Every book of the Bible, every
book is a book about Christ. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, you
can go on Old Testament, New Testament. It's a book full of
Christ. Its main message is Jesus Christ
and him crucified. Its main message is the gospel
in some way. Whether it's in spoken or in
literal word, or if it's just implied, it's all there. If God
has given you eyes to see and ears to hear. And this book called
the Song of Solomon is no different. It says in verse one of Song
of Solomon, the Song of Songs, which is Solomon's. And that
tells us, obviously, that God the Holy Spirit inspired Solomon. And who was Solomon? He was the
prophet king of Israel. He was David's son. Remember,
he was the son that was born out of that horrible thing that
David did, he and Bathsheba. And Solomon was born out of that.
But as you know, we see the providence of God there. We see the sovereignty
and the power of God. David meant it for evil, God
meant it for good. And so God the Holy Spirit inspired
King Solomon to write this Song of Love. And that's what the
Song of Solomon is. It's a poem. It's part of what
we call the wisdom literature of the Bible. It's poetry just
like the Psalms that God inspired David and Moses and others to
write. It's called the Song of Songs
here because it's considered the chief of all the songs, all
the poems that Solomon wrote, and the reference is made to
the number of songs or songs and psalms that Solomon wrote
in 1 Kings 4.32, and I've got that referenced in the lesson.
The Song of Solomon is poetical wisdom. You know, the Bible has
different types of literature. There's legal writings, there's
historical writings, there's wisdom and poetic writings, there's
letters, all of that. The Song of Solomon is one of
the wisdom books, the poetical books. Now listen to this. The
purpose, and what I want to do in this introduction, is give
you a basis on which you can read and study and understand
the Song of Solomon. The Song of Solomon is, or the
purpose of this song, I think it's divided into eight chapters
in our King James Bible. The purpose of this song is to
show through types and metaphors, you know, symbols, the greatness
and the power of the eternal spiritual love of Christ for
his church. And in it, Christ is symbolized
and represented as the groom, the bridegroom, the husband of
the church. And the church is represented
as the bride, the wife of Christ. He's the head, we're the body,
he's the husband, the church collectively is his wife. He's married and we're married
to Christ. And so the purpose is to show
how the greatness and the power,
the awesomeness, you might say, of his love for the church and
the church's love for him. And this is altogether a book
about fellowship and communion with Christ. And we're married
to Christ. It's not in any sense, now listen
to me very carefully here because when we talk about literal, somebody
says, well, you don't interpret it literally. Well, it's not
in any sense to be interpreted literally as if to say this is
some kind of a manual for eroticism or erotic love or anything like
that. We do, we derive what, you know,
to take something literal means that you find the intended meaning
of it. And this is spiritual. It's an
allegory. It's a spiritual dialogue, you
might say, between Christ, our heavenly bridegroom, and the
church his bride. So like all the books of the
Bible, this is a book full of Christ. This is a message of
God's grace, the gospel, and how Christ saves and keeps and
blesses and loves his people. Christ is presented here not
only as our God, our Redeemer, our Savior, and our King, all
those are there, but also in a most intimate character and
personal relationship imaginable, our bridegroom and we his beloved. And so here we see the Son of
God in a marriage union with his elect, who are justified
by his righteousness imputed, and who are redeemed by the blood
of his cross. And I'll tell you what, the love
of Christ for his church and the church for him is here portrayed
through the love of a man for his wife and a wife for her husband. This song, this poem is intimate,
even passionate. because it's all about the love
life of Christ and his church. The love of a man for his wife
is set before us throughout the scriptures as a type and picture
of Christ's love for his church. Think about it, Adam and Eve,
one man, one woman coming together in a marriage union. Abraham
and Sarah, that's a picture. Jacob and Rachel. Boaz and Ruth, that's a great
one. And then one of the best pictures
