for Christ's sake. Amen. You know, there's nothing that
is more encouraging than if you happen to be in a place where
you're not as familiar with the environment or you're just in
a big crowd or things are just not as certain as you wish they
would be. There's nothing that is more
encouraging than a friendly face, a familiar face, or a familiar
voice. You're somewhere and you didn't
know exactly how things were going down or something, you'd
see somebody you knew and you had confidence in them. Or you'd
hear somebody's voice and you'd think, man, I'm glad you're here.
It's good to see you. I'm just glad you're here. Well,
the bride has been speaking of the bridegroom, the Lord Jesus
Christ, and she started back in verse 10, and she summed up
His countenance, spoke of Him as being white and ruddy, deity,
the man, Christ Jesus. Spoke of His head in verse 11
as being fine gold, His locks bushy, black as raven, His eyes
were as the eyes of doves by the rivers of water washed with
milk and fitly set." That's what we looked at the last few times. And tonight I'd like for us to
look at that thirteenth verse. She says of Him, His cheeks are
as a bed of spices, as sweet flowers, His lips like lilies,
dropping sweet-smelling myrrh. I started off saying that there's
nothing like beholding of a friendly face, a familiar face. And here, the thing that is put
forth, so we'll just understand, I'll just set the groundwork
for what the bride is saying. She's speaking when she said
his cheeks. Actually, what she's talking
about is his face. And then when she speaks of his
lips, she's speaking of his voice or his language. So his cheeks,
his cheeks are as a bed of spices. His cheeks set forth a lot. It sets forth, first of all,
the aspect of his countenance and his mind or how God sees
things. His cheeks. You know, you look
at someone's cheeks. The cheeks reveal a lot. Embarrassment,
anger, just the shape of the face. I'll study people's faces. I guess it's because I paint
them, you know, and I always used to tell people, everybody's
got two eyes, a nose, and a mouth, but everybody looks different.
Everybody's kind of equipped with those few things, but the
face, speaks of what's going on inside. His cheeks set forth
His countenance. Listen to this. Psalm 34, 16
says, The face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to
cut off the remembrance of them from the earth. What is His face?
It's what He thinks. What He thinks. How God Almighty
sees them. Psalm 31, 16 says, Make thy face
to shine upon thy servants, save me for thy mercies' sakes." His
face, his cheeks, his cheeks speak of his manifestation. It speaks of his attitude against
some and for some. And his cheeks speak of his incarnation,
his manifestation. The Word was made flesh and dwelt
among us. beheld His glory, the glory as
of the only begotten of the Father. But for us today, you see, we
behold Him, truly we do, by faith as He is revealed in His gospel. His cheeks, His face, His countenance,
His revelation in the gospel reveals who He is. as the sovereign God. When the
bride says His cheeks, that's what she's talking about, His
countenance, His face, His manifestation, who He is. Psalm 22, verse 6
says, and He's speaking of Himself. When I said that we behold His
cheeks, His face, we see Him. He said, I am a worm, and no
man, or reproach of men, and despised of the people. I read that and I think, who
could say that of himself but the Lord Jesus Christ? We would
dare not say that. But he said it of himself, his
manifestation, his countenance. Though equal with the Father,
he became subject to him, made himself of no reputation, though
the brightness of the glory of the Father." He stooped and washed
the feet of His disciples, His cheeks, how He says He is, how
He sets Himself forth. The Father looks upon His face,
His countenance, Himself, and sees the heart of obedience. We look on the outside. Man looketh
on the outside. So when she says, His cheeks,
she's saying, the way He is, the way He sits, set your face
toward Me. His cheeks speak of substitution. Isaiah 50, verse 6, I gave My
back to the smiters, My cheeks to them that plucked off the
hair. I hid not My face from shame
and spitting. You see, I didn't back up. His cheeks, His face, the substitute,
knowing that His cheeks, the expression of His incarnation,
the manifestation of the Godhead bodily, Himself, He put away
my guilt by the shedding of His blood as my substitute and surety. The bride says of His face, that's
a bed of spices and sweet flowers. You see, only those who have
been quickened by the Spirit of God behold His cheeks, His
face. I mean, it speaks myriads. Proverbs 16, 15 says, In the
light of the King's countenance is life. Now, this is what that
verse means. In the light or in the illumination,
how He manifests Himself. That's what she's saying. The
