verses, you remember from last
week, we were looking at this. The bride has talked about her
life as a believer. She talked about times that she'd
gone through a winter time when it seems like the Lord is gone. Now, He's not gone, but there's
just times that we can't feel His presence. And then she talks
about times when it's springtime, a time of refreshing when the
Lord has granted us a sense of His presence and blessed us with
some times of worship and communion with him. And since this is the
experience of every believer, we go through times of winter
and times of spring. Our Lord gives us here a word
of encouragement and a word of admonition. First, he gives us
a word of encouragement in verse 14 of Song of Solomon 2. Christ
says to his people, what more encouraging word than this? Your
mind. Verse 14, he says, O my dove,
thou art in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of
the stairs. Let me see thy countenance. Let
me hear thy voice, for sweet is thy voice, and thy countenance
is comely. Our Savior says, as a word of
encouragement, you're my dove. You're doves. Believers are compared
to doves for several reasons. First of all, at least when we
look at doves, doves are innocent. And a believer is Christ's dove,
you're my dove. We're innocent in Christ's obedience. We're innocent in his righteousness.
Our guilt has been put away under his blood. And then doves are
beautiful. Well, believers are Christ's
doves. They're beautiful in his beauty that he's put on us. We're
beautiful in his righteousness that he's clothed us in. And
then believers are like doves because doves mourn. And believers
do more. We mourn over our sin. But what Christ does, Christ
is our comfort. Our comfort in our mourning is
Christ is our atonement. Then doves are faithful to their
spouses. They keep just one spouse. Believers
are Christ dove. Believers are faithful to Christ
because he's faithful to us. And then doves are peaceful birds.
Believers are peaceful people because we have peace with God
through our Lord Jesus Christ. And we've been given a new nature,
a nature that doesn't war with God and war with other people
all the time. We're married to the Prince of
Peace. We're his doves. We're married to the Prince of
Peace. So we're peaceful people. And a dove will always return
to Christ. We're his doves who always return
to Christ. Just like that dove that Noah
let loose from the ark. He let loose one day to see how
much the waters had receded. He let loose a dove. He let loose
a raven. Well, the dove came back to the
ark. And that's a believer. A believer cannot find a place
of peace and rest and comfort in the corruption and the death
of this world. A raven can, but the dove can't. The believer must have Christ. So we always come back to him.
That's why Peter said, to whom coming? It's not just we came
to him once. To whom coming? The Lord says, you're my dove.
You're constantly coming to me because you belong to me. And
the Lord says, you're safe in me. You're hidden in the clefts
of the rock. Now, you know that rock is always
a picture of Christ. Christ is that rock that followed
Israel in the wilderness. Christ is that smitten rock that
gave water from which they drank. Now Christ is a stone of stumbling
to the unbeliever, but to the believer he's the sure foundation.
That same stone that's the stumbling stone to the unbeliever, that's
the stone that's been laid by God to be the chief cornerstone
of his church, and the house built on that rock will not fall. The wind's going to come, the
waves are going to come, the rain's going to come, but that
house built on that rock will not be blown over by the storm.
Believers shall not be moved. because our feet are set upon
the rock, upon the rock Christ Jesus. But he's talking here
specifically about the cleft in the rock. You're hidden, safe
in the cleft of the rock. Now you remember the time Moses
asked God, show me your glory. God said, all right, I'll show
you my glory. But Moses, you can't see my face
and live. So I'm going to put you in the cleft of the rock.
Put my hand over it, cover you, safe in the cleft of the rock.
I pass by, and after I pass by, you're still in that cleft of
the rock. I'll remove my hand, and you'll see my back parts,
but you won't see my face, for no man can see my face and live."
And Moses was there in the cleft of the rock, and God passed by,
and Moses lived. Now, this is the cleft of the
rock that a believer is safe in, and here's our comfort. There
are times of wintertime. We may not always feel the presence
of the Lord, but just because I don't feel his presence doesn't
mean I'm not safe in him. I'm always safe in the cleft
of the rock, whether I feel and enjoy his presence or not. The
cleft of the rock is a picture of the wounds that Christ our
Rock received at Calvary. Believers, Christ doves, they're
safe from the curse of the law because they're hidden in the
holes. the hands and feet of our Savior. Where'd those holes
come from? Those holes were put in His body. Those clefts in the rock were
made in His body when they nailed Him to the tree. Scripture says,
cursed is everyone that hangeth upon a tree. Those holes in His
hands and His feet are the evidence Christ was made a curse for His
people. That's how he was nailed to the tree, made a curse, and
a believer saved from the curse of the law because we hide in
those clefts in the rock, made in the hands and feet of our
Savior. There's no more curse to them who are in Christ Jesus.
