Alright. Turn with me to Song of Solomon,
chapter 4. Song of Solomon, chapter 4. I'd like to deal this evening
with verses 9 to 11. Before we begin, let's have a
word of prayer. Our glorious Father, we indeed
realize this evening that as we approach You, we are able
to do so only in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Indescribable
is His Glory indescribable is Your grace and mercy to us to
grant unto us an understanding of that which You have set forth
in Your Word by Your Son revealed by Your Spirit. We ask You this
evening to bless the preaching and the hearing of the Word,
Lord, we ask You to bless those places where men stand even now,
setting forth the Word of God. We pray, Father, for those that
You have set Your affection on eternally, praying, Lord, You'd
call them out by Your grace, mercy, Word, We ask You to bless
us tonight. For Christ's sake, Amen. I've mentioned this before concerning
this particular passage of Scripture. This is one of those passages
that for me, I know that there are passages that the Spirit
of God has blessed to your heart in such a way that you, by God's
grace, are lost in the wonder of the truth, of the revelation
of that which is set forth. This is one of those verses that
to me sets forth a truth that I may be able to, by faith, enter
into, though I may not or cannot and do not. I admit, how can
these things be so? But by the grace of God Almighty, as we look into these Scriptures,
I pray the Lord would truly bless it to our heart. Verse 9 of chapter 4 says, And
this is the Lord Jesus Christ speaking. Thou hast ravished
my heart, my sister, my spouse. Thou hast ravished my heart with
one of thine eyes, with one chain of thine neck. How fair is thy
love, my sister, my spouse! How much better is thy love than
wine! and the smell of thine ointments
than all spices. Thy lips, O my spouse, drop as
the honeycomb. Honey and milk are under thy
tongue, and the smell of thy garments is like the smell of
Lebanon." Wonderful are the words of love
that the Lord Jesus Christ has for His bride. These are not
words of mockery. He Himself, as God speaks, God
who cannot lie, the Lord Jesus Christ sets forth that which
is absolutely so. No way could this be known except
by the revelation of His thoughts for His bride. This is what the
Lord Jesus Christ says, and this is what we're doing. We come
together for the comfort, for the glory of God Almighty, and
for the comfort of God's people. We sit down And this is what
we come to do, not to entertain, not to find something to do for
the kids. This is what we do. We come and
we sit and we consider the Word of God. And all that we are to
do is to look into the Scriptures, setting forth that which God
has said, and the Spirit of God takes that Word, and by that
Word calls out all that God has everlastingly loved, and comforts
the sheep, establishes them, the causing of their conscience,
as Brother Scott just said, to be soothed, to be quieted, because
they hear, this is what He says that He has done for me. Not what I've done for Him, but
what He's done for me. said his affection, thou hast
ravished my heart." That word ravished has immense meaning
of which I am convinced I cannot set forth in its fullness. I know that. He says, you've
ravished my heart. How can I, how can any man, set
forth the fullness of that which Christ says His Bride has done
to Him? You've ravished my heart. That
word means in one sense, I am overcome with joy and delight. You've ravished. my heart." Here
is the depth of revelation that is too wonderful to be comprehended
in its completeness by the believer. I could understand it easier
in my little fickle mind if the bride said to him, you've ravished
my heart, which the Lord Jesus Christ has done that. The new
heart The new mind, the new creature, the workmanship of God created
in Christ Jesus, Christ has ravished her, stolen her heart. She loves Him because He first
loved her. But He says, you have ravished
My heart. The Lord Himself reveals Himself
to be wounded in heart with the dart of love. Turn with me to Hebrews 12. Hebrews
12. Verse 2. The Scripture says, looking unto
Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith. Now listen to this,
who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross,
despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the
throne of God. Who for the joy that was set
before Him as the Lord Jesus Christ The Scripture says, as
he beholds the bride, that bride that had been given him by the
Father from the foundation of the world, betrothed to him eternally,
as he looked upon her for the joy that was set before him,
set his face like a flint, He endured the cross. You have ravished
my heart. The thought, if I can say this
and put it into words that give honor unto Him, the thought of
spending eternity with her heartened Him. You've ravished my heart. Joy fills my heart. He has made His spouse to be
perfectly beautiful in His sight with the imputed righteousness
that He has given her. And He is ravished with joy. That's what Scripture says, for
the joy that was set before Him and delight to look upon her. You have ravished me. with your beauty. I began to think upon this thought,
and I thought for simply. When I paint a picture, I sit
down and I start struggling with it. It starts off, it's just
a white canvas. My canvas, that's all it is.
