As the Lord may graciously help
me, I turn your prayerful attention to the Song of Solomon, chapter
2, and take in for a text this morning, verses 8 and 9, although
I do want to look at this precious chapter. Song of Solomon, chapter
2, verses 8 and 9. The voice of my beloved. Behold, he cometh, leaping upon
the mountains, skipping upon the hills. My beloved is like
a row or a young heart. Behold, he standeth behind our
wall. He looketh forth at the windows,
showing himself through the lattice. Song of Solomon, chapter two
and verses eight and nine. We haven't had a Sunday school
this morning as we have our anniversary this afternoon. But as some of
you know, I often use the Sunday School opening talk to give the
children some little message regarding what I'm going to speak
to in the main service. I just wanted to tell you a little
story to get you thinking. Just imagine you had a very,
very generous father who gave to his son a great estate for
that son to live in. It was all free of charge, as
it were, for that son to live in and to enjoy. And the father,
the kind father, just gave this son just one command. He said,
I have an enemy, and if he comes to your front door, don't let
him in. He will destroy your property. One command. Would you think that that father
was unkind to give that one command? How would you see that? Well,
you might see a similarity between what I've given as an example
and what happened in the Garden of Eden. God gave Adam and Eve
that whole garden of paradise and just one single command,
don't eat of the tree. of the knowledge of good and
evil, just one command. But you see, Satan came along
and said this. We read in Genesis 3, now the
serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which
the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, yea,
half God said, ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden.
You see, the only thing he talks about is not the liberality of
God in giving them this. He didn't come and say, what
a lovely paradise you've got here. Isn't it beautiful? You've
got all these different fruit trees. You've got everything
that you could enjoy. No, he takes one thing and one
thing only. Aren't you allowed to eat of
that fruit, of that tree of the knowledge of good and evil? One
thing, the one prohibition. And that's the one thing that
Satan was focusing on, that God is not good. If he was really
good, he'd let you do everything. And you see, you might wonder
what on earth that's got to do with the text. Well, we have
in our day, we're living in a day when God's truth is being undermined. And you children, particularly
young people, you live in a world that is telling you constantly
that God's 10 commandments are no way for your good. Happiness
is to be had by breaking those commands. Happiness is to be
had by throwing them away. Look at what we read in Exodus
20, and God spake all these words, saying, I am the Lord thy God,
which hath brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the
house of bondage. This is where it comes from,
the hand of a loving father, something for our good. And what
do people think? Well, you see, they don't think
it's for their good. One of the commandments, thou
shalt not commit adultery. One of the 10 commandments. And
yet a commandment which is so despised in our days, it's not
illegal to commit adultery in the laws of our land. And yet it does such, so much
destruction. And I wanted to really to Underline
this because if I don't first of all present to you what marriage
really means and how precious it is, what does the Song of
Solomon mean? The Song of Solomon is focusing
on a relationship between the bridegroom and the bride in that
marriage bond. or looking toward that marriage
bond, the marriage supper of the Lamb. And if you, young people,
with the indoctrination of the world into you the whole time,
you probably see marriage as quite a low thing. You see, you're
told, interesting, one of my sons, when they got married,
one of the cards they received from one of their work friends
had this title on it, and I thought it said everything to me. It
said, game over. That's what marriage seems to
mean to our society. Game over. This wonderful blessing
that God has given of Christian marriage and the world turn it
round as game over. Now you can't have who you want,
when you want, for as long as you want, with as many people
as you want. You can't do that. Now you're
married. Now you're tied down. What a total perversion of God's
holy, righteous, good law. I've now been married nearly
29 years and I did not see when I went into marriage the importance
and the value and the preciousness of marriage as I do today. As
I've gone on in the pathway, I see so much more of the preciousness
of it. And we live in a society that's
telling you that it has no value. But look at the rates of of mental disorder that we have
today, they're rampant. People are not happy. The family
is devalued. And these precious things of
marriage, for life between a man and a woman, is set aside and
game over. Another thing that happened with
my son's wedding, when we were getting ready to get their house
ready a few weeks before their marriage, we had some neighbours,
which were well-meaning neighbours, they came up to us and we said,
we're just doing this for our son, they're hoping to get married
in a couple of weeks' time. They looked at us blank. You're
getting married and you're ripping a house apart? They didn't go
together in these people's minds and they weren't trying to be
unkind. they genuinely didn't understand. But this is God's
order. And this is what you young people
need to know. That the order that the world
has put on it of game over associated with marriage is totally, totally
wrong. I've lived to see my mother and
father live in marriage happily for 56 years I think it is. They've now finished now because
death has parted them. But I can see in that bond and
the blessedness it's been to them for those years. You see,
you young people, you've never been 50 years old. We have been
your age. And I didn't see these things
when I was young. But the blessing of marriage, God has given this.
