extraordinary how so much of
our lives is lived in complete independence of any acknowledgement
of God at all, isn't it? It is remarkable. In Song of
Solomon, we've seen the Lord deal in a most gracious way with
the Shulamite. She had sinned, she had sinned
wickedly. And yet, as he chastises her,
he teaches her and he draws her to himself. And we come to this
beautiful passage that's before us, this remarkable verse. She's
longed that she can have communion with him. She says in verse 11,
she says, come my beloved, let us go forth into the field, verse
11 of chapter 7, let us lodge in the villages, let us get up
early, let us, you see, let us get up early to see the vineyard,
let us See if the vine flourish, whether the tender grape appear,
and the pomegranates bud forth. There I will give thee my loves.
The mandrakes give a smell, and at our gates are all manner of
pleasant fruits, new and old, which I have laid up for thee,
my beloved. Oh, that thou wert as my brother
that sucked the breast of my mother. Then I should find thee
without, I would kiss thee, yea, I should not be despised. I would
lead thee and bring thee into my mother's house, who would
instruct me, I would cause thee to drink the spiced wine of the
juice of my pomegranate. His left hand should be under
my head, and his right hand should embrace me. I charge you, O daughters
of Jerusalem, that you stir not up nor awake my love till he
pleases. And the daughters of Jerusalem
ask this question, who is this that cometh up from the wilderness. I love the King James Version.
When it says ETH at the end of the word, it means that she's
coming, and she's coming, and she's coming, and she's coming,
and she's coming. It's continuous. She's coming,
and she's coming up from the wilderness, leaning on her beloved. Let's pray and ask the Lord to
help us. Our Father, these beautiful pictures in Song of Solomon are
full of remarkable pictures of the Lord Jesus and his love and
his care for his bride. And we pray, Heavenly Father,
that you would cause us to see his care and his love, and you
would cause us, Heavenly Father, to long to be like the Shulamite,
that coming up out of this wilderness world is a coming up that involves
us leaning. Make us lean, Heavenly Father.
Make us lean on Him who is the Rock of Ages. Let us lean on
Him, that tried and tested and true foundation And Father, we
do know the pain, something of what it is when you take away
the props of this world that hold us up in our own esteem
and in the esteem of others. We thank you, Heavenly Father,
for the gracious way you take away those props from us and
cause your people, like the Shulamite, to just lean on the Lord Jesus. and to walk together with Him
up out of this wilderness world. Bless us, Heavenly Father, with
His presence and Your grace upon us this morning. We pray in His
precious name. Amen. People are by nature inhabitants of this wilderness
world, but also by nature we don't see that it's a wilderness. If you ask the people of this
world, is this a wilderness? A howling wasteland, a waste
and howling wilderness, it's described in Deuteronomy 32 verse
9. And out of that waste, howling
wilderness, he led them about, he instructed them and he kept
them as the apple of his eye. God's children, according to
Jeremiah 31, are people who have found grace in the wilderness. Simon reminded me that Noah had
remembered an illustration, which is not mine, it's from a long
time ago, but an illustration of an old sailing ship, passenger
sailing ship, that was crossing the seas and it was sinking. And the rich people in their
cabins were just throwing away their jewels and their coins
and they were fleeing to the life rafts. And there was a maid
on the ship. And the maid on the ship, probably
you can't imagine her rejoicing as she saw these jewels and these
gold coins. And she gathered them and gathered
them and gathered them. And you imagine her joy as she
ran down the deck of the ship in the anticipation that her
life would be completely transformed by what she'd gathered for herself.
And she tied it to herself, tied it close to herself, and then
she made sure as she looked to jump off the ship that she wouldn't
get injured in any way, and she jumped. And it was only when
she hit the water did she realise that that which she had clung
to was that which drew her down beyond the ships and to her death. Such is the state of the people
of this world. Not the strongest to start, but
it looks like a reed you could lean on a bit. We're talking
about leaning on Jesus, it's called. It looks like you could
lean on it. And what the scriptures say,
unless you're leaning on the Lord Jesus, and all of your soul
is leaning on the Lord Jesus, when you really put your weight
on it, when you really need to put your weight on it, it actually
pierces your hand. is secure of what you think is
holding you up, what you think is a problem, it actually ends
up piercing the very soul. That's happening all around us,
all the time. In fact Psalm 73 says that the
people of this world go to their deaths like that girl on a ship. They go to their deaths with
no sense of trepidation at all. There are no bans, there are
no pains in their death, which is why so often you would think
when you're talking to old people who are close to death, they
would want to talk about eternity, they would want to talk about
God, they would want to talk about their souls. And I've had
the Men's Shed guys at home for the last five years and prayed
and longed and talked to them about that. And it's just extraordinary
how these men, like that maid on the ship, like someone holding
one of these, are clinging to the things that they have done.
