that psalm that Matt read. Turn back there. Turn back there
if you would. 145. Now I believe this is the
only psalm that this is headed this way. A lot of these psalms,
it's a psalm of David. It's a psalm of David. It's a
psalm of David. Look at this one. David's psalm of praise. I've got on the margin of my
Bible, I got this from somebody, but this
was David's personal psalm of praise. Now he wrote a bunch
of them, but this one is particular. And I've got on the margin on
this heading, may we have our own psalm of praise. And I know Matt is like me, he
likes the psalms. And there are some that are particularly
sweet. So, like a promise, find one. It may be in 1st or 2nd Samuel,
it may be in Kings, it may be in Chronicles. Find your psalm
of praise, personal psalm of praise. And I say we should be
able to praise likewise, yet that which is very personal to
ourselves. But I just thought that was,
I think that's the only title that's, it's David's psalm. So
just to pass that on. And as you're turning to 2 Corinthians
11, that last hymn that we sang, Isn't the Love of Jesus? Well,
in light of that, we'll look at this this morning. We will
look at this love letter from our Savior to us, and us to Him,
and just the beauty that's therein, the beauty that we see in the
believer's relationship with Christ. 2 Corinthians chapter
11, I want to look at verse 2 and 3, 2 and 3, and mainly look at what
he says in verse 2 for my title, espoused to Christ, espoused
to Christ. Paul says in verse 2 of chapter
11 of 2 Corinthians, for I am jealous over you with a godly
jealousy. For I have espoused you to one
husband that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. But I fear lest by any means,
as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so your mind should
be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ." And that's what I'm about, is the
simplicity, because again, that's where I'm at. But my thought
was, for I have espoused you to one husband. One husband. This is talking about marriage.
Let's talk about marriage. Introductory comments would be
marriages ought to be founded in mutual and reciprocal love
between the parties involved. Marriages ought to be founded
in mutual and reciprocal love. That's the first thing. You can
talk about respect, you can talk about this, you can talk about
that. If you don't have love, you don't have a marriage. Between
the two parties. Now, to look at it as Christ
and His church, we being the church, or the bride, We've all
heard of the stories and there's been some fairy tales written
that we're familiar with. We've heard of the stories of
one person in this relationship who's very wealthy and has a
superior pedigree. And then the other person is
very low and poverty stricken. They're in that kind of condition.
And yet they marry. And this has happened in civilization,
not just fairytales. Yet they marry. And everybody
who sees this concludes one thing for sure, surely it was true
love that was expressed and enacted. Why would this man even look
at this woman who is of low degree? The kings are supposed to marry
princesses. That's what we're told. Supposing this person of low
degree and of poverty inclination is a woman as the bride of Christ,
the church. She, the bride of Christ, once
married to such a wealthy and high pedigree man, do you think,
just think with me, do you think or do you suppose that every
time she remembers her former condition, her former estate,
her former nothingness, you would think she surely would show great
gratitude and tender compassions to the bridegroom. Yes, you know,
we jokingly say, us husbands, we outmarried ourselves. The
woman, we've outmarried ourselves. Not this case. Not this case. This case is of Christ and his
beloved bride, the church. Turn, or I'll read to you, you
can turn if you want, but Isaiah 54. Isaiah 54. And verse five and six. For thy maker is thine husband,
the Lord of hosts is his name, and thy Redeemer, the Holy One
of Israel, the God of the whole earth, Who shall he be called? For the Lord hath called thee
as a woman forsaken, and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth,
whom thou wast refused, when thou wast refused, saith thy
God." That's where he found us. That's where he found her. This
is not a fairy tale, and this is not a story that shows, oh,
then she discovered that she was a prince, you know, she was
a princess, and this and that. No, this is high cotton meeting
nothing. That's what we are. That's what
we are. This is the case. It would do
us very well to remember our own poverty, our rags for garments
where we were clothed in. And yet, even in this condition,
our Father, our Redeemer, loved us and called us out by his amazing
free grace through the gospel. Recall in our mind the state
in which he found us, his future bride, the church. Distress over
our corruptions. Once he made us known to us,
we realized we had nothing to offer. We had no, we thought
we had, we've been told by preachers all along we had free will. They
found out that was a lie. Find out we couldn't do anything.