Yes, thou shalt not commit adultery, but there's this great provision
of love in the marriage. Marriage is honourable and all,
and the bed undefiled. home hungers and adulterers,
God will judge. It's what the Bible says. And
even though your society and your lessons that they tell you
at school, it's lies. And it comes from the father
of lies. I wanted to give that as an introduction because Song
of Solomon is about a spiritual relationship. but it's pictured on a natural
relationship. And if you don't understand the
natural relationship, you don't see that marriage is a blessing,
you don't see that the stability of the family and the fact that
two people are committed to one another, not just taking from
one another what suits them for the night, but supplying one
another's needs with a view to the rest of their lives, it's
a very different outlook. And the Song of Solomon, you
see, is based on that relationship there is between Christ and his
church. Now, our natural relationships pale into insignificance. Yes,
you may have been married for 56 years, but that's very short,
you see, compared to the marriage that is in the word of God between
Christ and his church. The marriage between Christ and
his church started in eternity past. He loved the church. The father gave the church to
the son and the son in love was willing to come to this earth
to purchase that bride. And you see it's a beautiful
picture and then that marriage you see the marriage supper of
the lamb that is to take place when time is no longer. It is
not just a marriage, well, and you have to say, well, they live
as long as life, as long as they are alive until death them do
part. No, there's no death us do part in that marriage supper
of the lamb. It's an eternal state of union
with the church's living head. And it's meant to be a picture,
our relationships, our marriages here below are meant to be a
little picture. Imperfect, yes, but a little picture of that
eternal union. that there is between Christ
and his church. A union of love, a union of giving. You see, a lot of people's idea
of relationships is what you can get out of it for yourself.
If the other person is ruined by it, like David's son Amnon did to Tamar,
he totally wrecked Tamar just for one night of pleasure. Totally
ruined her. Is that kindness? It's not kindness
at all. But in our society, they would
call it love, and they would call it forbidden pleasures.
And they'd say, this is happiness. Marriage? Game over. It's very solemn. And I want
to lovingly talk to you young people, because you have an adversary,
the devil, that is telling you so many lies. And you need to realise that
it's lies. Just as he said to Eve, eat of
this fruit and you'll be happy. Was she happy? She was driven
out of the garden. She immediately knew sorrow.
Satan is a liar and he's not your friend. You've got to know
who your friends are and who your enemies are. Satan is not
your friend. Most of the world think that
Satan's dictates are for their good. But sooner or later they
realise, and certainly in eternity they realise, that he was not
their friend. He was their greatest enemy. So what we have here then is
a relationship that, just as there should be true love and
union, between husband and wife, so it's pictured here as that
love that there is between Christ and his church. You see in verse
4 of the chapter that we've read, he brought me to the banqueting
house, he's going to feast this one, and his banner over me was
love. You think of that often with
conquests, Napoleon and so on, when they conquered a nation,
you think of Hitler when he conquered France, no doubt he would have
put the German flag over France, that France was now under his
control, under his banner. Was it a banner of love? It wasn't
a banner of love, was it? No love in it. You see, this
is a kingdom of love. Love is a powerful, powerful
force. We do a lot of things in commerce
for money, and there's a place for that. But love is a far higher
motive. If we do something out of love,
it's so much more than doing it for payment. Although I'm not saying it's
wrong to do something for payment. But love is the higher motive. And
you see, Christ's love for his church and a true love between
a bride and a bridegroom is not for money. It's not for, you
see, if you say somebody married somebody else for their money,
you think, how horrible. It's not nice. No, you marry
them because you love them. And this is a kingdom of love.