of Christ as the husband and his relationship to his wife,
the church, is the prophetic book of Hosea. Hosea and Gomer. And we'll look at a portion of
that in just a moment. But those are all pictures of
Christ. And listen to the words of the
Apostle Paul when he's speaking to the church at Corinth. In
2 Corinthians chapter 11 and verse 2, he says, he wrote to
the Corinthians, he said, I have espoused you to one husband that
I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. Espoused to
Christ. And what Paul's talking about
is in the preaching of the gospel, the command And the power of
God that brings us to salvation is that which drives us to Christ
in a marriage union with Him. We unite with Him, we submit
to Him, we bow to Him. And we, by faith, we put on the
robe of righteousness, which He worked out for us on the cross
by His obedience unto death as our surety, our substitute, and
our redeemer. The Lord Jesus Christ, think
about this, loves his bride everlastingly, eternally, unchangeably, immutably,
purely, and unconditionally. That's right, his love for his
church is unconditional towards them. And all who are born of
God, all who know Christ, As our surety, substitute and redeemer,
we can honestly say that we love Him. One man said, going back
to a song that we used to listen, to know Him is to love Him. Now,
we as His bride, particular individuals who make up the church, sinners
saved by grace who are in the warfare of the flesh and the
spirit. We cannot say that we love him perfectly as he loves
us. He loves us perfectly, without
wavering, without competition. There's no competition in Christ's
mind and heart for his bride. Nothing that would cause him
to look away for a split second. And we can't say that we love
him perfect. We can say we love him because
of the grace and power of God, that love of God that the Spirit
sheds abroad in our hearts when he opens our eyes to our depravity
and our sinfulness and drives us to Christ for salvation and
for righteousness. But even then, we cannot say
we love him like we should. And his love for us is not based
upon or grounded upon our love to him. 1 John 4.10 is a verse
that I'll probably refer to quite a bit through this study, which
says, herein is love, not that we love Christ. See, if you wanted
to define the perfection of love, don't look at your love for him,
even though we do love him and we want our love to grow, but
herein is love, not that we loved him, but that he loved us and
then gave his son to be the propitiation for our sins, the sin-bearing
sacrifice that brought satisfaction. We don't love him as we ought
to, but we do love him. We know that because we cling
to him. We stay with him by the power of God. We don't love him
as we desire. We don't love him like we'll
love him when we're freed from the sins of remaining flesh in
glory. But by God's grace and power,
we do love him. And so it's his love for us. Understand this. It's not our
love for him that saves us or keeps us or will bring us to
glory. It's his love for us. And that's what this is a celebration
of. this song of Solomon. He saves us, he keeps us, he'll
bring us to glory. This is a love song of the perfect,
sinless bridegroom, listen to this, to an unworthy, sinful
bride. And although we are unworthy
and sinful, his bride is the object of his love. You ask yourself, why would he
love me? Well I know this, there is absolutely
no reason in me for him to love me. There's every reason for
him to hate me, to reject me, to punish me eternally. But he does love his people.
Christ is presented here as a bridegroom, now listen, a bridegroom who
does everything necessary to secure the salvation, the blessedness,
and the well-being of his bride, and to draw out her love to him. Let me give you several things
to consider here by way of introduction. And this really does provide
a background to go into this, this Song of Solomon. Talking
about the marriage of Christ the bridegroom to his people,
his church, the bride. Number one, it's a marriage of
sovereign, unconditional, electing grace. And what I mean by that
is this. Christ, the Son of God, he was
appointed by God the Father before the foundation of the world to
be the bridegroom. And his bride was chosen by the
Father in him and betrothed to him before the foundation of
the world. The Lord Jesus Christ refers
to this quite often. He speaks of those whom the Father
had given him. John 6, 37, he said, all that
the Father giveth me. Who's he talking about there?