And they are clinging to their righteousness and their works.
And it grieves me that so often They have a little shed and I
can actually walk through the door out of their sight. And
so there are times when I've talked about the Lord Jesus to
these old dying men. And I've happened to have been
on the other side of the tin and come back and I've heard
them laugh and joke and think me a fool and blaspheme my Saviour
even more strongly. And that's exactly a promise
from God, isn't it? There are no bans in their death. There are no bans in their death.
For them, this world is not a wilderness. For them, this world is a place
where they have achieved some righteousness, achieved some
things that are worthy of. My prayer for you, my friends,
the people that I love, is that you would find yourself just
leaning on the Lord Jesus. Unless you lean on Him totally,
you are not leaning on Him at all. Unless you lean on Him for
absolutely everything, you are not leaning on Him at all. Of course, leaning is just a
synonym, isn't it? It's a synonym for faith. See, faith is looking to the
Lord Jesus Christ and seeing Him. He says, Behold Me, behold
Me, look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth, Isaiah
45. This is the will of Him who sent
Me, said the Lord Jesus in John 6, that everyone that sees the
Son and believeth on Him may have everlasting life. is looking and seeing, like those
Israelites bitten by that snake had to look at the representation
of the very thing that had bitten them. And they looked and they
lived. Faith is described as coming
to Christ. He that cometh to me shall never
hunger. He that believeth on me shall
never thirst. Faith is fleeing to Christ. God's children are described
as those who have fled for refuge to lay hold on the hope set before
us. The Lord is a strong tower, the
righteous run into it, and they are safe. Faith is described
as laying hold of the Lord Jesus Christ. Faith is described as
receiving him, as many as received him, to them he gave power to
become sons of God, even to them that believe on his name. This world is a wilderness. And as I said earlier, Moses
describes it as a waste, howling wilderness. And it's a wilderness,
of course, because of what happened at the fall. It's interesting
how John describes this world. He says, the world and all that
is in it. The world and all that is in
it. He's not excluding anything,
is he? All that's in it is the lust
of flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. And this is not of the Father,
but is of the world. The world passes away, and the
lust thereof, but he that does the will of God abideth forever. And then he goes on to say, love
not the world, neither the things that are in the world. John,
of course, is giving us synonyms for what happened in the garden.
She saw that tree, and she saw it was good for food, the lust
of the flesh. She saw it was pleasant to the
eyes, the lust of the eyes. And she thought it was good to
make one wise, the pride of life. God rescues his people. out of
that wilderness, that wilderness that Satan rules, under, of course,
the sovereign hand of God. But he holds these people in
his hands, he holds them and he rocks them to sleep. And he
gives them little trinkets, and he gives them another little
trinket, and another little activity, and another little thing they
can do, and he constantly continues to entertain them. and constantly
continues to look to say to them, this is what it's all about.
In fact, until the grace of God has powerfully worked in someone's
life, as it did in Hosea 13, he says, I did know thee into
the wilderness, in the land of great drought. And the drought,
of course, is a drought of the worship of God, a drought of
God being glorified. He gives life, and He gives the
sun, and He gives breath, and He feeds everyone. But such is
the wilderness of our world that is not acknowledged or thanked.
And in these dark, dark days, He's treated with contempt. And
what a dark day Amos spoke of in Amos 8.11. He says, Behold,
the days come, says the Lord, that I will send a famine in
the land. Not a famine of bread, nor a
thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord. When God sends a famine, it's
a famine. But here in Song of Solomon,
we've got some pleasant things to think about today. We have her now coming up out
of this wilderness, and she's coming up leaning on the Beloved. See, her communion was disturbed.