Find out there's a price paid. Why would we have to pay a price?
We're debtors to the grace of God. We heard that this morning.
We call to our mind the state in which He found us, not only
distressed, but over our head in debt to God's law. You do
it one, you've got it. If you mess up with one, you've
messed them all up. You've got to be perfect. Justice,
there's no answer here. Don't look to me for justice.
I have nothing to offer. I'm not just. I'm not righteous. We're in prison for crimes against
his kindness, and these are all self-inflicted. In Adam, we died,
self-inflicted. Rags for clothes, this is our
condition. Self-righteous without any good
reason. You know, when you see Well, I don't know who said it,
Scott Rich, somebody, you know, it's like two worms arguing.
Two worms arguing. What? A worm? A worm? And scripture says he
became a worm and no man. I think that's what it says.
No good reason for us to be haughty about anything. Naked in God's
eyes, because he's purely holy, You want to see what we are,
turn to Hosea. You want to see what we are,
turn to Hosea, chapter 1. There's this woman here called
Gomer, and that's the church, that's us. And then we look at
Hosea, he's a picture of Christ. Hosea, chapter 1, in verse 2,
or the beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. He's a
prophet. 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 he went and took Gomer the
daughter of Dilip and conceived and bear him a son." This is
like a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. Came down, emptied himself,
from heaven, if we could say he shed his royal garb and came
down amongst the inhabitants of the earth, and they didn't
recognize, they didn't know him, they didn't, you know, he came
unto his own when his own received him not. That's us. And you could
read, I won't read everything or any more, but you could look
at what she did to to what Gomer did to Hosea. She didn't love
him. She didn't show him any kindness.
She just kept on with going with her lovers. He put presents in
her door, and then he would leave. She'd open the door, and she'd
see these presents, and she'd, oh, my lover's brought these.
My lover's brought these to me. No. No. It's been Christ. And when the believer, by the
grace of God, comes to his senses, like the prodigal son, When the Lord does something
for you, you look back over your life, all the nonsensical religious
experiences, good, bad, whatever, all the things the Lord's protected
you, you see that He has led and He has fed and we didn't
know it. We didn't know it. But He brought
us to where we are right now. Why? For so it seemed good in
His sight. You can't attribute it to anything
else. You cannot attribute it to anything else. Well, yet,
with nothing to pay us, nothing to commend ourselves, nothing
to barter or bargain with, and less than nothing to stand up
against the wrath to come, turn to Psalms of Solomon, chapter
four. Even though this is our condition,
and even though this is our state, Songs of Solomon, chapter 4. This is that love letter between
the church and Christ. Songs of Solomon, chapter 4.
This is Christ speaking to His bride of low pedigree, as Corinthians
says, of the baser sort. That's us. Verse seven. This is Christ speaking to his
bride. I hope he's speaking to us here
this morning. Thou art all fair, my love. I can't even hardly
read this next section. It's just too amazing. It's too
wonderful. There is no spot in thee. If that's all you get. whatever
you've done this morning, whatever you felt this morning, whatever
God you've served, if he's got you, this is his
declaration to you. No spot in thee. No spot in thee, dear lowly bride,
dear one loved before time and covenant grace and mercy, no
spot May we, by the solitary workings of the Holy Spirit,
get a hold of this. He came to save, to redeem, to
reconcile sinners of whom Paul says, I am chief. Do you know
that? Do I know that? I'm chief. Do
we understand that? We don't look to the person to
the right, to the left, behind us, we just, he's talking to
me. Because this is talking, I hope,
to me and to you. Let's look at what he's done
for his chosen bride. By himself, Christ, paid all
our debts. And when I say our, I'm talking
about the elect. He's canceled every bond, fulfilled the holy
law, satisfied every wit of divine justice against us. No spot. Come back. No spot. No spot. Also, we now have according to
Ephesians 1 all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ
Jesus not in anyone else Enriched with spousal gifts and treasures
and even the angels when he comes down and he saved one sinner
the angels are looking at that and they're amazed because they
don't they have never experienced redemption and They're like,
it's, you know, I don't know their mind. You can kind of get
off, but you think they're like, well, why, why that person? What
a wretch, what miserable, what sinners? Why, why that person? It seemed good in his sight.
