Good evening. Good evening, sir.
I invite your attention to the
Song of Solomon, Chapter 5. Song of Solomon, Chapter 5. The Song of Solomon is one of
three books written by the wisest man who ever lived. It is said that he wrote the
song of Solomon in his youth when he was in love, young man
in love. Wrote the book of Proverbs in
his middle years, it is assumed, when his wisdom had some experience
with it. And then in his old age, having
experienced wealth and fame and fortune and having found no satisfaction
in it, he wrote, the book of Ecclesiastes. Well, this book is a love song,
a series of love songs. Canticles is the name that some
of our ancient fathers gave to this book. Love songs. These are a number of love songs
between Solomon and his wife. Her name, she's called the Shulamite. Solomon's name means peace. Her name Shulamite is the feminine
form of the name peace. But more than that, and if that's
all you see in this book is Solomon and the Shulamite, if that's
all you say, you missed the real meaning of the book. Solomon
throughout this book represents Jesus Christ, And the Shulamite
represents his wife, the church. Jesus Christ is a greater than
Solomon. And Solomon's name means peace. Jesus Christ is peace. This man
shall be peace. He is our peace, Christ our peace. And his church in harmony with
him is a peaceable woman, a peaceful woman. and at peace with her
husband. A lot of lessons here to be learned
by earthly husbands and wives observing Christ and his wife.
They should be our examples. But here in chapter five, verse
10, is my text for the night. I'm gonna preach on the subject
of what Jesus Christ is to me. But before we look in verse number
10 of Song of Solomon, chapter five, I take your attention to
verse number eight, because this verse is at the end of a passage
in which the slothfulness of the wife has caused the husband
to leave and she misses him. She's looking for him. And here
she speaks to her daughters, the daughters of Jerusalem. Now,
if the Shulamite is the church, the daughters of Jerusalem would
be the respective members in the church. And she says to them,
I charge you, oh, daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved,
that you tell him that I am lovesick. Twice in this song, she says,
I'm lovesick. I'm lovesick. I'm smitten, lovesick. That is the best infirmity to
have on this earth, lovesickness for Christ. She says it twice. One time is when she's in his
presence and enjoying his company. And the other time is when He's
gone. He's away from her. This lets
us know that we should be lovesick for Christ when he is absent
from us and we should be lovesick for Christ when he is with us.
Absence makes the heart grow fonder and. Looking into his
eyes. And hearing his voice. And enjoying
his fellowship. That. That just increases the
lovesickness, makes you love him all the more. And she says,
tell him, when you find him, tell my husband, I'm lovesick.
I want him. Tell him to come. I'm lovesick
for him. And they reply. In verse nine,
what is your beloved more than another beloved, oh, fairest
among women? What is your beloved more than
another beloved that you so charge us? Amen. What is so special
about Jesus Christ that you want us to go looking for him and
tell him you love him? What do you find in Jesus Christ
that is so special and makes him so dear to you. And notice
that they ask the question twice. I assume that there is a reason
for asking the question twice. I would hope that when you walked
through that door tonight, that you would have said to the
preacher, Why don't you tell us what is, what's so special
about Christ to you? I mean, you're going to get into
the pulpit and you know, what's so special about Christ? Tell
us. I mean, I'm not going to talk to you
about my religion like many preachers would. And I'm not going to talk
to you about my church like many preachers would. Not gonna talk
to you about my cathedral or, you know, the beauty of the building
like many preachers would. We come into this pulpit and
it is our intention to tell you about Jesus Christ. Well, what's
so special about him? What is your beloved more than
any other beloved? What's so special about him? I would hope that at least someone
walked in that door tonight with that thought, you know, Moose,
what's so special about him? Well, I'm going to tell you.
You just give me a few minutes. I'm going to get there in a minute.
I'm going to tell you what's so special about him. But I hope
that after I've done so, you'll come back through that door next
Lord's Day morning. I said, well, John, what do you
find so special about him? What is your beloved more than
any of the beloved? There's all kinds of beloveds
in this world. What makes yours so special?