He brought me to the banqueting house and his banner over me
was love. You see, the world want to say
that come to the church and come amongst his people and game over. You've lost your fun. But this
is true happiness, true happiness, true fulfillment. Why, if in
our society, when love and any form of love takes, it is okay,
everybody says, or lots of people say, if this really led to happiness,
we should be the happiest people. We should be all happy people,
all around us. But that's absolutely not what
we see. Mental health is spiraling out of control. because people
don't get happiness from these blips of disobeying God's rules. He brought me into his banqueting
house and his banner over me with love. There was this embrace, there
was this friendship, there's this communion. His left hand
is under my head, his right hand doth embrace me. I charge you,
O ye daughters of Jerusalem, by the rose and by the hinds
of the field, that ye stir not up, nor awake, my love, till
he please. So here, the picture is, if you
think of deer, rose, and hinds of the field, they tend to be
very scared animals. You can easily frighten them.
And here, the charge is don't, Don't frighten my love. Don't
do anything to make him go away. And of course that makes us tender,
you see. Not out of legality. You see, this is the point. God
wanted Adam and Eve to serve him out of love. Not out of legality. Out of love. And that's a higher
motive. And we, as true Christians, should come to this day of God's
day, this great gift of having the Lord's day. And of course,
that's under attack in our day too. A lot of Christian so-called
people say that it doesn't matter, you know you can do it any day.
But this is a day that God has given us for his glory. My beloved spoke, sorry, the
voice of my beloved. So here we have this one who
desires the beloved. So this beloved, of course, is
a relationship, that love relationship. And that's why I wanted to picture
it. In a sense, the two in Song of Solomon are courting. And
you see, that's another thing that's gone out of fashion, courting,
with a view to seeing one another, to find out whether you're compatible
with each other. But not in a physical way. That is to be left until we are
married. And that's another principle
which is so sadly ignored and to our detriment. But you see,
in a sense, in the Song of Solomon, and in our lives as Christians,
we are going out. We're in that betrothal stage. Because the marriage supper of
the Lamb is coming. It's yet future. It's something
to be anticipated. And that's why God's people,
you see, are looking for that blessed hope and the glorious
appearing. They've got something to look
forward to. You think of those, those who are courting rightly
and keeping themselves separate. There's an anticipation of what
it must be to be married. And that blessing of being together,
not having to part at each time, just come to see each other for
the day on the weekend and then have to go apart. To actually
be together. And you see, this is the great
blessing of that love that is to be between Christ and his
church. At this time, we're going out.
As it were, we're having those short glimpses of him, but then Those of us, those of our dear
friends that have gone to be with Christ, which is far better.
The veil has been taken away and then they see and they know
him and they love him with unsinning hearts. That's, as it were, the
full enjoyment of that love. But here below, we have glimpses.
And that's the picture you see. We're not permanently. You think
of the disciples. They weren't on the Mount of
Transfiguration permanently, were they? There was a glimpse,
and then they had to go off. They had to do some other things.
