Would you pray with me, please? Gracious and merciful Father,
Lord, I pray your blessing on your people today. Your law is
the best of fathers because it convicts us of sin, leads us
to Christ. But dear Father, we do praise
you for the law of love, a law that comes from our Mother,
a law of love. Give us the discernment, Lord,
we pray, to see and to know the difference, that we might look
to Christ, seeing His love as He died, that we might have life.
Oh, dear Father, may our response be a love that rules over us
and causes us to continually seek after Christ, in whose name
we come to You, and in whose strength enables us to live for
You as Your obedient children. In Jesus' name I pray, Amen. Open your Bibles please to Proverbs
chapter 6. We're looking this morning at
verses 20 to 22. I've entitled my sermon on this
Father's Day, The Best of Fathers and His Command, The Mystic Mother
and Her Law. Well, I pray that You'll understand
my title as we go through this sermon this morning. The Lord
is our teacher. As we're taught of Christ, we
learn to love Christ. We have a continuing need for
Christ, don't we? We need to love Him continually.
Let's begin by reading the text, and please keep your place there
because we're going to go through it verse by verse. In Proverbs 6, verses 20-22,
Christ says, My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake
not the law of thy mother. Bind them continually upon thine
heart, and tie them about thy neck. When thou goest, it shall
lead thee. When thou sleepest, it shall
keep thee. And when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee. First
thing I'd like for you to see in our text this morning, is
the way it begins. Wisdom, or Jesus Christ, who
is our wisdom, begins by addressing His Son and He says with these
words, My Son. In the book of Proverbs, God
often speaks to us as His children. But there are other types of
sons too that God tells us about in the Scriptures. Angels are
called sons in Job 38.7 because they were created by God. Israel,
the nation of Israel, was called a son, but Israel was only a
son by national adoption. And Israel was not a son in the
best sense by which sinners would long to be sons. And the magistrates,
or the judges, are called children of God, but they only appear
to be children in the office as magistrate because, as judges,
Psalm 82, verse 5 says, they know not, neither will they understand
they walk in darkness and all the foundations of the earth
are out of course. In other words, they don't have
the faith of Christ. Yet they are called sons. But
God is not talking here in Proverbs to angels or to the nation of
Israel or to judges. But there is another group that
he is talking to. It's another group of sons who
are the sons of God by election and profession. And God is talking
to these sons. Genesis 6-1 says, And it came
to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and
daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the
daughters of men that were fair, and they took them wives of all
which they chose. And the Lord said, My spirit
shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh. Now turn to Ephesians 1, please,
verses 5 and 6. These sons in Genesis are sons
that God has pre-appointed. He has chosen them to be His
sons by adoption from everlasting. Even though they're called flesh.
Even though they're sinners. As Ephesians 1, verses 5 and
6, it says about these fleshly men, God having predestinated
us to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according
to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of
His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. Think
of it. God takes sinners and He makes
them His sons. Think of it. Oh, I hope you know
you're a sinner. Because God died to save sinners. It's because God has adopted
sons that poor and needy Gentiles are called sons. They were called
sons long before they had any real knowledge of their father.
In Isaiah 43.6, God says about them, I will say to the north,
give up. And to the south, Keep not back. Bring my sons from afar and my
daughters from the ends of the earth. I think when he talks
about sons, he's not just talking about men, but he's talking about
sons and daughters. He just uses the terminology
sons. And in Hosea 1.10, God says about
these Gentiles that it shall come to pass that in the place
where it was said about them, ye are not my people, There it
shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God."
Now turn please to John 1, verses 11 and 12. Well, it's the secret, the secret of
our adoption which makes us God's sons and it is revealed to us
when God gives us faith to believe and to trust Christ. As John
1, verses 11 and 12 says about Christ, He came into His own.