What is so special about Jesus Christ? Well, I'm glad you asked
because I'm gonna tell you what Jesus Christ is to me. She does. She, his church, She now describes
her husband in 10 particulars, describing his body. She uses
physical features to describe spiritual attributes. And we
will look at these. I'm not going to look at all
at all tonight. I'm just going to look at verse
number 10, but she starts and she describes his complexion,
his head, his eyes, his cheeks, his lips, his hands, his body,
his legs, his countenance and his mouth. 10 parts of his body. 10 is a number of completion. He is a complete man. He is a
perfect man. This one of whom I'm gonna tell
you tonight. My beloved is white and ruddy,
verse 10. chief among 10,000. His head
is like the finest gold. His locks are wavy and black
as a raven. His eyes are like doves by the
rivers of waters washed with milk and fitly set. His cheeks
are like a bed of spices, like banks of scented herbs. His lips
are lilies dripping liquid myrrh. His hands are rods of gold, set
with beryl. His body is carved ivory, inlaid
with sapphires. His legs are pillars of marble,
set on bases of fine gold. His countenance is like Lebanon,
excellent as the cedars. His mouth is most sweet, yes,
he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this
is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem. You asked me what's
so special about him. There it is. There it is. Well,
we have not the time to deal with the whole passage tonight,
but we are going to look here at this first verse. In the first verse, consider
with me. The fact that my beloved is white
and ruddy, chief among 10,000. This is not his physical complexion. If you're looking for a white
Jesus, you'll have to go to an idolater who can make one for
you, but it's worthless. You want a black Jesus, you can
go to a black idolater and he'll make one for you because idolaters
usually make Jesus to look like themselves. It is said that God
made man in his own image and idolatry is man's way of returning
the favor, making God in his image. You look at pictures of
Jesus, you can usually tell a lot about the artist. The artist
usually says, Jesus ought to look like me. Well, if that's
what you're looking for, folks, you've missed it all. He is white
and ruddy. He is the perfect combination
of white and red. Ruddy means red. Ruddy has the
connotation of health to us and he is healthy. He is healthy. But here is white and red perfectly
joined together in three ways, in at least three ways. Here
in being white and ruddy is Christ in his dual natures, in his incarnation. White represents his divine nature. He is righteous, holy, godly,
sinless, impeccably so. White represents those things. Your robe of righteousness, it's
white. And your holiness, it's white. What does the red represent?
That's his human nature. He came as the second Adam. If
you look at the name Adam and look at the meaning of the name,
the name means red. Red, that's Christ in his human
nature. He is the perfect combination
of white and red. White representing his divine
nature and red representing his human nature. White and red represent
Jesus Christ and his relationship to the law when he was here on
this earth. White represents his sinless
conduct. He was born under the law, fulfilled
it in every jot and tittle. Whatever the law said to do,
he did. Whatever the law forbade, he
abstained from. He was born with the words on
his lips that said, I delight to do your will and your law
was written in my heart. And from his mother's womb, he
fulfilled that law in perfectly in every detail and there's a
whiteness regarding his innocence. Red denotes him fulfilling the
law in dying in the place of sinners and shedding his blood
for them. This is why the twice we hear
Jesus Christ saying it is finished. At first, when he fulfilled the
law and his active obedience, he said, Father, I have finished
the work you have given me to do. And when he shed his blood
to fulfill the law with regard to its condemnation of me and
the rest of God's elect, and shed his red precious blood for
our sins, he again shouted, it is finished. There you have the
white and the red perfectly joined together. You'll also find white
and red perfectly joined together with regard to his dual glorious
garments in both of his advents. When he came to earth the first
time, he was transfigured on a mountain and there with Moses
and Elijah, the Bible says that his garments were glistening
white, whiter than any launderer could make them, glowingly white. glistening white, shining white,
brightly white. That's Christ when he came to
earth this first time in his first advent, glorious apparel
representing his holiness and his righteousness. But when he
comes back the second time, his garment is red. Who is this that
comes from Edom? with garments stained in blood. And he says, it is I, glorious
in my apparel, I have come to stomp the enemies of God in perfect
righteousness. And there you see white and red
perfectly joined together. That's my beloved, folks. My
beloved, the one I love, the one who loves me, my beloved
is white and ruddy, perfectly. And he is chief among 10,000.
