I forgot to mention, when I got
here this morning, the power was out. And it did come back
on about 9.30. So when the power was out, the
heat was out. But it's running. We'll get warm
back up here eventually. All right, Psalm of Solomon,
Chapter 3. Now, there is a royal wedding has taken place. The
king has married his bride. And you can imagine her life
has changed, marrying King Solomon. In this passage we'll look at
this morning, it does have reference to Solomon marrying the daughter
of Pharaoh. But this passage is written,
the purpose of this passage is to give us a picture of Christ
and his marriage to his bride that his father gave him. And
it's written to show us how secure the bride is in Christ's love
for her. So let's begin here in verse
six of Song of Solomon three. Who is this that cometh out of
the wilderness, like pillars of smoke, perfumed with myrrh
and frankincense, with all powders of the merchant? Now, this is
the daughters of Jerusalem speaking. Now, these may be unbelievers,
they may be babes in Christ, but either way, they just, they
can't get over how beautiful the bride is. They see her coming.
The bride of Christ is so beautiful. Look back in chapter one of the
Song of Solomon. Once, The bride was black with
sin. That's the way she described
herself in chapter one, verse six. Look not upon me because
I'm black, because the son had looked upon me. My mother's children
were angry with me. They made me the keeper of the
vineyards. You remember that's what they did with the lowest
servant, made them keepers of the vineyards. But mine own vineyard
have I not kept. And the daughters of Jerusalem
wonder, How can someone who was once so defiled with sin, how
can she be so beautiful now? They're just overcome by how
beautiful that she is. Now we know the reason for that
is because of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. He washed
away the blackness of sin in his people and made us whiter
than snow. He's taken our ugliness away
and gave us his beauty. And they also wonder, how can
she be so beautiful? She's coming from the wilderness.
How can someone this beautiful come from this awful wasteland
of the wilderness? Is she really from the wilderness?
You know, was she just there visiting or something? Is she
really from this wilderness? And the believer says, oh yes,
we're from the wilderness of sin. Our nature is a wilderness. There's no life in it, there's
no water of life, there's no food of life, nothing that can
produce life. The only thing in our nature
that we can find is death. We're born in the wilderness,
but God's gonna bring his elect out of that wilderness because
Christ has brought us out of the wilderness by his grace.
We had death in the wilderness, Christ has given us his life
in him. He took our death and gave us his life so we'll never
die. And I'll tell you what that does
for the bride. That makes her heart burn with love for her
beloved. The bride loves the bridegroom. I mean, she just head over heels
in love with her husband. And that's what these pillars
of smoke represent. The smoke is the smoke of thanksgiving
that rises from our hearts because our hearts are burning with love
for Christ. The heart of a believer goes
upward toward God. It's drawn toward our God, just
like plants naturally grow toward the sun. I mean, you just watch
them. If the sun's blocked, they grow around you. They grow toward
the sun. That's what the believer's heart
does. It's just drawn and pulled toward our Lord Jesus Christ.
In his commentary, Robert Hawker asked this question. Can people
tell that we've come up out of the wilderness and that our hearts
burn with love for the Savior? Can they tell that? Robert Hawker
says they ought to, and he's right, they ought to. People
ought to know our hearts burn with love for our Savior. People
knew that about the bride. They said, boy, look at her heart
burning with love for her beloved. And this bride, she used to be
the lowest servant, working in the heat, taking care of the
vineyards. And when she was doing that, she didn't look very good.
She didn't smell very good either. She's out there working in the
heat of the day. She's in the wilderness. There's
no water for her to bathe in. She didn't look good. She didn't
smell good. But now, she's beautiful and
she smells pretty because of the myrrh and frankincense and
powders that the bridegroom gave her. The daughters of Jerusalem
say all these are the powders of the merchant. Well, the merchant
they're speaking of here is Christ. All this that makes a believer
smell good, that didn't come from where we live. That had
to come from somewhere else. Christ had to be the merchant
who traveled a long way to go buy this expensive myrrh and
frankincense and powders. He went all the way as far as
it took and bought those things with His precious blood. Look
at Philippians chapter 2. Our Lord Jesus Christ took the
longest journey that's ever been taken when the Son of God was
made flesh and He came down all that way so He could buy the
things that are necessary to save His people from their sin.
