by those who refuse to be disciples, that is, learners. We must learn of him before we are competent to judge whether Christ is wise, or not; and never did a disciple sit humbly at his feet, never did one, in the spirit of a little child, sit with Mary at the feet of the great Teacher, without saying, as he listened to the gracious words that proceeded out of his mouth, “The half was not told me. Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge that are to be found in him!”

The queen of Sheba is also to be admired in that, wishing to learn from Solomon, she asked him many questions;-not simply one or two, but many. Some people say, though I do not know how true it is, that curiosity is largely developed in women. I think I have known some men who have had a tolerably large share of it also. In this case, however, the woman’s curiosity was wise and right; it was a wise thing, on her part, when she was in the presence of such a man of wisdom, to try to learn all that she could from him; and therefore she questioned him about all sorts of things. Very likely she brought before him the difficulties connected with her government, various schemes relating to trade, the modes of war, or the arts of peace; possibly she talked to him concerning the beasts of the field, and the fish of the sea, and the fowls of the air; but I am persuaded that she also talked about higher things,-the things of God; and I am led to that conclusion by the expression in the first verse of my text, “When the queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord, she came to prove him with hard questions.” The report that came to her had to do with Jehovah, the God of Israel, as well as with Solomon; so we may rest assured that she put to him many difficult questions concerning the state of her heart, her character, her present position before God, and her future relationship to Israel’s God. Questions on those points are not easy to answer, but she took care to ask them so that, when she reached her home, she might not have to say, “I wish I had asked Solomon about that matter; then I should no longer be in doubt.”

Now, beloved, if you want to know the wisdom of Christ, you must ask him many questions. Come and enquire of him about anything you please. There is nothing which he does not know of earth, of heaven, and of hell. He knows the past, the present, the future; the things of every day, and the things of the last great day of days. He knows the things of God as nobody else knows them, for he is one with the Father, and with the Spirit, and he can tell us all that we need to know. Come to him, then, with every question that has ever puzzled you, and with every doubt that has ever staggered you. Resort not so much to your own thoughts, or to the counsels and arguments of your fellow-creatures; but consult with him who spake as never man spake, and whose wisdom, like Alexander’s sword, can cut each Gordian knot, and end in a moment all the difficulties that trouble your spirit.

But the main point, for which I admire the queen of Sheba, is that she proved Solomon “with hard questions.” Was she not wise? If she had asked Solomon questions which a schoolboy could reply to, it would have been almost an insult to him. No, if Solomon’s wisdom is to be tested, let him be proved with “hard questions.” If a man is really wise, he likes to have enquiries put to him which a man with less wisdom could not answer. If the queen’s questions had been such as she could herself answer, why need she have gone all that long way to ask Solomon to reply to them? Or if she had had somebody at her home, wherever it was, who could have replied to her questions, why need she have gone to Jerusalem? It was because she had no one else to help her that she brought her questions to the one who, because of his superlative wisdom, would be able to answer them. This would relieve her mind, and send her home satisfied upon many points that had previously troubled her; so she did well to bring her “hard questions” to Solomon.

But I have known some-I think I know some still-who seem as if they could not ask Christ a hard question. For instance, they feel that they are great sinners; and they think that, if they had not sinned so much, he might be better able to forgive them, so they do not like to bring their hard questions to King Jesus. Others have a hard struggle to conquer some fierce passion, or some reigning lust, and they think they must overcome that evil themselves. Then, do you think that my Master is only a little Saviour? He is the great Physician; will you only bring to him a cut finger or an aching tooth to cure? Oh, he is such a Saviour that you may bring to him the worst, the most abject and depraved of men, for they are those who can best prove his power to save! When you feel yourselves most lost, then come to him; when you are at your worst state, when you think you are almost damned, and wonder that you are not altogether so, then come to him. If yours is a hard case, bring it to the almighty Saviour. Do you think he only came into the world to save those who are decent and good? You know what he himself said, “They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”

And, beloved, hearken yet again. Are you in some very sharp trial? Is your spirit terribly depressed, and have you, because of that, kept away from Christ? Have you felt that you could go to him with your every-day burdens, but not with that special load? But why not take that also to him? Prove him with hard questions; the harder, the better. Do you not remember the Indian nurse, who said to the invalid lady who seemed as if she did not like to lean too heavily upon her, “If you love me, lean hard.” That is what your Lord says to you, “If you love me, lean hard upon me.” The more of your weight you rest upon him, the better pleased will he be. The more you trust him,-the more you prove your confidence in him,-the closer will be the union between you. Do not save up your little pennyworths of trouble, and your halfpennyworths of grief, for him to carry away; come to him with your thousand talents of sorrow, when you are pressed down under it like a cart that groans beneath the load of sheaves in the time of harvest. Christ is the Bearer of a world’s iniquities; so he may readily enough be the Bearer of your most extraordinary griefs. When the night is darkest, ask him for his light. When the way is roughest, lean more than ever upon his arm. When the storm is fiercest, trust the Pilot of the Galilean lake. When all around you rocks and reels to and fro, like a drunken man, find a sure shelter and hiding-place in the Rock of ages. Prove the Lord Jesus in every possible way, for he loves so to be proved. You blackest sinners who are here, come and put my Lord to the test.

“The poorer the wretch, the welcomer here.”

The more hungry men are, the more fit are they for the gospel feast. The more needy the outcast, the louder does the gospel trumpet blow that they, who are ready to perish, may come and be saved.

So, first of all, we admire the procedure of this queen of the south in coming to Solomon, and proving him with hard questions.

Now, secondly, let us imitate her example, in reference to Christ, who is “greater than Solomon.” Let us prove him with hard questions. Let us bring to him some nuts to be cracked, some diamonds to be cut, some difficulties to be solved. I do not know what hard question may be resting upon the mind of any of you, but I will briefly mention ten hard questions which Jesus answers. They are only ten out of ten thousand that might be put to him, for there is no hard question which he cannot answer. He is far wiser than Solomon, of whom we read that he “told her all her questions: there was not any thing hid from the king, which he told her not.”

Here is the first hard question. How can a man be just with God? It stands in the Book of Job, and it seems to stand there unanswered: “How should man be just with God?” There is nobody, on the face of the earth, who could have answered that question if it had not been made possible by our Lord Jesus Christ. There is no way of being just in the sight of God except through him. But if we come to him, he will tell us that we ourselves must stand in the place of condemnation, and confess that, for our sin, we deserve the wrath of God. We must always admit that no merits of ours can ever win his favour;-that, in fact, we have no merits of our own, but are undeserving, ill-deserving, hell-deserving sinners; and when we occupy that position, then, of his own abounding grace and mercy, God will reckon us as just through Christ Jesus.