Chief among 10,000. This Hebrew word translated chief
has to do with the standard bearer. When a squadron of soldiers is
on the march, there's going to be one man out front. and he's
probably gonna be a center of attention. He's probably carrying
the standard for his squadron or for his troop, his platoon,
and he's marching smartly. This is Christ at the head of
his people. He's the standard bearer. He
is the most conspicuous, and he is chief among 10,000. He is fairer than the sons of
men, Psalm 45, verse two. fairer than the sons of men. I suppose some men, if not almost
all, look in the mirror every morning and say, you know, mirror
says I look pretty good. And either mirrors are liars
or else we enjoy lying to ourselves, whichever the case is. But in
this one, there's a fair one. He is fairer than the sons of
men. The mirror does not lie to Christ
when it tells him he's the fairest of them all. He is. He is fairer
than the sons of men. And furthermore, what should
we expect other than that? He is the image of the invisible
God. He is, the scriptures declare,
the brightness of God's glory and the express image of his
person. And so it is no wonder that the
church of Christ and the daughters of Jerusalem, the members of
Christ's church, they look upon him and they say, he's chief
among 10,000. 10,000. Ten being a number of completion
and thousand being a number of completion, put all them in together. Jesus Christ is head and shoulders
above them all, fairer than all of them, sweeter than all of
them, better than all of them, greater than all of them, grander
than all of them. That's my beloved. That is my
beloved. He's fairer than the sons of
men and chief among 10,000. He is chief among 10,000 friends. I've been blessed with, I suppose,
thousands of friends. And I've been blessed. I've got good
friends. I drove in here to this little
town, Some fellow met me and said, here, I got a place for
you to stay. And he had the refrigerator stocked. And the place was already
cooled off. Somebody else came by and said,
here, we're taking you to dinner. And then some friends came to
hear me tonight. I've got good friends. I've got
good friends. And it's in other places, too.
The Lord has been so good to his preachers, giving them friends.
I love my friends. But as much as I love you, I
must tell you there's a friend I have who's better than you.
And as much as I would be a friend to you, there is a friend who
is better to you than I could ever be. It is this one who is
chief among 10,000 friends. He is the foremost proof that
a man who has friends must himself be friendly. Jesus Christ has
friends, but they were all enemies. All of them were enemies against
him, but he proved himself friendly. He came to them when they were
enemies against him. He came to them when they were
best friends with his arch adversary, the devil. He came to them with
overtures of kindness and mercy and grace, and we spurned him. And still he came back from time
to time through the preaching of the word and let us know I
do love you. I do love you. I'll be your friend
if you need one. No, I don't think I do. Don't
think I do. And then one day I cried for help and Jesus showed
up. What's the problem? I just realized
I'm a sinner. I just realized it. I'm under,
I'm under God's condemnation. I deserve to die. And he says, well, let me be
your friend. I'll take care of it. Be my friend. Please be my
friend. He showed himself friendly to
me and he became my friend. He's done that to all of his
friends. They all were enemies. He is
the foremost proof that a man who has friends must be himself
friendly. He is the foremost proof that
there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. Proverb
18 verse 24. I have two brothers. We were
inseparable in our youth, best of friends, best of brothers. But in the course of time, we
were scattered. I'm down in the Caribbean. I've
got a brother in Nevada, and I've got another brother in Kentucky. You know, we're just scattered
about as far between as we can be and still be in North America. And, you know, there are certain
things they cannot do for me. They're not there, you know,
when I need them. It's not their fault. They give to me what moral
support they can through whatever means. But if I need someone
there, they're not there, my brothers. They would if they
could. But even brothers are incapable
of helping us out of some situations, but not this one. He's a friend
who sticks closer than a brother. He will never leave me. He will
never forsake me. And he is never too busy to take
care of all my needs. He's a friend, the chief among
10,000 friends. He is the foremost proof that
a friend loves at all times. He loves at all times, immutably. Husband warning too. show his wife some endearment,
says, honey, I love you more today than yesterday, but not
as much as tomorrow. And if she's wise enough, she'll
say, well, you know, that's kind of hypocritical of you, is it
not? How come I have to wait until tomorrow to get more love
from you? But it's not that way with Christ.
Not that way with Christ. He never says, I love you more
today than yesterday, but I'll love you more tomorrow. He never
says it. He says, The love that I'm going to show you when you
reach heaven, the love that when you reach heaven, when I embrace
you in heaven's glory, the love that I'm going to show for you
there is the same love I had for you before time began. He
appeared to me of old and said, I have loved you with an everlasting
love. He has been a friend whose love
has never failed. He is a friend who loves at all
times. And I'm glad to say the scriptures
also say he's a friend of sinners. Actually, that was his enemies
who said that the scriptures recorded. He's a friend of sinners. I'm so glad because I'm a sinner
and the self-righteous are not going to be my friends. The holier
than thou are not going to be my friends. But in this one,
he's a friend of sinners. Well, he's the chief among 10,000
friends because he's the friend of all true sinners. He proved his friendship to me
when he said, greater love has no one than this than to lay
down one's life for his friends. I do not know that any, I think
I can say with certainty no one laid his life down for me. No
one ever did. I'm a military veteran, and I
gave four years of my life for my country. And I know of many
men who gave their lives for their country. But Jesus did
more than that. He gave his life for specific
individuals. And I was one of them. He gave
his life for me. Greater love has no man than
this. And a man laid down his life for his friends. He counted
me his friend. Well, I want to be his friend.