way you set yourself forth in the light of the King's countenance,
or that word countenance there is, face. In the light of the
King's face, in His cheeks, is life. Life is knowing Him as
He is revealed from heaven. Job 34, 29 says, when He hideth
His face, what that word right there means is whatever is in
his mind. That's what the cheeks, the face,
what is in his mind, what he thinks. When he hideth his face,
who then can behold him? If he holds back, if he does
not manifest his cheeks, how he sets himself forth. And the
great benediction of the high priest in Numbers 6, 24 and 26,
set forth the blessing of Almighty God. The Lord bless thee, and
keep thee. The Lord make his face to shine
upon thee, and be gracious unto thee. The Lord lift up his countenance
upon thee, and give thee peace. How God Almighty views a man. That's what he's saying. How
he sees him in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord lift up his
countenance, his cheeks, his cheeks. Fourthly, speak of the
believer's hope. Psalm 42, 5 says, Why art thou
cast down, O my soul, and why art thou disquieted in me? Hope thou in God, for I shall
praise him for the help of his countenance. Again, his cheeks
set forth what he thinks. What he thinks. You just think
about this. You watch somebody's face and
you can tell just about what they're thinking. Now, I understand
that some folks have a poker face and you don't have a clue
what to mean, but you watch somebody. Watch their cheeks. Watch their
face. Watch their countenance. And they react to you. And when
you say something, how they look at you, how they react, they're
telling you just about what they're thinking inside. As we grow in
grace and in the experiential knowledge of our Lord, Savior,
the Lord Jesus Christ. By the revelation of His Spirit,
we behold the marvelous mysteries of grace which the Father has
hidden in Him for the elect. Exodus 33, 11 says, And the Lord
spake unto Moses face to face as a man. Oh, I read that right
there and I think, man, the depth of what was being said. He said
he spoke to him as a man speaks to his friend, face-to-face,
just revealed his heart to him, told him, you know, I'll have
mercy. I'll have mercy on whom I'll
have mercy. I'll have compassion on whom I'll have compassion,
just as a friend talked to him, face-to-face, the cheeks, in
the days of ceremonial law. We're going through the book
of Leviticus. During the time of these sacrifices, the entire
nation of Israel, in the person, representation of the high priest,
the Lord Jesus Christ, but in that high priest that represented
them, communion with God was held face to face in the person
of that high priest. That high priest communed. with Almighty God, and that is
how the people communed with Him. Now, Jehovah, the thrice
holy God, looks upon the face of our blessed Redeemer, and
in Him the sins of the elect are drowned in the sea of His
suffering. In Him there is no condemnation,
and the bride says of His face, His The way he sets himself forth,
the manifestation of himself, the way he has portrayed himself
to be, his cheeks, his face, or as a bed of spices and sweet
flowers. Is there a fragrance that could
possibly smell sweeter by faith? I mean, we do. We smell this.
You ask a believer, you say, you smell that. Do you smell?
The smell of substitution. Yes, I do. How do you, by the
grace of God? She said of him, he smells as
a bed of spices and sweet flowers. The smell of redemption from
the shackles of sin and death. And in that moment, when Almighty
God removes His saints from this earth, Only in that moment will
a believer truly smell the fragrance of redemption and to know in
that moment, in that day, to behold Him as He is, in that
day the indescribable sweetness of His face of affection looking
upon them. Smell the savor of life. in His promise. I've quoted time
and time again. He said, I'll never leave you.
I'm not going to forsake you. Knowing that His sacrifice, the
willingness of His obedience, of His sufferings was a sweet
savor to the Father, that's what the burnt offering set forth,
a sweet savor offering. That makes His substitution for
me, a bed of spices as sweet flowers, towers in your margin
there of perfumes." You know, I read these things and I know
these things. I look upon them. And even as
I read them and search them out and speak them, do you know the
thought that goes through my mind? Lord, would You teach me
more of this? Lord, would you reveal more of
this to me? I know the wonder of what's being
said here. Would you reveal this to my heart
and grant unto me the privilege to smell the sweetness of the
Lord Jesus Christ? Fifthly, His cheeks speak to
the bride of her safety in Him. He smells to her as security. He is my surety. He set my face. I began to think of that face
as I started off in a place as we walked through this world.