And as I began to put some paint on it, I tried to start making
it look like something, a human being. And as I began to paint
and struggle with it, and it is a struggle, believe me, I've
had people say, I bet it's a real comfort to be able to sit down.
It's not me, it's a job. It's hard. As I began to struggle
with it, And I make it and I look at it and that eye doesn't look
just right. And I'll take turpentine and
I'll wipe it off. Do it again. Do it again and
do it again until finally it gets to the finished product.
And it then looks like something, hopefully. I look at it and I
think to myself, I know what that looks like. I know what
it is. I know what's under it. Someone
else looks at it and they say, oh, that's nice. That looks good. I look at it and it really doesn't
impress me that much because I know what's under it. I know
what it's made out of. Someone else looks at it, they
think it's beautiful. Or they say they do to make me
feel good. I look at it and I say there's impurities underneath
it. Not so the Lord Jesus Christ. He looks at her all together,
lovely, in Him. And only in Him. You have ravished
me. I look at what I did and I'm
not impressed. He looks at what He's done and
He says, you've ravished me. With one of your eyes, you've
drawn my heart to you. You have, the Hebrew says this,
you have beharted me. You have stolen my heart. That's what a man says to a woman,
you know, falls in love with her. She stole my heart. You've
ravished me. Wonderful is this thought, for
there's nothing within the bride by nature that's lovely. All
that she is in His sight, she is by His creation. He made her, adored her, adorned
her, washed her, imputed to her His righteousness. But this is
real love. Herein, 1 John 4, 10 says it
is love. Not that we love God. This is love. Herein is love. Not that we love Him. Here is
love that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation
for our sins. That's love. What shall He not
do for the good of the ones that He loves? He moves nations for
her. loves her everlastingly. We would not and do not by nature
love Him, but His love for us, His love for His Father is bound
up in that everlasting love, that everlasting covenant, His
love His obedience, His righteousness as the God-man is ours by imputation. He has made us to be beautiful. We have a new heart given by
the Spirit of God that actually loves Him and obeys Him. Lord willing, I'm going to deal
with this Sunday on this subject. of sanctification. What is it?
The Lord says, if you love Me, if you follow Me, if you keep
My commandments, what does that mean? I'm telling you, the bride
of Christ loves Him, truly loves Him. He beholds that love, that
hungering and thirsting after Him, and He says, you've ravished
My heart. You say, how do you know that?
Because 1 Corinthians 2 says, we have the mind of Christ. That means this, the communication
of His secrets. We have them revealed to us in
His Word. And when He says, you've ravished
Me, you've ravished My heart with one of your eyes. You've
ravished Me. You've stolen My heart. The bride can say this,
Oh, the indescribable mercy of Almighty God that He would set
His affection on me. Because I know this, that in
me, that is in my flesh, there dwells no good thing. He's loved
me. He endured the cross, despising
the shame, sat down on the right hand of the throne of God, thereby
having glorified the Father in the redemption of all that the
Father had given Him. And for the good of the elect,
He is their Redeemer. He's their King. He's their Husband. But who is it that has ravished
His heart? Well, He says, Thou hast ravished
My heart, My sister and My spouse. He said, You're My sister. We
are His. brethren by divine election,
chosen by the Father in the Lord Jesus Christ, considered in Him,
who is not ashamed, the Scripture says, to call us brethren. Because He that sanctifieth,
or that is, makes holy, and they who are sanctified, that is,
made holy, are all of one, we have the same Father, by regeneration,
same nature, having been given the nature of the Lord Jesus
Christ, that is, His righteousness, not His essential nature. I mean,
there is that righteousness He is God Himself, but as a man,
He earned a righteousness. and charged it, imputed it to
the elect. John says in 1 John 3, 1, Behold,
what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we
should be called the sons of God. He said, You're my sister.