And so it is with us. Well, in the earlier verses in
this chapter, there was this banquet that they had. The banner
over them was love. But then you see, clearly, In
verse 8, there's been a separation. They're not together. And yet,
the church is hearing the bridegroom's voice, the voice of my beloved. And this is, you see, if you
love somebody, when they call from a distance, this is, you
hear their voice. You know them. You see, it says
in the word of God, my sheep hear my voice. I know them, and
they follow me. This is life eternal. The voice
of my beloved. He speaks, you see. He speaks
to his people. The voice of my beloved. Behold,
he cometh, leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills. So what
do we make of these mountains and these hills? The picture
naturally is a deer or a young heart. You see them bounding
across these boulders and they just bound across and the things
that would be very difficult for us, they can easily come
over. You see, mountains and hills
are obstacles If you look at the end that we have this in
verse 17, until the daybreak and the shadows flee away, turn,
my beloved, and be thou like a roe, a young heart upon the
mountains of Bitha. And the Bitha means mountains
of division, mountains of separation. So you see, the natural picture
is here that you've got the one you love over a lot of mountains. There's a lot of mountains between
the one you love and yourself. That's the picture. And then
you hear the voice, the voice from a long way away, the voice
of my beloved. So what are these mountains and
these hills? Well, we're sinners and sin is mixed
with all that we do. And by nature, we were far off
from God. There's these mountains of sin.
There's the broken commandments. The ten commandments which were
given for our good. We haven't kept them. We've fallen
short. The mountains of sin, of pride,
of selfishness, of jealousy, of hatred, of unkindness, of lust, of dishonesty, of telling
lies. All these mountains. The voice
of my beloved, behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains and
skipping upon the hills. These mountains and hills of
separation and the difficulties. And you see the picture is here
that we can think of it in one way of the gospel. You see there
was these mountains of sin, however, can this unworthy bride ever
be united with the bridegroom? How can they ever become one?
How can there ever be a union between a wretched, hell-deserving
sinners and a holy God? That was the question Peter struggled
with when he was on that boat early on in his discipleship.
His solution was this. Depart from me, for I'm a sinful
man. That was Peter's solution. Separation. I'm a sinner and he's holy. Separation seems the only solution
that Peter could see. But you see here in this verse,
we don't have separation. We have the bringing together
of two. The voice of my beloved, behold,
he cometh. He's a coming saviour, you see.
And you see that the idea here is it's from God's side. You
see, we were lost and ruined in the fall. How could we ever
get back to God? It was God's plan to send his
beloved son. He came over the mountains, over
the impossibilities, and made a way back to God from the dark
path of sin. The voice of my beloved, behold,
he cometh leaping upon the mountains. You see, there's an activity
here. This is not just, well, I suppose I better go. I don't
really want to go, but I suppose I better go. See, that's so much
the attitude of so many we have in our day. You listen to them
at work, perhaps. They do try and do as little
as possible and get away with it. I suppose I have to. That's not the way that Christ
came to his church. Lo, I come in the volume of the
book it is written of me. I delight to do thy will. And you see, if you have somebody
that delights to do what they're doing, they do it very, very
differently than if they try and do as minimum as possible
at every step. And we live in a world that tells
you if you can do as minimum as possible and get as maximum
as possible back, that's great. It's so wrong. We have a saviour
that taught something so different He gave everything he had for
his unworthy bride. This is the nature of love. You see the love of Christ is
rich and free, fixed on his own eternally. An unworthy bride. My beloved, at the voice of my
beloved, behold he cometh leaping. There's an activity here. He
comes over these impossibilities and how, just think about it,
if there wasn't the gospel, how would we ever get back to God?
How would we that were breakers of the Ten Commandments every
day, how would we ever get back to God? We would be lost and
lost eternally. But there is a way that God has
made whereby sinners can get back to God. And this is the
way. He cometh leaping upon the mountains,
skipping, upon the hills. There's an ease to his step.