Our Lord Jesus also tells us how a man can be just with God as he reminds us that he is the covenant Head of his believing people,-that, as in Adam, the first head, all men fell, so those who are in him who is the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, all rise again. “As by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of One shall many be made righteous.” Righteousness in the sight of God comes, through the headship of Christ, to all who are in him. Christ has honoured the law of God, he has obeyed every jot and tittle of it; and his obedience is reckoned as the obedience of all who are in him. “Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity;” and blessed is that man to whom there cometh a righteousness which is not of the law, and which cometh not because of circumcision, but which cometh to those who believe, as it is written, “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” The question, “How can a man be just with God?” is, therefore, answered thus. Jesus saith, “I have stood in the place of the guilty, and have rendered to God’s law a perfect obedience. This is imputed to all who believe, and God regards them as just through my righteousness.” Oh, glorious doctrine of imputation! Happy are all they who believe it, and rejoice in it.

Here is another hard question. How can God be just, and yet the Justifier of the ungodly? If he be just, surely he must condemn the ungodly; yet we know, of a certainty, many who have been ungodly, whom God has been pleased to meet with, and to justify so completely that they have been heard to say, “Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth.” How can this be? Only Jesus can answer the question, and he answers it thus. “I have borne the penalty that was due to sin; I have stood in the sinner’s place, and suffered that which has fully satisfied the claims of divine justice on his behalf; I have paid the sinner’s debt, so the law may well let him go free.” “He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.” Therefore, by the knowledge of him shall God’s righteous Servant justify many, for he has borne their iniquities. The great Sin-bearer has suffered in the sinner’s stead; the sword of divine justice smote him, for he stood in the sinner’s place, willingly bearing the sinner’s penalty; and, now that sin has been punished upon him, God can be just, and yet be the Justifier of all who believe in his dear Son.

The next question is one which has puzzled many. How can a man be saved by faith alone without works, and yet no man can be saved by a faith that is without works? Some have thought that there is a contradiction between the teaching of Paul and that of James, and have even gone so far as to say that the apostle James was not inspired when he wrote, “Faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.” This they had no right to say, for James was as much inspired as Paul was; and the truth which James teaches is as certain and as valuable as the truth which Paul taught; neither did James teach other than Paul, or Paul other than James. Whenever they met, I have no doubt that they had blessed communion with one another, for they both meant the same thing even though they expressed it differently. If you are puzzled by this question, our Lord Jesus Christ will tell you, in this Book, through which he still speaks to us, that we are to believe in him for salvation, and not to bring any works of our own as the ground of our trust;-not even our own faith, so far as it is a work, for a man is saved by grace, that is, by God’s free favour, not by works of righteousness which he has himself done. “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast.” That truth is as clearly taught in Scripture as it can possibly be; but then it is equally true that no man may claim that he is saved unless the faith, which he professes to have, is an active, living faith, which makes him love God, and, consequently, do that which is well pleasing in his sight. If I say that I believe in God, yet continue to live in sin wilfully and knowingly, then I have not so good a faith as the devils have, for they “believe, and tremble.” There are some men, who profess to believe in God, yet who do not tremble before him, but are impudent and presumptuous. That is not the kind of faith that saves the soul; saving faith is that which produces good works, which leads to repentance, or is accompanied by it, and leads to love of God, and to holiness, and to a desire to be made like unto the Saviour. Good works are not the root of faith, but they are its fruit. If you want fruit, you must plant the root; you need not put any fruit into the ground along with the root; but if that root is a living one, it will grow, and bring forth fruit. A house does not rest upon the slates on its roof, yet it would not be fit to live in if it had not a roof; and, in like manner, our faith does not rest upon our good works, yet it would be a poor and useless faith if it had not some of the fruit of the Spirit to prove that it had come from God. Jesus Christ can tell us how a man can aim at being as holy as God is holy, and yet never talk about his holiness, or dream of trusting in it. We would live as if we were to be saved by our own works, yet place no reliance whatever upon them, but count them as dross and dung, that we may win Christ, and be found in him, not having our own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.

Here is another hard question, which once greatly puzzled a ruler of the Jews. You know his name, Nicodemus: “the same came to Jesus by night.” This was his hard question: “How can a man be born when he is old?” At first sight, it seems as if that were unanswerable; but Jesus Christ has said, “Behold, I make all things new.” Even under the old dispensation, God’s promise to his people was, “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.” All this is impossible with man, but it is possible with God. The Holy Spirit regenerates a man, causes him to be born again, so that, though his bodily frame remains the same, yet his inner spirit becometh like that of a little child, and as a new-born babe, he desires the unadulterated milk of the Word, that he may grow thereby. Yes, dear hearers, there is a total change wrought in men when they believe in Jesus Christ. He said to Nicodemus, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God;” but men, who are old, can be born again, “by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.” Greybeard, thou canst be born again; leaning on thy staff for very age, though thou hast outnumbered three score years and ten, thou canst be born again; and if thou wert a hundred years of age, yet if thou shouldst believe in Jesus, by the power of the Eternal Spirit, thou wouldst at once be made a new creature in Christ Jesus.

Here is another hard question. How can God, who sees all things, no longer see any sin in believers? That is a puzzle which many cannot understand. God is everywhere, and everything is present to his all-seeing eye, yet he says, through the prophet Jeremiah, “In those days, and in that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be none.” I venture to say that even God himself cannot see that which no longer exists; even his eye resteth not on a thing that is not; and thus is it with the sin of those who have believed in Jesus; it has ceased to be. God himself has declared, “I will remember their sin no more.” But can God forget? Of course, he can, as he says that he will. The work of the Messiah was described to Daniel in these remarkable words, “to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness.” To make an end of sins? Well, then, there is an end of them, according to that other gracious, divine declaration, “I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy trangressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins.” Oh, what blessed words! Hence, they are gone, they have ceased to be, Christ has obliterated them; and, therefore, God no longer sees them. Oh, the splendour of the pardon which God has bestowed upon all believers, making a clean sweep of all their sins for ever! His own words are, “I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.”

Here is another hard question. How can a man see the invisible God? Yet Christ said, “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall sea God;” and the angel said to John: “His servants shall serve him, and they shall see his face.” This hard question is putting in another form the difficulty which Philip brought to Jesus: “Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us.” Jesus answered him, “Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” In the person of his dear Son, God the Father has displayed himself before the eyes of men, as John says, “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.” Jesus himself said, “I and my Father are one;” so that we can see the invisible Father in the person of Jesus Christ his Son.