I want him for my friend. He is chief among 10,000 friends. He is chief among 10,000 prophets. Locate Deuteronomy chapter 18.
He is the chief among 10,000 prophets. What is a prophet?
A prophet is a spokesman from God. He is an intermediary. As it were, he gets a word from
God because God is not going to talk to people. They're sinners
and so God gets a prophet and he says, you go tell them what
I said. That's what the prophets did.
The prophets received the word from God and they were God's
spokesmen to his people. In the book of Deuteronomy chapter
18, Verse 18, Jehovah said, I will
raise up for them a prophet like Moses from among their brethren,
a prophet like Moses but greater. He's gonna be an Israelite. I
will put my words in his mouth and he shall speak to them all
that I command him. It shall be that whoever will
not hear my words, which he speaks in my name, I will require it
of him. This is serious business, folks.
God sent a prophet. He said he would. He did. In
the epistle to the Hebrews, we read that God, who in various
ways and sundry manners spoke in time past to the fathers,
has in these last days spoken unto us by his son, Jesus Christ. He's the fulfillment of the prophecy.
He's the fulfillment of the prophecy. He is greater than all prophets
who ever lived before him. Greater than them all. There
were many of them greater than them all. This was demonstrated
on the Mount of Transfiguration. When Jesus went apart from his
disciples and and there as they watched him Going away for a
short distance, they looked and all of a sudden his garments
became glowingly white. He was transfigured before them. And lo and behold, two men stood
there with Jesus on that mountain. And they're looking at each other,
who is this? They just showed up. Why brethren,
this is Moses and Elijah. showing up, that's Moses and
Elijah. Do you realize that the three
greatest of the prophets are right there in front of us? We
need to do something to honor this occasion. Let us build three
tabernacles. One for Moses, one for Elijah,
and one for Jesus, the three great prophets. And God interrupted
that notion in a hurry. He would have none of that. No,
this is my son. You hear him. And Moses would
agree. Yes, he is God's son. I told you he was coming. You
hear him. I'm done speaking, Moses would
say. I'm done speaking. I told you
he's coming and here he is. Elijah would say the same. He
comes a greater prophet than me. And his mantle, I'm not worthy
to bear. His mantle is greater than mine. And there he is. And that's God
letting us know he's the chief among 10,000 prophets. Greatest of all the prophets
who came before him and greater than all the prophets who came
after them because they all are false prophets. He's the final
prophet. He spoke and God had said enough. Jesus said it. That's all that
needs to be said. We have a complete revelation
from God now in this book. Jesus said, behold, I come quickly. And then he told John, God's
through speaking. Close the book. And that's my
prophet. And yet people all around the
world looking for a profit, looking for a profit. Some years ago,
my wife and I, it was evening time, we were in our house, knock
on the door, two young men, white shirts, black ties, little name
tags identifying these young boys as elders. They asked if
they could come in and talk with us about their prophet. And we
spotted them, you know, they're Mormons, we know it immediately.
Why, sure, come right on in. With this one condition, we will
listen to you talk about your prophet. You take whatever time
you want. But when you're done, I get the same amount of time
to tell you about my prophet. Is that fair enough? Yeah. They did not know who I was.
You know, they just knew I had some prophet. He can't be as
good as Joseph Smith, I suppose they thought. But they came in
and, you know, we courteously listened to them. And they talked
for quite some time about their prophet Joseph Smith, about,
you know, the magic stones he found and how he, you know, had
these visions and wrote a New Testament or another testament.
And we listened to them for a while, and then they got through. And
when they were through, I said, okay, I get to talk to you about
my prophet, right? Yes, his name is Jesus Christ. And I went to this prophecy here
in Deuteronomy 18, and then demonstrated from the New Testament that Jesus
Christ is the prophet, and that God has in these last days, And
if you're in the church of the Latter Day Saints, that should
be important to you. In these last days, he's spoken
to us by his son and nobody else. Nobody else. We do not need another
prophet. People are welcome to theirs,
but I did something else then. You still got your Bible open
to Deuteronomy chapter 18. Look in verse 20, I read these
words to them. But the prophet who presumes
to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak,
or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall
die. The law of Moses required it.