There's a joy in his step. There's a willingness in his
step. He comes to this one in her need, in her far offness. And there's a desire in the bride
that he does come. There's a behold, you see. Behold,
this is amazing. The voice of my beloved, behold
he cometh, leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills. May
that be something for some here this morning. The mountains and
the hills. I've spoken a bit of our sin
and how Christ has come over and paid the price at Calvary
for all of our sins. And yet there's a lot of mountains
and hills physically in our lives too. The mountains, the impossibilities. Who art thou, O great mountain,
before as a rubber ball thou shalt become a plain? As Moses
stood before the Red Sea, the enemies were behind him, the
Red Sea was before him. What a mountain, what a difficulty,
what a great problem it was to Moses. But you see, he comes
leaping over them. He made a way through them. I
will make all my mountains away. And in your life, you see, you
may have great mountains. You think, well, all these great
problems. We're only talking as a family
Friday evening. Some of the great problems in
the world, thinking of Russia and the war and the possibility
of a nuclear war starting up and then other problems that
there is in the internet with all this artificial intelligence
and what this gives us as possibilities in the future and how this will
affect all of our lives. The voice of my beloved, behold
he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills. They're
things that are totally outside of our control. And yet they're
not outside of our God's control. And you bring your mountains
this morning, impossibilities, things that could devastate the
whole of the UK in one moment. We have a God, you see, that's
above it. I'm not trying to predict the
future. I'm just trying to say that we have a God that is in
control. He knows everything. He knows
every mountain. He knows every impossibility.
He is the one that we ought to fear. Skipping upon the hills, my beloved
is like a roe. a young heart behold he standeth
behind our wall now he's coming closer look he's coming closer
he's come over the mountains now there's just he's just the
other side of the wall of the house He standeth behind our
wall, looking forth at the windows, sometimes those have been described
as the windows of grace. He shows himself through those
windows of grace. See here, here below we see through
a glass, darkly, we're going out as it were. It's the going
out stage, that we don't, we're not yet living together, we're
just going out. And in these, this going out
phase, there's a looking forth at the windows of grace. at the
grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, showing himself through the lattice.
If you look at a lattice work, you can see somewhat through
the lattice, but you can't see perfectly, can you? But he's
showing himself. And you see, these are the way
he shows himself to his people. He shows himself to the church.
And there's a longing, you see, in the heart of the church for
the bridegroom. And he's coming over those impossibilities. You
see, this is the barriers that there are. The barriers that
there are between us and our beloved. And you all have, no
doubt, different barriers. One of our dear brethren recently
that came before the church, this lovely word, thy love unknown
has broken every barrier down. Broken it down. So there's no
barrier now. There can be fellowship. There
can be union. You see, this man shall be your
peace. This man. This man is the one
that's able to come over the mountains. These things that
are totally off our scale of sorting out. We have one that is above. We
commit our lives and our times to him. He knows the end from
the beginning. And we know one thing, that it
will be well with them that fear God. We don't know what's going
to happen with the war. We don't know what's going to
happen with many things. But we know it will be well with
them that fear God. We know it will be well. And you see here it says then
the next verse is verse 10. My beloved spake. So here you
see before in verse 9 it was the sorry in verse 8 was the
voice of my beloved if you like more like a general call. And
we hear God's voice you see in his word as we read God's word
we need to read God's word. This is God speaking to us and
as we read God's word that it might affect our lives that we
might realize this is God's word. These words are true. and that we may fear what he
says. And then the sermon, the preaching of the gospel, that's
hearing his voice too, as God's servants are able to expound
God's word. This is encouraging to our souls.
But you see, there's a relationship. This is not static, is it? This
is love. Love is dynamic. Love is mutual,
or should be in a good marriage. Mutual love. You see, my beloved
is like a young heart. He is standing behind our wall,
looking forth at the windows. He shows himself, you see, glimpses
of his glory, only glimpses. The disciples wanted to stay
on the Mount of Transfiguration, but they had some work to do.
They had to go, and Jesus couldn't have stayed there. He had to
suffer, bleed, and die. It was not the, you see, Satan
always wants the crown before the cross. But you see, Jesus
knew that he had to have the cross first and then the crown. And that'll be true for all his
followers too. We're to have the cross here below. Take up
your cross and follow him. But the crown is to follow. But then we come to verse 10.