Moving upward in Christian experience, here is another hard question. How can it be true that “whosoever is born of God sinneth not,” yet men who are born of God do sin? Ah! that is a question which has puzzled many; but we must remember that every man of God is two men in one. That new part of him, which is born of God,-that new nature which was implanted in regeneration, cannot sin because it is born of God. It is the incorruptible seed, which liveth and abideth for ever; but, as far as the man is still in the flesh, it is true that “the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” The old nature sinneth through the force of nature; but the new nature sinneth not, because it is born of God.

This helps also to answer another hard question. How can a man be a new man, and yet be constantly sighing because he finds in himself so much of the old man? The Holy Spirit guided the apostle Paul to instruct us upon this matter. There is the new man within us, which leaps for joy because of the heavenly life; but, alas! there is also the old man. Paul calls it “the body of this death.” There it is, and you know that it is the older of the two, and that it will not go out if it can help it. It says to the new nature, “What right have you here?” “I have the right of grace,” answers the new nature; “God put me here, and here I mean to stay.” “Not if I can prevent it,” cries the old nature; “I will stamp you out, or I will smother you with doubts, or puff you up with pride, or kill you with the poison of unbelief; but out you shall go somehow.” “No,” replies the new nature; “out I never will go, for I have come to stay here. I came in the name and under the authority of Jesus; and where Jesus comes, he comes to reign, and I mean to reign over you.” He deals some heavy blows at the old nature, and smites him to the dust; but it is not easy to keep him under. That old nature is such a horrible companion for the new nature, that it often makes him cry, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” But even while he is thus crying out, he is not afraid of the ultimate issue; he feels sure of victory. The new nature sits and sings-even, as it were, within the ribs of death, with the stench of corruption in its nostrils,-it still sits and sings, “I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord,” and triumphs still in him. We are not going to be overcome, beloved. “Sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.” But, my brethren, it is a tremendous struggle; and if our Lord had not instructed his servant Paul to tell us about his own experience, some of us would have been obliged to cry, “If it be so, why am I thus?” Believers are like the Shulamite in the Song of Solomon: “What will ye see in the Shulamite? As it were the company of two armies;” and these two armies keep on fighting and wrestling from day to day. Christ knows all about the inner life of his people, and his Word explains what may appear mysterious to you; so, when next you feel this conflict raging within your spirit, you will understand it, and say, “It is not because I am dead in sin; for, if I were dead, I should not have this fighting. It is because I have been quickened that this battle is going on.”

Here is one more of these hard questions. How can a man be sorrowful, yet always rejoicing? That is one of the apostle Paul’s riddles, of which he gives us a great number, such as these. How can a man be poor, yet make many rich? How can a man be cast down, yet not destroyed; persecuted, yet not forsaken? How can a man be less than nothing, and yet possess all things? The explanation is that, while we are in this body, we must suffer, and smart, and pine; but thanks be to God! he has taught us to glory in tribulation also, and to expect the great reward that awaits us by-and-by; so that if we are full of sorrow, we accept the sorrow joyfully; if we are made to smart, we bow beneath the rod, and look for the after blessed results from it. So we can sigh, yet at the same time sing; and, just as, when it rains, and the sun is shining, the bow of promise spans the heavens, so we rejoice, yea, and will rejoice, even in our most trying experience.

I have one more hard question. How can a man’s life be in heaven while he still lives on earth? May you all understand this riddle by learning what Paul means when he says, “For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God;” who “hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus”! Even now, the heavenly life may be enjoyed by us, although we still live upon earth; and, sometimes, we are half inclined to say, with the apostle, “Whether in the body, or out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth.” Yet we soon discover that we are in the body, for we have physical wants, temptations, and trials; and then we cry, “Woe is me, that I sojourn in Mesech, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar!” Yet, perhaps, the next moment, we say, “My treasure is all packed up, and gone on before me; and I stand on tiptoe, waiting to be called away; for, where my treasure is, there my heart is also, and they are both above the skies with my dear Lord and Saviour.”

There are ten hard questions; I might have asked a great many more, and he, who is “greater than Solomon,” could have answered them all.

Now, in closing, let us answer certain questions of a practical character.

Answer, first, this question,-How can we come to Christ? He is in heaven, so we cannot climb up to him there. Yes, but he has graciously said, “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.” And though we see him not, and hear him not, yet in spirit he is among us at this moment. You need not stir even a step in order to get to him. If Jesus were again upon earth, he could not, in his bodily presence, be in all places at once. Suppose he were in London, what would they do who live in Australia, and wanted to get to him? They might die on the voyage. Or if he were at Jerusalem, how many poor people would never be able to get to Palestine! It is much better that he is not on earth; it is more expedient for us, because his Spirit is everywhere; and, desiring to think about him, wishing to know him, seeking him, and, above all, trusting him, we have come to him.

“Well,” says one, “supposing that is done, how can we ask Christ hard questions?” You may ask anything of him just the same as if you could see him. You need not even speak the question; if you think it, he hears it. Pray to him, for he hears prayer. Wherever there is the praying lip of a sinner, there is the hearing ear of the Saviour. In your little room, in the workshop, in a hay-loft, walking along Cheapside, in this Tabernacle, in these rooms underneath,-there Jesus is, so ask of him all you need, for he will hear you, and bless you.

“But,” you say, “if I ask of him, how will he answer me?” Do not expect that he will answer you in a dream, or by any vocal sound. He has spoken all you need to know in this Book. Read it, study it, that you may learn what he has revealed. We who preach are not worth hearing unless what we say is taken out of the Bible. Listen to us when we do so preach, because, oftentimes, the words of the Book may seem cold to you; but, if we translate them into warm lip-language, they will go home to your heart. You will understand them better, and feel them better, as coming from one who loves you, and who is a man of flesh and blood like yourselves. If you have any hard question that troubles you, pray about it, and then read about it in the Word, and hear all you can about it from Christ’s servants, and so you will find that he will answer you in a very wonderful way.

I have known, many a time in this house,-and I speak not of this house above others, but because I happen to know about this more than I do about others,-oftentimes, I have been told that the preacher has described the inmost thoughts of his hearers;-sometimes the very words they have used, in casual conversation, on their way to this house of prayer, have been quoted by the preacher, and the hearers have been startled and astonished. Some have even come to me under the suspicion that somebody in their house had acted as a spy upon them; this has happened to me, not merely once, or twice, but many times. The reason is that, he who sees you in your bed-chamber can tell his servant what to say about you; and if the wife of Jeroboam should come to the door, after having tried to disguise herself in some strange fashion, the Lord’s prophet will be able to say to her, “Come in, thou wife of Jeroboam; why feignest thou thyself to be another? for I am sent to thee with heavy tidings.” Unwittingly, the preacher has often said something that has come close home to the heart and conscience of his hearers. If you never find it so, in any place where you attend, do not go there any more; that is not a place where you will be likely to get a blessing. You remember how Nebuchadnezzar required the magicians, and the astrologers, and the soothsayers, to tell him the dream that he had forgotten, and also to interpret it to him; but they said, “No; you tell us the dream, and we will interpret it.” But when God sent Daniel to him, he told the king both the dream and its interpretation; and if God sends his servant to you, he will tell you your experience, and he will explain it as well, because his Master has sent him with a message to your soul.

