1 Kings 10, we'll read the first 13 verses tonight. Let's listen to God's Word. Now, when the queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord, she came to test him with hard questions. She came to Jerusalem. with a very great retinue, with camels bearing spices and very much gold and precious stones. And when she came to Solomon, she told him all that was on her mind. And Solomon answered all her questions. There was nothing hidden from the king that he would not explain to her. And when the queen of Sheba had seen all the wisdom of Solomon, the house he had built, the food of his table, the seating of his officials, the attendance of his servants, their clothing, his cupbearers, and his burnt offerings that he offered at the house of the Lord, there was no more breath in her. And she said to the king, The report was true that I heard in my own land of your words and of your wisdom. But I did not believe the reports until I came and my own eyes had seen it. And behold, the half was not told to me. Your wisdom and prosperity surpasses the report that I heard. Happy are your men. Happy are your servants who continually stand before you and hear your wisdom. Blessed be the Lord your God, who has delighted in you and set you on the throne of Israel. Because the Lord loved Israel forever, He made you king, that you may execute justice and righteousness. Then He gave the king 120 talents of gold and a very great quantity of spices and precious stones. Never again came such an abundance of spices as these that the Queen of Sheba gave to King Solomon. Moreover, the fleet of Hiram, which brought gold from Ophir, brought from Ophir a great amount of almogwood and precious stones, and the king made of the almogwood supports for the house of the Lord, for the King's house, also lyres and harps for the singers. No such Almogwood has come or been seen to this day. And King Solomon gave to the Queen of Sheba all that she desired, whatever she asked, besides what was given her by the bounty of Solomon. So she turned and went back to her own land with her servants. Now, Jesus tells us about the Queen of Sheba. Jesus tells us that she's a dangerous figure. Jesus declares that she will one day stand up and condemn unbelief. This very Queen. Remember His words? He says to the religious leaders of His day in Matthew 12, The Queen of the South will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it. For she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon. And behold, something greater than Solomon is here. Here's Jesus speaking to his own people, and they're rejecting him. They're not believing what He's saying. They want to see more and more in a demanding, unbelieving sort of way. And Jesus declares to them that they have failed to see the King that's greater than Solomon. And that one day the Queen of Sheba will stand up and condemn them. This Gentile Queen will condemn these Jews. Because she came from a far off land. She came from far away to hear the wisdom of Solomon. She came, she heard it, and she believed. Believed in the Lord. And Solomon, in all his glory, Jesus says, but a small picture of the greater glory that has arrived with King Jesus. And so, here are these Israelites beholding the greater Solomon, and they fail to believe. So, Jesus says, the Queen herself, will stand up with God's people on that day and condemn them for their unbelief. So the Queen is dangerous. It's a great warning to us, a warning, but it also helps us understand the passage. Jesus kind of sets us up to see where this goes. It gives us first an understanding about what's going on in the Queen's heart here. That her quest and her arrival and her interaction with Solomon wasn't just a surface-level thing. That she is genuinely converted. If she wasn't, then Jesus would not have put her on the Day of Judgment as standing with believers, taking part in the judgment. She would be one of the condemned so clearly whatever is going on in her is genuine This is a real conversion, but also we see according to Jesus that what the Queen points us to is ultimately Jesus himself Beyond Solomon to the greater Solomon in King Jesus and knowing those things we should get the warning that we have a privilege like like the people of Jesus' own day, a privilege that we have to be very careful not to take advantage of. We see the glory of the King in clarity, no longer just shadows like the Queen saw. We see it in clarity. So if we fail to believe, then greater condemnation will be ours. Even the Queen herself will stand in condemning us. Well, perhaps we should put it more positively though. We can strive, avoiding the example of the Pharisees and the religious leaders, we can strive to follow in the Queen's footsteps as we seek out the greater King. We can divide the passage into four segments, thinking about Solomon and then ultimately Jesus. Four segments, we'll take them one at a time. First, looking at the first five verses, we're challenged to seek out the king's greatness. Seek out the king's greatness. The queen hears about this Solomon. She lives far away. Sheba, we don't know exactly where it was, but the best candidate is probably in modern-day Yemen. So if you can picture where that is, you picture the Arabian Peninsula coming away from Egypt, it's pretty far away from Israel. It's about 1,500 miles away. That's a long way for word to travel in the ancient world. But we've seen it earlier in our study of the life of Solomon. His reputation, his fame is growing and word is getting out. And the Queen hears about it, not just about him, but the God who has placed him on the throne. She hears the news and she's got to see it for herself. She's got to see it for