Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2779
“She communed with him about all that was in her heart.” 1 Kings 10:2.
Last Sunday evening I mentioned some of the “hard questions” which Jesus is able to answer [Sermon No. 2778, Volume 48—CONSULTING WITH JESUS]. It appears that the queen of Sheba, 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 unloosed herself to him and exposed 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 utters all his mind; but a wise man keeps it in till afterwards.” There are many things which you had better not tell to anybody. Make no one your complete confidant. 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 about all that was in her heart.”
I. We will begin by saying that WE OUGHT TO COMMUNE WITH JESUS ABOUT 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 Savior, 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 communing 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 your kindness to your Friend?”
I may go further than that, for you believe yourself to be married to Christ, for that is the union which exists between Him 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 be holding intimate conversations 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 Jesus? Is there anything you love that you could not ask Him to bless? Is there any plan 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—you can be sure of that! The thing must be evil, or else you would not wish to conceal it from Him whom, I trust, you really love. O my Lord, why should I desire to hide anything from You? If I want to hide it, then, surely, it must be because it is something of which I have cause to be ashamed! 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 spiritualPresence isthere! May there never be anything about you which you wish to conceal from Him!