In the Song of Solomon, chapter
four and verse eight, the Lord Jesus Christ himself, speaking
to his bride, says, come with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with
me from Lebanon. Look from the top of Amenah,
from the top of Shinar, and Hermon, from the lion's den, from the
mountains of the leopards, Here he's speaking to his bride. He's
calling her to come with him. And it's clear that now, you
know, a lot of commentators, they'll divide this up into the
courtship and the marriage and then the marriage life. Well,
it's clear that Christ and his bride are now married. He calls
her his spouse. And he addresses her that way,
his church. his bride, his spouse. And this
is the union, the blessed, glorious union between Christ and his
church that comes about as the church, each and every believer
that make up the true church was betrothed to him before the
foundation of the world in divine electing grace. And how Christ,
as he is the surety of his bride, the surety of his people, came
to earth and paid the dowry, he paid the redemption price
and brought about the ground upon which she would be qualified. Because there's no qualification
in ourselves, you see. Remember, always remember that
whenever you see these words about the bridegroom and the
bride, he's the worthy bridegroom, we're the unworthy bride. Our
relationship with him is not a matter of merit on our part. It's not a matter of what we
are by nature, for we are, we have sold ourselves out to the
world naturally, but he came and got us and brought us back.
And he qualified. He washed us in his blood. He
clothed us in his righteousness. And that's our qualification.
It's the grace of God. It's not that the bride chooses
him. It's he chose the bride and brought
it to himself. And then he married her. And
if you look over in the passage, I'll just give you an example.
Romans 7 it speaks of this marriage union and verse 4 of Romans chapter
7 where the Apostle Paul says wherefore my brethren you also
are become dead to the law by the body of Christ now there's
the qualification Having been under the law by nature, condemned
under the law, that's what we deserved, what we earned. Now, the law has been satisfied,
justice has been satisfied. How? By our faith? No. By our repentance? No. By our works? No. By the body of Christ. dying
for us on that cross, satisfying justice, bringing forth that
righteousness in which the bride is clothed, his righteousness
imputed. And it says that all that took
place for this reason, look at it, that in order that you should
be married to another, there it is, married to Christ, even
to him who's raised from the dead, he's our life. that we
should bring forth fruit unto God. And that little verse right
there speaks of the beauty and the fruitfulness of Christ that
is displayed and worked out in the bride. And that's one of
the things I wanted to say about Song of Solomon, hear these verses. When he goes through here, he
describes the beauty of the bride and the fruitfulness of the bride.
But I entitled the lesson, The Beauty and Fruitfulness of Christ.
Now why did I do that? Did I miss the point? No. It's
because the beauty and the fruitfulness of the bride is that which belongs
to Christ and that he gives her. So our beauty is Christ. Our fruitfulness is Christ. He's
the vine. We're the branches. So the fruitfulness,
and what is that fruitfulness? Well, it's faith in Him. It's
repentance from ourselves, our dead works. It's the fruit of
the Spirit, love, joy, peace, all of that. Perseverance in
the, that's the fruit, see? And He's the vine, the power,
the life comes from the vine. The life of Christ within us
is from Him. So that our beauty and our fruitfulness
is His. And I think that's expressed
well by the prophet Jeremiah when he talks about, in Jeremiah
23, the Lord being the Lord our righteousness. And he goes on,
he says that in Jeremiah 23 in verse six, he said, His name,
Christ's name, shall be the Lord our righteousness, Jehovah Sid
Canu. You may have heard that term.
But then over in Jeremiah 33 verse 16, he talks about her
name, the church. Her name shall be Jehovah Sid
Canu, the Lord our righteousness. Now what does that mean? That
means when we're married to Christ, just like a man and a woman are
married, when they're married, the woman takes his name. They
become one flesh. And that's what happens when
we're married to Christ. He is our righteousness. He is
our justification. He is our sanctification. He
is our redemption. And so now he calls her to go
with him. Come with me from Lebanon. Lebanon
is a place in the Bible that is very highly regarded. Not because of its religion now.