And we are strangers, pilgrims. This is not our home. This is
not the home of a believer. This is a wilderness to the people
of God. We are in this world, but not
of this world. And we behold his face, we look
into the Word of God, and we hear him expounded and set forth. And the believer says, I see
him. I see his cheeks set forth, who he says he is, and smells
of redemption. And then the bride says, in that
latter part of that verse, he says his lips. like lilies, dropping
sweet-smelling myrrh. His lips. In Genesis 11-1, the
lip there is interpreted language. It says in Genesis 11-1, And
the whole earth was of one language, or that word language there is
lip, was one lip, his lips. It refers to the communication
of the Father's will and heart to the people that He has everlastingly
loved. His lips, His language, the expression
of Himself. Proverbs 16.13 says this, Righteous
lips are the delight of kings, and
they love Him that speaketh right. Righteous lips. Now, I know this,
that none righteous but the Lord Jesus Christ. I know that. I
know that when He speaks, only His lips can be spoken of as
righteous lips. I mean, Chuck, there's unrighteousness. There's only righteousness in
anybody. would be the imputed righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's His righteousness. It's
His. So righteous lips, the Scripture
says, are the delight of kings. But now, does this refer to the
mere kings of this earth when men are haters of God by nature? Does that mean...? Turn with
me to Revelation. Let's just look at this first
very quickly here. Revelation 1, 5 and 6. Revelation 1, verse 5 and 6. And from Jesus Christ, who is
the faithful witness. That's where the faithful lips
are. The faithful witness. And the first begotten of the
dead and the prince of the kings of the earth, unto him that loved
us and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made
us kings and priests, unto God and His Father, to Him be glory
and dominion for ever and ever. Amen." God's people have been
made kings and priests. God's people in the Lord Jesus
Christ, we are able by Him to be kings and priests unto God
by Him. So therefore, believers being
said to be kings and priests unto God and His Father, they
delight in the language of the Lord Jesus Christ. He has revealed
by being the Word of God Himself to His people the glory of God. So it is as God's people are
kings in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now reading Proverbs
16, 13, it says, Righteous lips are the delight of kings, and
they love him that speaketh right. They love him. Man by nature
does not love him, but the kings of Christ, kings in Christ, they
love him. They love the righteous lips.
Proverbs 15, 7 says, The lips of the wise, and there is none
wise but God. It's nothing good but God. He's
the wise God. The lips of the wise disperse
knowledge. Romans 16, 27 says, To God only
wise be glory through Jesus Christ forever. The lips. That's what
she's saying. His lips. His lips like lilies. Dropping sweet-smelling mark. His lips. speak of the gracious
communication from the Father to the everlastingly loved bride."
His lips, His language. Or He says, I have given in John
17, verse 8, I have given unto them the words which thou gavest
Me, and they have received them. They have known surely that I
came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst
send Me. You see, some of them heard his lip, his word, his
language. Some of them heard and they said,
this is a hard saying. He told them, he said, no man
can come except it be given from my Father. That's a hard saying.
Who can hear that? But some heard with an ear made
to hear faithfully, and they heard the Word who is. the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ, the Word of God. It's Him. He is quick. He is alive. That's what it means.
Powerful. Sharper than any two edges. The Word was made flesh. In the beginning was the Word.
The Word of God. His lips speak graciously to
His own. And His own, they hear Him. They
hear Him. They hear Him speak and they
hear these gracious words, these words that are like lilies, lips
that speak, the manifold blessings. His written Word is filled with
the gracious promises of God to His people in the person of
His dear Son. The lips of Christ are required
to teach them that by His Spirit. It is His Word and His Word. His written Word becomes His
living Word by the Spirit of God that speaks to the heart.
He said, I speak. You know, I can read them. I
can read this. Try reading. Just take this book
and read through it. Just read it. Read through some
of these books that we've dealt with and others that we haven't.
Just read them. And here's the thing you'll realize
very quickly, and I do, I can read them, but I need Him to
teach me what is being said. I can see it. I read them, but
He must impart it to me. The saints long for His loving
embrace. Teach me something. Lord, communicate
to me. Job 23.12 says, Neither have
I gone back from the commandment of His lips. How can Job say
that? Because God has kept him. How
can you say that? that you've not gone back from
the communication of His lips. How could you say that? Well,
you could say the only way I could say that is that He's kept me. That's the only reason. The only
reason I have a heart to long after Him, come after Him, because
He'd give me a heart to do that. Neither have I gone back from
the commandments of His lips. I have esteemed the words of
His mouth more than any necessary food. Often, His truth, this
is an amazing thing. I'll bet you there's not a believer
sitting in this congregation that won't agree with this statement.
Often, you can be sitting and you can hear something, and say
somebody will stand up and preach for 30, 45 minutes, and there
will be a word that just be like in that entire message. There
was something. There was a word or two or a
sentence or half a sentence or something. There was something
that was said during that message. And I'm telling you, it was like
that was exactly what I needed to hear. That was that word right
there. That was encouraging to me. That
was life to me. And of all the body of things
that was said, there was something in there. The Lord just spoke. gave my heart a fire of His revelation. It was exactly what I needed
at that moment. Hosea 2, verse 14 says, I will
allure her and bring her into the wilderness. You know why
you're here? Why are you in this wilderness?