His bride, the elect, his church. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. and him that cometh unto me I
will in no wise cast out. And read the first chapter of
the book of Ephesians which talks about how God chose us. He blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ
Jesus. Chose us, predestinated us in
Christ. You see that was all in light
of the union that we have with Christ that was set before the
foundation of the world. The Bible speaks of a salvation
that was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. So Christ
loves his betrothed with an everlasting, unconditional love and mercy
and grace. But here's the thing, and this
is why I say this is a marriage of sovereign, unconditional electing
grace. Now you have to understand, God,
the Father appointed the Son to be the bridegroom, to be the
surety of his people. But and he chose the bride, each
individual that makes up this bride, his elect in Christ before
the foundation of the world. But the bride that the father
chose for the son was not a worthy bride. She was not qualified
in any way. In fact, she was disqualified
because of sin as she would fall in Adam She'd be born dead in
trespasses and sins, and she would prostitute herself out
to other lovers, false gods, idols. And that's why this is
so amazing. Amazing love, amazing grace. We see an illustration of this,
as I mentioned before, in the life of the prophet Hosea, who
was married to a prostitute named Gomer. And if you'd look, I'll
just read it to you, Hosea chapter one. This is something. Read
the book, I preached through Hosea before, and it's an amazing
book. But Hosea, he prophesied around
the same time as Isaiah. But in Hosea chapter one, in
verse one, it says, the word of the Lord that came unto Hosea,
the son of Beri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and
Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam, the
son of Joash, king of Israel. Now look at verse two. The beginning
of the word of the Lord by Hosea. Now Hosea, he's a prophet. He had a prophetic word for the
people, but he's also a type. He's a type of Christ. And so
he's, the Lord said, and the Lord said to Hosea, go take unto
thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms, for the
land hath committed great whoredom departing from the Lord. So Hosea
was not only a prophet in his spoken word, but in his life,
he was a, and God commanded him to go marry a prostitute. What
a command. But what was God doing in his
wisdom, in his sovereign wisdom and work? He was going to use
Hosea not only to prophesy to Israel, but also to be a type
of Christ and his church. And this is the issue. Listen,
when we talk about election, we call it unconditional election
because there is absolutely nothing in the ones whom God chose that
would draw out God's love or God's goodness towards them.
You see, if it were conditioned on us, we'd be doomed forever.
We're sinners. And so you say, well, why did
God choose me? The only answer the Bible gives
is because he chose to do so. He sovereignly, he said, I'll
have mercy on whom I'll have mercy, and I'll be compassionate
or have grace upon whom I will have grace. And that's what he
says, it's not of him that willeth, it's not because he foresaw that
we would love him or choose him, no. In fact, we wouldn't love
him or choose him had he not first loved us and chosen us. It's not of him that willeth,
it's not of him that runneth, it's not based on our works,
it's of God that showeth mercy. So in this marriage of sovereign,
unconditional, electing grace, Two things, if the bride, if
the son was going to marry his bride, his unworthy bride, his
sinful, disqualified bride who deserved nothing but death and
hell and alienation from God, two things had to come about.
Number one, she had to be first legally free to marry. There's got to be a legal qualification
here. She could not be married to anyone
else, and if she was, the only thing that could free her was
death. The only thing that could free
her to marry another was death. Now Paul wrote about that in
Romans chapter seven. And if you, just to give you
an idea, when he talks about in verse one, he goes back to
the law of Romans chapter seven, he says, Know ye not, brethren,
for I speak to them that know the law, how that the law hath
dominion over a man as long as he liveth. For the woman which
hath a husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as
he liveth. But if the husband be dead, she
is loose from the law of her husband. So then, if while her
husband liveth, She be married to another, she be called an
adulteress. But if her husband be dead, she
is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress, though
she be married to another man. So here's a man and a woman who's
married, bound by law, and neither one of them are free to marry
another until one or the other is dead. And so Paul writes in
Romans 7, 4, listen to this. Wherefore, my brethren, you also
are become dead to the law. By nature, in our state in this
world, we're married to the law. But you become dead to the law
by the body of Christ. Now this is one of the things
that the husband, the bridegroom, Christ, does for his bride. He
died for his bride. And he freed them from the law. And he says, you become dead
to the law by the body of Christ, that you should be married to
another, even to him who's raised from the dead, that we should
bring forth fruit unto God. So you see, this is a marriage
of sovereign, unconditional, electing grace. And in order
for him to marry his bride, she had to be freed. She had to be
liberated legally. And that's our justification
before God in the person and work of Christ. God chose us
in Christ. God sent Christ as our surety,
having our sins imputed to him, and he became our substitute
and took our place, and he bought us with the price of his blood.