But because of its beauty, its fruitfulness, the name literally
means white mountain. That's what it means. Moses called
it the goodly mountain over in Deuteronomy chapter three. And
of course, when I think of Lebanon, I think of Psalm 92 where it
talks about the cedars of Lebanon. That's when the psalmist compares
the quality of the cedar trees to God's people. They're beautiful,
they're stately, And they're lasting, they're strong, not
because of anything naturally in themselves, but because of
God, because of Christ. He mentions Ammanah, he mentions
Shinar, he mentions Hermon, those are mountains in Syria. And then
he talks about lions and leopards. Some commentators would say this,
if you travel through these mountains, you would be in danger to be
attacked by these animals. And what Christ, I believe, is
saying to his bride there, come with me, I'll protect you. I'll take care of you. I'll be
with you. Nothing will harm you or touch
you as far as your life is concerned, as far as your right relationship
with God is concerned. And that's his divine love and
his divine power expressed toward his bride. He saves us. He keeps
us and he'll bring us to glory. And I can say it this way, no
matter what, you know, if this country goes belly up, which
I hate to even think about that, we're fine. We're going to be
fine. Now, aren't we? We're in Christ. He's our shield. He's our buckler. He's our hiding place. He's our
high tower. You see all those terms that
are given to him. So he's going to protect us as
we go through these mountains, as we are attacked, Satan attacks
us, the world attacks us, sometimes our own flesh attacks us. But
if we're washed in his blood and clothed in his righteousness,
we're gonna be fine. So what he's doing here, when
he says, come with me, he's saying, come with me, leave the world
behind. Stay with me. And then look at verse nine.
This is Christ speaking to the bride. Listen to this language.
He says, thou hast ravished my heart. And he calls her my sister,
my spouse. She is both his spouse, his wife,
and his sister. Now we know something about that.
When we get married, two believers are married. The man is the woman's
husband, but she's also the woman's brother. in Christ. The woman
is the man's wife, but she's also the man's sister in Christ.
And these are the different roles by which Christ described his
relationship to his people. And he says, when he says, you've
ravished, you might have this in your concordance, you've taken
away my heart. And what that means is simply
this, that his heart, and I'll tell you what, this is overwhelming.
The heart of Jesus Christ is sat and consumed with his people,
with his bride. I think about John 13 one where
it talks about he loved his own until the end. He loved his people,
his bride, his sister, his spouse so much that he set his face
like a flint to do whatever was required and whatever it took
to save her and to cleanse her and to bring her into his bosom. You know, the high priest of
Israel wore garments. He had amulets on his shoulder,
and on his shoulder, on those amulets, six on one side and
six on the other were the names of the tribes of Israel. but
he had his breastplate too, and he had six and six, the same
names. So that tells us two things,
that not only were we put upon Christ's shoulders, he carried
us. All of our salvation conditioned
on him, and he fulfilled those conditions. He put the burden
of the church upon his shoulder, and he made himself of no reputation,
and was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross,
to do everything that the Father required to save her and to qualify
her and to bring her to himself. But not only were we on his shoulder,
we're on his heart. That's what the breastplate.
We're on his heart. And that's what he says here.
He says, his heart, She has consumed his heart. Now why is that? Because is there any, we're all
together unlovely. She said, you remember back in
chapter one, she said, I'm black, but comely. Sinful. What is there in us that would
consume or ravish the heart of the holy, harmless, undefiled
son of God? And I'll tell you exactly what
it is. His own glory. His own glory. There is, listen,
think about it this way. You know, when God created this
world, He showed forth His glory, didn't He? But not the fullness
of it. Now, He showed forth His power,
His wisdom, and other things. Romans 1 talks about that. Genesis
1. He showed forth His glory. But
this created world didn't consume his heart. You know how I know
that? Because it fell, and it's going to be burned up. And he's
going to bring forth a new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth
righteousness. God shows forth his glory in
providence, but this The governance of this world didn't consume
his heart because his providence even reaches to the heathen.
The king's heart is in God's hand to turn it as he will, that's
just not good kings. But there's only one place, one
work that we see the fullness of the glory of God, how every
attribute of God, Y'all have seen these books, The Attributes
of God? I think Stephen Charnock has
one, and then Arthur Pink. Those are good books, talking
about the attributes of God. Well, there's only one place
where every one of those attributes are manifested, working consistently
together, and you know where that is? in the salvation and
redemption and justification and sanctification and preservation
and glorification of his bride. And that's consumed his heart.
This is what he says here in verse nine. Thou hast ravaged
my heart, my sister, my spouse. Thou hast ravished my heart.
He says it twice. This is emphasis. You've got
to know. And that tells us this, we were talking about this earlier.
If God loves you, you're in good shape. That's right. He loved us when we hated him. If God loves you, Christ died
for you. If God loves you and Christ died
for you, he's going to bring you from death unto life and
bring you to himself. He's gonna make you his wife. That's what he's going to do.