The Lord brought you there. Why? And He says, and I'll speak
comfortably to her. I'll bring you into the wilderness. Hosea 2, verse 14. That's a good
one. You might want to write that one down. I will allure
her and bring her into the wilderness, and I'll speak comfortably to
her." I looked up that comfortably to her. It means this, I'll speak
friendly to her heart. That's what we're saying. His
lips, his lips. John 3, 34 says, For he whom
God has sent speaketh the words of God. He always speaks to his
people. the right words at the right
time, divinely arranged according to His covenant arrangement. I'm going through Psalm of Solomon. I pretty well know. Pretty well,
unless the Lord were to impress me to do something else. But
I pretty well know. I'm trying to go through. This
is the way that the Spirit of God wrote this book. He wrote
it line by line. And I cannot improve upon the
way that He wrote it. That's why he wrote Leviticus.
That's why he wrote Psalm of Solomon. That's why he wrote
Ezra. You see what I mean? That's exactly the way the Lord
wrote it. And we do well to take it and
take these books word by word, just look at the words, look
at the sentences, look at that passage and take it just like
that. But though I can assume that that's the passage that
I will deal with next, the Lord knows exactly the next word. that He is going to speak to
His people. His lips are like lilies. That is to say, sweet and pleasant
as those in Luke 4.22 that it says, they wondered at the gracious
words that proceeded out of His mouth. They drop a sweet-smelling
myrrh. Myrrh is always associated in
God's Word with bitterness and suffering. Distress. Myrrh is a, it's a gummy, it's
a gum like substance. And the way you get it is by,
you split, you take a split, either self split, inflicted,
you know, or the tree splits through, something happened to
it. But what happens is that gum
oozes out and it's, it has a very sweet smell, but it's very bitter. to the taste was not the wrath
of Almighty God that was deserving to the people of God. We deserved
it. We have sinned against God. We
did. But the Lord Jesus Christ took
the judgment of God deserving to His people. He said of His state of being in the Garden
of Gethsemane, as he prayed, he said, I am in agony. I am in a strait. I have told
you this before, but that word agony was the word that was associated
like with an arena, like the Roman gladiators. And they were
out there in the middle and all the people were around here and
they were watching the gladiators or the people out there that's
being thrown to the lions or something, that area out there
was called agony. That's where they're in. They're
in agony. They're in the strait. They're between a rock and a
hard place. That's what it meant. And the Lord said of Himself,
He said, I am in agony. There He was as He drank the
dregs of the judgment of Almighty God for us and then blessed us
with the sweetness of redemption. His lips like lilies dropping
sweet-smelling myrrh." His lips, that's what he's speaking. He
speaks of that which he has done in our stead. He bore the wrath
of God, made a curse for us, for he hath made him to be sin,
who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of
God in Him. Mark 15. I'm going to show you
two verses of Scripture and then I'll stop. Mark 15. Mark 15.23. Scripture says concerning the
Lord Jesus, it says that while he was there upon the cross. It says in verse 22, And they
bring him unto the place, Golgotha, which is being interpreted, the
place of the skull. And they gave him to drink wine
mingled with myrrh, but he received it not. The reason that he didn't
drink it, and while, turn with me to Matthew 26. This will be
the last scripture. Matthew 26, 37. He didn't drink of that mixture
of wine and myrrh, the bitterness. He didn't drink the bitterness
from the hands of man. And the reason that he didn't
do it, because he drank the myrrh, the bitterness, at the hands
of his father. Man did not disperse his bitterness,
Neil. God did. He suffered. under the
hand of Almighty God. He said, No man takes My life
from Me. Man's dealing of bitterness to
Him was not the way it was. Matthew 26, verse 37 says this. It says, well, let's read 36.
Starting in verse 36, Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place
called Gethsemane, and said unto the disciples, Sit ye here while
I go, pray yonder. And he took with him Peter and
the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very
heavy. Then saith he unto them, My soul
is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. Tarry ye here, and
watch with me. And he went a little further,
and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my father, if it be
possible, let this cup passed from me nevertheless, not as
I will, but as thou wilt." The Lord Jesus Christ, He speaks,
and from His lips come the words of blessing that are spoken to
the heart of every believer, redeemed by His blood. His lips,
the bride says. there as lilies, and they drop
with sweet-smelling myrrh, or bitterness. His cheeks, the way
he sets himself forth, his face, his countenance, and his word. When asked back in the few verses
back when the daughters of Jerusalem asked her, she said, Who is he?
Who is thy beloved more than another? Boy, I'm telling you,
the description that she sets forth of him is altogether lovely,
isn't he? Alright, Pat, you come listen. Let's stand and sing hymn number
34.