Look at Philippians 2 verse 5. Let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought
it not robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation. Look how far down he came. He
made himself of no reputation and took upon him the form of
a servant and was made in the likeness of men and being found
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto
death, even the death of the cross. Christ our Savior must
be obedient even unto death, the death of the cross, because
that's the only way His people can be redeemed. And we can't
afford to buy that redemption, to pay that redemption price.
We can't afford the price that it would take to obtain cleansing
from our sin, the forgiveness of our sin that would make us
smell so good like the bride does here. But the blood of Christ
is so precious, He can pay the price. Only he can pay the price. And he, just like this merchant
seeking those goods that he wants, he came a long way to pay the
price, to redeem his people. He shed his blood to purchase
the redemption of his people. And scripture tells us the sacrifice
of Christ is a sweet smell to the Father. And when we're washed
in the blood of that sacrifice, We smell sweet, too. That's the
myrrh and frankincense and powder. It's the blood of Christ. And
when we're washed in His blood, we smell good, too. We smell
just like our Savior. And the daughters of Jerusalem,
they're amazed at this. But now the bride, she's not
going to let that attention stay on her. She knows she is what
she is by God's grace. She knows everything she is,
God made her. Everything she has, God gave
her. All she is is a trophy of God's grace. She knows the attention
can't be on her. The attention has to be on Christ.
It's not gonna do anybody any good to look at her, but sinners
will be saved if they look to Christ. So she tells everyone,
don't look at me, look at Christ. Be overcome with his beauty.
Look at verse seven. Behold his bed, which is Solomon's.
Three score valiant men are about it, of the valiant of Israel.
They all hold swords, being expert in war. Every man hath a sword
upon his thigh because of fear in the night. Now the bride,
she refers to Solomon, but you know she's really talking about
our Lord Jesus Christ, the one greater than Solomon who's come.
And there are three things she wants everyone to know about
her beloved. The first one is the safety of his bed. Now, the
bed she refers to here, it's the marriage bed. It's a place
where Christ and his bride have close, intimate communion. And
this bed, it's not just a place. It's not a place at all. It's
the covenant of God's grace. It's the gospel that tells us
of Christ. And believers enjoy that bed. We enjoy this place of communion. And really, we can enjoy it anywhere.
We enjoy this bed here where we meet together in the assembly
of the saints, where Christ is preached and where Christ is
worshiped. That's this bed that she's talking about. We can enjoy
that communion with Christ there. We can enjoy this bed when reading
the scriptures at home when we're alone or in times of prayer when
we're alone. You could even enjoy this bed
in an airplane or driving down the road. If you're driving,
I'd do it with my eyes open, but you know, you can enjoy it
really anywhere. It's the bed of communion with
our Savior. And this bed is a place of safety.
Now you get the image here. Here's the bride. She is laying
in that bed in the arms of her Savior. She's safe. What communion, what, naturally
speaking, That's my favorite time of the day. Jan and I go
to bed, turn the lights out, and I hold her in my arms, and
we're all alone. It's quiet, it's dark, it's just
her and me. That's my favorite time of the
day. How much better, spiritually, when we are in the arms of our
Savior, in intimate communion with Him. That's such a sweet
time. There's no better place of safety than that. And to make
sure everybody knows this bed is a place of safety, there are
60 valiant men standing around this bed. All of them have swords
guarding that bed. Now I read that and I thought,
you know, I'd have trouble sleeping in this situation. It's got to
be dark and quiet, you know. Here are all these men standing
around with swords. But the life of the king and
the queen It's so important that there was times they were guarded
like this, these valiant men standing around their bed with
swords, guarding their life while they slept. Now, if a natural
king is going to guard his queen, he can go to this extent to guard
his queen. How much more does our Savior,
who's the king of kings, how does he guard his bride? Oh,
he guards her with all his omnipotence. She's safe in him. And these
valiant warriors surrounding the bed, they're a picture of
God's preachers. The job of God's preachers is
to guard, carefully, zealously guard the bride of Christ. We're
to protect her from error, protect her from wandering off. You know,
that's what we do, you know, protect her. Walter Groover told
me about this when we were visiting. He said, I'm like an old shepherd.
He said, I told Henry this, and you may have heard this before,
but it's good. He said, I'm like an old shepherd. He said, I'm
sitting under a tree watching the sheep. They're all spread
out down there in the pasture, and I'm watching them. The sheep know I'm there, so
they feel safe. And they just can graze and eat
in the green grass of God's word. And the wolves know I'm there
too, and they stay away. Interestingly, over the years,
especially years ago, when Walter come back to the States to visit,
those wolves knew it, and they started moving in on the churches.