“I cannot understand it,” says one; “it seems so strange.” My dear friend, is that the first strange thing you have ever heard of that has turned out to be true after all? There are scores, there are hundreds, there are thousands in this house of prayer, who can bear me witness that, sometimes, in reading the Bible, it has seemed to them that a text must have been written after they have been placed in certain circumstances, so exactly did every word suit their case. And when the gospel has been preached from the pulpit, they have been astonished to find how precisely, even to jots and tittles, their case has been described as the Lord has spoken to their souls. O beloved, go to Jesus with your hard questions, for he has many ways of sending you an answer to them!

You recollect, perhaps, how Mr. Hone, the author of the Every-day Book, was brought to know the Saviour. Hone had been an infidel; and, one day, he was in Wales, and he saw a little girl sitting in the porch of a cottage reading a Bible. He said to the child, “Well, my dear, you are getting through your task.” “What, sir?” she asked. “I see that your mother has set you to learn a portion out of the Bible, and you are doing it like an obedient girl.” “No, sir,” she said, “I am not.” “But you are reading that Book because your mother told you, are you not?” She looked at him in surprise, and she said, “No, sir, I am not; I am reading it because I love it.” “But it is a task, is it not?” Mr. Hone asked. She said, “No, sir; I never heard of such a thing in all my life. Do you think it is a task to me to read my Bible? Why! it is my joy and delight; I wish I could read it all day long; there is no book like it;” and the dear girl’s eyes flashed with their Welsh fire, and something better, a fire of intense delight in the Sacred Volume; and Hone began to see that there was in the Word of God that which could make him wise unto salvation, and the Holy Spirit blessed the child’s simple talk to his conversion.

“Ay,” says one, “I would fain come to Christ with my doubts and difficulties, and here is one question that I want him to answer now. How is it that I read, in the Word of God, that he hath limited a day, and yet you bid me come to him now?” Yes, I do bid you come to him now; and what is more, I tell you that his own word is, “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.” “But is it not also true that he limiteth a day?” Yes, he does; but shall I tell you how he limits it? “Again, he limiteth a certain day, saying in David, To-day, after so long a time, as it is said, To-day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” Blessed be his holy name, if he has limited you, he has limited you to to-day; and if I live to see your face to-morrow, I will still say the same to you. The limit is a very gracious one; it is “to-day.” If ever a soul does come to Christ, when he does come, it is to-day; and if you come this day, you will be within the limit, for he hath said, “To-day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” To-day then, dear soul, is within the boundary; this night, ere you go to your home, you are just within the limit. “To-day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” Accept him now; trust him now; come to him with your hard questions now; come to him with your hard doubts, come with your hard infidelity, come with your hard obstinacy; come just as you are, and cast yourself at those dear pierced feet of his, for there is not a question that he will not answer, not a difficulty that he will not overcome, nor a sin that he will not pardon, and send you away rejoicing.

I think I hear someone say, “What is all this about? Are there really any people in the world who want God in this fashion?” Yes, there are; and we are grieved if you are not one of them; for, believe me, friend, all who are living as if there were no God are missing everything that truly makes up life. I heard a young man say, “I should like to see a little life.” Yes, I hope you will, and a great deal of life, too; but there is no life in the purlieus of vice; that is death, rottenness, stench, corruption, like the valley of Hinnom and the burning of Tophet. Flee from it. But life is to be found by coming to God; and by trusting Jesus you get to God, and so become the possessor of eternal life. Then, getting to know God, you help to make the world all alive. The very times and seasons seem to have changed to you, for things are not what they once were. The wilderness and the solitary places rejoice, and the desert blossoms as the rose. If I could live ten thousand years on earth without my God, and perpetually swim in a sea of sensual delights, I would beg to be annihilated sooner than have to undergo such a doom. But let God send or withhold whatever he pleases of temporal favours, if he will but give me to know that he is mine, and that I am his, it shall be all I will ask of him. I mean what I say, and I believe that every child of God, who has once enjoyed the full light of his countenance, will say the same.

The Lord bless you all, beloved, for Christ’s sake! Amen.

Hymns from “Our Own Hymn Book”-426, 45 (Version IV.), and “Art thou weary?”

HEART-COMMUNING

A Sermon

Intended for Reading on Lord’s-day, May 18th, 1902,

delivered by

C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington,

On Lord’s-day Evening, April 7th, 1878.

“She communed with him of all that was in her heart.”-1 Kings 10:2.

Last Sabbath evening,* I mentioned some of the “hard questions” which Jesus is able to answer, just as Solomon solved the riddles of the queen of Sheba. But it appears that this queen, when she had once obtained an interview with the great and wise king of Israel, was not content with merely putting to him various difficult questions, for she unbosomed herself to him, told out all that lay concealed in her heart; and Solomon listened attentively to her, and, no doubt, so spoke to her that he sent her away rejoicing.

It is not generally a wise thing to tell all that is in your heart. Solomon himself said, “A fool uttereth all his mind; but a wise man keepeth it in till afterwards.” There are many things which you had better not tell to anybody. Make no one your confidant completely. If you do, you run great risks of making an Ahithophel or a Judas for yourself. David said, in his haste, that all men were liars. That was not quite true; probably, what he meant was that, if we trust all men, we shall soon find ourselves deceived; but if we could meet with a Solomon,-one who had been divinely endowed with wisdom, as he was, it might be safe for us to bring all our questions and tell all our troubles to him. At any rate, we know of One, who is “greater than Solomon,” to whom it is most safe and blessed to tell out all that is in our heart. He is willing to listen to us, and to commune with us; and the more frank and open we are with him, the better will he be pleased, and the better will it be for us. That is to be our subject, heart-communing with Jesus, spiritualizing the action of the queen of Sheba, when she came to Solomon, and “communed with him of all that was in her heart.”

We will begin by saying that we ought to commune with Jesus of all that is in our heart.

I do not mean all of you who are present; I mean all those who have been redeemed from among men by his most precious blood, all those who are believing in him, and who call him their Saviour, their Master, their Lord. You are bound to tell him all that is in your heart, and to have no secrets hidden away from him within your soul.

