You will find the Song of Solomon,
Chapter 8, and just hold your Bibles open there while I make
some comments leading up to this text. Song of Solomon, Chapter
8. John makes a statement in 1 John
Chapter 4, Verse 18, that I keep going back to in my heart's meditation
over and over and over again. He says, there is no fear in
love because perfect love casteth out all fear. He that feareth is not made perfect
in love. Perfect love. Perfect love. Perfect love casted
out all fear. Perfect love is God's love. And there is no other perfect
love. It is the knowledge of God's
love for me that cast out fear from me. It is the knowledge of God's
perfect love for me that cast out fear from me. If I am confident that God in
heaven loves me, if I'm confident that I'm the
object of God's love. I have no reason to fear him
and no reason to fear anything or anyone else because he's God. Perfect love casteth out all
fear. What is this perfect love? God's
perfect love for us is described in this book as an everlasting
love. Jeremiah chapter 31, he said,
I have loved thee with an everlasting love. Therefore, with loving
kindness, have I drawn thee. So God's love for his elect is
an everlasting, eternal love. It began before time was, in
fact, It has no beginning for God is eternal and it has no
end. It is everlasting love. That love of God pitched upon
his people before the world began is an eternal everlasting love. That love is unconditional. Unconditional. These days people
talk about unconditional love. There's no such thing among me. There's no man who loves his
wife unconditionally. There's no woman who loves her
husband unconditionally. There's no mother who loves her
child unconditionally. There are always conditions connected
with our love, always conditions. But God says concerning his people,
I will love them freely. I will love them without any
cause. My love for that lady there,
I hope she knows it. I suspect you know it. It's not
unconditional love and it's not free. First time I saw her, I
had a suspicion that maybe I could fall in love with her. She was
good to look at. And there were lots of things
that attracted my love to her and still do. And my love for
her is anything but free love. It is love that was attracted
by something in her and is attracted by something in her. My love
for you, I hope, is real and genuine, but it's not unconditional. It has a lot to do with our relationship
together these past 32 years. Has a lot to do with things we've
gone through. It is not absolutely free love. God's love for his
elect is free. I can't even imagine it. Free. Without condition of any kind
in us. Without any attraction in us. with nothing in us to win it,
but everything in us that might repel it. He said, I will love
them freely. And this free, everlasting, eternal
love of God is electing love. He said, Jacob, have I loved? But he saw, have I hated? His
love is discriminating. It's distinguishing. I know that
people like to have this foolish notion, well, God loves everybody.
Tell the folks in hell that and ask them what they think about
it. They'll say, well, he has a strange way of showing it.
No, God does not love everybody. God is not benevolent to everybody. God does not have a universal
grace toward everybody. Universal anything is universal
nothing. To talk about loving everybody
is to talk about love that means nothing. To talk about grace
for everybody is to talk about grace that means nothing. To
talk about benevolence for everybody and kindness for everybody and
a goodwill for everybody is to mean that God's benevolence and
God's kindness and God's goodwill is totally insignificant because
it benefits nothing for many. No, God's love is electing love. Jacob have I loved, but Esau
have I hated. And God's love is redeeming love. You want to
know the love of God? Go to Calvary and behold the
Lamb of God slain in our stead. You want to know the love of
God? Listen to the Savior as he cries, suffering under the
agonizing wrath of God as our substitute. My God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me? You want to know the love of
God? Hear this. Herein is love. Not that we loved
God. We didn't. We couldn't. We wouldn't. But that he loved us. Loved the
people from whom he would get no love in return except he created. Herein is love, not that we love
God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation,
the justice satisfying sacrifice for our sins and not for ours
only, but also for the sins of the whole world. That is for
the sins of God's elect throughout all the whole world. God's love
is shed abroad upon the multitudes of his people scattered through
the ages of time and through every nation and kindred and
tribe and tongue. And God's love for us is immutable. I am the Lord, he says. I change
not, since I don't change. And this is the only reason.
