Song of Solomon, chapter 2. Song of Solomon, chapter 2, and
we'll be looking at verse 16 this morning. Here the bride speaks, and she says, is mine, and I am his. He feedeth among the lilies."
The title of the message this morning is, Jesus is mine. If there is a statement that
would bring any believer in Christ joy, it is this statement. If there's any statement in Scripture
that would bring the believer such awe, it is this statement,
Jesus is mine. Mine. Hear the bride, which we
know to be the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, after she
had heard His voice, The voice of her bridegroom, Jesus calling,
and he says to her in the latter part of verse 13, he says, Arise,
my love, my fair one, and come away. Come away. Jesus says to his bride, Come
away with me. Come away with me. He says, you
are my dove. You are in the cleft of the rock,
in the secret place of the stairs. Let me see thy countenance. Let
me hear thy voice. Is this not sweet to you, believer,
that this is what your Savior sees of you? You are His dove. You are His beautiful dove. washed in His blood, clothed
in His righteousness. You are the dove hidden in the
cleft of the rock, which is Christ, our refuge, You. O timid believer,
that's what a dove is, it's timid. If you ever try to approach them,
they flee away. I'll tell you, anyone that approaches
our soul but the Lord Jesus Christ causes us great fear. Our Lord
Jesus Christ says, you are my dove and you are hidden in the
bosom of my heart. You are my beloved and your voice
is sweet. Is that not something that He
desires to hear your prayers? Is that not something that He
has to cause such grief and heartache to us? to move us to pray. And yet He says your voice is
sweet, your countenance is lovely. He loves you to appear before
Him so that He may see you in your beauty, which is His own. Your beauty is His beauty, and
He calls you to come away. And now then, the Beloved, the
Bride, is so overwhelmed. Have you ever been in the presence
of Christ and been so overwhelmed by His presence, by His words? I tell you, those times to us
are very few. But we enjoy those times. We long for those times. I long
for the day when those shadows will flee away. Earth's vain
glories and shadows will flee away and I'll just be in His
presence forever. This is the hope of every believer.
And yet we experience those so few times in this life. But we
cherish them. And this is one time where the
bride is experiencing it. She feels His presence and she
is overwhelmed by His love and she says, My Beloved is mine
and I am His. My Beloved is mine. How do you
suppose to believe such a statement as this? Jesus belongs to me. Jesus belongs to me. He is mine. He is mine. How do you suppose
you can wrap your mind, as I was studying this, I tell you, I
couldn't wrap my mind around it. I couldn't get a hold of
it. I couldn't fully understand the
overwhelming joy of this, that He is mine. He is mine, and I
am His. There was once a time where we
were dead in our sins. There was once a time where the
things of Christ meant nothing to us. There was once a time when we
were rebels and haters of God. We were by one nature of the
carnal mind that was enmity against God, that was not subject to
the law of God, neither indeed can be. Is that not something?
Man's so overwhelmed with pride and foolishness to think that
he could somehow make himself subject to God. Think of all
the things people do to themselves to make themselves subject to
God. They don't do this, they stop doing this, they start doing
this and they put themselves under such bondage and regulation
and all the while they're not subject to God. We were not subject
to God, neither indeed could be. Until when? Until God who
is rich in mercy came to us. Until God spoke to us. Until God came in the power of
His Holy Spirit and we heard. I cannot tell you how many messages
of the gospel I heard with these physical ears and had no understanding
of the gospel. I did not hear His voice. I heard
the preacher. I heard the man, but I never
heard the voice of my Savior. And it wasn't until He spoke
to my heart, it wasn't until He came to me, I heard His voice,
and we who were dead were quickened to life. It was then we were
quickened to life. We had no life. He spoke and
we had life. It was that simple. It was that
fast. It was that immediate that we
had life and Christ became ours. Can you say that Jesus Christ
is yours? Can you say that? Because if
you cannot say that, it is because you are dead in trespasses and
sins. Only those who have heard His
voice can say this. Jesus is mine. And notice how
she puts this in our text. She says, My Beloved is mine. You can only know if Jesus is
yours if He is your Beloved. Is He your Beloved? Is Jesus the sole object of your
affection? Notice I didn't say your passion.