And the salvation of a believer is sure. Our sin is covered and
the filth of our sin is washed away in the blood and the water
that flowed from his side, that soldier pierced with his spear. That hole in our Savior's side
is a cleft made in the rock that the double cure poured out of.
Rock of ages, cleft for me. Let me hide myself in thee. And
our Lord says, you're my dove. You come hide in the cleft of
the rock. You're safe in me. And he talks here about the secret
places of the stairs. Now that refers to the new man.
That new man is hidden inside a believer. He's hidden from
other men. And those times of winter, he's
hidden from us. There are times we can't see
him. I doubt he's there. But he's never hidden from our
Savior. That new man, he's justified from all sin. You can't see him
when you look at me. He's the hidden man of the heart.
But he lives. He's justified from all sin. That man is righteous and he's
holy. That man sees God. He sees the
glory of God in the face of our Lord Jesus Christ. And our Lord
says here, you're hidden in the secret places of the stairs.
Now, what are those stairs? Well, they're Christ. The stairs
are the way we go up to God. Remember that night Jacob, he
lay there sleeping. He had that dream. He saw the
ladder that reached from heaven to earth and the angels ascending
and descending upon him. That ladder's Christ. Christ
is the way to God. And every believer has access
to that ladder. Every believer has access to
these stairs. You've been put there by Christ
Himself. He is our access to the Father.
Now here's more encouragement. Every believer can call out to
our God and pour out our hearts to Him. In those secret places
where only Christ can hear us, we can pour out our heart to
Him. Our Savior says, let me hear
your voice. Let me hear your voice call to
me. It's sweet to me. Isn't that encouraging? Our Lord
says, call on me at all times. Come speak freely to our God. The prayers and the praise of
God's saints is a sweet sound to our God. So He says, in your
winter times, call on me. for light and warmth. In your
springtimes, call on me. Call on me in praise and thanksgiving. Call to me. Your voice is sweet. The sound of the voice of the
bride calling to our Savior out of our need is sweet to you because
that voice glorifies Christ as our all. When I call on Christ
out of my need, Christ my righteousness is glorified. It's sweet to you.
When I call on Christ out of my need to have my sin forgiven,
Christ our sacrifice is glorified. That's a sweet sound to him.
When I call on Christ out of my weakness, Christ my strength
is glorified. When I call on Christ out of
my sickness, Christ my great physician is glorified. Those
things are not irritating to our Savior. That's not an irritating
sound to him. It's a sound of our need of righteousness.
It's a sound of our weakness, a sound of our need to have our
sin forgiven. But that's not irritating to
him. Our Savior says that voice is sweet to my ear because it
glorifies me as your all. So our Savior says, come to me,
call on me and don't be afraid to show your face in my presence.
Your countenance is comely to me. Now to us, Our face seems
dirty and ugly. We're ashamed of it, aren't we?
Something that we should just be ashamed of. But Christ says,
your face is beautiful to me. It's been washed in my blood.
I see your face reflecting my glory and my grace. So that's
a word of encouragement. How encouraging is this? And
you'll notice everything that's comforting, everything that's
encouraging here is Christ. It's what he's done for us and
what he's made us in. Now verse 15, Psalm of Solomon
2, this is a word of admonition. Take us the foxes, the little
foxes that spoil the vines, for our vines have tender grapes.
Now here's a word of loving admonition for our good. This word of admonition,
if we'll heed it, it'll reduce our wintertime and it'll make
our springtime more fruitful. Our Lord tells us, guard against
the foxes. against the little foxes that destroy the tender
vines and the tender grapes. Those little foxes are the sins
of our sin nature. It's what our sin nature produces.
Now, to you and me, they seem little. You know, we classify
sins as big sins and little sins, you know, a white lie and a black
lie. So they may seem little to us. They're not little to
God, but they seem little to us. But I'm telling you, a little
fox, just a little one, and destroy those tender vines and those
tender grapes. Just a little gossip does a lot
of damage. Just a little slander, just a
little evil thought would destroy those tender fruits so quickly.
Just a little doctrinal error, just a little, would destroy
the whole gospel. You let just a little doctrinal
error in the pulpit and soon you won't have a gospel at all.
Just a little bit of man's free will corrupts the gospel of God's
free grace. It takes away all the glory of
Christ. Man's free will takes away all
the glory of Christ now. Just a little bit of it. Just
a little bit of man's works corrupts the gospel of Christ. It takes
away the glory of the person and the work of Christ. And it
brings wintertime and death. The vines he talks about here,
these are the tender branches that grow out of Christ's vine.
And the tender grapes, those are the fruit of the vine. They're
just beginning to grow. And you'd be shocked how easily
just a little sin can choke them out and take those fruits away. So after hearing this word of
comfort, and encouragement, this word of admonition from her Beloved,
the Bride speaks and tells us where assurance is found. Verse
16, assurance is found in Christ. She says, My Beloved is mine,
I am his. He feedeth among the lilies.