What was she longing for in all of her searching? She was longing
for one thing. She was longing for Him. She
wasn't longing for the gifts that He brings. She was longing
for communion and fellowship with Him. And when that communion
is disturbed, it's like being in the wilderness. We shall come
up from the wilderness. when we are anxious that our
beloved's fellowship with us shall not be disturbed. The journey
of God's children in this world is never taken alone. We are
pilgrims. The question before us, isn't
it, is are we leaning? Is her beloved that she's described
so beautifully in this book, is he your beloved? And not only
that, is he your beloved that you're leaning on? He is all
my salvation and all my desire, said David when he was dying.
No other refuge have I none. My soul hangs her utter helplessness
entirely upon Him and who He is. He is the Beloved, of course.
What a great title for Him. He's the Beloved of His Father.
He's the Beloved of the angels. He's the Beloved of His redeemed
in glory. He's the Beloved of His bride
when she's awakened here. The rest for her soul is that
he is her beloved. Her beloved. What did she say
of him and herself in 7 verse 10? I am my beloved's. I belong to him. He's bought
me. He owns me. And his desire is
toward me. But here, now that she's got
him in her company, and this question is asked by the daughters
of Jerusalem, who is this that cometh up? Here she is depicted
in three states, and I'll just try and be brief as we look at
them. She's depicted here as coming up, and as I said earlier,
she's coming and coming and coming. She's continually coming. She's
coming and she's leaning. And she's coming and she's leaning
because she has confidence, assurance. It's faith that leans. No wonder we're described as
a vine. Vine has no ability to hold itself
up. It's held up, and when it's held
up, it's fruitful. But for someone to lean, there
are two things, three things necessary. There must be a nearness
to that person. They must be near. There must
be a presence of that person. We used to take our kids at school
walking lots of weekends, and they didn't enjoy it all the
time, but we did have to exercise them somehow. But it was all
hilly where we were. It was 7,000 feet, so you ran
out of puff. It gets to you occasionally.
And often we'd be walking up a hill, and I'm sure it's Lisa's
experience as well. All of a sudden, you'd find yourself
walking along, and there'd be someone leaning on your arm,
and you'd be carrying, and then there'd be another one leaning
on another arm, and then there'd be one with her arms wrapped around
your neck, and you'd end up sort of walking along carrying them
all. Leaning. There must be a nearness. There must be a presence. We
only lean on a sure thing, and we only lean on a thing that
is nearby. You see, that's why she's leaning.
Her great desire was his presence and faith, true faith. It's remarkable what Hebrews
says of faith in Hebrews 11 verse 1-3. Faith is the substance It's
remarkable, isn't it? Faith is a substance. It means
the ground, the confidence. It's the substance of things
hoped for. It's the evidence of things not
seen. Faith causes God's people to
see a reality in the Lord Jesus and His care for us that our
senses, our five senses, can never detect. Faith that God
brings and God inspires and God nurtures is a faith that becomes
the things that the faith depends on, that looks to the Lord Jesus,
becomes more real than anything we can perceive. So you will
never lean on Christ until you believe His word of promise. She was leaning because He had
made promises to her. He'd acted in the most remarkable
way of drawing her back to Himself. You can't lean on Him unless
you're consciously aware of His promise that He's with you. He
says, doesn't He? He says, I'll never leave you
nor forsake you. One of the great characteristics
of our Lord Jesus as God is He's omnipresent. You cannot move
in this universe out of the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's
omnipresent. He's omniscient. Nothing happens
in this world outside of his clear and perfect knowledge. He's near. Now that she has him
with him, what was she desiring? She was desiring communion with
him. His left hand should be, she
said under my head, his right hand should embrace me. She's got him with her at last.