Since I don't change, therefore, you sons of Jacob are not consumed. Jacob, of whom he said, Jacob
have I loved. You who are the chosen objects
of God's love and mercy, the chosen objects of God's grace,
you sons of Jacob, wretched, fallen, depraved, fickle, sinful
men and women that you are, I am the Lord, I change not. Therefore,
you sons of Jacob are not consumed. God's love is immutable. It is indestructible. You heard me right. It is indestructible. That means, Don Ranieri, if God
set his love on you from eternity, nothing you have done in time
or can do tomorrow can destroy that love at all. Nothing can
cool it. Nothing can quench it. Nothing
can destroy it. Let's see if the book declares
that. Song of Solomon, chapter eight. Oh, that thou wert as my brother. The church, Christ's chosen bride
cries out to him. Oh, that thou wert as my brother.
that sucked the breast of my mother. If that were the case,
when I should find thee without, I would kiss thee." I'd kiss you in public. Remember,
this is written in ancient times when expressions of love between
a man and a woman were not something publicly displayed as it's cheaply
displayed in our day. You young people, you date and
start courting each other, men and women as well. Open displays
of passion and affection are cheap. They're cheap. They don't
show respect. But she said, she said, I wish
you were like my brother. That way, when I met you on the
street, I could kiss you. You'd expect a long-lost relative
meeting another to kiss them, no matter where they meet them.
I'd meet you publicly and kiss you. Yea, I should not be despised. Nobody'd mock me for it. Verse
2, I would lead thee and bring thee into my mother's house,
who would instruct me. I'd take you home with me. I'd
meet you in the street and I'd bring you into the house of God
with me. I'd bring you to church with
me. Read on. I would cause thee to drink of
spiced wine of the juice of my pomegranate. Pomegranates being
representative, at least in the minds of men, a passion fruit. I'd cause you to drink of my
pomegranate juice. I'd cause you to drink the sweet
spiced wine of my love for you. His left hand should be under
my head. His right hand should embrace
me. I charge you, O daughters of
Jerusalem, that you stir not up nor awake my love till he
please. His right hand under my head.
his left hand or his left hand under my head, his right hand
embracing me, he and I comfortable together in sweet, intimate fellowship. Now, I charge you, daughters
of Jerusalem, my brothers and sisters, I charge you, I charge
you, stir not up nor awake my love till he please. Don't disturb
this sweet, sweet fellowship. This sweet, intimate embrace
of my soul by my Redeemer until He please. Who is this that cometh
up from the wilderness? Yesterday morning, Brother Bruce
Crabtree brought an outstanding message from this opening part
of chapter, verse five. And immediately my mind turned
to this subject this evening. Who is this that cometh up from
the wilderness, comes up out of this world? Who is this coming
up from this empty, barren, useless, worthless, dry wilderness, leaning
upon her beloved? Who is this that comes up out
of this world, hanging on the omnipotent arm of that one who
is the beloved of her soul? hanging on the omnipotent arm
of Christ our Savior. Who is this? We don't. There thy mother, I'm sorry,
I raised thee up under the apple tree. And there thy mother brought
thee forth. There she brought thee forth
that bare thee. And she cries, set me as a seal
upon thine heart. as a seal upon thine arm. For love, love, it's strong as
death. Jealousy is cruel as the grave. The coals thereof are coals of
fire, which hath the most vehement flame. Now watch verse seven. Many waters cannot quench love,
neither can the floods drown it. If a man would give all the
substance of his house for love, if a man would give all the substance
of his house for love, it would be utterly contempt, utterly
despised. The Lord Jesus declares his love
for his church. What a description this is of
that love that passes knowledge. It's Christ who speaks and says,
I raised the up under the apple tree. It's Christ who says, I
have loved thee with an everlasting love. With loving kindness have
I drawn thee. It's God, our savior, who declares,
I drew them with the cords of love, with the bands of a man.
He found me in a desert land and a waste and howling wilderness.
Christ loved the church and gave himself for it. And she who has
experienced this love cries to him, set me as a seal. A seal upon your heart and a
seal upon your arm. A seal on the place of your deep
compassion. A seal on the arm of your omnipotent
power. a seal on the tender place of
emotion, deepest passion, and a seal upon the place of power,
safety, and work. Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? His love is invincible, irresistible
as death. It's jealous love. an undying,
unalterable love. Undying and unalterable as the
grave. It's comparable to fire, coals
of fire, the very flame of Jehovah. Here, then, is the love of Christ. Its breadth, its length, its
height, its depth are absolutely immeasurable. But our text singles
out two things about the Savior's love, to which I call your attention
this evening. First, it is unquenchable. And second, it is unpurchasable. Here's the first thing. The love
of Christ for his people is unquenchable love. Unquenchable love. Turn to Ephesians
chapter 3 for a moment. No other love is really unquenchable. His love is eternal, everlasting,
immutable, unalterable. His love is infinitely, infinitely
beyond that of a father or a mother, a brother, a sister, a husband
or a wife, a son or a daughter. The love of Christ is the one
and only love that passeth knowledge, that passeth knowledge. We know
the love of Christ, but how little we know his love.