herself. So she packs up this great entourage, travels all 1,400, 1,500 miles to see it with her own eyes. She arrives and we're told in verse one, she came and she tested him with hard questions. tested him with hard questions. We're not told exactly what it was. Perhaps they were riddles of some sort, as we might think of brain teasers and seeing Solomon's mind work. But perhaps as a fellow ruler herself, there were practical questions on her mind, questions of leadership, questions of moral leadership and political leadership. Maybe she came with questions like, well, what if As the leader in the land, there are two moms who come before you and they both claim that the baby is theirs. How do you decide who's the rightful mother? How do you figure it out? And Solomon, as we've already seen in that very case, Solomon has the wisdom of God to be able to rule well, to be able to decide in the most tricky of dilemmas, to be able to decide God's righteousness. And we're told he answers all of her questions. doesn't hide anything back. She gives her deepest of questions and Solomon dazzles her with his wisdom. But it doesn't stop there. She also gets a tour of Jerusalem. She's shown the palace. She gets introduced to the servants of the king. His officials. His table. The servants. The cup bearers. She sees the temple. The temple of the living God that we've been reading has just been completed. She gets to see it. See the worship of Almighty God in process. The offerings unto Him. And we're told about her response in verse 5. At the end, she sees it all and we read, there was no more breath in her. Speechless. Absolutely speechless. She's dazzled by it. Now again, Jesus encourages us to see this quest as a picture of something greater. We see it guided by Jesus, first of all, as something very genuine in the Queen. That this wasn't just a matter of show or a matter of ancient politics, but apparently God was really doing something in her heart. Really moving her to be able to seek the Lord. And she goes and apparently she believes. But also, we can see how this is just but a shadow of something greater, of the greater King Jesus. And, by God's grace, He calls us to seek out the Lord. to seek out King Jesus. Isn't this part of our journey as believers? Part of our story, our testimony? That somewhere along the way, God brought before our eyes news of the fame of King Jesus. And somewhere along the way, God stirred up in us a desire to find out more. Find out more about this Jesus. And through His Word, we got to see the Lord. Through the Gospels, we got to know the wisdom and the majesty of this King of Kings. His saving plan, His marvelous rule, and by God's grace, we believed. It's a good reminder to us as we think about encouraging others in the Lord, that part of what we're doing is encouraging them to go and seek out the Lord Jesus. Part of what we're encouraging them to do is, go see for yourself, we say to a lost world. Go look at Jesus yourself. Bring Him your questions. Go to the Gospels. See who He is. That really is the best evangelism. Better than fancy arguments. Go seek out Jesus Himself, yourself. Taste and see that the Lord is good. Go and look and see His glory, knowing that if the Spirit's at work, they will behold His glory and believe. Of course, it's a reminder to us also to never stop seeking the King, even though we might be already believers. We're never to stop seeking Him out. Never to stop going and trying to understand and behold the glory of His wisdom and power and rule so that we can be more and more amazed by who He is and what He's done. Go to His Word. Seek out the Lord Jesus. Seek out the King. Secondly, praise the King and praise the Lord. Here we're looking at verses 6 to 9. She not only, the Queen, is amazed, but she then goes on to give praise. Well, she expounds about how the reports indeed are true. She expresses her amazement to Solomon himself, that indeed he is a blessed man, but she doesn't just stop with him. This isn't a eulogy of a person, an adoration of a person. She really sees that there's something behind it. You start to see that the Lord is definitely at work in her life, because she doesn't just see the human level, but she takes it a step beyond and sees this is the Lord at work. This is the Lord at work. And so, she says, verse 9, Blessed be the Lord your God who has delighted in you and set you on the throne. Blessed be the Lord. Think of what's going on here. Here's a Gentile from far off who comes and gives praise to God, the God of Israel, for what He has done. Clearly, God is at work in her heart. We see here part of the Old Testament promise being fulfilled. The promise that through the children of Abraham, the nations would be blessed. And here you see the nations coming in more and more in the Old Testament. That theme has developed. We read it in Psalm 72. You see it in Isaiah that the nations coming into Zion to offer praise to the Lord. Even those who are far off, the nations being brought in. And you want to think of a fulfillment of that great promise, you can look around the room. It's us. We are part of the nations. God has brought us in from far off to worship the Lord, the one who sent and established the throne of the King, even Jesus. Next, verse 10, we're encouraged to give the king our finest. Give the king our finest. The adoration and appreciation of the queen isn't just in words, but it takes a very tangible form. We're told, verse 10, then she gave the king 120 talents of gold. and a very great quantity of spices and precious stones. Never again came such an abundance of spices as these that the Queen of Sheba gave to King Solomon." It's more than just wonder. She gives of her riches. She's clearly a very, very rich queen. And she packs the best of her riches up and brings it to the king. Her adoration is not just shallow, but it's very, very tangible. The best of her country, the best of what she has is brought to the feet of King Solomon. This too reminds us of the Lord Jesus. The New Testament begins and ends with gifts to King Jesus. Think about that. The New Testament begins and ends with the nations bringing gifts to King Jesus. Gentiles bringing gifts to King Jesus. The New Testament begins, right, in Matthew. And what do we read in Matthew? But there are the Magi coming from far off, bringing their expensive gifts to worship the newborn King. Then, how does the New Testament end? It ends with Revelation. Revelation 21, what do we read? But the nations bring their gifts. Here's Revelation 21, verse 24. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day, and there will be no night there. They will bring into it the glory and honor of the nations. The Queen of Sheba is a prophecy of sorts. of things greater to a greater King. That the nations, even the highest rulers of the nations, will come and bring tribute to King Jesus. Well, if that is true of the Queen, and it's true of the Magi, and the Kings at the end of the age, shouldn't it be true of us? That we are to give of our finest? As we'll see in a minute, it's not because the King is poor. The King is actually richer than the Queen. So the offerings aren't about, well, we need to give the king something he doesn't have. Our offerings to the Lord, whether it's a very tangible offering. Think about our tithes and offerings that we take up on a Sunday morning. It's not because God is poor. It's because the church needs our money. It's worship. It's the best of what we have. The finest of what we have offered up in praise. to the King. It's not just our wallets, though. It should be the finest of our energies, the finest of our time, the finest of our thoughts dedicated to the King. So we think about what we have, what God has given us, and ask that question, how can I give this as an offering to King Jesus? How can I use it? Maybe even this week, Thinking, thinking, how can I worship the king by taking what I have and offering it for for his kingdom and for his glory? Not because the king needs it, because he's poor. He's because he's worthy of worship, which brings us to our next point. As we give our finest to the to the king, we can expect to be blessed. We see the queen. She doesn't walk away empty. But no, verse 13 we read, and King Solomon gave to the Queen of Sheba all that she desired, whatever she asked besides what was given to her by the bounty of the King Solomon. Verses 11 to 12 describe some of the the riches that are brought to Solomon besides other gold. And you can compare what in verse 14, the gold that comes in from other places with what the queen gives her. And you start to realize that Solomon is far richer than the queen is. But still she brings her finest, but yet the king gives back to her. We're told that part of it is the bounty of the king. But then, it's everything that she asks for besides. There's nothing that the Queen can ask for that Solomon can't give her. And he does give her. And so she walks away blessed with the riches of Solomon's kingdom. Again, it's an encouragement to us. Isn't that the way it works with King Jesus? That as we give to Him, even give our finest, and maybe in the back of our mind we begin to worry, What if this is too sacrificial? Isn't this going to impoverish me if I give so lavishly? Again, it could be monetarily or just with our time and our efforts and our energies. We're giving the best of what we have. We might begin to wonder, well, maybe this is just going to be too much. Maybe this is going to drain me. Maybe this is... But there is King Jesus. He gives to us far more than what we give to Him. We expect to be blessed. And so if an opportunity comes up this week and it seems really expensive, an expensive service to the king, remember, indeed expect to be blessed. You can't out give King Jesus. Expect that you're not going to walk away empty handed, that his spiritual riches and yes, his material provision according to our needs will be ours in Christ Jesus. So, the Queen of Sheba gives us a warning and an encouragement. It's a warning because we are those who have seen King Jesus in greater clarity than she did. We have seen the fulfillment. We have known the details of His wisdom and His glory and His saving acts. She just saw the shadows. So, if we fail to believe and fail to trust Him and fail to serve Him, will then greater condemnations due to us. But at the same time, we have a great encouragement that we can seek the Lord in greater clarity and expect to be blessed in even greater measure. We give and serve and seek the Lord Jesus expecting that the glorious riches of his kingdom, both given now and its fullness later, will be ours according to his good pleasure. So let's praise Him and serve Him together. Lord, we do pray and thank You for Your glory and Your power for the greater Solomon who has come. Father, encourage us to seek Him with all our hearts. Stir us up and strengthen us through Your Holy Spirit. Give us a desire to know the Lord Jesus as we study the Word even this week, as we fill our minds with it, And then as we serve Him in the places where You have put us, Lord, even taking those fine things that You have put into our hands, time and resources and energy and thoughts, and dedicating it to the King. Lord, we expect that Your blessing and Your riches will be ours as we serve You. We pray in Jesus' name, Amen. Amen. Hymn 178 178. 178. If you're able, please stand.