Still the echo from heaven is there's no spot in thee. clothed with the garments of
salvation, given new names, because old things are passed away, adorned
with his robe of righteousness, Isaiah 61 verse 10, decked from
head to toe with jewels, spices, and the fragrance of the perfections
of our heavenly husband. That's what we need. No spot. No spot. Like I said, no spot. No spot. Thirdly, what behavior
is due to our husband, to our Redeemer? What behavior is due
to the Lord our God? Why? We will walk daily with
Him. We will stay close to him, we
will read about him, we will fellowship with him, and we'll
gather together in his name. That's what we'll do, because
the debt of love we owe. Secondly, we will not be ashamed,
out of Rowans, of our merciful caregiver. We will not be ashamed. Thirdly, we will render unto
him our all in all. pocketbook, whatever, I'm not
asking for money, whatever we have, all are the gifts of God. Christ took us, I like this,
this is what Mason, William Mason said, he said, Christ took us
for better or worse. Those words don't mean much in
a wedding ceremony. The worst happens, I'm out of
here, I'm done. For better or for worse, there's
no divorce in his court. There's no second thoughts. He
has no change of heart or mind, for he cannot change. Malachi
3, 6, he's immutable, which means he's not subject to change. Isn't
that great? Isn't that great? You talk about
absolutes. Matt and I were talking last
night about absolutes. This is the only absolute ever. We change. We're mutable. We
get older. We get decrepit. We say we'll
do things and we can't get them done. This does not change. Therefore, if he says to you,
no spot, there's no spot. No spot. His care, his love, his compassions
are ever the same to each member of his church. full of tenderness,
full of affections, full of delight, and full of pity and consolation. Brethren, let us then render
unto Him our entire being to the glory of His grace. Now I know things happen, things
get involved, we get children, believe, unbelieve, we get all
these things. The parents, who's a believer? It's singular, it's
simple. And I know in a complicated world,
render unto Him your all in all. We're going to make mistakes.
We're going to make wrong choices. This is what we do. This is what
we are. But remember, confess. There's no spot. There's no spot. Things are tough. And it's tougher
now raising children than it was when we raised our child. decisions, this is tougher. But
you can, you can, you can, God, God's grace is sufficient. Where
sin abounds, grace did much more bound. Now all these situations,
things, My desire, I hope your desire for the children, for
anyone, is salvation first. That may mean problems don't
go away, but through those problems, you will see, you will have a
peace. Scripture says it, not just me. Believe me, but believe
the scripture. The scripture says you'll have
a peace that passes all understanding. And I can't explain it, but I
can read it and believe it. Why? No spot. No spot. And that doesn't make us lethargic. That doesn't make us lazy. That
makes us want to serve him more. That makes us work daily with
him and spend more time with family. What Bruce said this
morning, if I heard, turn with me to Revelations 19
and closing. Revelation 19. In closing, shortly,
very soon, the Lamb will, in the most open display of His
covenant love and marriage to His chosen bride, will celebrate
this union in eternity. It will be the most open display
for all to see And in all doubt we'll fly away and we'll say,
well, he really meant it, didn't he? He said no spot, but I kind
of wondered, because I know what a rascal I am. Revelations 19, then it will
be said, Revelations 19 verse 7, 8, 9, Let us be glad and rejoice
and give honor to Him for the marriage, the consummation, it
will be complete, the marriage, of the Lamb is come, and his
wife, that's us, hath made herself ready. And to her was granted,
there's grace, there's no free will, was granted that she should
be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white, for the fine linen
is the righteousness of the saints. And he said unto me, write, blessed
are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb,
And he said unto me, these are true, the true sayings of God. It all comes down to that marriage
relationship. And Paul says, I've espoused
you. The gospel I preached, you believed. That espoused you by
the grace of God, not by anything you've done. So I just have a
couple, one question. Are we, are we ready for this
glorious day? and his wife made herself ready.
But why? Because she was made willing
in the day of his power. Are you ready for this day? Are you called? Are we called
unto the supper? Dear sinners, cry for mercy. If you're not, cry for everlasting
mercy in the bridegroom, and may he make it so according to
his sovereign purpose of grace.