and He has reaffirmed His love. He is so near that she can lean. He can't lean on someone who
is far away. What does He say in those remarkable
words that no doubt you know well from Isaiah 43 verse 2? When you pass through the waters, When you pass through the waters,
Isaiah 43 verse 2, I will be with thee. And through the rivers,
they shall not overflow thee. When thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned. neither shall the flame kindle
upon you." Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were in that fiery
furnace, but they weren't in that fiery furnace on their own. There was another one there with
them. The smoke didn't affect them. The only thing they lost
in that fire were the ropes that bound them. And they had him
there with them. We can't experience in this life
anything without His presence, without His sovereign decree. But that's a special presence,
isn't it, as it is with the Shulamite. He draws her back to Him with
cords of love and not the whip of the law, not telling her how
to behave. It's love that's constrained
her and love that compels her, and so it is with all of God's
children. You see, he is sovereign God,
ruling all things, sitting on that throne in heaven, having
finished his work and ruling. But also, he is a man. He's able to sympathize. He's able to comfort. He is a
brother born for adversity. There are things in our lives
that come into all the lives of people on this earth that
are very difficult to share with other people. They just haven't
experienced the things we experienced and sometimes it's not helpful
for them to know. But there's nothing that's ever
happened in your life in thought, word and deed and experience
that he hasn't been there. Talk to him. Lean on him. He is alive. He is a sympathising
saviour. He's touched with the feelings
of our infirmities. A brother born for adversity. And remarkably, in John 14.24,
he is in us, he dwells in his people, and we dwell in him,
brothers and sisters in Christ. There's this sacred unity that
exists between his bride and himself, that we drink the cup
his cup, and we are baptized with his baptism. In all of our
sorrows and all of our afflictions, he takes his share. He's not an absent friend. What did he say to Saul on the
road to Damascus? Saul, Saul, you've just killed
Stephen. You've killed other Christians.
You're on your way to Damascus to kill other Christians. And
the Lord Jesus says, not why are you persecuting my sheep? He says, why are you persecuting
me? To touch one of the Lord's people
is to touch the apple of his eye. So lean. To lean is to have
someone near you. To lean is to have someone you
have confidence in. To lean is to have the weight
lifted off you and the weight put onto another, just like those
students. I couldn't carry them for long, but there were times
when they were hardly touching the ground. They were just leaning
and clinging. The one you lean on bears your
burden. To lean is to be in need. Christian life begins when we
see the whole weight of our sin, and we've only ever seen it for
the first time. We don't know what sin is until
the Holy Spirit gives us life to see sin. And we see sin not
as transgressions against men, but we see sin in light of who
God is, and we see sin in light of how serious God takes sin
as He punished His Son on the cross. But we see by His grace
the whole weight of all of our sin laid on Him. He carried it and He bore it
away and He took it to a place where God says He cannot remember
it again. We see Him by faith in the new
birth as the Lord, our righteousness. By one man's obedience, many
were made righteous. Made righteous by this sovereign
God and our dear Lord Jesus. As God, I said before, He is
sovereign. As God, He is promise-keeping.
As God, He is covenant-making. As God, He has perfect and complete
rule over all this universe. And as a man, He is touched. He's touched with the feelings
of our infirmities. As a man, He can love. As the glorified man, he is now
in heaven at the throne of God, presenting his wounds. In a sense, by his own blood,
he's entered in and he's taken all of his people there. In heaven
right now, he's interceding for us. He speaks to God for us. What a wonderful thing. that
the judge is an advocate for his people. And justice, God's
justice, demands the salvation and the complete acceptance of
all of his. He's a prophet, and he speaks
to us from God. And he teaches, and he is wisdom
itself. And as a king, he's the lord
of the hosts of armies. And he says again and again,
the battle is his. and He reigns and rules. So we
lean upon Him. We lean upon His person for our
acceptance with God. We lean upon His righteousness
for our justification before God. We lean upon Him in all
of His fullness. From His fullness He has given
us grace upon grace, fountains overflowing, full and filling
and never depleted. We lean on His blood. We lean
on His blood for pardon and for cleansing. We lean on Him with
the full weight of our salvation resting entirely upon Him. All
of your soul's destiny is dependent entirely upon Him. Lean. See, leaning implies dependence. What a wilderness our independence
makes for us. We love to take care of ourselves. We love to stand alone. We love to not be in need. We love our achievements. You see, where there is strength,
where there is strength, there will be no leaning. A vine will
lean, but a great tree will stand by its own strength. And what does the Lord Jesus
say? He says, Without me you can do nothing. It's only the
grace of God that can make us like children, make us conscious
of the fact that our strength is not in ourselves, our strength
is leaning on him. I love that picture in the Last
Supper with John sitting next to the Lord Jesus and he's asked
the question, who's this betrayer? We have no idea who the betrayer
is. And what does he do? He just leans on Jesus' chest. It's a remarkable picture of
intimacy, isn't it? It's a remarkable picture of
fellowship and communion and acceptance. that we would be weaned, weaned
from standing on our own, that we would be wearied by this wilderness
and all of its fancy baubles. You see, you cannot lean too
much, and you cannot lean too often. How does Peter describe
it? He says, cast all your care,
cast in all your care upon him, for he careth for you. He cares
and he cares and he never stops caring. Cast all your care upon
him. What's the result of her leaning?