Tell Jesus all that is in your heart, for neglect of intercourse with Christ, of the most intimate kind, is ungenerous towards him. Are there any professing Christians here, who have lived for a month without conscious communion with Christ? If I were to speak of a longer period, and to ask, “Are there not some professing Christians here, who have lived for three months without conscious communion with Christ,” I am afraid there are some who, if they were honest and truthful, would have to reply, “That is the case with us.” If so, think what that means; you profess to belong to Jesus, and to be his disciple, yet you confess that you have lived all this while without real, intimate communication with him who is your Master and Lord. What is more, you profess to be, not only one of his disciples, but one of his friends. “Is this thy kindness to thy Friend?” I may go further than that, for you believe yourself to be married to Christ, for that is the union which exists between himself and his people. That would be a strange kind of marriage union in which the wife should be in the presence of her husband, and not even speak to him by the week, by the month, by the three months, by the six months together. For them to have no fellowship with one another, no mutual interchange of love, no communications with each other, would be regarded as unnatural, and would be rightly condemned; but do we not, sometimes, act towards our heavenly Bridegroom in just that manner? Are we not, too often, like the men of the world who do not know him? Do we not live as if we did not know him, or as if he were no longer present with us? It ought not to be thus; unless we would act contrary to all the dictates of our higher nature, we must be continually holding intimate intercourse with our Lord Jesus Christ.

And we must tell him all that is in our heart, because to conceal anything from so true a Friend betrays the sad fact that there is something wrong to be concealed. Is there anything that you do that you could not tell to Jesus? Is there anything you love that you could not ask him to bless? Is there any plan now before you that you could not ask him to sanction? Is there anything in your heart which you would wish to hide from him? Then it is a wrong thing; be you sure of that. The thing must be evil, or else you would not wish to conceal it from him whom, I trust, you do really love. O my Lord, wherefore should I desire to hide anything from thee? If I do want to hide it, then, surely, it must be because it is something of which I have cause to be ashamed; so help me to get rid of it. O Christian brothers and sisters, I beseech you to live just as you would do if Christ Jesus were in your room, in your bedchamber, in your shop, or walking along the street with you, for his spiritual presence is there! May there never be anything about you which you would wish to conceal from him!

If we cannot tell Jesus all that is in our heart, it shows a want of confidence in his love, or his sympathy, or his wisdom, or his power. When there is something that the wife cannot tell to her husband, or there begin to be some secret things, on the part of one of them, that cannot be revealed to the other, there will soon be an end of mutual love, and peace, and joy. Things cannot go on well in the home while there has to be concealment. O beloved, I beseech you to love Christ too much to keep anything back from him! Love him so much that you can trust him even with the little frivolous things which so often worry and vex you. Love him so much that you can tell him all that is in your heart, nor ever for a moment wish to keep back anything from him. As the hymn says,-

“Tell it all to Jesus, comfort or complaint.”

If we do not tell it all to Jesus, it looks as if we had not confidence in his love, and therefore thought that he would not bear with us; or else that we had not confidence in his sympathy, and fancied that he would not take any notice of us; or else that we had not confidence in his wisdom, and thought that our trouble was too perplexing to bring to him; or else that we had not confidence in his power, and dreamt that he could not help us in such an emergency. Let this never be the case with any of you; but, every day, unburden your heart to Christ, and never let him think that you even begin to distrust him. So shall you keep up a frank, and open, and blessed fellowship between Christ and your own soul.

I am quite certain, dear friends, that if you will carry out the plan I am commending to you, it will bring you great ease of mind; whereas, if you do not, you will continue to have much uneasiness. Is there anything that I have not told to Jesus,-anything in which I could not have fellowship with him? Then, there is something wrong with me. Are you keeping your trouble to yourself, and trying to manage without consulting with Jesus? Well, then, if anything goes wrong, you will have the responsibility of it; but if you take it all to him, and leave it with him, it cannot go wrong whatever happens; and even if it should seem to do so, you would not have the responsibility of it.

I believe that our trials usually come out of the things that we do not take to the Lord; and, moreover, I am sure that we make greater blunders in what we consider to be simple matters, which we need not take to the Lord, than we do in far more difficult matters which we take to him. The men of Israel were deceived by the Gibeonites because they had on old shoes and clouted, and had mouldy bread in their wallets, and the Israelites said, “It is perfectly clear that these men must have come from a long distance; look at their old boots and their ragged garments;” so they made a covenant with them, and enquired not the will of the Lord. If it had not appeared to them to be quite so clear a case, they would have asked the Lord for direction, and then they would have been rightly guided. It is when you think you can see your way that you go wrong; when you cannot see your way, but trust to God to lead you by a way that you know not, you will go perfectly right. I am persuaded that it is so,-that the simplest and plainest matter, kept away from Christ, will turn out to be a maze, while the most intricate labyrinth, under the guidance of Christ, will prove to have in it a straight road for the feet of all those who trust in the infallible wisdom of their Lord and Saviour.

On the other hand, if you do not come to Jesus, and commune with him of all that is in your heart, you will lose his counsel and help, and the comfort that comes from them. I do not suppose anybody here knows what he has lost in this way, and I can hardly imagine how you are to calculate what you have lost of spiritual good that you might have had. There is many a child of God, who might be rich to all the intents of bliss, who continues to be as poor as Lazarus the beggar; he has hardly a crumb of comfort to feed upon, and is full of doubts and fears, when he might have had full assurance long ago. There is many an heir of heaven who is living upon the mere husks of gospel food when he might be eating the rich fare of which Moses speaks: “Butter of kine, and milk of sheep, with fat of lambs, and rams of the breed of Bashan, and goats, with the fat of kidneys of wheat.” Very often, beloved, you have not because you ask not; or because you believe not, or because you do not confide in Jesus, and commune with him. How strong the weakling might be if he would go to Jesus more frequently! How rich the poor soul might be if it would draw continually from Christ’s inexhaustible treasury! Oh, what might we not be if we would but live up to our privileges! Might we not live in the suburbs of heaven, and often, as it were, be close to the pearly gates, if we would but go and tell all to Jesus, and commune with him concerning all that is in our heart?

Sometimes, our naughty habit of reticence towards Jesus is aggravated by our eagerness to tell our troubles to others. In the time of trial, we often imitate king Asa, who, when he was sick, “sought not to the Lord, but to the physicians.” It was not wrong to go to the physicians, but he should have gone to the Lord first. It is the same with many of you as it was with Asa, away you go to your neighbour over the fence, or you call in a friend, and have a talk with him in your own drawing-room, or you go to some great one, and tell him all your trouble; yet how much have you gained by doing so? Have you not often found that you would have been wiser if you had followed Solomon’s advice, “Go not into thy brother’s house in the day of thy calamity”? Have you not also frequently discovered that, when you have talked over your griefs with your friends, they still remain? Cowper truly wrote,-

“Have you no words? Ah, think again,

Words flow apace when you complain,

And fill your fellow-creature’s ear

With the sad tale of all your care.