And one of the men, you've heard his name, Retilio, would go around,
keep those wolves at bay. He'd travel around to the different
churches keeping those wolves at bay till Walter got back.
He's one of these guards. He's one of these valiant men
with his sword. These men guard the bride of
Christ. But they also guard the king. God's preachers, we don't
have to defend Christ. We don't have to defend the truth.
He's perfectly capable of doing that in His own self. But we
do guard the glory of Christ. We do contend for the truth of
Christ and carefully guard His glory. And these are valiant
men. He says it twice, they're valiant.
They're courageous men. They've got to be because they're
fighting real dangerous enemies. And they're motivated by love
for their king. They're motivated by love for
Christ and a devotion to Christ. But you know, they also love
people. You know, if you're going to be a preacher, you've got
to love people. You can't preach to people and
defend their souls if you don't love them. These men are so valiant
and courageous because of love. and they're not novices. These
men have been proven in battle. They're experienced warriors.
They've been in battle. They've been proven faithful.
They're not preacher boys. They're men in every sense of
the word. Don Fortner says in his commentary,
The Church of Christ does not need any preacher boys any more
than U.S. Marine Corps needs soldier boys.
They look for men and they make them men, warriors. And that's
what we need. We need men who will stand for
the truth, who will preach Christ and tell the truth no matter
the cost, no matter the opposition. God's preacher is going to valiantly
tell the truth. What good does it do anybody
if you don't tell them the truth? And here's these warriors. Each
man has his place. They're standing around this
bed in a place where the kings put them. That's God's servants. We all serve where the Lord put
us. Walter and Cody Groover, they're
down near Mexico because that's where the Lord would have them
serve. They couldn't be anywhere else. That's God's place for
them. I couldn't be down there. My place is here in Ashland.
This is where I'm to serve, because this is where the Lord put me.
Every man has his place to serve. And every man that you notice,
they don't have a variety of weapons, do they? Every man carries
the exact same weapon. It's a sword. Look at Hebrews
chapter four. And that sword, you know full
well what that is. That's the word of God. Sharper than any two-edged sword. In Hebrews 4 verse 12, this is
why this is the only weapon we need. The word of God is quick
and powerful and sharper than a two-edged sword, piercing even
to the dividing of sunder of soul and spirit and of the joints
of marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of
the heart. See, this is our only weapon.
We don't use another weapon, we don't need another weapon.
This is the seed that God uses to give life. This is the sword
that God uses to pierce the heart and to break the heart and to
give a new heart. The words of this book are the
words of life. These are the words that correct
us from error. These are the words that keep
the false prophet at bay. I thought this was very interesting.
Walter was telling me this one day, I was sitting in his study,
and he was asking me about the commentaries I read, and we were
talking about studying and preaching. And he told me about those pastors
in Mexico. He said, they all have, and as
far as I know, I guess it's the only set of commentaries that
they have. Henry's commentaries were translated into Spanish,
and Walter bought a set for all these pastors. But now I'm telling
you, these men are Preachers. I mean, they can preach. I mean, wow. I couldn't understand
them, but, you know, I get to hear some translations and think,
wow, I wish I could just sit down and listen to this fella
preach. These men are preachers. Well, how'd that happen? I mean,
I got four or five sets of commentaries. You know, I'm the whole time
going and reading what Gil say, Matthew, Henry say, all these
men, you know. How'd they become such preachers?
They don't have access to all these commentaries and things. They study the word. They diligently
study the word and they preach the word. That's the only weapon
we need. God's saving his people by the
study and preaching of his word. And every one of these guards,
they have the same weapon. They're all carrying their sword.
And that's, I don't care where you find them. That's every servant
of God uses exclusively the word of God to preach the gospel.
I was reading a book on the airplane. I knew it'd make me mad, but
I was going to read it anyway. This fellow, I wanted to kind
of find out about the error that this fellow was in, you know.
And I told Holly about it. She almost didn't believe me.
He was talking about the church, how the church, the local church,
should be formed, how it should be run. And you know the backup that
he used to support his point? a Supreme Court decision. It
wasn't the Word of God. I thought, well, I mean, you
know, there's no doubt this man's a false prophet. I read about
60 pages, not one time did he mention forgiveness of sin and
the blood and the sacrifice of Christ. It's just, it's so sad. Well, that man's not God's preacher.
