Bees are noted for two things—honey and stings. In seeking the honey, beware of the stings! Sins also have their sweets: “the pleasures of sin” which are only “for a season” and always end in the penalties of sin, which are eternal. Doing wrong may be like eating honey, but when conscience convicts, terrible are its stings.
Sins, like bees, are numerous. There are in some hives as many as 30,000 bees. Who can tell the number of sins in our minds and hearts? They are countless. How they buzz around—sins of speech, sins of action, sins of thought. Try to count the bees flying in and out of a hive, and then try to number your sins.
Thousands of bees are inside the hive and out of sight. A friend of ours opened a hive one evening and let us see the black swarms of bees moving within, though not a bee could be seen outside.
Jesus, when on earth, knew what was in people’s hearts. He knows what is in our hearts today. One day He opened the human heart, as my friend opened his hive, and showed some of the evils working within. “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies” (Matthew 15:1919For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: (Matthew 15:19)).
We would not like for the world to know the thoughts within us, yet God says, “I the Lord search the heart.”
Did you ever have a bee follow you and try to sting you? One made for a friend of mine. He started beating the air, until he thought he had beaten his attacker off. When he stopped, I saw the bee was quietly crawling inside his coat. It is hard to get away from sin, and when we think we have succeeded, it may be nearer than ever.
I knew a woman who, when threatened by a swarm of bees, shut the garden gate to keep them out! This was just as effectual as our good resolutions to keep away evil thoughts and desires.
Only the Lord Jesus can save from the sting of sin. A bee cannot sting two persons. Its sting is barbed, like an arrow, and when inserted cannot be withdrawn but is left in the wound. Thereafter the bee is stingless and cannot sting again.
My sins the Saviour stung
And caused His painful death
When on the cross He hung
And yielded up His breath;
My sins can never sting me more,
For all of them my Saviour bore.