How little we know his love. Shelby and I will often express
to one another, I wish I could somehow show you how much I love
you. Hundreds of times she said that
to me, hundreds of times. Hundreds of times I've said that
to her. Wish I could show you how much I love you. But his love, we just can't know. We know his love better than
any. And yet his love, we can't know. It's love that passes knowledge. So that there's nothing in heaven
or earth or hell Comparable to his love and nothing in heaven
or earth or hell that can extinguish his love or cool his love the
one love Whose dimensions are beyond all measure is his love
Ephesians 3 verse 14 Paul writes to the Ephesians now remember
what he's told them in chapter 1 He told them what God has done
for us in Christ from eternity what God has done for us by Christ
in redemption, what God has done for us in the sweet experience
of his grace in the new birth. And now it says in verse 14,
chapter three, for this cause, I bow my knees under the father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven
and earth is named, that he would grant you, this is what I'm seeking
for you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened
with might by His Spirit in the inner man. How is that? That Christ may dwell in your
hearts by faith, that ye being rooted and grounded in Him. And
this is where the strength is. This is the might of His Spirit
in the inner man. This is what'll make you strong.
This is what'll make you strong in the face of what causes others
to tremble. This is what'll make you strong
in the face of that which discourages others. This is what will make
you strong in times when other folks lose their minds. That
you might comprehend with all sense what is the breadth and
length and depth and height and to know the love of Christ which
passeth knowledge. Now watch this. that ye might
be filled with all the fullness of God. To know His love, this
love that passes knowledge, is to be filled with all the fullness
of God. What a statement. What a statement.
Our Redeemer's love is here compared to fire that can't be quenched. As such, we're told here in the
Song of Solomon that waters, many waters cannot quench it. Christ's love for us is a thing
of life which the floods cannot drown. He loved me with an everlasting
love. And there came the waters of
a great flood in which in my father Adam, I chose rebellion
rather than bowing. I chose sin rather than righteousness. I chose darkness rather than
light. I chose death rather than life. And I sinned against him with
both fists shoved in his face and said, God, get out of my
way. And that's what happened in the garden. But Bobby, Didn't
affect his love at all. Didn't affect his love at all. I just had some correspondence
with a friend of mine who suggested that there's somehow a time when
God didn't love his people. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Don't ever think such. When our father, Adam, Went astray
in the garden, his fall was but the means by which our Savior
would make us to know in the sweet experience of his grace,
the love of God. The angels know nothing about
this kind of love. They've never been recovered
from the fall. Oh no, our sin and fall in our father Adam didn't
cause him to cease to love us. But weren't we under the wrath
of God like everybody else? Yes and no. Consciously under
the wrath of God children of wrath even as others men and
women who in their own consciences by their own guilt and sin were
Conscious of God's wrath and their desert of God's wrath and
full of fear for God's wrath because they knew nothing about
the love of God When Christ comes in His grace and sends His Spirit,
causing the love of God to be shed abroad in our hearts, then
we are made aware of His love. And the fear of God vanishes,
for the conscience says His sacrifice is enough. But our experience
of grace, Is not the beginning of grace our experience of his
love is not the beginning of his love his love for us It's
from everlasting and it didn't change because we sinned and
fell in the garden We came forth from our mother's womb speaking
lies rebels And lived all the days of our lives in rebellion
to god you and me hating God and doing everything we could
to display that hatred of God. That's the nature of man. Unbelief,
man's willful, deliberate, obstinate unbelief is looking on Christ
and saying, we despised him, we esteemed him not, he deserved
to die. It's man's way of attacking God. But his love, never even cooled, never even
cooled. That prodigal left his father's
house and took the goods he thought were his by right. and ran away
to a far country and wasted his substance and riotous living.