And if you say in your heart, how shall we know the word which
Jehovah has not spoken? Well, When a prophet speaks in
the name of Jehovah, if the thing does not happen or come to pass,
that is the thing which Jehovah has not spoken, the prophet has
spoken it presumptuously, you shall not be afraid of him. Meaning
it, he shall die. So, I told two young men, I said, I'm willing to put my prophet
to the test. I'll put him to the test. If
you can show me one prophecy that he ever made, one doctrine
he ever taught, one teaching of his that was false, but one
prophecy that could not, will not, and cannot come to pass,
I would be the first to say that Jesus Christ deserves to die
according to the law of Moses. Now, would you join me? Yeah,
yeah, yeah, if Jesus, If Jesus ever prophesied falsely, he deserves
to die. All right. Now let's put your prophet to
the test. Same test. If I can show to you a prophecy
that Joseph Smith made that could not come to pass, will not come
to pass, impossible to come to pass, would you join me in saying
that he deserves to die according to the law of Moses, that prophet
shall die. And they said, oh, no, no, no.
Because evidently they knew, like I knew, that there are some
prophecies he made which cannot... Folks, he proved himself to be
a false prophet. He proved it in a prophecy that
never came to pass. And yet here are his followers. They know he's a false prophet.
And they say, he's the chief of them all. Oh, really? No, no, no. I can show you a
prophet that no one can bring any fault against. Every word
he spoke, even God said, hear him, hear him. This is my son. And God put his approval on him.
Now, if Jesus Christ is God's prophet, then let me say to you,
he's the chief among 10,000. He's the one I want. He's the
one I want. And he is the chief among 10,000
priests. What is a priest? The prophet
is God's representative to the people. The priest is the people's
representative to God, taking their sacrifices, making the
sacrifices for them in their behalf unto God. And there were
hundreds of priests. There were thousands of priests
who preceded Jesus Christ. The priesthood was established
in 1440 BC when the Lord brought Israel out of Egyptian bondage
to Mount Sinai and established a covenant. And there were thousands
of priests, and they worked there in that tabernacle. You know
what they did? They came to work early in the
morning, and people started bringing their animals in. First was the
lamb. put that lamb on the altar, and
every morning at sunrise, they slew a lamb, shed its blood. When the sun went down, they
slew another one. And all day long, people brought
their sin offerings and their trespass offerings. And those
priests stood at that altar all day long and slew animals for
the sacrifices for Israel's sins. standing in an ocean of blood,
that altar creaking under the groan of thousands of lambs and
bullets and heifers and bulls. And they did it from 1440 BC
until one day Jesus Christ came and went to Calvary as the high
priest of God and made one sacrifice for sins forever and it was over. The writer to the Hebrew says
that every priest stands, stands, lots of furniture in that tabernacle,
not a single solitary chair, not even a three-legged stool,
no place for a man to sit down all day long from sunup to sundown,
seven days a week. Offering sacrifices, every priest
stands daily, ministering the same sacrifices, which can never
take away sins, because if they ever took away sins, the sacrifices
stop. But this man, Jesus Christ, having
made one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down, finished his sacrifice,
and God said, come on up here, son, I've got a throne for you.
Come on up here. And the high priest representing
me, my high priest, made a sacrifice for sins and God set him down
on his own throne in heaven. That's my priest, folks. Let
me tell you about my priest. He's the chief among 10,000 priests. I can go on and on and on in
this. It is an inexhaustible subject, but I'll just deal with
one I have dealt with The mediatorial offices, the prophet, God's representative
to the people, the priest, the people's representative to God.
He's also the chief among 10,000 kings. How do we know? He's king of kings and Lord of
lords. Now that's my beloved. That's
my beloved. The world says that there's no
beauty in him that we should desire him. He's despised and
rejected of men and a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
In your eyes he is. In your eyes he is. But in my
eyes, my beloved is white and ruddy, chief among 10,000. What is your beloved more than
any other beloved? That's what he is. He's everything
to me. All in all, if you need a friend, and you
do, let me commend mine to you. You
need a prophet to know what God has said. Let me commend mine
to you. You need a priest to make satisfaction
to God for your sins. I commend mine to you. You need
a king to protect you, provide for your needs, take care of
you. I commend mine. This is my beloved. Oh, daughters
of Jerusalem. And though God, our father magnify
your son in our presence. Do your glory in Jesus name.
We humbly pray.