“Were half the breath thus vainly spent,

To heaven in supplication sent,

Our cheerful song would oftener be,

‘Hear what the Lord has done for me.’ ”

You say that you want a friend; yet he who is the Friend that sticketh closer than a brother is neglected by you. Suppose the Lord Jesus Christ were to meet some of you, and you were to say to him, “Good Master, we are in trouble;” and suppose he should say to you, “Where have you been with your trouble? You have not been to me;” and you were to reply, “No, Lord, we have been consulting with flesh and blood; we have been asking our friends to help us;” and suppose he were to say to you, “And have they disappointed you?” and you had to reply, “Yea, Lord, they have;” suppose he looked at you severely, and said, “Where you have already gone, you had better go again. You went to your friends first; are you coming to me last? Am I to play the lackey to you, and do you only come to me after having tried all others?” Ah! if he did talk like that, what could you reply? Why, I think your only answer could be, and I trust your answer now will be, “Jesus, Master, I have too much forgotten thee. I have not regarded thee as a real present Friend. I have gone to my neighbours because I could see them, and speak with them, and hear what they had to say to me; but I have thought of thee as if thou wert a myth, or, perhaps, I have not thought of thee at all. Forgive me, Lord, for I do believe that thou art, and that thy Word is true, which declares that thou art ever with thy people, and help me, henceforth, by thy grace, always to come to thee.”

That is my first remark,-that we ought to commune with Jesus concerning all that is in our heart.

Secondly, we need not cease communing with Christ for want of topics.

The queen of Sheba and Solomon came at last to an end of their talk; they could not go on speaking to one another for ever. But with regard to ourselves and our Lord, there need never be any end to our communion with him, for the subjects upon which we can have fellowship with him are almost innumerable. Let me mention just a few of them.

There are, first, your sorrows. Are you very grieved? Are you smitten of God, and afflicted? Then, brother, sister, you may well go to Jesus with your sorrows, for he is the Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. He knows all about you, and all about your sorrows, too. There is not a pang that you have ever felt but he has felt the like. If you will only talk with him, you will find an open ear, and a sympathetic heart, and a ready hand, all placed at your disposal. “What do you mean, sir? Do you mean that I am to sit down in my room, and tell Jesus all about my troubles?” Yes, I do mean just that; and as you would do if you could see him sitting in the chair on the other side of the fire, sit down, and tell it all to him. If you have a quiet and secluded chamber, speak aloud if that will help you; but, anyhow, tell it all to him, pour into his ear and heart the story which you cannot disclose to anyone else. “But it seems so fanciful to imagine that I can really speak to Jesus.” Try it, beloved; if you have faith in God, you will discover that it is not a matter of fancy, but the most blessed reality in the world. If you can only see what your eye perceives, it is no use for you to do as I say; in fact, you cannot do it. But if you have the inner eyes that have been enlightened by the Holy Spirit, and if your heart discerns the invisible presence of the once-crucified but now glorified Saviour, tell him the whole story of your grief. Oftentimes, after you have done, you will find that it will cease to grieve you any more.

Then, also, tell him your joys, for he can have as much true fellowship with the joyous as with the sad. Go, young sister, young brother, in the gladness of your first youthful joy, and tell it all to Jesus. He rejoiced in spirit when he was upon the earth; and, now, he has the joy that was set before him when he endured the cross, and despised the shame. If you tell him your joys, he will sober them,-not sour them. He will take away from them their earthly effervescence, and impart to them a spiritual flavour, and an abiding sweetness, so that, even in common things, your joy shall not become idolatrous and sinful. You who are bereft of creature comforts should pray that you may find all things in God; but you who have such comforts, and are full of joy, should pray this prayer,-that you may find God in all things. They are both good prayers. That latter petition, you joyous souls may well pray to Jesus, and he will answer it, and you shall find that the marriage feast is all the better for Jesus being there to turn the water into wine, and that to all earthly joys he adds a bliss which they could not otherwise possess.

Some people say that we Christians get into ecstasies and raptures, and then we hardly know our head from our heels, and we are so excited that we are not fair witnesses as to matters of fact. I do not think that the Church has often had too much excitement, the fault has usually been something quite in the opposite direction; but my own conviction is that we do not see the glory of Christ when we are excited, or when we are in an ecstasy, one half so well as we do in our cool, calm, reflective moments. I know a great many Christian people who are by no means fools; if you try to do business with them, you will find that they are as shrewd and wide-awake as any men. I should like to appeal to them about this matter. I believe that I have myself a certain degree of common sense, and I venture to say that Christ never appears to me so glorious as when I am perfectly cool and collected, just as I should be if I were sitting down to write out some statistics, or to work out a mathematical problem, or to make up an account, and strike a balance. Whenever, in the very calmest and quietest manner, I begin to think of my Lord and Master, he then most of all strikes me as glorious. I speak for myself,-and I know that I am also speaking for hundreds of you,-I do not require the beating of a big drum to put me into a right state to think of Christ; neither do I need to sit in a meeting, and sing or shout for hours; but if I am just suffered to go upstairs alone, and to open my Bible, and sit still, and meditate upon the Lord Jesus, it is then that I grow enthusiastic about him, when I get all my thoughts fixed upon him just as another man might have all his powers occupied with a political question, or some subject that comes before him in his daily business. It is when we are fully awake, but in a cool, calm frame of mind, that the glory of Christ is best seen by us. Our religion does not require the excitements and stimulants upon which some seem to live; but when we are in the most serene state of mind and heart, then we can best see the glories of Christ. O sirs, my Master would have you sit down, and count the cost of being his servants! He would make you arithmeticians, that, after you have counted the cost, you may see that he is worth ten thousand times more than he could ever cost you. He would have you survey him, and look upon him from all points of view,-look at his person, his work, his offices, his promises, his achievements,-that in all things you may see how glorious he is. I ask you calmly to see what kind of Lord and Master he is, and what sort of glory it is that surrounds him; and if you will do so,-that is, if your hearts have really been changed by his grace,-you will say, “Oh, yes! tell it, the wide world over, that it is simple common sense to believe in Christ, that it is irrational to reject him, that the best use of your reason is to lay it at his feet, and that the truest wisdom is to count yourself but a fool in comparison with him, and to sit with Mary, and listen to his wondrous words.”