God's preacher has one weapon. It's the Word of God. You just
preach it. It's powerful. It'll call out
God's sheep. And it's important these men
do the job that the Lord gave them to do. The bride's been
brought out of the wilderness. She'd been brought out of that
wilderness of sin. But we're still living in the wilderness.
We're traveling through the wilderness of this world. And it's a dark
place, isn't it? This world's a dark place of
unbelief and sin and error in our own hearts. We still have
that old natural heart that we're born with. It's a dark, scary
place. You know, I try not to look into
it. It's scary. It's dark. What's going to protect
us from all that? Nothing but the word of God.
It's so important these men do their job. Because if we have
this word preached to us, that's when we enjoy that safety in
the bed of Christ and his gospel. Second, the bride wants everyone
to see the splendor of Christ's bed. Look in verse 9. She says,
King Solomon made himself a chariot of the wood of Lebanon. He made
the pillars thereof of silver, the bottom thereof of gold, the
covering of it of purple, the midst thereof being paved with
love for the daughters of Jerusalem. Now this, the word there is chariot
and it's not a chariot used in war. The word, it should have
been translated a bed. It would be the bed that they
would carry the king and queen on when they travel. You know,
you've seen them in movies, you know, the four guys are carrying this
big old bed and there's somebody laying in it, you know, eating
grapes while they carry them along. That's the kind of bed
she's referring to here. And the bride says King Solomon
made himself a bed, a bed that was worthy of his position, suitable
to who he is. Well, King Christ has made himself
a bed that's suitable to who he is and to who his bride is. It's made out of the wood of
Lebanon. Now those cedars of Lebanon, they're sweet smelling
trees and they're incorruptible. They don't decay. That's the
gospel of Christ. Nothing smells sweeter than grace. What smells sweeter to a sinner
than mercy and grace? There's nothing sweeter than
the sacrifice of Christ that put the sin of His people away.
The gospel is sweet. If it's not sweet, we're not
preaching it right. And the gospel never changes.
It never decays because Christ never changes. He never decays.
We went to those ruins and it just amazes me. Those Mayans
used some sort of incorruptible wood as door headers. These things
were built 3,000 years ago. There it still is. I mean, I
just, it amazes me. That's the gospel of Christ.
It never changes. It never decays. It never rots
because the gospel is Christ who never changes or decays.
And then this bed has pillars that hold up the canopy and they're
made out of solid silver. Now in scripture, silver is a
picture of redemption. Silver was used as redemption
money in Israel. Remember we studied the tabernacle,
the silver sockets that the walls, the boards of the walls stood
up in. They got that silver, melted it down from what the
people gave them of the redemption money. Silver's a picture of
redemption. And it is God's redemption that
holds up all of the gospel. This is the redemption God the
Father purposed in eternity. It's the redemption God the Son
came in time and purchased. And it's the redemption. God,
the Holy Spirit, comes and applies to the hearts of his people.
They're held up by these pillars. It could be a lot of pillars,
but I thought about the pillar of God's immutability. God says,
I never change. Therefore, you sons of Jacob
are not consumed. You're redeemed. It's the pillar
of God's everlasting love for his people. I've loved you with
an everlasting, eternal love. Therefore, with loving kindness
have I drawn you and not going to run you off. There's the pillar
of God's power that enables him to save even the chief of sinners,
justify him completely, save him to the uttermost. Then there's
the pillar of God's wisdom that enabled God to find a ransom
that would enable him to be both just and justifier. There's the
pillar of God's justice The Father punished Christ for our sins.
He'll never punish us, because that would be unjust. It's the
pillar of God's justice that holds up the gospel. Those pillars
all together hold up the gospel. And she says the bottom of the
bed, the floor of it, is made from pure gold. Now gold represents
deity, the deity of God, the deity of Christ. All the purpose
of God and salvation is upheld because the Lord Jesus Christ,
our Savior, is God. It's not like He's God. He is
deity, manifest in human flesh. So Christ can never fail because
He's God. God's not going to fail. So His
people are eternally secure in Him. The bottom of this bed,
it's not going to fall out. The pillars are going to hold
up the roof and the floor is not going to fall out from underneath
us. It's made of pure gold, the deity of Christ. And because
he can never fail, we're secure in him. And the canopy of the
bed covering the whole thing is purple fabric. It hung over
the top and all down the side. So they're carrying this bed,
you know, through town. People can't really tell who's
in there. All they see is this purple fabric all the way around
it. Well, purple is the color of royalty. Christ is King, so
we're secure in Him. He's wrapped His people in His
omnipotent power as King. We're secure in Him. But purple
is also a mixture of red and blue. You mix red and blue, you
get purple. Well, that's a picture of Christ
the God-man. Red, the color of man. Atom,
made from the red dirt. And blue, the color of the heavens.
When you put those together, you've got the God-man, the purple.
And the bride is covered in Christ. She's all wrapped up in that
purple. She's covered in Christ. She's
in Christ our sacrifice, in Christ our substitute, in Christ our
representative. So when the people look at her,
what do they see? They see purple. When the father sees us, what
does he see? He sees his son. And that's why we're accepted
in him. man to be the representative
of his people, God to be perfectly holy, and that's what his people
are in him. She's wrapped up in this purple.
And then she says this bed is paved with love. She's not talking
about asphalt pavement, she's talking about pillows. Every
believer lays on the pillows of Christ's love for his people
and is so comfortable Jan was glad to get back home to our
bed. I'm telling you, she's got foam and everything stacked up
on her side of the bed just to make it soft. Oh, she said, this
feels good, laying in these soft pillows. That's what a believer
feels like when we hear the gospel. Christ loves me? Oh, I can rest
in that. Oh, just let me lay in that. Oh, it's so comfortable and soft. There's no hard spots in that.
It's the love of Christ that moved him to come to earth as
a man. It's the love of Christ for his
people that moved him to come establish a righteousness for
his people. It's the love of Christ for his
people that moved him to suffer and to die as a sacrifice for
the sin of his people. Now brethren, he's done all that
because he loves his people. He's not going to stop loving
you now. That love's eternal. It's an eternal love that gives
rest for the weary soul. That's the splendor of the bed
that Christ has prepared. Then third, the bride wants everyone
to see this. She wants them to see the majesty
of the person of Christ. Look at verse 11. She says, go
forth all you daughters of Zion and behold King Solomon with
a crown wherewith his mother crowned him in the day of his
espousals and the day of the gladness of his heart. Now this
is what the bride says, you go to Christ. You look to Christ.
The bride wants everyone to see the glory of the person of Christ. But you know, that's going to
take eyes of faith. The natural eye can't see that. Natural man
sees a Jesus who's not deity. He's not God who does what he
will, when he will, with whom he will. This Jesus that man
preaches, he can fail. Well, that's not God. This Jesus
that the natural man sees needs your help to accomplish his purpose
because he's not God. The natural man sees a Jesus
that has no power. His blood alone is not enough
to cleanse you from your sin. You've got to clean up your axon.
You've got to start living better because His blood is not sufficient
to wash your sin away. The natural man sees a Jesus
whose grace is not sufficient. You can't be saved by grace alone.
You've got to make a decision. You've got to do these certain
things because His grace alone is not enough. But no, that's
not who we see if God gives us eyes of faith. The bride has
been given eyes of faith. And she received those eyes in
the day that God the Holy Spirit drew her to Christ. And she sees
Christ and becomes married to him, joined to him in marriage
union. Now she sees. Now apparently
Bathsheba must have given Solomon some sort of a crown or decoration
for his crown or something on his wedding day. That's the day
she's talking about, this wedding day. I'm sure it was pretty. But you ought to see the crown
the Father has given the Son. The Father has crowned His Son
with glory and honor, the glory and honor of God. The Father
gave the Son all authority in heaven and earth, put all things
under His feet. And that's the crown, that's
the dominion that we see if we believe Christ and we bow to
Him. And the day we're joined to Christ, we're married to Him,
is a day of gladness. Nothing can make us happier than
having Christ revealed to us and in us. But you know, it also
makes Christ our Savior happy. It makes Him rejoice when His
people come to Him and are joined to Him. When the elect come to
Christ, that's the day He sees of the travail of His soul and
He's satisfied. He's happy. He rejoices. Isn't
that what our Lord said in Luke 15? All of heaven rejoices, all
the angels of heaven rejoice when just one sinner repents
and is joined to Christ. Christ rejoices when his bride
comes to him. The church in heaven rejoices
when his bride comes to him. And the church on earth rejoices
too. And we rejoice. As individual believers, we rejoice
in our own heart when we come to Christ and we enjoy the security
of His love, safe in Him. All right, I hope the Lord will
bless that to you.