I see people who are very hot one minute, very cold the next,
empty. Passions go up and passions go
down, don't they? I'm talking about affection.
Affection is something that lasts. Affection is what God wrought
in our heart in salvation. Is Jesus Christ your sole object
of affection? Is there anyone or anything you'd
put above Him? Do you love the Lord Jesus Christ? Do you love Him? Is there anything
that you would give, that you would take in exchange for Him? Will you love your family over
Him? Will you choose your father,
your mother, your sister, your brother? Will you love your children
or even your own life? Jesus said if a man hate not
his father and his mother and his sister and his brother and
yea his own life also. He cannot be my disciple. Why? Because his disciples have
him as the sole object of their affection. Jesus Christ is the
object of his people's love. Do you love Him above all else? If you've heard His voice, I
know this, you love Him. You love Him. You love Him because He has given
you a new heart. And you, like the psalmist, say
in your own heart, in your own soul, you say, one have I desired,
and that will I seek after. over in Philippians chapter 3. Philippians chapter 3 in verse
8. The Apostle Paul says concerning
his love for Christ, he says, Yea, doubtless I count all things
but loss. for the excellency of the knowledge
of Jesus Christ my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss
of all things and do count them but done. that I may win Christ."
Is that not your affection? Do you not count all things lost,
all things as done, that you may win Christ? Or is there something
else that you prize other than Christ? Not His people. His people
do not prize anything in this world above Him. Everything else
is easily let go for Him. Paul says, "...and to be found
in Him, not having mine own righteousness which is of the law, but that
which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which
is of God by faith, that I may know Him." Do you know Him like
you want to know Him? I'll tell you, if you ever come
to that point, it's a sad place. If you think you know all there
is to know about the Lord Jesus Christ, you say, well, I know
enough. That's all I need to know. Then you, you don't have
a true love for Him. The Apostle Paul said that I
may know Him. Now, does anybody know Him like
the Apostle Paul knew Him? We've not met him physically
as Paul did, but we've not been spoken to by the physical voice
of Christ, and yet we want to know Him. We want to know Him. And the power of His resurrection
and the fellowship of His sufferings being made conformable to His
death. We want to know Him. We love Him. I tell you, if you
love somebody, you want to know about that person. If you love
the Lord Jesus Christ, you want to know about Him. His people love Him, not like
we would, not like we should, and not like we will in glory. But this one thing is true. We
confess we love Him. I confess this morning I love
Him. Do you love Him? You remember when the Apostle
Peter denied our Lord Jesus Christ in front of those people? We know that the Lord smote his
heart and he went out and wept bitterly, didn't he? He had denied
his Savior and he wept bitterly. And when Jesus came to him, you
remember, he asked him those three times, Simon, son of Jonas,
lovest thou me more than these? And I'll tell you, every time
the Lord said that, you know it was like a dagger in his heart. Lord, you know I love you. Lord,
you know I love you. And finally he said, Lord, you
know all things. You know I love you. This is
the answer of every sinner. Lord, thou knowest I love thee.
Many times we, like the bride, have fallen asleep, and we may
fail to open to our Beloved because of our own selfishness, because
of our own greed or laziness. We fail to open unto Him. We
fail to go to Him as we should. But every time He puts His hand
to the hole of our heart, we are stirred. We are convicted and we get up,
we are moved to commune with Him and we won't be content until
we find Him. Is that not the experience of
you who love Him? That's my experience. I know
this. He is my Beloved. Is this so
with you? Do you love Him? Or can you do without Him? If
you can do without Him, you cannot say He is yours. I cannot do
without Him. I must have Him. He is mine.