So here we now have the beloved, the Lord Jesus Christ, now speaking
directly to this child of God. Another aspect I just want to
perhaps quickly mention about the Song of Solomon is, obviously,
as you probably know, Solomon had an unusual relationship in
the sense that he had these 700 wives and these 300 concubines. Totally forbidden by God, and
this was wrong of Solomon to do that. But as a type and a picture of
the Lord Jesus Christ, there is something precious here that
Solomon had individual fellowship with each one of those virgins
of Israel. And in that sense, spiritually,
so Christ has individual relationship with each member of his church.
If Solomon had enjoyed a biblical marriage in the sense of between
one woman and himself, then that woman would be able to say Solomon
is mine and therefore he's not yours. I found my beloved but
you can't because I'm my beloved's. But you see that is not so in
the church. We can say, we have found my
beloved. And in Song of Solomon it says
in verse 8 of the first chapter, if thou know not, O thou fairest
among women, go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock
and feed thy kids beside the shepherd's tent. You come with
us and you can find him too. And that's the message you see
of the gospel. in this spiritual union that Christ has with his
church. It's one bride, and yet each one has individual fellowship
with their beloved. And you see, this is true love. And this is why Satan, you see,
when he says, you see, he looks at the Lord's people, he says,
you haven't got any joy. Ah, we have joys, you see. When Christ
comes and says unto us, rise up my love, my fair one, and
come away. What is that worth? Put a monetary
value upon that. You cannot do it. It means everything. It means security for time. It
means security for eternity. Give me a company that will give
you security for eternity. You cannot find one. Nobody can
do it. It's impossible. apart from God
is able to do it. And you see, this is the one
my beloved spake and said unto me. So he speaks to his people. He speaks personally. Has he spoken to you? Have you
heard his voice in the gospel? Has he spoken to you? And what
is he saying? Rise up, my love. my fair one, and come away." What gracious words. Remember
this bride is, think of it as sinners, we're sinners, we come
short of the glory of God in everything and as we come to
God we realise our uncleanness and our vileness in so many ways
and we see it in so many aspects of our lives. But look at the
language. This is Christ talking, rise
up my love. Now you see, I understand that
a lot of the, a lot of mental health problems are linked with
a person not feeling loved. If they don't feel loved, for
example, in their childhood or later on in life, it causes all
manner of sadnesses in their lives. Here you see, rise up,
my love. You see, this is Christ talking
of his love for his people, his love for the church. This is
a place of comfort. We read perfect love casteth
out fears. If you really love somebody,
then you're not afraid of what they're going to do tomorrow
because you trust them. Rise up, my love, my fair one. Think of the language. the language,
my fair one, but you say altogether is an unclean thing, all my righteousnesses
are as filthy rags, that's true. But I've been clothed with Christ's
robe of righteousness and therefore to my beloved I'm beautiful. And that's something that's very
hard for us to understand and something that we need to keep
trying to drink in how precious the church is to Christ. It's
only, of course, evidence to what he was willing to pay for
the church. He was willing to lay down his
own life for that church. He was willing to die for that
church. My beloved spake and said unto me, rise up, rise up. Don't stay where you are. You
see, we can be earthly minded. just living for the here and
now. Perhaps living honourable lives in the sense of an outward
sense, but here you see there's a command, rise up, don't stay
there. Don't stay with a life that's
just totally taken up with the here and now. Yes, we have to
live in this world, but if that's all your world is, it's a very
sad world. If you've got nothing, I always
remember our old late pastor, used to tell of a story of a
man, a farmer. He took his friend to a very
high hill in his farm. And he got this man, he said,
look here, look left, right, and all the different directions.
He said, it's all mine. To which the man looked up and
he said, have you got anything up there? Have you got anything
up there? If everything you've got is here
below, then when that heart stops beating, which can happen in
a moment of time, happened to my father just in a moment of
time. What of that land? What of that estate? What of
that business? What of everything? Have you got anything above?
