The Queen of Sheba Visits Solomon (Solomon): After hearing reports of King Solomon and his God, the Queen of Sheba came with hard questions to see the wisdom of God for herself. When the king answered her questions, she was overwhelmed and left praising God. How can we help the spiritual seekers in our lives today? There is much to learn from King Solomon here. Recorded on Jan 18, 2026, on 1 Kings 10:1-13 by Pastor David Parks.
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This sermon is part of the Solomon: The Legacy of a King series. King Solomon was a complex man whose story started some 3,000 years ago, when David, his father, was the most powerful and successful king of ancient Israel. David’s reign brought peace, prosperity, and plans to build the temple before handing the kingdom to Solomon. How would King Solomon handle living in the shadow of his great father’s legacy? Would he learn to be a wise and godly king? Could he overcome the plotting of his enemies, the dysfunction of his family, and the temptations of virtually unlimited wealth, fame, and women? What would be his legacy? Solomon’s story is a vital part of the history leading up to the ultimate son of David and anointed king, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Sermon Transcript
A few years ago, comedian Chris Rock had a special where he said something deep. In what seemed like a moment of honesty, he confessed, “I’m basically trying to find God before God finds me.” (Rock, Chris. Chris Rock Total Blackout: The Tamborine Extended Cut. Netflix, 12 Jan. 2021, www.netflix.com/title/81397260.) Now, I don’t know Chris Rock and have no idea whether he’s ever been truly open as a spiritual seeker. My prayer for him, as I prepared this message, is that he would find God in the Lord Jesus Christ. All of heaven would rejoice if Chris trusted Christ. But his statement seems to tap into something. From time to time, God seems to be working in someone’s life who doesn’t know him, putting certain people of faith in their path, surprising them with certain religious experiences, providing for their needs in what could only be described as miraculous ways, and that sort of thing. These people start to seriously wonder whether there actually is someone behind/beyond the world we can see, someone who is pursuing them or calling out to them. When this happens, they might start to seek out the truth about who God is and how they might find him, and maybe, as Chris said, to find him before he finds me. Have you ever seen something like that? Have you ever had a friend or family member who started to be interested in the things of God? Or at least seemed open to talking about faith? Someone seeking answers to some of the big questions of life? But how can we help people like that? Well, we’re working through a sermon series on one of the most important kings of ancient Israel, in a series called Solomon: The Legacy of a King. And we’re more than halfway through his reign as the king. Solomon had built his famous, historic temple in Jerusalem and the extravagant Palace of the Forest of Lebanon. God had appeared to him twice, once before the temple project to give him wisdom and once after to give him a warning to remain faithful to him and stay on the path that leads to life. Today, we’ll consider the famous story of when the Queen of Sheba came to visit Solomon. And the queen was one of these spiritual seekers. She had heard reports about King Solomon and Yahweh, his God, and she came to see for herself. How would Solomon respond? Would he welcome this gentile, pagan queen? And how would she respond? Would she become a believer in the one true and living God? And is there anything we might learn from this today? How can we help the spiritual seekers in our lives today? Well, if you have your Bible/app, please open to 1 Kings 10:1. We’ll read through it and unpack it as we go.
1 Kings 10:1–2 (NIV), “1 When the queen of Sheba heard about the fame of Solomon and his relationship to the Lord, she came to test Solomon with hard questions. 2 Arriving at Jerusalem with a very great caravan—with camels carrying spices, large quantities of gold, and precious stones—she came to Solomon and talked with him about all that she had on her mind.” Ok! I wonder what Solomon’s Egyptian wife thought about this foreign queen paying her husband a visit? Well, at any rate, the queen of Sheba made a long journey to come and meet the famous King Solomon, and she gave two reasons. First, because she heard about his relationship with the Lord, that is, Yahweh God, the maker of the heavens and the earth, and the one who rescued Israel from slavery in Egypt. She wanted to hear more about him, and rumor had it that his temple was there in Jerusalem. Second, she came to test Solomon with hard questions. Whether these were philosophical questions, or political or religious questions, it doesn’t say. I’d guess it was probably some combination of all of them. But you might remember that King Solomon had become internationally famous for his wisdom. After his God-given gift of wisdom, Solomon spoke over 3,000 proverbs (wise sayings) on all sorts of topics in addition to writing over 1,000 songs and researching various plants and animals. Back in chapter 4, it said, “From all nations people came to listen to Solomon’s wisdom, sent by all the kings of the world, who had heard of his wisdom.” (1 Ki 4:34). And the queen was one of those people who came to listen. So, where was the kingdom of Sheba? Scholars aren’t 100% sure, but the two most likely candidates are the southern Arabian Peninsula (modern Yemen) or the eastern Horn of Africa (Ethiopia). Ethiopia has long claimed a line of kings descended from King Solomon through a son he supposedly had with the Queen of Sheba. There isn’t any historical evidence for that, but it would fit later descriptions of Solomon’s many foreign wives. Nevertheless, Sheba is presented in the Bible as rich in gold and costly spices, gained through extensive trade with other kingdoms, perhaps India and beyond. Either way, the queen traveled some 1500 miles to meet the man she had heard so much about. No pressure, Solomon. But how would he do?
1 Kings 10:3-9 (NIV), “3 Solomon answered all her questions; nothing was too hard for the king to explain to her. 4 When the queen of Sheba saw all the wisdom of Solomon and the palace he had built, 5 the food on his table, the seating of his officials, the attending servants in their robes, his cupbearers, and the burnt offerings he made at the temple of the Lord, she was overwhelmed. 6 She said to the king, “The report I heard in my own country about your achievements and your wisdom is true. 7 But I did not believe these things until I came and saw with my own eyes. Indeed, not even half was told me; in wisdom and wealth you have far exceeded the report I heard. 8 How happy your people must be! How happy your officials, who continually stand before you and hear your wisdom! 9 Praise be to the Lord your God, who has delighted in you and placed you on the throne of Israel. Because of the Lord’s eternal love for Israel, he has made you king to maintain justice and righteousness.” So how did King Solomon hold up? No problem! He had an answer for everything. But when the queen heard the answers to her questions, and she saw all the wisdom of how he had everything set up in his palace and the Temple, from his officials and servants and how they were dressed and how they were organized to carry out their business, and the burnt offerings made for worship in the Temple of the Lord, the queen was overwhelmed (literally, she was speechless). My guess is that a queen who was willing to travel so far to get answers to her hardest questions was rarely speechless. But when she finally caught her breath, she did something totally unexpected. What did she do? She praised God! First, she said that the reports she had received about his achievements and wisdom, which she thought were too good to be true, had under-estimated Solomon! But seeing was believing for this foreign, pagan queen. She saw how blessed the people of Israel were to have a king like Solomon. And how blessed his officials were to serve a king like that and benefit from his wisdom and good governance. But, I would guess this was all fairly normal for the meeting of two heads of state. Basically, “What a lovely place you have here!” Which is nice and polite. But what wasn’t normal was her statement about the God of Israel. She praised him by name in v. 9. “Praise be to the Lord…” That is, praise be to Yahweh, the covenant name of God. Remember, every time you see ‘LORD’ in the Bible in all caps, that is a translation of the personal Hebrew name of God, Yahweh. But why? Why does she praise the Lord? Well, this God must be real, and he must have delighted in King Solomon to have placed him on the throne of Israel and to have given him such wisdom. This God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the one who had shown eternal love for Israel, had made Solomon the king to maintain justice and righteousness. At least some of her questions must have been about the history of this relationship between God and the Israelites, because she recognized God’s love for them. This is what Moses said about their relationship many years earlier in Deuteronomy 7:7–8 (NIV), “7 The Lord did not set his affection on you [Israel] and choose you because you were more numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples. 8 But it was because the Lord loved you and kept the oath he swore to your ancestors that he brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the land of slavery, from the power of Pharaoh king of Egypt.” The queen had heard of this relationship, but now she saw, firsthand, the blessings of this God who loved his people. She saw the love of God in practical ways working itself out in the lives of God’s people, including in a king who was committed to justice and righteousness. Now, throughout our whole series, we’ve said that a good and godly king is one who rules and reigns according to justice and righteousness. That wherever righteousness is lacking, justice is required. But the fact that this foreign queen could see that and recognize that from meeting Solomon and seeing his court and how he governed there in Jerusalem is remarkable. She had heard about this king and his God, but now she had met the king and gave praise to his God. Just as Hiram, king of Tyre, had given praise to God and agreed to help build Solomon’s Temple and Palace, so the queen of Sheba praised the Lord. But was that it? Or, like Hiram, did the queen do something more?
1 Kings 10:10–13 (NIV), “10 And she gave the king 120 talents of gold, large quantities of spices, and precious stones. Never again were so many spices brought in as those the queen of Sheba gave to King Solomon. 11 (Hiram’s ships brought gold from Ophir; and from there they brought great cargoes of almugwood and precious stones. 12 The king used the almugwood to make supports for the temple of the Lord and for the royal palace, and to make harps and lyres for the musicians. So much almugwood has never been imported or seen since that day.) 13 King Solomon gave the queen of Sheba all she desired and asked for, besides what he had given her out of his royal bounty. Then she left and returned with her retinue to her own country.” This is God’s word. So the queen didn’t just praise God with her lips only, she didn’t do the bare minimum to check off some religious box, she generously gave a huge amount of gold — about 4 1/2 tons worth, along with costly spices and precious stones! Can you imagine all that? What a generous gift for Solomon and Yahweh, the God of Israel. Now, I would certainly notice if someone gave me four tons of gold. But would Solomon have even noticed? Next week, we’ll consider King Solomon’s virtually unlimited wealth and what the Bible says about money. But whether or not Solomon was moved by this gift of the queen, it was clearly part of her response to finding the God she had been seeking. It was a gift for the Lord more than it was for Solomon, because even a pagan, gentile queen could see that the wisdom and blessings of Solomon hadn’t come from the king; they had come from God, and God loved his people and had blessed them in many ways. And after receiving everything she wanted and then some, the queen returned home to her own country. The queen had come to see if the rumors were true, and she came with hard questions for someone who supposedly had been blessed with the wisdom of God. And she rightly saw and understood both the blessing of Solomon being a good king (righteousness and justice), and that it came from the wisdom/blessings/love of God. For his later faults, King Solomon was a good ambassador for God. He represented God well enough here for the queen to find God and worship him. He welcomed her in and gave her time and attention. He was able to answer her hard questions, but she must have felt he was open to them to ask them at all. He wasn’t threatened by her questions or her foreign religious background. Certainly, she hadn’t been raised to worship Yahweh God or obey the Mosaic Law or anything like that. She likely came with very different ideas about how life came into being, why the world is how it is today, and what might be done about it, and so forth. She probably had offered many sacrifices to gods that Solomon would’ve considered to be dead idols. She was very different from Solomon in language, culture, religion, and more. But he still welcomed her in and shared what he knew and had experienced from the love of God, and it seems that she went home as a believer. Now, will a foreign queen ever want to meet you and talk with you about Jesus? Maybe! (You don’t know!) But probably not. But it’s been my experience that you don’t have to spend that much time around someone before questions of faith and God come up. Maybe a neighbor or a coworker, maybe a family member or a friend from high school. How might we respond? Here’s a big question for you: How can we help the spiritual seekers in our lives today? Well, the first answer is what we’ve already observed. Solomon welcomed this queen, despite their many differences. And he gave her time, and they talked about many things, despite, I’m sure, Solomon’s already busy schedule. He was willing to be interrupted by her when she came asking questions and was clearly paying attention to his answers. He wasn’t forcing her to listen to his opinions about God; he wasn’t cramming it down her throat. She had come to him! But he was open to her seeking. Second, he knew the Scriptures; he knew the Bible, so he knew the story of God’s goodness and faithfulness to his people from creation down through the flood and the Exodus and into the Promised Land. He knew the good promises of God for their future. And because he knew these things, he could share them with the Queen of Sheba when she came. You don’t practice free throws during the game. You practice for hours and hours and hours on your own so that when the game’s on the line, you can hit those free throws automatically. Solomon had been shooting free throws for years by the time the queen showed up. He had thought a lot about who God was and what it meant to follow him. He had seen his father, David, follow this pattern. Much of it probably felt automatic. Now, maybe that would be part of Solomon’s problems later in life? But here, he was ready with answers. Good job, Solomon. But this didn’t end with Solomon. Helping people who are spiritually seeking is central to the Great Commission of Jesus. To go and make disciples of all nations (including Sheba), baptizing and teaching people to obey everything that Christ has commanded. To help people find God before God finds them. The Apostle Peter would later write, “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” (1Pe 3:15). Solomon did this, but Jesus did too. (Thomas) And if Jesus did this, then so should we. So today, do others see the love of God when they meet you? Do they see the wisdom of God when they consider your life? Do they see the blessings of God when they think about the people around you? Do they hear good news from you and see it changing and transforming you in your life? The best way to help the spiritual seekers in our lives is to make following Jesus our top priority first. But we don’t have to do this all on our own. Ultimately, if anyone sees anything good, any blessing, in my life, it’s because of the incredible grace and mercy of God. It’s because of the goodness and faithfulness of the Spirit of God and the word of God in my life. It’s because he has promised to go with us and never to leave us or forsake us, and he is here even now. So let us praise him, and lift up the name of Jesus. There is a whole world that should be filled with his glory. Let us pray.