This is the Bride speaking after she hears Christ speak, her Beloved. Now she speaks in assurance.
That her sin, these little foxes that cause so much grief, they've
been put away through the sacrifice of our beloved. You see assurance,
there's no denying the little foxes, is there? There's no denying
the sin and the sin nature. Yet despite that, a believer
has complete assurance of salvation in Christ and being saved by
him and being kept by Christ. Now that's assurance in every
believer. can boldly and confidently make
this statement without being presumptuous. My beloved is mine. He's mine. The Lord Jesus Christ
is mine. How's that? He gave himself to
me. That's how. Christ loved me when
no one else would love me. And he gave himself for me when
nobody else would die for me. He loved me and gave himself
for me and he gave himself to me. He clothed me in his righteousness. He gave me his obedience. He
washed me in his blood. He's taken up residence in my
heart. He gave himself to me. He's mine. The Holy Spirit is
the earnest, the engagement ring that Christ is my beloved. He's my husband. He gave me the
earnest of his spirit. is mine and I am his. I belong to Christ. I belong
to my beloved. I belong to him. I'm his property
because the Father gave me to him in divine election. I belong
to him because Christ redeemed me. He bought me with his precious
blood. He bought me lot, stock, and
barrel. I'm his. I belong to Christ. Because He adopted me into His
family. He made me His. I belong to Christ
because He loved me with an everlasting love and He drew me to Him. And I belong to Christ because
I choose to belong to Him. I wouldn't go anywhere else.
I choose to belong to Him. He's my beloved. I come to Christ
because I love Him. I stay near to him because I
love him. I seek his face because I love
him. Now, I know I love him because
he first loved me. But I do love him. I do. I don't
love him like he deserves to be loved, but I love him. I don't
love him like I wish I loved him, but I love him. I don't
love him like I'll love him someday, but I do love him right now. Now, there are times when my
love is so dead and so cold, I doubt it. You may look at me
and you say, I doubt it. I doubt his love for the Lord.
But every believer can plead with Peter, Lord, you know all
things. You know I love you. You know
I do. You put that love in my heart.
I love you and you're mine and I'm yours. Now, in the original,
this verse says, my beloved to me and I to him. I'll tell you what that's saying. Christ is only for me and I am
only for him. There's no other. This is a mutual
love and a mutual marriage union. Christ to me, my beloved to me
and I to him. Everything Christ is, his people
are. Everything he's done, everything
he's done for his people, my beloved to me and I to him. I won't go anywhere else. He's
my beloved. Now, people who Christ loves
and people who love Christ, they long to be where he is. He's
my beloved. He's mine. I'm his. And I long
to be where he is. Well, you know, there's just
one place on earth I know Christ is. You'll always find him in
a place of public worship. Always. That's his promise. We're
just the three are gathered together in my name. There I am in the
midst of you. People who love Christ know enough
to know this. He feeds among the lilies. That's
public worship. The lily patch. We looked at
this earlier. The lilies, that's the believer.
Well, when you've got a lily patch, what's that? That's when
all the lilies have come together in public worship. And Christ
comes there. He takes His pleasure there. It says here He feeds among the
lilies. What does that mean that He takes His pleasure among the
lilies? I love to eat. I mean, I love
to eat. Yesterday, Jamf fixed his big
ham and bellies, potatoes, and oh my goodness. I took my pleasure
at the table. I mean, I just enjoyed that. Well, that's Christ our Redeemer.
He takes His pleasure where His people are gathered together.
This is where He comes and feeds His people. Now, we're talking
about assurance here. She's speaking here in assurance.
My beloved is mine. I'm His. My sin's been put away.
These little foxes, I hate them. They destroy the tender vine,
I know. But they've been put away under the blood of Christ.
If you would have assurance, I think every believer would
always say, I wish I had more assurance. If you would have
assurance, I'll tell you what, you'd be where Christ is preached.
Because that's where he takes his pleasure with his people.
This is where he comes and feeds his people. And if you'd have
assurance, we must know where to look for it now. Where is
assurance found? Assurance can only be found in
Christ. There is no assurance of salvation
in our experience. Now think about it. In our experience,
do you really find assurance there? For every springtime that
we have, where we experience a time of refreshing and it lifts
us up that we could think maybe that gives us some assurance.
