Kingsport Sovereign Grace Church,
located at 2709 Rock Springs Road in Kingsport, Tennessee,
would like to invite you to listen to a message of sovereign grace
of their pastor, Gabe Stonica. For information and service times,
visit www.ksgc.church. And now, Gabe Stoniker. I would
like to bring a message to you today from Matthew chapter 12.
If you would like to follow along with me, Matthew chapter 12,
will be our text and one verse will be our starting point. One
verse, it's verse 42. Matthew 12, verse 42 says, 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." A greater than Solomon is here. That's what our Lord said. Solomon
in the scripture is a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. When
we read about Solomon, he is a type, he is a picture of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And this queen, In her story
in the Old Testament it tells us that she was the queen of
Sheba. This queen is a picture of a sinner coming to the Lord
Jesus Christ. A sinner being drawn to the Lord
Jesus Christ. And I love how it says she came
from the uttermost parts of the earth. far away, uttermost parts
of the earth. Do you know where Hebrews 7 says
our Lord is able to save to the uttermost? He's able to save
to the uttermost no matter where a center is, no matter how far
gone a center is. He's able to save to the uttermost.
I want us to look at her story this morning. It's in First Kings,
the book of First Kings, and I want us to see this comparison,
this spiritual picture of a sinner coming to the Lord Jesus Christ
in her story. The message in today's message
is come to the Lord Jesus Christ. Come to Christ. The scripture
says no man can come except the Father which sent Christ draw
a man. No man can come unless God gives
the ability to come. But if God gives a sinner a heart
to desire to come to Christ, come. Come to the Lord Jesus
Christ. Look to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Man by nature is blind. Man cannot see, but if God gives
spiritual eyes, Look to Christ. Cast your all on Christ. Man by nature is dead. Man cannot
do anything. But if God gives life then you
cast your life on the Lord Jesus Christ. worship Christ. That's the message of this message. It's all about Christ. It's all
about the Lord Jesus Christ. Now let's see this in this story
of the Queen of Sheba coming to Solomon. Again, that's in
1 Kings 10. But I want us to see some things
about Solomon first. So if you're turning with me,
let's go to 1 Kings 3. In 1 Kings 3, It says in verse five, in Gibeon,
in this city of Gibeon, the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream
by night and God said, ask what I shall give thee. Ask of me
what you would like for me to give to you. Look at verse 9,
it says Solomon said, give therefore thy servant an understanding
heart to judge thy people that I may discern between good and
bad for who is able to judge this thy so great a people. And
the speech pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this thing. And God said unto him, Because
thou hast asked this thing, and hast not asked for thyself long
life, neither hast asked riches for thyself, nor hast asked the
life of thine enemies, but hast asked for thyself understanding
to discern judgment. Behold, I have done according
to thy words. Lo, I have given thee a wise
and an understanding heart, so that there was none like thee
before thee, neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee. And I have also given thee that
which thou hast not asked. both riches and honor, so that
there shall not be any among the kings like unto thee all
thy days." That is a picture of Jesus Christ. None like him. None like him. God said, no one
will compare to you. No one. You will be the greatest
in every way, shape, and form. You will be the wisest You will
be the most approachable and understanding. What a blessing
that is. You will be the richest. You
will be the most honorable. That's Christ. That's the Lord
Jesus Christ. Solomon is a picture of Christ.
If you look at chapter 4, 1 Kings chapter 4, verse 29 says, And
God gave Solomon Wisdom and understanding exceeding much and largeness
of heart even as the sand that is on the seashore. Largeness
of heart, a giving heart, a generous heart as the sand that's on the
seashore. Verse 30, Solomon's wisdom excelled
the wisdom of all the children of the East country and all the
wisdom of Egypt, for he was wiser than all men. He was wiser than
all men. What this tells us is Solomon
was in need of nothing. That's what it tells us. Solomon
needed no man's counsel. If he was the wisest of all men,
then who could counsel him? He needed no man's counsel. He
needed no man's riches. If he was the richest of all
men, he needed no man's riches. He was the king. He held all
the authority. Now that's Jesus Christ. That's
Jesus Christ. That's a picture of Jesus Christ.