You're going to be married to him. You're okay. We were talking about this, too,
earlier. I said, you know, I told a preacher years ago, he's a
free will Baptist preacher, and he went to the same gym that
Debbie and I go to, and he'd seen me on TV, and, you know,
the first thing they do, you know, they negatively say, you're
a Calvinist, you know, and all that junk. we got to talking
about it. And I told him this, I said,
let me ask you one question. Can you find in the Bible, from
Genesis to Revelation, any example of evangelism where God's preachers
stood up before lost people and said, God loves you and Christ
died for you? Can you find that in the Bible?
And the answer's no. Now they stood before lost people
and they said, God saves sinners and here's how he does it, through
the blood and righteousness of his son by his grace. But they
never stood before people and looked at them and just blankedly
said, God loves all of you and Christ died for all of you, now
the rest is up to you. That's a false gospel. But when we talk about the love
of Christ for his people, the love of God for his people, It's
a love that never fails. And not only, and this is why
this got a hold of me, because, you know, sometimes we'll say,
well, Christ loves his people, and that kind of goes in one
ear and out the other. Listen to what he says here. You've
ravished my heart. Like a man in love with his bride,
you've ravished my heart. His love singularly is upon his
people, but look on. He says in verse nine, with one
of thine eyes, with one chain of thine neck. What does that
mean? Well, one eye is a single eye.
And what is he saying here? The bride has her single eye,
her single mind, her head is turned toward Christ and no other. I think about the Apostle Paul
over here in 2 Corinthians chapter 11. When false preachers were
creeping in to turn their eyes away from Christ and on themselves
and on other things, and Paul said in verse three of 2 Corinthians
11, he said, I fear lest by any means as the serpent begot Eve
through his subtlety, So your mind should be corrupted from
the simplicity that is in Christ. What is that simplicity? That's
the singleness, singularity, that Christ is everything God
requires of me and everything I need for salvation. His glorious person, I don't
need any other person for salvation. His glorious work, of redeeming
me by his blood on the cross, that's all I need. To wash away
all my sins. Don't need to look anywhere else.
Don't need to look to me within. But you see, Satan subtly creeps
in and tries to get God's people to look elsewhere. But by his
grace and power, we don't. And that's what I think this
means, with one of thine eyes, with one chain on thy neck. We're focused on Him, and Him
alone. In Him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily, and we're complete in Him. That's the issue. We'll look back at verse 10 now.
He says, how fair is thy love, my sister, my spouse. That's our love for Him. You
know, when I think about my love for Christ, I really sort of
feel bad because my love is so pitiful. There's still so much self-love
in me, you know? And a lot of times it becomes
a rival. But he says, how fair is thy
love? And how can it be said to be
fair? It's beautiful, it's what it means. He says, how much better
is thy love than wine? You know, wine back then was
a symbol of joy. Sometimes it's a symbol of the
work of the Spirit. He says, and the smell of thine
ointments than all spices. A sweet smelling savor to God. Sometimes the things I think
and the things I do, they stink. But you see, this is the bridegroom
speaking of his bride as she is manifesting and empowered
with the grace of God. And why is this love so beautiful?
Well, here in his love, not that we loved him, but that he loved
us and gave his son to be the propitiation for our sins. My love still falls short of
the perfection of love. The perfection of love that Christ
had for me. But here's the fact of it. I'm
not bragging, and I hope you're not seeing it that way. I do
love Christ. I do love God. Not perfectly
yet, but I do. And how do I know that? Well,
I love his truth. I can't sit under the preaching
of a false gospel. I'll tell you why. If I went to a service and they
were talking about my mother, for example, if the preacher
got up there and started lying on my mother, how long do you
think I would sit there? I would sit there for a minute,
or even my father. I wouldn't sit there for a minute.
Well, what am I gonna do if I go into a service and that preacher's
lying on my heavenly father? Lying on my bridegroom, my husband? Am I gonna sit there and say
amen? Oh, well, they just, you know,
they're just second-class Christians. No, I'm not gonna do that. You can't love Christ and not
love his truth. Because what does his truth do?
It describes Him, it identifies Him, it distinguishes Him so
that we know who He is. We know how He saves. We know that He loves us and
He keeps us. And that's better than wine.
We do love Him. And in Christ, because of His
sacrifice, the spotless Lamb of God giving Himself in our
place, We are a sweet-smelling savor unto God, better than all
spices. That's something. That's not natural to us. Look
at verse 11. He says, 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. What about the lips and the tongue? Well, what is
he talking about? He's talking about our speech. how our lips and
our tongues, our mouth, from the heart are filled with expressions
of His glory. What are we doing here this morning?