and his own received him not. But as many as received him,
to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on his name." Now turn to Matthew 10 in verse 40,
please. I've given you a Bible drill
this morning. The first time that we see any
evidence of this work of God adopting sons and giving his
sons faith, which the Apostle calls receiving him, we are able
to see only because the heart of the believer is touched with
love for God and love for God's children. In Matthew 10, verse
40, Jesus was about to send his disciples out into the world
to preach the Gospel, and he says, He that receives you, receives
me. And he that receives me receives
him that sent me. That's one of the principal ways
that we can recognize sonship. The sons of God receive Christ. And having received Christ, they
learn about Christ and they love Christ with an everlasting love. There are many indications of
sonship. But I think the best indicator may be that we all
know them by their love, because all of God's children are taught
of Him. And one of the lessons which God teaches them, the Apostle
says in 1 Thessalonians 4 and 9, is this. The Apostle says,
Ye are taught of God to love one another. You see, love is
a fruit. Love is a fruit of the Holy Spirit
which shows in the life of a child of God by a love of the truth,
a love of the brethren, by love for God, love for His ways, and
as our Savior said in Matthew 7.20, wherefore by their fruits
ye shall know them. There are many other indicators
which show us that God has adopted us as His sons. They are intended
to encourage believers in their faith, I think. For instance,
when the Spirit of God has removed the veil of ignorance and darkness
and confusion from a believer's heart. And then the Holy Spirit
has illuminated the believer's understanding. You're called
a child of light. And God is light. So you're called
a child of light, a child of God. The sons of God are called
the children of light because the children of this world consider
themselves to be wiser than the children of light. But the children
of the world don't have the light of God or the wisdom of Christ.
They only have the wisdom of this world, and so they walk
around in darkness. We see another evidence of sonship,
too, when we have found the peace which believers find and enjoy
in Christ. Christ, you see, is the Prince
of Peace. As Jesus said in Luke 10, verses
5 and 6, Under whatsoever house you enter, first say, Peace be
to this house. And if the Son of Peace is there,
your peace shall rest upon it." A believer is the Son of Peace
because he is an adopted son of God. And finally, we see evidence
of our sonship when we have been given a reverence, an awe, and
a fear of God. As God says in Malachi 1.6, a
son honors his father and a servant his master. and that then I be
a father, where is my honor?" I'll turn back please to our
text, Proverbs 6.20, where we see that wisdom says, and remember
that wisdom is Jesus Christ, and he says to believers, my
son, keep the Father's commandment. This commandment that wisdom
tells us to keep is the Word of God or the promise of life.
And I emphasize it's the promise of life which is the Word of
God. Turn please to 105 verses 8-12. Let me show you what the
Word of God is. It is His covenant promise of
everlasting life which God made to Abraham and then later it
was repeated to Isaac and Jacob and to Israel and then by Christ
to all of His disciples. to all who would believe. As
Psalm 105, verses 8-12 says about the Lord our God, He has remembered
His covenant forever, the word which He commanded to a thousand
generations, which covenant He made with Abraham and his oath
unto Isaac, and confirmed the same unto Jacob for a law, and
to Israel for an everlasting covenant, saying, Unto thee will
I give the land of Canaan, the lot of your inheritance, when
they were but a few men in number, yea, very few, and strangers
in it." Now this covenant, or this promise from God, is called
the covenant of promise, and the land of Canaan is called
the promised land. Because as Galatians 3.18 says,
if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise. But God gave it to Abraham by
promise. In this covenant of promise,
there are two things which God promised to His children. First,
God promised to give a blessing to all of Abraham's spiritual
seed. God said, In thee and in thy
seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. And this
promised blessing is the blessing of eternal life. In Matthew 22,
verse 32, Jesus said, I am the God of Abraham, and
the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. God is not the God
of the dead, because that God is the God of this world. But
He is the God of the living. The covenant of promise comes
from the God of the living. In Galatians 3.9, Paul tells
us that the blessing of Abraham came to the Gentiles through
faith. He says, So then they which be
of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham. And in John 3.36, the
apostle says that he that believeth on the Son has everlasting life. Our God is the God of the living,
not the God of the dead, but the God of the living. And then
the second thing that is in this covenant of promise, which God
promised to the spiritual seed of Abraham, was that the holy
land would be given to Abraham and to all of his seed. Or in
other words, that the holy land would be given to all of his
descendants. But you know, Abraham himself
never enjoyed the inheritance of the literal holy land of Canaan. Abraham didn't even so much as
set foot on the physical land of Canaan, which tells me that
the land of Canaan was only a picture of a far greater land that was
promised to Abraham and to his spiritual seed. Not his natural
descendants or the seed of his flesh, but to his spiritual seed. And Abraham did seek a better
country, didn't he? By faith, Abraham was seeking
a heavenly home, not the physical land of Canaan. And this is the
wonderful promise which God promises to all of Abraham's spiritual
seed. God gives both grace and glory
to His children when He promises to bring them home to be with
Him forevermore. That's God's promise to us. And
so this covenant promise is also called the covenant of life and
peace because it is a promise of life and peace in Christ. But look at verse 20 of Proverbs
6 again. In the second phrase of verse
20, Wisdom says, forsake not the law of thy mother. Turn to Hebrews 4, verse 2, please. So what is the law of thy mother
which we're told not to forsake? Well, it isn't the law of Moses.