And so we're free to marry him. So this had to be a just and
righteous marriage. The second thing that had to
be done for the bride, in order for the bridegroom to marry her,
is she had to be spiritually drawn or wooed to the Son of
God. Else she would never come to
him. And that means that we who are by nature spiritually dead,
we have to be given life. We have to be drawn to him in
the power of God's grace to see our depravity and to see his
beauty. We have to be brought under the
preaching of the gospel and hear the words of the Lord in the
power of the spirit as he reveals himself. We have to be born again. We have to be given eyes to see
and ears to hear. We have to be given a new heart,
else we would never come to Christ, the bridegroom. And so that's
what John was talking about when he said, all that the Father
hath given me shall come to me. And him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out. Christ said in John 12, he said,
if I be lifted up, I will draw all unto me. He's gonna draw
us with cords of love. And that's in the new birth when
he shows us his glory, his beauty, in light of our depravity. Now,
first, it's a marriage of sovereign, unconditional, electing grace.
Secondly, it's a marriage of sovereign, effectual redemption. Now, as I stated before, the
bride that was chosen for the bridegroom and loved by him was
an unworthy and an unlovely bride. No worthiness, no qualification,
no beauty about her. And he's gonna mention that several
times in Song of Solomon. Nothing in the bride to attract
the bridegroom. And she had no dowry, nothing
to give him to cause him to join himself to her. In fact, she
was sold into the slave market of sin and death because of her
sin. So what did the bridegroom have
to do? He had to come in time as our surety and be our substitute,
take our place under the law and do everything necessary,
all right, everything necessary to save us from our sins. So
it was necessary that the bridegroom come in time and redeem us, pay
the ransom price. In the book of Hosea, as time
goes on, Hosea having been married to Gomer, she went off and prostituted
herself. And as she grew older and men
didn't want her, they were putting her on the slave block to sell
her. And guess who bought her? Her husband, Hosea. She didn't
deserve it. I guarantee you if it was a situation
in our lives, we wouldn't do that. But Hosea bought her, paid
the price, the ransom price. So Christ ransomed his bride. The Bible speaks in Acts chapter
20, I think it's verse 28, talks about the church which he purchased
with his own blood. And then thirdly, now I've got
a little mistake here if you have the lesson. I say here it's
a marriage of sovereign justice. I've already talked about justice,
but what I wanted to emphasize here, it was a marriage of sovereign
love based on justice. So write that in. Sovereign love
based on justice. His bride was bound to the law,
as I said, because of her sin. And if married to the law, she
could not justly be married to any other. The bridegroom had
to come and pay the penalty of all her sin to the law and establish
the only ground upon which God could justify her and set her
free to marry another. Now go back to this, I mentioned
this. Herein is love. Not that we loved him, but that
he loved us and did what? Gave his son to be the propitiation
for our sins. Christ out of love, went to the
cross, and died for the sins of his bride. In John 13 and
verse one it says, he loved his own unto the end. Who are his own? It's his bride.
It's his betrothed. Those whom he would draw unto
himself with cords of love. And what does it mean he loved
them to the end? It means he loved them to the
finishing of the work that was required to make her his. And so the bridegroom took her
place under the law and established perfect righteousness for her.