His church loves Him and desires Him. He is our Beloved. Therefore,
if He is our Beloved, if we love Him, if we desire Him, then we
may say this, that my Beloved is mine. My Beloved is Mine,
and I am His." Read this in your text with me. Read it with me
again. And tell me if this is not so
with you, because when I read this, it says, My Beloved is
Mine, and I am His. Does that not seem backwards
to you? Does that not seem backwards? Automatically, I just know that
doesn't sound right. It should be, I am His, therefore
He is mine. You see, I think in order of
time. The bride here is talking about the order of experience. In the order of time, it is true
that we were His long before He became ours. Long before,
the order seems to be reversed. The Apostle Paul, in Acts chapter
27, when the ship was going, fixing to go down, he said, the
angel of the Lord stood by me. Lord Jesus Himself stood by me
and He told me what to do. And the Apostle confessed that,
he said this, he said, whose I am and whom I serve. Now that sounds like a right
order. That sounds like the right order to me. And very well it
should be this, in the way of time. The church belonged to
Christ before it ever belonged to us, but in the order of experience. The order of experience, this
is the way it must be. He must be mine. I must have Him. And then, when
we have Him, we know that we were His from eternity. We were His from eternity. Long
before we could understand the election of God, we knew. We didn't know much about eternity,
but we knew something about our need. And we, like that woman with
the issue of blood, I don't imagine she had asked much about election. She had a great need, and all
she knew is that she must touch the hem of His garment. That's
all she knew. And by order of experience, she knew that, and
when she had that, she knew then that He belonged to her because
she belonged to Him long before. This is the order of experience.
But in the order of time, I want us to see this. In the order
of time, how is it that we belong to Him? How is it that you belong
to Him? You belong to Him by a gift. A gift. The Father gave you to
His Son and you belong to Him. You belong to Him. according
as He had chosen us in Christ before the foundation of the
world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him."
The Father loved us. And having loved us, gave us
as a gift to His Son. It is by the everlasting love
of the Father we were chosen and given to Christ. We were
not given like you would give an object. I give my wife a present,
a thing. And I'll tell you, I've given
her many things, and you go into her closet, you would see all
of these things. And she couldn't, she wouldn't
say any one of them are particularly special. They've lost their luster
over time. But I'll tell you, God gave us
to Christ not as an object, but as a bride, a very special bride. As Abraham took a bride for Isaac,
even so the Father hath betrothed his church to Christ. Who then can remove this gift? If you have been given to the
Father, is there anyone that can take this gift from the Son? No. It is the gift of the Father
to the Son, and none can disannul it. Not even the host of hell,
not all the men of the world, not all the sins of men, and
not even the sins of His church could disannul this gift, because
this gift was given before there was ever sin. We were given to
the Son. Second of all, we belong to Him
by purchase. The Lord Jesus Christ purchased
us with His own blood. We were Christ by gift and by
purchase. The Son to whom the elect were
given, He in love for His church agreed to be her husband." I'll tell you, in our age, that
don't sound like much. But according to the Lord Jesus
Christ and God, in their eternal covenant of grace, it is great. Because the Son agreed to take
on the debt of the bride. Our debt, our sin debt. The Son agreed to be our Redeemer,
our Savior, And God, willing to display His sovereign grace,
not only chose us, put us in Christ as objects of His love
and grace, but Christ, in love for us, agreed to redeem us. We were predestinated to be His
sons in whom we have redemption through His blood. The forgiveness of sins according
to the riches of Christ's grace. Believer, hold on to this. When
the waves roll, and they will, when the storms come, doubts
and fears assail you to where you cannot know, is my beloved
mine? Know this, you are His. Because
He purchased you by His own blood. Blood. Jesus, our Great Shepherd, was
willing to lay down His life for you. I guarantee you, there's
nobody else that would do that. I remember when I was young,
I had my wife. I adored her. And I thought surely
that I loved her so much that I would lay down my life for
her. Oh, it was so beautiful, that
overflowing emotion and all that. It was really just lust, that's
all it was. Because I'll tell you what, after
over a period of time, you open the door for them for about two
or three weeks, and then pretty soon they're opening their own
door. Our love goes so fast, doesn't
it? But I'll tell you what, our Lord Jesus Christ loved us unto
death, even the death of the cross. So great was His love
that He became a man that He should suffer. In Hebrews 10,
He said, "...a sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but
a body thou hast prepared for Me. Lo, I come! In the volume
of the book it is written of Me to do thy will, O God!" Jesus
willingly was made flesh so that He might offer Himself in the
body as a sin offering. By the will of God, we should
be sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus once for
all. You belong to Him by purchase.
He is the Great Shepherd who laid down His life for the sheep.