Why does she now lean? What's happening? It's remarkable,
isn't it? She's coming up out of the wilderness. She's like the Christian in Pilgrim's
Progress on a journey to the heavenly Jerusalem. The word
Hebrew is a difficult word to translate, but two of the most
likely expressions of the word Hebrews is that they are people
from another place. Abraham came from a place way,
way, way, hundreds of miles away from Canaan. people from another
place. The other word is that they are
a people passing through. This is no place to put our foundations
down. Abraham, by faith, he sojourned
in the land of promise, as in a strange land, dwelling in tents,
dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob and the heirs
with him of the same promise. Why was he doing that? It's a
strange land. 4, it says, He looked for a city
which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. You see, Abraham, all that land
before him was his. From Egypt to the Euphrates River
was all his, it was given to him. And he says, I can't find
any foundations here. Plenty of rocks in that land,
plenty of cities, plenty of high towers. The Egyptians were building
massive buildings. He says, there's no foundation.
He says, I'm looking for a place that has foundations, a place
whose builder and maker is God. And she's coming up like Abraham
was called out of that wilderness. And he was called to come with
God and walk with God, he did. You see, she had been independent,
isn't it? Listen to her words, I have put
off my coat, how shall I put it on again? I have washed my
feet, how shall I defile them? The reality is that her feet
are defiled because of Adam's defilement. It's not getting
out and getting dirty. You see, she saw, she had remarkable
experiences and she saw In the midst of all that, this taken
away from her, you see, one of the things that the wilderness
causes us not to see is that where we see our greatest strength,
there is our greatest weakness. She's now leaning because she
was weak. And she was leaning because the
way was long. Wildernesses are vast. Does the journey seem long to
you? Are you wearied with the journey? Do you find, like I do, that
your first love grows cold? Does it seem so often? but it's
just all too much trouble. Sin is a mighty foe and our flesh
is mighty weak. We need to lean on this journey. She leaned because the way was
perilous. Our fight, says Ephesians 6,
is not against flesh and blood. See, to have communion with the
Lord Jesus is to take on Satan as an enemy. He despises all
humanity. He despises them. He's a liar
and a murderer. Every single human being reminds
him of his duty to be a servant as the angels will be of human
beings. But he has the vast majority,
this broad way. He has them in his hands. He has them as his possession. You see, when Christians, when
God works in our hearts when we become Christians, we become
traitors to Satan. And he throws his darts over
and over again. See, he's been robbed of his
goods, and he's enraged. The world lies in his arms doing
his bidding, accepting his words of praise, accepting his word
to them all the time, peace, peace, everything will be okay. The Christians are his enemies.
They remind him moment by moment and every gathering of them together
is a reminder to Satan that he has been defeated by the Lord
Jesus. He's a defeated enemy and he
knows his time is short. We proclaim the Lordship of Jesus
and we proclaim the dethroning of Him. In a wilderness there
is no place of safety except in the One who is mighty to save. To lean with confidence you must
lean on someone who is mighty. I've laid help upon one that
is mighty, says God. God the Father laid help. He
laid all of his reputation. He first trusted in the Lord
Jesus, says Ephesians 1. He trusted him with his glory. He trusted him with these precious
people that he gave to him. Our Lord Jesus and them are one
in covenant union. They are one. which is why anything
less than a declaration of the Lord Jesus and His union with
His people in eternity, His union with His people in His life on
this earth, His union with His people on the cross where He
died in their place instead as their substitute, anything that
detracts from His deity, anything that detracts from His sovereignty,
detracts from his character. It is like this broken reed. See, Satan's greatest ploy in
this world is religion. He's far more dangerous standing
behind a pulpit talking about Jesus and talking about righteousness
and talking about the law than he is when he's controlling the
wicked evil brutalities that are happening in the Middle East
at the moment. He's far more dangerous when he's a liar and
a murderer and he's masquerading himself as an angel of light.