Until at last he came to nothing and he tried to fill his belly
with the husk the swine did eat. And finally he said, I'll arise
and go back to my father's house. He has hired servants and he's
got bread enough and to spare. And I'll ask him, father, make
me as one of your hired servants. And he went back to his father. Tail between his legs, head hanging
low. I don't know what he's gonna
do. I don't know what he's going
to do. I don't know whether he'll kick me or take me in. I don't
know what he's going to do. I deserve to be cast out forever. And his father saw him when he
was yet a great way off and ran and fell on his neck and kissed
him and kissed him and kissed him and kissed him and kissed
him and kissed him. Much love, deeply felt and freely
expressed. And Mark, he never mentioned
a word about all of his rebellion. Never said a word to him about
his ignorance. Never said a word to him about
all the sin. Never said a word to him about
all he had done to dishonor his father. Oh no, his father's love. Our father's love. Covers a multitude
of sins with the blood of his darling son so that he never
brings the issue up. Isn't it amazing Merle and our
experience of grace and our relationship with God. The only one who ever
brings up the issue of our sin is us only one. We break it up because
it's always there. Not him, not him. All the particles
receive freely because of God's infinite love. Our Savior came
here to suffer and die in our room instead because of his love
for us. And the waters of shame and suffering
sought to quench and drown it. They would have hindered its
overflowing and would have come like Peter between the Savior
and the cross, but he refused to be quenched. His love refused
to be quenched along the way to Calvary. Herein is love. He leaped over barrier after
barrier in the way. His love refused to be extinguished
or drowned. Its fire could not be quenched. Its life could not be drowned. He came at last to Calvary. Brother Frank brought a message
to you last week on Gethsemane and the Lord's sufferings in
Gethsemane as he anticipated his agony at Calvary. And the
waves and billows of death went over his soul, the great lover
of my soul. The grave cold, dark, empty tomb,
where lay his body sought to cool his love, but it proved
itself stronger than death, for neither death nor the grave could
alter or weaken or cool in any way his love for me. He came out of both death and
grave as strong as before, as full of life as before, His love
defied death and overcame it on my behalf. He loved us and he redeemed us
and we despised him. Despised him. Frank Hall, I tried with all
my might to go to hell. hating God, hating God. Chasing every vile lust. Pursuing every obscene thing. Chasing after vanity. Pursuing
anything that would likely destroy anything like manhood in me. But his love could not be quenched
or cooled to any degree. All our infirmities and unlovable-ness
and ugliness and rebellion could not quench or drown the love
of Christ. His love clings to the unlovely and will not stop. His love holds with the arm of
omnipotence and says, I will not let you go. In the waters
of rejection, flood after flood of rejection, you hear the gospel
and you say, no. You hear the message of God's
grace, you say, no. You hear of blood atonement and free salvation,
you say, I won't have it. You hear of Christ the King,
I won't bow. I won't have it. This man shall not rule over
us. But his love remained unmoved. Totally unmoved. How old did
you tell me you were when God first called you? 50 years old?
For 50 years, you're shoving God out of your face. And 50
years, he's pulling on you all the time. 50 years you seek to break the arm
of his love and 50 years he holds tenaciously and says, I will
not let you go. I will not let you go. And now
since we've been saved by his grace. Oh, what grace I've experienced. What goodness What compassion,
what free mercy, what abounding, abounding, abounding faithfulness. And I've requited that grace
with sin and coldness and indifference. Brother Frank Hall asked back
in the office, of God removing the candlestick. He said, what
does that mean? It takes the church away. It
takes away his witness. May leave the church people there,
but it takes away the gospel of God's grace and they don't
even know it. And he said, why would God do that? Well, he'll
do it because men despise the gospel. He'll do it because the
gospel's there and you won't have it. He'll do it in judgment. Or he does it because he's going
to take his gospel somewhere else and call his elect in another
place. But the fact is, all the floods of our rebellion, all
the torrents of our sin, all the waves and billows of the
evil of our hearts, constantly laboring, as it were, to quench
his love. never affect his love for his
own. When David had taken Bathsheba
and murdered her husband Uriah, his faithful servant, God took
the first son so that all Israel would know that the thing David
did displeased the Lord and David would know that the thing David
did displeased the Lord. But then Bathsheba gives birth
to another son. And God sent his prophet Nathan
back to David again. David had named the boy Solomon
and Nathan said call him Jedediah. Beloved of the Lord. Beloved of the Lord. David. David, don't ever imagine. Don't
ever imagine. Don Fortner don't ever imagine that you can quench my love.