You're my brethren. Sons of God. Predestinated us,
the Scripture says, to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to
Himself. Behold, now are we the sons of
God. Yes, I do know, though carrying
about us a body of sin, the presence of sin, yet by regeneration,
being quickened by the Spirit of God, we are made partakers
of the divine nature. having escaped the corruption
that is in the world through lust. That's what 2 Peter 1.14
says. As the King's daughter, we are
His brethren. When the Lord Jesus saw her in
the fall, fall of Adam, He loved her and indeed purposed to redeem
her. Ephesians 5, 26 and 27 says to
sanctify. That means to set apart, and
I want to be careful, I don't want to get too far into this,
but to sanctify. To set apart for God's use only. To be holy. To be used by no
other. Those that are sanctified are
not their own. Bought with a price. purchased
by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, set apart. But the Scripture
says to sanctify and cleanse her with His blood that He might
present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle
or any such thing, but to be holy and without blemish. Oh, but daily He cleanses her. from the defilement of sins by
the washing of her conscience by the Word of God washes her,
teaches her, and her conscience is cleansed. She knows in herself. She knows what she is. She sees
something of the presence of sin and grieves over it. The Lord tells her, you've ravished
me. with one of your eyes, my sister,
my spouse." Continually, He reminds her how great has been His love
for her eternally, redeeming her from her sins and the penalty
of the law's curse. She's His sister by obedience. Matthew 12, verse 50 says, "...whosoever
shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same
is my brother and my sister and my mother. Now, as to the doing
of the will of my Father, let me just say a few words of comfort
to those, those believers that examines daily the working of
those two principles within Himself, the law of sin and the law of
God. Turn to Romans 7.22. Romans 7.22. Paul says, For I delight in the
law of God after the inward man. When the Lord revealed in Ezekiel,
He said, I'm going to remove that heart of stone, that stony,
rebellious heart that has not the law of God written on it. And I will give them a new heart,
a heart of flesh, and I'll write my law on their heart. The believer
has the law of God written on his heart. There's a new creature,
a new man, a new creation, a rebirth, God's workmanship. And Paul reveals,
he said, I delight in the law of God after the inward man.
But I see another law in my members warring against the law of my
mind, bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in
my members, O wretched man that I am. Who shall deliver me from
the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ
our Lord. So then with the mind, that is,
that new mind, that new man, that new creature, I myself serve
the law of God. But with the flesh, the law of
sin. There is a struggle. Though man
by nature does not understand this, there is within a believer
the law of old nature, that law of sin that is in his members. It's there. And it wars against
the law of God Almighty, that new man, that new creature that
has been imparted Spirit, new spirit, new heart, new man. Paul
says, I serve the law of God with that new man, in that mind.
But he said, I see a war, a strife. And I'm telling you, God's people,
a believer, the Scripture says, revealed by Paul the Apostle,
serve the law of God in their mind. They serve Him. The Lord
willing, I'll deal with that this Sunday. He sees then in
His flesh a law that strives and struggles. But the Lord Jesus
Christ sees in His bride a love for Him that is real. You've
ravished me. He reveals that in just a few
minutes in verse 10. How fair is thy love! It's sincere
is what He says. It's real. It's real. It's not
a tainted insincere, God's people love Him. They do love Him. There's a new creature, and it's
written on their heart, the law of God. They've kept His Word. You know the strange thing about
when God Almighty reveals something concerning a believer. Things
are as God says they are. not as I perceive them or you
perceive them. A perfect example of this, and
I'll just quote this for the sake of time, and I see my time
is running very short. The Scripture reveals when Moses
killed the Egyptian there in Egypt, he realized very quickly
the next day that it was known. Some of his brethren saw him
do it. This Egyptian, remember, was
beating one of the Hebrews. And Moses came to the defense
of that Hebrew and killed that Egyptian. Buried him. Covered
him over. Thought nobody saw. The next
day, a couple of the Hebrews were arguing, and Moses told
them, basically, y'all shouldn't be doing this. Why don't you
straighten up? One of them says, what are you going to do to me for what
you did to that Egyptian yesterday? Is that what you're going to
do? You're going to kill me like
you killed him? And Moses knew that he had been seen, it says,
and so he left. He fled Egypt because he said,
surely if it's known, harm will come to me. So he fled. The Scripture
says in Hebrews concerning Moses' faith that Moses feared not Pharaoh,
but because of his desire to be with the people of God, rather
than stay in Egypt and remain there for the pleasures of sin,
which but for a season he left." You say, well, I don't remember
that being exactly the way it said it in the book of Exodus. God said, this is the reason
he left. We are what God says we are. God Almighty says, that
we serve Him, that we love Him, that we look upon Him and trust
Him, though we see so little of it in ourselves. The Scripture
reveals that the bride with one of her eyes has ravished the
heart of the Lord Jesus Christ. One of your eyes. Let me just
look upon this right here one of your eyes, and then I'm going
to stop for tonight because there's too much that I'd like to say
and not enough time to say it, and I don't want to weary you.