So many people are resting on a reed like that, and it will
break beneath them on that great day. We are prone to wander. The safest place for the sheep
is in the fold close to the shepherd, under his arm and in his care. You and I, like the Shulamite,
we are prone to wander. and we keep seeing him as that
great shepherd. Those beautiful pictures in Ezekiel
34 where he goes over hill and dale searching for his sheep
and he carries them home and he's rejoicing. In this age of
temptation and wandering, brothers and sisters, the coming up The
coming up out of that is to lean. She grows by leaning. Lean hard. She's always coming
up. Religion makes people stand tall
in their own attainments. But the Shulamite is coming up. Her way up is to lean. Her way of coming up is to lean
hard and cling passionately to Him. Christian growth. Going up is a growing leaning
on the Beloved, a growing weaning away from ourselves. The Lord
in His mercy will take away all the little props that hold our
life up. our righteousness, our works,
our esteem amongst people, the things that we have, the things
that we think we've done, the Lord Jesus will continually take
those props away. And He might, as He does with
the Shulamite, cause us to wander and search for Him. But it's
all His sovereign hand of love. He has to wean His people from
a wilderness to have them to lean upon Him. We grow in the
grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, but to grow in
grace is to grow more aware of how much sin is in us, how badly
we fell in our father Adam, how Constantly, sin is with us. In
everything we do, sin is there. But grace is God shining His
blessed light and love upon us, not because of anything we've
done, but purely and completely because of who the Lord Jesus
is. That's what it is to grow in grace, isn't it? It's not
to grow more and more strong and more and more powerful and
more and more able. more and more better evangelists
and better witnesses and better prayers and better preachers.
To grow in grace is to grow down, brothers and sisters. The lower
you are, the safer you are and the less distance you have to
fall. As someone said, if you're a
millimetre above the ground, you're too high. Grow down. And we grow in knowledge, don't
we? We grow to know more of him and his character and his offices,
and we've grown to see more of him fulfilling his promises. We don't grow stronger, we grow
more dependent. We grow to be more like children
who desperately need someone to carry us in their arms, close
to their heart. Paul says, let him that thinks
he stand take heed lest he fall. See, she's coming up. She's coming
up. He's drawing us to himself. Up from the world, up from this
wilderness, up out of that broad way. The way is incredibly broad,
isn't it? It includes all the isms of the
world. It's broad. and it's huge and
it's enticing. But he brings his people, they
come up out of that. Very few, according to the scriptures,
travel the narrow way. And they're the ones that are
coming up by leaning upon him. Leaning upon him for everything. We have that verse in 1 Corinthians
1.30 on our bulletin each week. It's good for us not to think
less of it because we see it so regularly. But of Him are
ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us. Wisdom. You have no other wisdom than
the Lord Jesus Christ. What does Proverbs 3 verse 5
and 6 say? Lean not on your own understanding,
but in all your ways acknowledge Him. And what's the promise?
He will direct your paths. He's our wisdom. We lean on Him
for all of our wisdom. We lean on Him for all of our
righteousness. We have no righteousness, never
done one righteous deed, but we have in the Lord Jesus a perfect
righteousness that God is completely and eternally satisfied with. And people talk a lot about sanctification.
He is our sanctification. He is our sanctification. We have no other sanctification
other than Him. And there will come a great day
when He's redeemed His people and He will redeem their bodies
from the grave. He will be all of our redemption. That, and
this is the reason for all that, according as it are written,
let him that glories, let him glory in the Lord. Coming up. The way up is to lean,
brothers and sisters. May God cause us to lean. May He cause us to look to Him
as He's described in His Word. And let us find Him as a sure
foundation, a tried and tested cornerstone, one that will not
fail. And when that overwhelming flood
comes upon people, and people are left finding that they have
nothing but a refuge of lies. May you brothers and sisters
be found in Him. Lean on Him now. Lean on Him
continually. Come up leaning.