Moses isn't our mother. But I pray you will hear me carefully. The law of thy mother is the
law of faith, which excludes boasting in ourselves. And this
law of faith requires the obedience of faith, which is an obedience
motivated by love. As Paul said in Hebrews 4, verse
2, For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them.
But the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed
with faith in them that heard it. And then skipping down to
Hebrews 4, verse 6, Paul says, Seen therefore, it remaineth
that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first
preached entered not in because of unbelief. So the law of faith
requires the obedience of faith. We must believe in order to enter
in. This is the law we should not
forsake. The law of faith, which is the promise of life. Furthermore, this covenant or
the word of promise is to be commanded to a thousand generations. God gave his word in the days
of old and a great number of people have preached it since
then. Moses and all the prophets preached
this promise of life and it is clear that Jesus received the
same commandment to preach this law of faith because when God
sent his king on his holy hill of Zion, he commanded the blessing
to be put thereto. Turn please to Psalm 133 in verse
3. Remember that the blessing that
God promised wasn't the physical land of Canaan, but it was a
better promise. It was the promise of heaven.
It was the promise of life. It was the promise of life and
peace because on Mount Zion, God commanded the blessing, which
was life forevermore. Or, in other words, God commanded
that there would be eternal life for His children. In Psalm 133,
verse 3, it says that, As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew
that descended upon the mountains of Zion, for there the Lord commanded
the blessing, even life forevermore. Eternal life is a command of
God to His people. And Christ gave this same commandment
to His apostles. In Mark 16, verse 15, Jesus said
to His apostles, Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel
to every creature. And we see this again in Paul's
letters to the Romans. In Romans 16, verse 26, Paul
said, But now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the
prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made
known to all nations for, or for the obedience of faith. And so, look at the whole verse
of Proverbs 6.20. And you see that the blessings
of everlasting or eternal life was promised to Abraham and all
of Abraham's spiritual seeds. This promise of the word of life
is the contents of God's covenant with Abraham which God commanded
to be known to all of the nations as a law requiring the obedience
of faith down through a thousand years. As wisdom says, my son,
keep the Father's commandment because God has commanded the
promise or the word of life to be published to every creature
and then God applies it to all of the hearts of the sons and
heirs of promise by the faith of Christ. Turn now please to
John 14 in verse 23. This Word of God must be received,
it must be kept, because God causes it to be received and
kept in the hearts of His dear sons. It is received by the light
of the Gospel, and so we understand it by the teaching of the Holy
Spirit. It is received in the power of the Word, who is Jesus
Christ, and so we are quickened by it, by the power of Christ.
And it's received by the God-given faith and so it's obeyed and
it's received in the love of it. The Word of God, the Word
of life is embraced, it's held fast, it's professed, and it's
abided in by the love of the Father who loved us before we
first loved Him. And we see that love in Christ's
death so that we might have life. In John 14, a man came to Jesus
and he asked Jesus a question. He said, Lord, how is it that
thou wilt manifest thyself unto us and not unto the world? And
in verse 23, John 14, verse 23, Jesus answered and said unto
him, If a man love me, he will keep my words, and my Father
will love him, and he will come unto him, and we will come unto
him and make our abode with him. Oh, I pray you can hear this. I think it's exciting. I think
it's neat. Turn to John 8, verse 31. It is the indwelling of the
Spirit of God that will reveal to you that you are one of the
chosen ones who have been enabled to receive and to keep the Word
of Life. And those who aren't able to
receive God's commandment will not have the indwelling of the
Holy Spirit of Christ. And Christ is life. Christ is our life. Jesus Christ
will come to believers, and He will dwell in their hearts by
faith, and God the Father will come and dwell in the hearts
by love. Those who are indwelt by the Spirit of God will find
it to be the Word of life, like Peter did. They will find it
to be the Word of eternal life, and it operates and grows and
prevails in them as their souls are made free to live for Christ. As it says in John 8.31, Then
said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If you continue
in my word, then you are my disciples indeed. And you shall know the
truth, and the truth shall make you free. Take close attention to this.
I pray it will work its way into your heart. It's the key to eternal
life, I think. Wisdom is telling us about those
who are the sons of God and that the one who gave the commandment
or the promise of the Word of God is a father. And so it isn't
a legal commandment given to a bondservant, but it's an evangelical
commandment given to a son. Can you see it? Can you see the
difference? All of those who are under the
law are servants. They're not sons. They're servants.