And this is her wedding garment. The perfect righteousness of
Christ, born out of the grace and the mercy and the sovereign
love of God for his bride, is her wedding garment. the righteous
robe of Christ, his righteousness imputed, put on us. Now that's
symbolic language. You know, people, they argue
with that, talking about, well, I have righteousness, but not
just on top of me or on the outside. No, it's by a sovereign act of
imputation, born out of the sovereign love and mercy and grace of the
Father. And then fourthly, it's a marriage
of love, joy, and peace, as the fruit by which he draws out our
love to him, by revealing his unconditional love to us. You
know what he does? He imparts and draws out our
love to him. I mentioned this and it's in
Romans 5 where the Holy Spirit sheds abroad within our hearts,
the hearts of his bride, the love of God. And how does he
do that? In the new birth under the preaching
of the gospel, he tells us of the love of God in Christ. There's no love of God outside
of Christ. Bible says God hates all workers
of iniquity. Well, somebody says, well, aren't
I a worker of iniquity? Not if we're in Christ. We're
sinners saved by grace. But if we're in Christ, we have
a righteousness that measures up to the perfection of the law,
and it's Christ's righteousness imputed to us. And by his love
and power towards his bride, he reveals this to us, saves
us, brings us into a union with him by faith, and he preserves
us unto glory. That's what this song is all
about. Now the language of this love song is very, very intimate,
even passionate. I heard a man one time say that
he wouldn't preach through the Song of Solomon because he was
embarrassed to do it because of this language. Well, the remedy
for that is to understand what it's talking about. This is spiritual
truth. This is not some kind of a sex
manual or anything like that. It's a, remember, this book is
spiritual. Look at verse two. I'll just
give you this one. It says, here's the bride speaking
to her bridegroom. Let him kiss me with the kisses
of his mouth, for thy love is better than wine. Now that's
a love story. And again, it's passionate, but
it's not a manual for eroticism or sexual love between a man
and woman. The Bible speaks, now the Bible does speak of the
intimacy of physical erotic love between a man and a woman within
the sanctity of marriage. Outside of marriage, it's called
fornication and adultery, that's what it is. But within the God-ordained
institution of marriage between one man and one woman, it's ordained
and sanctioned by God. In Hebrews 13, he talks about
the marriage bed is undefiled. And in fact, biblical marriage
between one man and one woman is a beautiful picture of the
spiritual and eternal union of Christ and his church. Paul dealt
with that in Ephesians chapter 5 when he said, husbands love
your wives as Christ loved the church. Wives submit to your
husbands as unto the Lord. And he goes on and says that
he's talking about Christ and the church. The Song of Solomon
is a book that describes three things, the courtship of the
bride, the bridegroom to the bride, the marriage of the bride
to the bridegroom, and the growth of the church in her marriage
to Christ. So remember, this book is an
allegory. It's not to be taken literally as if to say it's some
kind of an erotic story. It's a spiritual conversation
between Christ, the heavenly bridegroom, and the church, all
the elect and every generation, his spiritual bride. Now let
me say this in closing. Some claim that this is God's
love song to the nation Israel. And although God had established
a temporal, temporary union with that nation, that physical nation,
under the terms of the old covenant, that union was never intended
by God to be either spiritual or eternal. It was conditioned
on a sinful people and doomed to fail to save them and keep
them united to God. You can read about that in several
of the Old Testament books. I've referenced Deuteronomy 28,
for example. It was given to show Israel the
impossibility of eternal salvation and an eternal union with God
based on the terms of the law, which says do and live, disobey
and die. It was given to show them their
sinfulness, their depravity, and to show them their need of
salvation by God's grace in and by the promised Messiah. It was
given to show them the impossibility of righteousness by their works
and drive them to the promised Messiah for righteousness. In
fact, the Lord through the prophet Jeremiah spoke of the backsliding
and adultery of Israel and pronounced that he had put her away and
given her a bill of divorce. You can read about that in Jeremiah
3 and Isaiah 50. Judah also backslid and committed
spiritual adultery against God, but God suffered longer with
Judah because it was his purpose to bring Christ into the world
through that nation. But eventually, he put away Judah,
he divorced Judah. But now listen to me, under the
gospel, Under the covenant of grace, under the new covenant
that God has made with spiritual Israel, all believers, Jew and
Gentile, the church, the bride, all conditioned on Christ, there
is and can be no bill of divorce. He said, I'll never leave you,
I'll never forsake you. God will remember our sins no
more. God will not impute or charge
our sins to us. They were charged to Christ.
And so Christ's love for and marriage to his bride, the church,
is eternal and can never be broken because he promised that he'll
never leave or forsake his bride. All right.