We're worshiping Him. I feel very comfortable, as long
as I stand up here and brag on Christ. I feel very comfortable
to be up here before you, and those who are listening by internet, if I tell you about
His beauty and His glory, His love, His redemption, His righteousness. That's what our lips and our
tongue are all about. It's preaching the gospel, telling
the truth. And it's like honey and milk. You know, those were very precious
things in the Bible. You remember when God gave them
the promised land, it was often described as a land of milk and
honey. And that's what the gospel, that's
what the word of God is to us. That's what our fellowship is.
Coming together, this is a land of milk and honey, provided fully,
100% by our Savior. That's what this is. And it provides the The smell
of the sweet smell of Christ, the smell of our garments. Well,
what are our garments? They're the garments of salvation.
Remember over in Isaiah chapter 61, he talks about the garments
of salvation. Well, that begins with the foundational
garment, which is Christ's righteousness imputed to us. That's a sweet-smelling
savor unto God. What are our works? What are
our righteousness? Isaiah said it, our righteousness
is our filthy rags. But His righteousness, charged
to my account, is a sweet-smelling savor. But then it's also the
garments of salvation, the grace of God, life given, faith and
repentance. In Isaiah 61 and verse 10, I
will greatly rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my
God, for He hath clothed me with the garments of salvation. He
hath covered me with the robe of righteousness. As the bridegroom
decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself
with her jewels. Look at verse 12 back in Song
of Solomon. I'm gonna read these next few
verses together because all of these are elements that describe
the beauty of God's grace. Listen to what he says in verse
12, a garden. Now we've talked about the beauty.
Now here comes the fruitfulness, all right? And it's like a garden,
a garden enclosed in my sister, my spouse, a spring shut up,
a fountain, a well-watered garden, growing in grace and knowledge,
growing in the graces of the spirit, the gifts of the spirit.
He says, verse 13, thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates.
You know, pomegranate is a picture of God's grace and his lordship
and all of that. He says, with pleasant fruits,
camphor, and with spikenard, the healing element, spikenard
and saffron, calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense. Those are the healing elements. You could probably take each
one and apply it. Commentators will say different
things about them, but the point that he's making here is that
this is the fruitfulness. of his bride because of his goodness,
his power, and his grace. All trees of frankincense, myrrh
and aloes, that's healing. And he says, with all the chief
spices. Verse 15, a fountain of gardens,
a well of living waters. That's Christ. Remember what
he told the woman at the well. A fountain of living waters and
streams from Lebanon. There's Lebanon again. But look
at verse 16, he said, and all these, these are poetic symbols
of the fruitfulness of his garden, which is his church. They shall
bear fruit. Over in Romans chapter seven
there, where I read from verse four, down at verse six, it talks
about bearing fruit unto God, which means fruit that gives
God the glory. It's not fruit that we produce,
it's fruit that we bear from the life of the vine, the water
that comes from Christ, the water of life. And then verse 16, he
says, Awake, O north wind, and come thou south. Blow upon my
garden that the spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved
come into his garden and eat his pleasant fruits. Now the
north, you know, there are all kinds of different types and
pictures in the Old Testament. And the North normally speaks
of God's sovereign throne of judgment. You know, Israel's
punishment, for example, under the Old Covenant often came down
from the North. The South normally pictures the
pleasant graces of God and all that. And we could talk about
the East and the West, but talking about the coming of Christ and
all of that. But what I believe he's talking
about, this symbol, is the Holy Spirit, who is the spirit of
truth and judgment. Remember, when the Spirit comes,
he will convict his people of sin, because they believe not
on me, of righteousness, because I go to the Father, and of judgment,
because the prince of this world is cast out. All those have to
do with judgment, right judgment. I preached on this Wednesday
night back in Ashland, repentance and righteous judgment. And what
happens here when the north wind comes down, that's the power
of the Holy Spirit who is often compared to a wind. You remember
in John chapter three when the Lord talked about you must be
born again? And he said the wind bloweth and listeth where it
will, and you don't know from whence it came, but you know,
basically he's saying you know it by the effects thereof. The
Holy Spirit imparts life in the new birth. And so this is talking
about how the Holy Spirit in the spirit of righteous judgment
through the word of God, comes through the church, works and
keeps her and teaches her that she may be fruitful, that the
spices thereof may flow out. We preach the gospel throughout
the world. We're a witness of light to the
world. And then when he says, let my
beloved come into his garden and eat his pleasant fruits,
that's talking about our union with Christ. Consumed with one
another and that that's what the Holy Spirit does to the church
the Holy Spirit continually keeps us consumed with Christ If you
want to know if the Spirit of God is present listen to what's
being preached I Is it the truth? Is it right judgment in the truth
from the word of God that leads us to be focused and intensely
ravished with Christ? Or is it going somewhere else?
Look into someone else. Okay, bye.