Can't be done. His love stronger than death. His love can't be quenched with
many waters. His love can't be drowned with
great floods. Our text tells us His love is
unquenchable. And then it tells us something
else, and I'll be very brief here. It's unpurchasable. Now, I may have just coined a
word. It cannot be purchased. It cannot be purchased. Some
of you here are yet without the knowledge of the love of God
in Christ. And I know why. I know why. Because you keep
trying to buy it. With your goodness, with your
good works, with your righteousness, with your feelings, with your
emotions, you keep trying to buy it. I'm going to I'm going
to get God to love me by something I do. Oh, no. What does that text say? Look
back in Song of Solomon. Chapter 8, verse 7. If a man would give all the substance
of his house for love, it would be utterly content. utterly despised. You can't buy love. You can't
buy love. When Shelby and I were dating,
first date we had, I took her to a steakhouse. Man, I'd never
taken a girl to a steakhouse before. I didn't know what to
expect. I got my best clothes on. She got, man, she got dolled
up, had her little beehive hairdos. Roommate gave her some of those
long ear bobs and We went out to the steakhouse, but I took
her to Ponderosa. Everybody else had them bibbed
overalls. That's the best I could do. And from then on, we'd go
to McDonald's and I'd ask her what flavor she wanted. I didn't
dare ask her what she wanted because I didn't have nothing
to buy anything. But I did the best I could to impress her with
what I could do for her to win her love. But you can't buy love. Not with lots of money. not with
all the substance of your house. You can't buy love. It can't
be done. And you sure can't buy the love
of God. Whatever you offer him, God despises
it. Your righteousness, your prayers,
your Bible reading, your devotion, Your self-denial, your sacrifice,
whatever it is, God despises it. He calls it filthy rags. You may as well take a bloody,
dirty, filthy rag and stick it in his face and say, here, now
love me for this. Our righteousnesses are filthy
rags. Brother Don, what can I do that
I may have this love? And you won't do that. You won't
do that. Turn to Romans chapter, chapter
five. Let's look at two passages of
scripture and I'll quit. Romans chapter five. You won't do nothing. You won't do it. You're going
to keep trying. You're going to keep trying to muster something
you can give God. Muster something from within
that will make you happy with yourself before God. Romans chapter five, verse what?
Paul's talking about our free justification by Christ. Therefore,
being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
Lord Jesus Christ, by whom also we have access by faith into
this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory
of God. And not only so, but we glory
in tribulation also. Knowing the tribulation work
of patience and patience experience and experience hope and hope
make us not ashamed. How come? Because the love of
God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given
to us. Now. If God will do something
for you. If God will do something for
you. If God will do something for you. You'll walk out those
doors tonight filled with the knowledge of perfect love. Love that casteth out all fear
if God will shed it abroad in your heart. You see, in the new
birth, God the Holy Spirit comes and gives sinners life. And with
the gift of life, he gives them faith. so that he causes you
now to believe on his side, to trust the Lord Jesus, to trust
the Lord Jesus. Believe on the son of God. And
Alan Kidman, the love of God is made perfect in you. This perfect love is perfect
love. It's mine. I dare believe it. It's mine. I dare not believe
it. Perfect love that casteth out
all fear. Now, turn to the book of Jude. Book of Jude. I sat down this
afternoon for a good while and just looked at this. Jude verse 21. Keep yourselves in the love of
God. Keep yourselves in the love of
God. You call me or come by the office,
we're riding down the road and you have trouble and you having
difficulty with peace and assurance, blessed knowledge of Christ,
mercy and grace. I'm going to tell you to do something. I'm going to tell you to do something. I'm going to tell you to bury
yourself in this book and trust Christ. Trust Christ. That's what Jude
means when he says, keep yourselves in the love of God. Trust Christ. How did you come to know God's
love to begin with? How did you come to find out
God loved you to begin with? Believe on the son of God and
believing the son of God. I have life everlasting. Believe
on the son of God. Believe on the son of God. Keep yourselves in the love of
Christ. Read on. Looking for the mercy of our
Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. Keep yourselves in the
love of Christ, standing on the tiptoe of faith,
looking for mercy. The mercy that culminates in
eternal life When the Savior comes again, or when he comes
to call you home. Pam Wood's older brother, Ron,
he'd been a good friend of mine since 1969. Good friend. I got this note from him this
morning about their younger brother, Pam's, he's a little older than
Pam, but Ron's younger brother, he's dying with cancer. And this
is how the note began. Almost home. Almost home. Almost home. That's what it's all about. Keep
yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our
Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. Amen.