But Christ is all of that. in a way that Solomon could never
picture really. So much greater than Solomon. What we see in Solomon, Christ
is infinitely higher, infinitely greater. And every sinner that
comes to Jesus Christ is going to see that to be the case. Every sinner will realize this.
Every sinner will come realizing it is not what I'm going to do
for him. Not at all. It is what he is
going to do for me. Whatever I thought I needed to
do for him, after seeing him, I realized there is nothing I
could do for this man. It's all about what he is going
to do for me. That's what the Queen of Sheba
realized when she came to Solomon. Now look with me at chapter 10,
1 Kings 10. It says in 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. And she came to Jerusalem with
a very great train, with camels that bear spices, and very much
gold and precious stones. Okay, she had heard of him. That's
the first thing she'd heard of him. She had heard of his greatness
and she came to him bringing things that I'm sure she thought
he needed. Things that she thought would
be very pleasing to him. And that's what man naturally
does with the Lord Jesus Christ. Man comes bringing offerings
of his own. That's what man thinks he needs
to do. He thinks he needs to bring some kind of offering of
his own, thinking that God needs those offerings. But a sinner
who truly comes to Christ will soon realize the same thing that
the Queen of Sheba realized. Look at, skip down a little bit
and look at verse 21 with me. It says, and all King Solomon's
drinking vessels were of gold. And all the vessels of the house
of the forests of Lebanon were of pure gold. None were of silver. It was nothing accounted of in
the days of Solomon. For the king had at sea a navy
of Tarshish with the navy of Hiram. Once in three years came
the navy of Tarshish bringing gold and silver, ivory and apes
and peacocks. So King Solomon exceeded all
the kings of the earth for riches and wisdom. Now watch this. Verse 27 says, and the king made
silver to be in Jerusalem as stones. As stones. The silver was piled
up everywhere like rocks. They had so much silver, they
just threw it on the ground. They just made piles of silver
like rocks. And this queen of Sheba brought her salt and pepper. It says she brought some spices.
You know, thinking she had something to make things savory to him.
Well, I'm going to bring something that'll be savory to him. And
it says in verse two that she brought some gold. It says much
gold. It was much gold to her. She
thought it was much gold, but it wasn't much gold to Solomon.
And she immediately realized that. If you look back at verse
4 here in the story, 1 Kings 10 verse 4, When the queen of
Sheba had seen all Solomon's wisdom, and the house that he
had built, and the meat of his table, the moment she saw his
table, and the sitting of his servants, and the attendance
of his ministers, and their apparel, once she saw what he robed them
in, and his cupbearers and his assent by which he went up unto
the house of the Lord, there was no more spirit in her. It just emptied her. 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. How be it I believed not the
words until I came and mine eyes had seen. and behold the half
was not told to 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." They're so happy to just stand there and
listen to your words. That's what they live for, to
just hear you speak. through your words. When a sinner
comes to the Lord Jesus Christ and truly sees Christ, it slays
that sinner. This is the honest truth. This
is the honest truth. If a sinner has never been slain,
a sinner has never seen Christ. That's the truth. You see men
and women in religion, they're so haughty and so proud and so
arrogant. That man or woman has never seen
Christ. That's the truth. When a man
or woman sees Christ, it utterly slays that man or woman and brings
that man or woman down into the dust. It causes that man or woman
to realize, I have nothing to offer God. Nothing. What could I possibly offer to
this man? What could I possibly bring that
he would find to be sufficient or worthy or of any value? Something he would be pleased
with. What could that possibly be? The sinner who believes he
has something for Christ, something to offer Christ, something to
benefit Christ, that sinner has never seen Christ. Mark it down. Mark it down. That's the truth.