But when he says to her, you have stolen my heart, you have
behearted me, my sister, by electing Grace, my spouse, by being betrothed
to me from the foundation of the world. You have stolen my
heart, ravished with one of your eyes." Now what could he possibly
have been talking about with one of her eyes? Turn with me
to Ephesians 1.18. Let's read verse 17. That the God of our Lord Jesus
Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit
of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, that the eyes
of your understanding, being enlightened, that ye may know
This is what she knows by the eyes of her understanding being
enlightened. This is what she knows. That
ye may know what is the hope of His calling. That's the first
thing she knows. And what is the riches of the
glory of His inheritance in the saints? That's the next thing
she knows. And what is the exceeding greatness
of His power to us who believe according to the working of His
mighty power which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him
from the dead and sent Him at His own right hand in the heavenly
places. The eyes of her understanding
has been opened. God has given her an understanding
to see some things. She knows what the hope of His
calling is. She knows what the riches of
the glory of His inheritance in the saints is. She knows something
of the exceeding greatness of His power because her eyes have
been opened. The Lord says, you ravished My
heart with one of them. The understanding of the bride
looking upon Him and seeing Him and knowing Him. This is life
eternally. that they may know Thee, the
only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent. And when
he beholds that which God Almighty has done for her in revealing
Christ to her, she looks upon Him by faith with
the eyes of her understanding being enlightened. And she looks
upon Him with love and wonder and trust. And he said, you steal
my heart when you look upon me. You have ravished me with one
of your eyes, my sister, my spouse, with one chain of your neck.
One chain of your neck. Chapter 1, verse 10. A song of
Solomon says, Thy cheeks are comely with rows of jewels, thy
neck with chains of gold. These graces that have been given
her. Last verse. I said last verse
maybe a while ago. This is the last verse. Ezekiel
16. Look at me. Look with me. Ezekiel
16. He says, You have ravished me
with one of your eyes." And all of those lists of the eyes of
her understanding being open. He says, you've ravished me with
just one chain of your neck. Ezekiel 16, beginning in verse 10. He said, I clothed thee also
with broddered work, shod thee with badger skin, And I girded
thee with fine linen. I won't go into all of these
right now, but you know that the fine linen is a picture of
the righteousness of the saints. You know that. I covered thee
with silk. I decked thee also with ornaments. I put bracelets upon thy hand
and a chain on thy neck. I put a jewel in thy forehead
and earrings in thine ears and a beautiful crown Upon thine
head, thus was thou decked with gold and silver, and thy raiment
was fine linen and silk and embroidered work. Thou didst eat fine flour,"
you remember the fine flour, the meat offering, the eating
of the person of Christ, and honey and oil, and thou wast
exceeding beautiful, and thou didst prosper. into a kingdom. The Lord said, you ravished Me
with one of your eyes and just one chain of your neck. Oh, the indescribable glory of
Almighty God revealed to the bride when He tells her, reveals
to her, His love for her. in what He has made her to be. He has made her in Himself to
be without spot, without blemish. Altogether lovely is she in Him. You've ravished me. You stole
my heart. I have heart for no one but You. His love for the Father expressed
when He said, I have glorified Thee. Now glorify Me with the
glory that I had with You before the world was. He loved us and
gave Himself for us. Our Father, how we thank You
for the wonder and the comfort of knowing Lord, that You have
set Your love and affection upon us. Lord, not by works of righteousness
that we've done, but according to Your mercy, You saved us. Mercy, grace, how wonderful is
that sound! And Lord, that You would according
to Your own will and purpose, because it pleased You, Choose
us. Chose us because You chose to
do so. How it comforts our heart that
You would give us a heart to love You and realize Your love
for us. We thank You for the revelation
of Your truth. For Christ's sake, Amen.