Rise up. My love, you see, this is done
in love. You see, this is the point I'm trying to make. The
gospel is a gospel of love. You see, Satan would present
it as it's a set of rules and it limits you and it stops you
enjoying yourself. I go back to that original illustration
I used. Do you think that father was
unkind to tell that son not to open the door to his enemy? You'd
say that's common sense, that's good to tell them not to do that.
But Satan would twist it right round and said, the best thing
you can do is open that door to the friend. That's where happiness
lies when this enemy comes in. That's what happened in the Garden
of Eden. He's a liar. And you see, we need to resist
the devil. And you young people need to resist these lies. I'm
sad for you that such lies are being thrown at you in your upbringing
in that sense, at the schools and so forth. It is truly lies. You mark my words, if you do
what they tell you to do, I believe you will regret it.
You will live to regret it if you live. It's not for your good. You'll look back and you'll realise
you've ruined yourself. You've just given yourself to
the lusts of the flesh and the pride of life and you've got
nothing substantial. But you see here it says, my
beloved spake and said unto me, rise up, my love, my fair one,
what lovely words, and come away. Don't stay here. Don't make this
your rest. Don't, you see this is a time
of communion, isn't it? If you had a courting couple
and the husband-to-be said that to his wife, he wants to take
her out. You've got many things to do,
but just leave those, come with me. Let's have a time together. Let's have a walk together. Let's
have a time of fellowship. This is the picture. My beloved
spake and said unto me, rise up, my love, my fair one, and
come away. You see this is the love of Christ
in the Gospel. He loves his church, he gave
himself for it, he wants to draw them unto himself. You see, Abraham
was not allowed to just carry on in awe of the Chaldees. In
his idolatry, he could have done. God could have left him to live
the rest of his life in idolatry, but God called him out. He said,
come, come away. Don't stay there, Abraham. Don't
stay there. Come unto me and be my friend.
Be a friend of God. Live for my glory. Don't live
for here below. Have a city in heaven. They looked
for a city that hath foundation, whose builder and whose maker
is God. And you dear young people, that's
the thing to invest in. That city that hath foundation.
That's a city that's never going to pass away. If an atomic bomb
wipes out UK, that city will still stand. That city will stand,
no other city will here below. No other valuable possessions
you might have here below will stand. It'll all be gone. But
that city of God, to be with Christ, which is far better. This is life eternal, that they
may know thee and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. This is
what's valuable. The voice of my beloved. Have you heard it in his word,
in the preaching of the gospel? And have you communed with him?
Do you spend time with the Lord? You see, you might say, oh, it's
just, it's empty, it's dry. No, as the Lord comes, the voice
of my beloved, behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains. Yes, there's a confession of
our sins. We need to realise that all of our righteousness
is on filthy rags, but You see, and we mentioned earlier that
he brought me into the banqueting house and his banner over me
was love. Just close with this thought. Think of Joseph and
his brethren as he brought them into that house when they were
being guilty of, or appeared to be guilty of stealing the
silver cup. And he rounded them up as it were, and now they were
in his grip. They were being found with a cup in their sacks.
Now they would think, now it's all over. Now we're bondmen forever. He brought me to the banqueting
house and his banner over me was love. It wasn't judgment, was it? When
they came with repentance, they realized that actually Joseph
had a heart of love for them. None of what he'd done. You see,
Jacob was able to say at one point, all these things are against
me. It wasn't true. God was working
in those hearts of his wicked sons to bring them with true
contrition to own God as their God. And you see, that's what
God's doing. The voice of my beloved, behold,
he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills. My beloved
is like a royal young heart. Behold, he standeth behind our
wall. He looketh forth at the window, showing himself through. the lattice. May he reveal himself
to each one of us. This is life eternal, not what
the world tells you.