That sinner has never seen Christ. When Moses saw him, he hit the
dust. Read the story of Moses. Oh,
he hit the dust. Moses hid his face. He was afraid
to look on God. That's what happens. Do you see
that much in religion today? Do you see that much really in
religion today? Joshua, a man named Joshua in
the scripture, when he saw him, oh, he hit the dust. There's
a man named Manoah, Judges 13. This precious man, Manoah, hit
the dust. He said, the holiness of God
is going to kill me. It's going to kill me. When Isaiah
saw him, you know, in Isaiah chapters 1 through 5, Isaiah
went around, he thought he was a big shot, telling everybody,
woe is you, woe is you, woe is you. In Isaiah 6, I saw the Lord. And you know what he cried? Woe
is me. Woe is me. He said, I'm undone. I'm a man of unclean lips. This
is what happens when a person sees God Almighty, comma, Jesus
Christ. Jesus Christ, God Almighty, the
high king of heaven. The first time Peter saw him,
he hit the dust and he cried, Lord, I'm a sinful man. The first
time Paul saw him on the road to Damascus, you know what happened
to Paul? The light of Christ, the glory of the face of Jesus
Christ knocked him off of his horse, knocked him down into
the dust. When the apostle John saw him
on the Isle of Patmos in the book of Revelation, John hit
the dust. He fell at his feet as a dead
man. Every sinner who truly sees Christ
will do the same thing. Every sinner. There will be no
more haughty spirit of the flesh left in that sinner. That sinner
will be completely and totally emptied. Totally emptied. Totally broken. That's what happens. Broken. The flesh is broken.
A broken and contrite heart. That's the one God accepts, that's
the one God hears, and that's the one God has dealt with. God
is the one who breaks. He said, I wound, I heal, I do
all these things. The reason the Lord does that
to his own is because an emptying must take place before a filling
can take place. A wounding or a breaking must
take place before a binding can take place. And that's what happens
when salvation comes. Sinners see the all sufficiency
of Christ, they hear of the all sufficiency of Christ, and they're
filled with the knowledge of the all sufficiency of Christ. They see it, they hear it, they
realize it, they know it, they believe it. That's what happens
in salvation. They see the king who needs nothing
and provides everything. That's what makes them so happy.
Happy are your servants. He needs nothing and provides
everything. That'll make a man or a woman
happy. Look again at chapter four if you're following with
me. First Kings four verse 22 it
says, And I love this so much. Solomon's
provision for one day. Okay. He set a table. Anybody
could come eat. come and dine. Solomon's provision
for one day was 30 measures of fine flour and three score measures
of meal, 60 measures of meal. And I'm not exactly sure how
much that is, but I'm sure it's a lot. Measures means cores. I don't know how much a core
is, you might, but I'm sure that's a lot. All right, he said it's
10 fat oxen, and twenty oxen out of the pasture, thirty oxen,
and a hundred sheep," every day he slew a hundred sheep, "'beside
harts and roebucks and fallow deer and fatted fowl.'" No telling
how many of those. For he had dominion over all
the region on this side of the river, from Typsa, even from
Asa, over all the kings on this side of the river, and he had
peace on all sides round about him. That's Jesus Christ. He's
won the battle. And Judah and Israel dwelt safely,
every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan
even to Beersheba all the days of Solomon. And Solomon had 40,000
stalls of horses." That's amazing. "...for his chariots, and 12,000
horsemen, And those officers provided victual
for King Solomon for all that came under King Solomon's table,
every man in his month. They lacked nothing. Is that
not, bless your heart, they lacked nothing. That's what men and
women see when they see Christ. That's what you see when you
see Christ. That's what happens when salvation
comes. This Queen of Sheba perfectly
pictures this. All right, back to her story.
It's in 1 Kings 10, and it says in verse 1, when the Queen of
Sheba heard, when she heard of the fame of Solomon, and that's
how it all starts. When the work of salvation is
first made known to a sinner, It starts with that sinner hearing
that it's all about Christ. It's all about Christ, the fame
of Christ. All attention on him, all eyes
on him. He is our object. He is our all. What about this? Christ. What
about that? Christ. What's the answer to
this? Christ. Christ. Every time go
to Christ, the answer is Christ. What are we going to do about
this? Christ. Verse 1 says, When the queen
of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of
the Lord. Concerning the name of the Lord.