You may, also, go to Jesus, and tell him all about your service. You have begun to work for the Lord, and you are very pleased with the opportunity of doing something for him; but you do not find it to be all sweetness. Perhaps you are like Martha who was “cumbered” with her service for Christ. When she was preparing a dinner for him, she was greatly worried over it. The servants would burn the meat, or she was afraid that one very special delicacy would be spoilt altogether. Besides, somebody had broken the best dish, and the tablecloth did not look as white as she liked to see it. Martha was also troubled because Mary did not help her, so she went to the Master about it, which was the most sensible thing she could do. I can speak very sympathetically about this matter, for I get worrying concerning it sometimes. I want to see Christ served with the best that I have, and with the best that all his people have; and if things go a little awry, and will not work quite rightly, I am apt to become fidgety; but this will not do, dear friends, either for me or for you. We must go and tell the Master about it. He will set it all right, and make us see that it is all right. Suppose any of you have not been treated kindly by your fellow-members even when you were trying to do good, suppose that the girls in your class have grieved you, suppose that you have been rapped over the knuckles when you really meant to be serving your Lord, what are you to do? Again I say, as I said before,-

“Tell it all to Jesus, comfort or complaint.”

Do not come and tell me. If I could help you, I would; but there is One who is far better than any pastor on earth to go to, even the great Shepherd and Bishop of souls, our Lord Jesus Christ. Tell all to him; for, in doing so, you will readily enough get help out of all your troubles, and “sing a song to Jesus” all the more heartily because of his delivering mercy.

Then, next, go and tell Jesus all your plans. You think you will do something for him, do you not? Do not begin till you have told him all about what you mean to do. He had great plans for the redemption of his people, but he communicated them all to his Father; nay, I should rather say that he drew them out of his Father’s eternal decrees. Go and tell him what you are planning for the glory of God, and the good of men, and you may, perhaps, discover that some of it would be a mistake. At any rate, you will go to work more confidently when you have laid the whole matter before him.

When you have any successes, go and tell him. The seventy disciples returned to Jesus with joy, saying, “Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name.” If you have the high honour of winning a soul, tell Jesus, and be sure to give God all the glory of it. Sing, “Non nobis, Domine,”-“Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy, and for thy truth’s sake.”

And when you have any failures,-when your hopes are disappointed,-go and tell it all to Jesus. I do not know whether I make myself clearly understood upon all these points; but I feel that working side by side with Christ is the only style of working at which a man can keep on year after year. If you get alone, away from your Master,-if you have sorrows or joys which are all your own, and which you do not tell to him, you will get into a sad state; but if you feel, “He is near me, he is with me,” and if you act upon that belief by constantly communicating with him concerning what you feel, and what you believe, and what you do, you will lead a holy, and blessed, and useful, and happy life.

I have not time to complete the long list of topics on which we are to commune with Jesus; but, in brief, let me urge you to tell him all your desires. If thou desirest anything that thou oughtest to desire, and mayest desire, let him know it. Tell him, also, all your fears. Tell him that you are afraid of falling. Tell him that you are afraid of sickness, lest you should get impatient. Tell him that you are sometimes afraid to die. Tell him every fear that distresses you; for, as a nurse is tender with her child, so is Christ with his people.

Tell him all your loves. Bring before him, in prayer, all upon whom your love is set. Tell him especially all you can about your love to himself; and ask him to make it firmer, stronger, more abiding, more potent over the whole of your life. Often sing a song to Jesus, your Best-beloved; and say, “Now will I sing to my Well-beloved a song touching my Beloved.” Sing and speak often to him; and whenever you have any mysteries, which you cannot explain or tell to anyone else, go and ask him to read the inscription that is engraven upon your heart, and to decipher the strange hieroglyphics which no one else can read.

Now, dear friends, I will close when I have briefly shown you, in the third place, that we shall never cease communing with Christ for want of reasons.

I am not speaking now to those who have never communed with my Lord. I have often communed with him, I do still commune with him, and so do many of you; and I say that, we shall never cease communing with him for lack of reasons.

For, first, it is most ennobling to have fellowship with the Son of God; “and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.” I have heard it said of some men that, to know them, is a liberal education. If you are only slightly acquainted with them, you are sure to learn much from them; but, to know Christ, is to know everything that is worth knowing, and he is our All-in-all.

It is also highly beneficial to commune with Christ. I know of nothing that can lift you up so much above the evil influences of an ungodly world as constantly abiding in close fellowship with Christ, and telling out to him all that you feel in your heart of hearts.

How consoling it is to do this! You forget your griefs while you commune with him. How sanctifying it is! A man cannot take delight in sin while he walks with Christ. Communion with him will make a man leave off sinning, or else sinning will make him leave off communing. You will not be perfect while you are in this world, but the nearest way to perfection lies along the pathway where Jesus walks. Keep close to him, and you will keep in the right road. How delightful it is, too, to commune with Jesus! There is no other joy that is at all comparable with it, and it prepares us for the higher joys above. When those who walk with Christ on earth come to live with him above, there will certainly be a change in some respects, but it will be no new experience to them. Did he not love his saints, and seek their fellowship while they were here below? Then they shall have that fellowship continued above. Did they not walk with God here? They shall walk with Jesus up there. It will be the same life, and the same joy, as they had here, only the life shall be more fully developed, and the joy shall have reached a higher degree. Oh, that you might begin to enjoy the bliss of heaven while you are on earth! The way to do that is by keeping close to Jesus, and by evermore communing with him concerning all that is in your heart.

Are there any of Christ’s followers who seldom commune with him? Beloved, shall I not chide you if that is true of you? My Master is looking down upon you at this moment. Does he need to speak to you? He did not speak to Peter when the boastful apostle had denied his Lord. Jesus turned, and looked upon Peter; and I trust he will look upon you; that those dear eyes, which wept for you, will gaze right down into your soul; and that his blessed heart, that bled for you, will look out of those eyes of his upon you. He seems to say, “Dost thou indeed love me, as thou dost never wish for my company? Canst thou love me?” No, I will not put that question to you, I will just leave him to look at you, and so to bring you back to him.

And then, methinks that my Master looks upon some here who have never had any communion with him at all, and he says, “Is it nothing to you that I loved mankind, and came to earth, and died to save sinners? Is it nothing to you that I bid you trust me, and that I promise to save you if you do so? Will you still refuse to trust me? Will you turn upon your heel away from me? Oh, why will ye die? Why will ye die?”

And then, lastly, he speaks to those of you who have long enjoyed fellowship with him, and as he looks at you, he says, “Abide ye in my love, even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.” Beloved, if you have ever enjoyed fellowship with Christ, never lose it. Oh, to hold on,-to hold fast,-to hold through life, and to hold in death, to him whose face we have never seen, yet whom we know to be among us now! O thou Beloved of our souls, go not away from us! Nay, thou wilt not do so; we will constrain thee to abide with us. Give us grace, we pray thee, never to vex thee, or grieve thy Holy Spirit. Come very near to us just now, nearer than thou hast ever been since the first day we saw thee. Come near to every one of thy people now,-Immanuel,-God with us,-and be thou ever with us, and go with us wherever we go, and never leave us again, for thy love’s sake! Amen.