And in John chapter 10, the Lord Jesus says this, And I give unto
them eternal life, and no man, no man is able to pluck them
out of My hand. We belong to Him. Who then will
take us out of His hand? Who will disannul His offering? We are His by blood purchase. Therefore, the bride may say
that I am Christ's. He bought me. Who shall separate
me from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus? Life. death, angels, principalities,
powers, not all the hosts of hell will pry you from His hands.
You are His. You are His. And thirdly, we
are His by the new birth. The bride of Christ is a gift
of the Father, it is a purchase of the Son, and it is a new creation
by the Holy Spirit of God. Do you belong to Christ? The only way you know that is
if you're born again. See, I wasn't there when God
elected a people, were you? And I tell you, I wasn't there
when the Lord Jesus Christ died for our sins. I didn't see it
with these physical eyes. How do I know these things to
be true? How is it that I can be so sure that my name is written
down in the Lamb's Book of Life that I have never seen? Because
I have been born again of the Spirit of God. I have been given
a new nature. Except a man be born again, he
cannot see the Kingdom of God. This is the work of God, the
Holy Spirit, who's like a wind. He blows where He wills. We hear
the sound, we see the effects, but we can't tell where He's
coming and where He's going. We don't know who He'll save
and who He'll let go. But we know this. Praise God,
the wind is blowing into our hearts and He is our Beloved. I love Him. I believe on Him. The gospel is preached to sinners. I charge you this morning. Has there ever been a time that
I have not pointed you to Christ? Has there ever been a message
I have not preached that has pointed you to the Savior as
all your hope? And by God's grace, I'll never
preach any other message but Him. This is the message that
saves sinners. This is the message God will
use. It is the message of His Son, the message of His blood,
the message of His righteousness and His resurrection and His
ascension. We preach this at all times.
We point you to Christ. Have I not pointed you to a successful
Savior? Jesus said it's finished. What
a blessed word that is to our souls. It is finished! The work is done! Salvation accomplished. And God raised from the dead
and ascended the Lord Jesus Christ to the throne. We say, believe
on Him and be saved. But only the Spirit of God can
do this. Isn't it something? I want my children to believe.
But there's one thing I must resign. It is not in my power
at all. It is in the power of God to
do it. Faith in Christ is a simple thing. Faith is a simple thing. And
what I mean by simple is that it's singular. There's only one ingredient in
faith. There's not multiple things that go along with faith. It's
singular. And you know, faith has one singular object. Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. That's it. Faith looks only to
Jesus Christ. Now, faith is not simple to perform. Matter of fact, faith is impossible.
With men, it is impossible. It's against a man's nature to
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Faith is not simple. Faith is
impossible unless God give it. Do you believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ? Now, you have a simple faith in that your faith looks
to Christ alone. But I tell you, it was not simple.
It was something God had to give you. He had to give it to you. For by grace you are saved through
faith. And that faith is not of yourselves. Faith is a gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast. If you believe on Jesus Christ,
it is because you were born again. Don't look to your faith. How
often we fall into such a trap as that, to lean on our faith. I tell you, your faith is only
as strong as its object. If you're looking to faith, it's
going to be very weak, isn't it? But look to Jesus Christ,
He's very strong. Faith, look to Jesus Christ alone. Do you belong to Him? You do
if you look to Him alone. And if this is true, if we by
experience know that we belong to Him, then the reverse is true. He belongs to us. He belongs to us. I know that I am His bride. Therefore, I know He is my husband. I am His body. He is my head. Just as the head and the body
are in union together, even so am I in union with Christ. I'm in union with Him. My head belongs to my body and
my body belongs to my head. There is one. He is my shepherd. I am His sheep. He is my rock
and the foundation of my salvation. He is my strength. He is my life. He is my hope. He is my love. He is my desire. He is my everything. He is mine. and I'm His. And therefore I know this, all things work together for
my good. If the Lord God of glory belongs
to me, and I belong to Him, What then could interfere with our
relationship? Nothing and nobody. I love Him above all things. He's mine. Is He yours? May God, by His grace, Open your heart to see Him as your Beloved, your All. And I'll tell you, it makes it
a lot easier to let the things of this world go. To know that
He's mine and I'm His. Who then shall separate us from
the love of God that is in Christ Jesus? Nothing. May God bless
us to your hearts.