Now this is really important. When God's people start to really
hear the truth concerning Christ. What they hear is. What they
start to get a hold of. What they begin to understand
is the truth concerning his name. his name. What is his name? What
is the truth concerning his name? Over in Matthew 1 it said, Call
his name Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins. I pray the Lord will really cause
us to get a hold of this. I pray God will really let us
hear this. Call his name Jesus. Why? because he will save. He shall save. It does not say
he will make salvation possible for you. It doesn't say that.
It doesn't say he will start the work of salvation and allow
you to finish the work of salvation. It doesn't say that. It doesn't
say he will save as long as his people let him save them and
as long as his people accept his salvation and as long as
his people. It doesn't say that. It says he shall save his people
from their sins. What if they don't want him to
save them? Too bad. What if they don't accept his
salvation? Too bad. Thank God the scripture says
all of his people will be willing in the day of his power. They
will hear of his salvation. Call his name Immanuel. Why? Because it's God with us. Who is Jesus Christ? He's not
God's offspring. I have offspring. I am my father's
offspring. Jesus Christ is not the offspring
of God the Father. God the Son is the bodily image
of God the Father. All the fullness of the Godhead
dwells in Jesus Christ, God Almighty himself. There's one God. Beside
him, there's none else. And God was with us. Call his name Emmanuel. Why?
God is with us. Who is this we're dealing with?
We're dealing with God, the one who is able to save, the one
who did save. Job, back in the Old Testament,
he said he finally saw Christ and he said, I've heard of you
with the hearing of mine ears. But he said, now my eyes see
you. I see you for who you are. And what did Job see? He saw
the savior of sinners, the savior of sinners. And this is what
it caused him to say, I hate myself. That's what Job said,
I abhor myself. He said, I'm going to stop talking.
I just better stop talking. Christ is our only hope. Job said, you're my only hope.
If a sinner ever sees Christ, he will not see a cooperative
savior. He will see the Savior. He will not see someone who is
trying to make salvation possible. He or she will see the Savior. Based on what he or she sees,
that person will not say, I need to help him save me. I think
I need to make a decision to help him save me. That person
will not say that at all. That person will say, that's
the Savior. And if he saves me or leaves me to myself, that's
his business because he's God. He's the judge of this earth.
Whatever he chooses to do, amen. He's the only savior. He's the
only hope. There's no other name given among men whereby we must
be saved. Every other name given among men is nothing more than
a sinner before God. That's what men and women will
see. In the flesh, they will see he is the God of heaven.
He is the savior of earth. I'm the sinner. When a man or
woman sees Christ that man or woman will see himself or herself.
He's the Savior, I'm the sinner. He's the truth of God's law,
he's the justice of God's law, I'm the transgressor of God's
law. He's true, I'm a lie. He doesn't need me. But I need
him. I need him. I'm running out of
time here. Let me, I want to read this. It says, let me just read this
story for you here in closing. It says in verse one, 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. And
that's what people come to Christ with. They come with questions.
I have questions. And it says, Verse two, she came
to Jerusalem with a very great train with camels that bear 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.
And I love how it says Solomon told her all her questions. He
answered all her questions and he told her, this is what your
questions need to be. And he answered her. She didn't
even know what things she needed to ask for. But he told her all
her questions. There was not anything hid from
the king which he told her not. And when the queen of Sheba had
seen all Solomon's wisdom, and the house he built, and the meat
of his table, and the sitting of his servants, and the attendant
of his ministers, and their apparel, and his cupbearers, and his assent
by which he went up unto the house of the Lord, there was
no more spirit in her. 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 forever. Therefore made he the king to
do judgment and justice. She said, because God loved his
people, he made you king. And that's what he said about
Jesus Christ. Because God loved his people, he made Christ king. And to that we say, Amen. Tune in at this same time next
week for another message of God's free and sovereign grace.