Expositions by C. H. Spurgeon

1 KINGS 10:1-13; and MATTHEW 12:38-45

Let us first read part of the tenth chapter of the first Book of Kings; and, afterwards, a part of the twelfth chapter of the Gospel according to Matthew.

1 Kings 10 Verse 1. And when the queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord, she came to prove him with hard questions.

Her visit, you see, had a religious aspect. She “heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord.” He had wisdom of various kinds, but it was his knowledge of God, and of God’s ways, that seemed chiefly to attract this ruler from a far-distant land.

2. And she came to Jerusalem with a very great train, with camels that bare spices, and very much gold, and precious stones: and when she was come to Solomon, she communed with him of all that was in her heart.

She came with a price in her hand to get wisdom. Well did Solomon say, “Buy the truth, and sell it not.” No price is too dear to pay for it, but any price would be too cheap to sell it at.

3. And Solomon told her all her questions: there was not any thing hid from the king, which he told her not.

His wisdom came from God, and therefore it was full and complete, and could not be confounded by man. Let us seek after the wisdom which cometh from above, and remember that “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” Indeed, is it not the sum total of wisdom really to fear, in a filial sense, the Lord Most High?

4, 5. And when the queen of Sheba had seen all Solomon’s wisdom, and the house that he had built, and the meat of his table, and the sitting of his servants, and the attendance of his ministers, and their apparel, and his cupbearers, and his ascent by which he went up unto the house of the Lord; there was no more spirit in her.

She was a queen, but she had never seen such royal magnificence as Solomon’s. “The ascent by which he went up unto the house of the Lord” appears to have been a marvellous viaduct, constructed of the most ponderous stones, by which the king went from his own house up to the temple itself. I have read that an arch of that viaduct is standing at the present day, and it is still a marvel. To this princess, it must have seemed a wonder of wonders.

6-12. And she said to the king, It was a true report that I heard in mine own land of thy acts and of thy wisdom. Howbeit I believed not the words, until I came, and mine eyes had seen it: and, behold, the half was not told me: thy wisdom and prosperity exceedeth the fame which I heard. Happy are thy men, happy are these thy servants, which stand continually before thee, and that hear thy wisdom. Blessed be the Lord thy God, which delighted in thee, to set thee on the throne of Israel: because the Lord loved Israel for ever, therefore made he thee king, to do judgment and justice. And she gave the king an hundred and twenty talents of gold, and of spices very great store, and precious stones: there came no more such abundance of spices as these which the queen of Sheba gave to king Solomon. And the navy also of Hiram, that brought gold from Ophir, brought in from Ophir great plenty of almug trees, and precious stones. And the king made of the almug trees pillars for the house of the Lord, and for the king’s house, harps also and psalteries for singers: there came no such almug trees, nor were seen unto this day.

Probably, these “almug trees” were trees of sandal-wood. Whatever they were, they seem to have been the best timber known to the Easterns, and therefore Solomon very properly used them in the house of the Lord. Let the harps of our praises be made of such wood that there shall be no others equal to them in the whole world. Let us give to our Lord our best young blood, our warmest zeal, our highest thoughts, our most careful attention. Let us give him, in fact, the whole of our being, the love of our heart. He should be served with the best of the best, “for he is good, and his mercy endureth for ever.”

13. And king Solomon gave unto the queen of Sheba all her desire, whatsoever she asked, beside that which Solomon gave her of his royal bounty. So she turned and went to her own country, she and her servants.

The king first of all bountifully gave her a present which he thought most fitting; and then, afterwards, permitted her to ask whatever she would. How much is this like our King Solomon, who has already given us all our hearts can wish for; and yet, if there be any right desire that is still ungratified, he provides the golden mercy-seat, at the foot of his throne, where we may present our petitions to him, encouraged by his gracious word, “Ask what thou wilt; according to thy faith, so shall it be unto thee.”

Matthew 12 Verses 38, 39. Then certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee. But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas:

The queen of Sheba did not ask for a sign. She did not expect Solomon to work a miracle; but, sitting down in his presence, she proposed her hard questions, and meekly awaited his answers. So should these scribes and Pharisees have done with the Lord Jesus Christ. These were his signs:-

40, 41. For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here.

Jonas was a servant: Jesus was the Master. Jonas preached only one sermon: Jesus preached many. That sermon was a short one: Jesus Christ laboured long after souls. Jonas was a man full of infirmities, and with an unloving heart: Jesus was tender and compassionate. Jonas did but hurry through the streets, crying, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown,”-without a word of mercy: Jesus lived long among the people, giving them directions, and warnings, and invitations to seek and find salvation: “Behold, a greater than Jonas is here.”

42. The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here.

As I have so recently preached upon this verse,* I need not say anything about it just now.

43. When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man,-

Mark, not when he is turned out of him by superior force, but when he has gone out of his own accord,-

43. He walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none.

The devil was in the Jews of old, but he went out of them at the time of the Babylonian captivity; that heavy punishment cured them of idolatry. But the devil could never find a resting-place, in Gentile hearts, so pleasant to himself as among God’s own people.

44. Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished.

“I will go back to those Jews,” saith the devil; and, when he comes back, he finds them without any true love to God: “empty, swept, and garnished.” See how correctly the Pharisee is dressed, and note with what sanctimonious unction he repeats his hypocritical prayers. He fasts twice in the week, and pays tithes of his mint, and anise, and cummin. The devil finds the house “empty, swept, garnished;” and as he does not care whether he lives in a foul heart or a clean one, so long as he can but live in it, he takes up his abode there again.

45. Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first.

If idolatry did not come back to the Jews, the devil of pride, and self-conceit, and many more came, and fought against the Son of God, so that they became worse than they were before, and the first devil of the Jewish people was nothing compared with the seven devils which afterwards possessed them.

We have seen some men of this kind. Under temporary conviction, they have given up certain outward sins, but, afterwards, they have been ten times worse than they were before. We have known a man to be a drunkard, and we have rejoiced to see him leave his cups; but, yet, when he has made a self-righteousness out of his temperance, and set himself up against God and his truth, we have verily believed that he has had within him seven devils worse than the first. A man may reform himself to blacker stains, and wash himself with the waters of his self-righteousness till he becomes more hard to cleanse than he would have been at the first. Ob, for the mighty hand of One, who is stronger than the prince of hell, to throw the devil out, and then he will never come back again; but if he goes out by mere human persuasion, or by our own wills and wishes, he will most certainly come back to us. If the Holy Ghost turns him out, he will never gain an entrance any more.

45. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation.