This week I have read the narrative of the Queen of Sheba in 2 Chronicles Ch 9.
I came to be reading this through a general enquiry in the scripture, due to a desire to understanding a particular statement, leading to 2 Chronicles Ch 6 v32-33. That enquiry is inconclusive concerning the original context, but to have been in these passages has been a blessing.
It should be noted that this narrative while being a very close repetition to 1 Kings, differs extremely in its purpose and blueprint.
1 Kings directly highlights the transgressions of King Solomon and how his heart had not obeyed the law, through taking foreign wife’s and how his heart was turned aside by them in latter years to worship foreign gods.
The first named adversary to King Solomon is shielded and succored in Egypt; Hadad. He too is given an Egyptian wife. Here we have many principles. Firstly the absolute folly of thinking that a pact through marriage will secure a lasting peace, when the foundation is not upon interlocking stones. Solomon, may have procure some temporary peace through this alliance, but it was not of the kind that comes through the lessons taught to Abraham, who looked for a City whose maker and builder was God: a secure and everlasting one, to which John the Apostle saw. Founded upon the unity of brethren, procured through the Lamb and filled with precious stones and gold.
The narrative of Hadad, shows that the desire of the people of Israel to leave Egypt and return to their homeland was not a unique characteristic within their humanity. Here we have a great principle, and the distinction of why the Israelites where circumcised. We all have something innate within us that seeks and moves towards are roots.
But the Word to Abraham, was to get out of idolatry, from any cultural or family ties and to enter covenant relationship with the living God. The axe laid to the innate tree, so that its fruit might be planted according to the kindness of Gods own heart: a multiplication grounded and founded upon Gods provided sacrifice. A covering love, a faithful and enduring love.
We all have something innate within us that seeks and moves towards are roots. Solomons first adversary, comes from the roots of original sin! Trusting in his own wisdom and understanding, from the tree of his own perceptions of good and evil over and above that which had been commanded by the Lord. Solomon’s alliance with Pharaoh, started before he had asked the Lord for wisdom!
In 2 Chronicles, Pharaoh’s daughter is mentioned first, I believe, in Ch 8 v11. This is of interest as the whole narrative has been positive, and even here Solomon is making a judgement that appears consistent with Gods ways.
Now, on this verse I have no sense of specific revelation, and on face value you can speculate on whether Solomon was right to exclude his wife from his own prayer to the Lord concerning the foreigner! But due to the narrative in Kings, we know that Solomon was not able to walk unequally yoked, and with a perfect heart, before the Lord and God of his father David.
Immediately, after this verse follows the performance according to the commandments of Moses! The obedience is there, but something is missing in the narrative, his main wife is excluded from the centrality of worship. The full image of God is not being manifested or revealed.
Then we have the visit of the Queen of Sheba.
Therefore, as 2 Chronicles has no direct criticism of Solomon during his life, this is the inspiration of the Spirit, revealing the masculine and feminine blueprint. King and Queen, as figureheads to a nation: male and female.
Now Hollywood has much to say on the narrative of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. And a brief study shows a range of secular theories, attributing her origins to the kingdom of Yemen or Ethiopia.
Much speculation is given to whether their were relations between them that produced a child, especially within the narrative of Ethiopian history.
Personally, my leanings are towards the Ethiopian narrative, as they still have a reverence towards the ark of the covenant, to this day. Which is interesting given 2 Chronicles Ch 8 v11. And its more romantic given the eunuch in Acts.
But I am going to stick my neck out, and suggest that their was no such relations between them. Her introduction in the narrative is as a divine interjection of that which is right and proper.
Now if I am wrong on that it does not entirely alter that view. And in contrast to our Lord, the consequences are speculative. Hollywood in its worst light, of darkness had given license to that which is blasphemy, in respect to the film: the last temptation of Christ & others. And the narrative of the virgin birth and the virgin Savior are absolutes of the Christian faith.
2 Chronicles Ch 8 v18 Plus 2 Chronicles Ch 9 v 9 = 570. 666-570 = 99! The age at which Abraham is guarding the entrance to his tent and wife. When the Son of promise was born we have 9 months and that interlude between circumcision and the plains of Mamre (3 months!).
I don’t understand the sequence here. But that we have talents of Gold prior and after and within the narrative of the Queen of Sheba must have spiritual significance and perhaps it is in the number that is absence. Perhaps, that number is of the 9th hour of Calvary, where the blue print of family was truly redeemed by the promised Son of the Covenant, the provided sacrifice: It is Finished.
The Queen of Sheba, heard and she came to test him with hard questions.
As a ruler of her kingdom we can not know what she asked. Did she ask about the right for citizens to bear arms to protect their homes or of the horrors inflicted by calibrated bows and arrows upon children in the villages. Did she discuss the dynamics of the powerful families and vested interests of lobby groups within her lands and how they might respond to having their profits marginalized for the greater good.
Hard questions for any ruler, how to govern a nation.
In her journey, we do have a mirror to men who also sought wisdom and where guided by the lights in the night to one born king of the circumcised.
We also have her who gave her alabaster box of great worth. And Nicodemus who had come to him at night, in the transparency of the day declaring that his life is the true ark life, the life that lifts out of condemnation and into the acceptance of the grafting into the well beloved: the dove of peace having an Olive branch, returning in type to the Fathers hands: Into thy hands I commit my Spirit. The Spirit having moved upon the water: And God said: Let there be Jesus and his life multiplied.
(About a hundred pound weight).
She came with great gifts, despite not having believed the reports to be true. This women had had experiences of dealing with men, and knew the duplicity of their hearts. They only sought promotion and personal advantage.
She supposed that his fame was over elaborate or was a mask for his own gain, a promotion campaign.
We see through her into a women of great worth. She came with all of the gifts! She possessed great worth and came with them, to worship. To worship, a man who could tell her all she’d ever done. She was a women who could draw men out to see him themselves clearly. She was a women with living water, because she had a thirst for authentic and unadulterated life.
There is a great sweetness in this women. She was not a fool, and she knew how to guard her heart. But she came with all her gifts and she came with all her hard questions. She was pure, intelligent and regal, but she was willing to be transparent in her womenhood to obtain the wisdom of the King. They both needed each other to reveal the original mandate of God.
Her focus was not upon Solomon. Yes, she acknowledged him, but it was upon his God: Blessed be the Lord your God, who has delighted in you…..! Like Rahab she understood that the narrative of romance came from the ark of the covenant keeping God.
Her willingness to be a women after Gods own heart obtained from the King, more in return than that which she gave. God is a God of abundance and as with Solomon he gives us more than we could ask or think of in return for asking correctly.
James Ch 1 v5
James Ch 1 v17
James Ch 1 v19
The Queen of Sheba, was a foreign women to the covenants of Israel, was she not the answer to Solomon prayer within the temple at dedication, was her example not the lasting one that speaks into are troubled times today: Peace to Jerusalem and hope unto the nations.
She had come to the kingdom for such a time as this, because God wanted to speak a word in season through that which was planted innately within her heart: to cleave unto the Lord with all her heart.
And I believe a legacy is left in her nation to this day, due to the original blueprint of God that sin can’t take away.
eternalrays 