For every springtime, there's a winter. that if we were looking
to our experience would destroy our assurance. For every time
of refreshing that seems to give us assurance, there's a time
of deadness that would take our assurance away. There's no assurance
in experience. There's no assurance of salvation
in our love for Christ. We do love Him, don't we? We
do. And there are days and times
when our love waxes so hot for Him. And those times would seem
to give us assurance. But for every day like that,
there are more days where our love is so cold and dead, we
think it's not even there. And if we're looking to our love
for Christ for assurance, we lose all of our assurance. If we'll ever have true assurance,
we've got to look away from ourselves. We can't look to anything at
all about ourselves to find assurance. We have to look to Christ alone
because it's Christ alone who saves. It's Christ alone who
gives life. It's Christ alone who sustains
that life. It's Christ alone who forgives
sins. It is Christ alone who can drive away those dark clouds
from my skies and make the winter come to an end. That's what she
says in verse 17. Until the daybreak and the shadows
flee away, turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young
heart upon the mountains of Bethar." Now, we'd be being dishonest
with one another if we denied the fact that there are winters
in every believer's life. There are times of dark nights,
dark nights, long, cold, dark nights in every believer's life.
Well, now, I thought you just said, my beloved is mine and
I'm his. How can there be times of winter
and darkness if I belong to Him and He belongs to me? Well, we
do. A believer does always belong
to Christ and He always belongs to us. But there are times we
do not enjoy His presence. Janet's mine. I can say that
with full assurance. She's mine. She'll often tell
me I love you. Do you know I love you? Just
to be sure, do you know I love you? She's mine. But you know,
I do not always enjoy her loving presence. I don't always enjoy
those looks of love and that unspoken communication that can
go between you. Just look in the eye. I don't
always enjoy that. I might be in the study with
the door closed. She might be away at work. She might go visit
the girls I don't have her presence. I'm not enjoying a time of her
embrace. But I'm always comforted knowing
she loves me and I love her. That's the way it is with the
believer. I don't always enjoy the loving presence of Christ.
But I'm always comforted knowing He loves me. I may not be able
to look at myself and find any love for Him. But my comfort is, He loves me. That's our comfort. We can say
with Simeon, mine eyes have seen thy salvation. I see Him in His
own light. Oh my. That's the day winter
ends. That's the day winter ends. This
long, cold, dark night ends when I see Him. When He comes to us. And listen. The night's going
to be dark. It's going to be dark. It's going
to be cold. But daylight's coming. For every
believer, daylight is coming. Christ is coming. He'll come
to you. This has been the way it is all
throughout Israel's history. Israel was under a time of darkness,
nighttime, when they were under the law. There's just barely
enough light to see a few shadows. And then the gospel day broke.
Christ suddenly appeared in His temple and all the shadows vanished
away. Light came. And every believer
is in a time of winter. They have a time of night and
winter when we're dead. And it's so dark because we're
blind. We can't see Christ and we don't
want to even see Him. Then Christ appears. He comes
to the heart and darkness is gone. Nighttime has ended and
we believe. We see Him. Now I see how God
could save a sinner like me and still be God. Now I see. My eyes have seen thy salvation. And we think it'll never get
any better than this in wintertime. Nighttime comes again. A time
of winter. There's still life. It's just
hidden under the cold, dark, dead ground. The time of winter. Is it ever going to end? Yeah,
it'll end. Christ comes. He comes and there's
a time of springtime and refreshing. And only Christ our beloved can
bring that life and that light and put that darkness away. The
mountains of Bethar he talks about here are the mountains
of division. They're mountains that divide us from Christ. It's
our sin that divides us from Christ. It's our sin that separated
us from our God. It's our own sin that gives us
times of darkness. And we looked at these mountains
last week. You and I can't cross those mountains. They're too
tall. They're too rugged. They're too
steep for us to be able to cross. But our beloved is like that
young deer. He comes skipping and leaping
across the mountains. We can't cross Him. Our Beloved,
He just leaps over from a single bound. He just skips over every
mountain that separates us from God because of His joy in saving
His people from their sin. So that in Christ, there is no
separation from God. He skipped over the mountains
of fever. He skipped over the mountains
of division. and laid them flat so that in Christ there's no
separation from God. We're forever with Him in union,
in a union with Him that cannot be broken. What assurance? This union cannot be broken. What assurance? Don Fortner says
in his book here on the Song of Solomon, Don says somebody's
going to say I give I'd give anything to have that assurance. I'd give anything. Don says,
would you do nothing? That's a good question. I'd give
anything to have that assurance. Would you do nothing? Would you
do nothing? Would you have nothing but what
Christ has done for you? Would you be nothing except what
Christ has made you by His grace? Would you? then you have this assurance
that the bride speaks with you. You have assurance of salvation
because it's found in Christ alone. If you have only Him,
then you have assurance. If you're going to have Him plus
something you do, you'll have none. If you look away from yourself
and you'll be nothing, you'll be absolutely nothing except
what Christ has made you, then you'll have assurance. Would
you have assurance? Look to Him. Would you have forgiveness
of sins? Come to Him. Would you have communion
with Him? Be in the lily patch. He says,
call to me. Your voice is sweet. Why don't
we call? We'll call. I'll tell you when
we'll call. When He appears, then we'll call. Oh, I hope the
Lord will bless that too.