As servants, they're in the flesh. They're not in the Spirit. And
the children of the flesh are not the children of God. Can
you see that? But the children of the covenant
promise are counted as the seed of Abraham. And by this you will
know whether or not you're a servant or a son. If you're a servant,
then you will cleave to the law. trusting in what you do and you'll
be attracted to the citizens of the world. You'll follow men
and you'll follow preachers who preach the law even if their
preaching condemns you of your sin and it becomes a terrible
burden to you. Turn to Romans 4 and verse 15.
If you are condemned of your sin, you may seek your salvation
by trying to keep the law. But you can't ever do that because
all of your works of righteousness are only sin. And in your self-righteousness,
you will despise all of those people that you judge not to
keep the law as well as you do. But even worse than that, you'll
hate all of those people who are happy in Christ and who rest
in Christ because they don't live by the law like you say
that you do. Because as Romans 4.15 says,
the law worketh wrath. For where no law is, there is
no transgression. So trusting in the law or trusting
in your own righteousness will always stir up your enmity against
those who trust only in Christ. But if you're a son, if you're
an heir of promise, you won't expect to find any comfort or
nourishment in anybody except you'll find your nourishment
and your comfort in Jesus Christ. Certainly you will not find nourishment
in yourself, and so you will seek only what God has promised
in Christ to those who believe and trust Christ. You'll feed
on Christ as you drink the milk of His Word, because indeed there
is no milk in any other but in Christ. So looking back at our
text, we see that wisdom says, Forsake not the law of thy mother.
We saw that the law is the law of faith, But what mother is
wisdom talking about here when he says, forsake not the law
of thy mother? It's not our natural mother because
all believers don't have righteous mothers. Many mothers are unbelievers
and other natural mothers are rebellious and lawless and disobedient. Though your mother is not, I'm
sure. And Hagar isn't the mother that is meant in our text either.
Hagar was an Egyptian and her son Ishmael was born after the
flesh. Ishmael persecuted Isaac who
was born after the flesh and his mother helped him persecute
which resulted in God turning both of them out of Abraham's
house. Besides that, Hagar was bought and sold like a slave
and her son was a wild man. But turn please to Genesis 17
and verses 15 and 16 and let's see who this mother is. the Proverbs that Wisdom is talking
about. There are a lot of mothers. A lot of mothers in Scripture
that Scripture tells us about, that we might think of. There's
even earthly Jerusalem. She's called a mother in Scripture.
But Jerusalem is in widowhood and desolate and she sits on
the ground in bondage with all of her children. Now, if you've
gotten to Genesis 17, then you may know who this mother is that
I'm talking about, or that wisdom is talking about. The mother
that wisdom is talking about is Sarah, the wife of Abraham. Sarah is the mother of this adopted
son in our text, just as Abraham is the father. In Genesis 17,
verses 15 and 16, we read, And God said unto Abraham, As for
Sarai, thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah
shall be her name. And I will bless her, and give
thee a son also of her. Yea, I will bless her, and she
shall be a mother of nations. Kings of peoples shall be of
her. Abraham is the father, but Sarah is the mother of the seed
of Abraham." to Isaiah 51 and verse 1. I want to look at verses
1-3, please. So it is that we are commanded
to hearken to the Lord about this matter of the law and grace.
We are to listen to God. We are to listen to the preaching
of the promises of God. And that's where we'll find peace
and life everlasting. By the faithful preaching of
the Gospel, God will show us Christ. He'll show His people
Christ. It's in the preaching of the
promises of God that we will find Christ. In Isaiah 51, verses
1-3, God says, Hearken to Me, ye that follow after righteousness,
ye that seek the Lord. Look unto the rock, look to Christ,
the rock, whence you are hewn, and to the hole of the pit, whence
you are digged. Look unto Abraham, your father,
and unto Sarah that bore you. If I called him alone and blessed
him and increased him, for the Lord shall comfort Zion." The
Lord shall comfort His church. Now please turn to Genesis 21
and verse 10. Oh, may the Holy Spirit be our
teacher. This mother, Sarah, is Abraham's
lawful wife. by a marriage covenant. And she
is blessed of God with a promise and blessing of everlasting life.
She's also a partaker of the Holy Ghost. She is the spiritual
mother of the faithful just as Abraham is their father. And
I know that because Sarah was speaking as the Spirit moved
her when she said to Abraham in Genesis 21 verse 10, Cast
out this bondwoman and her son. She's talking about Hagar and
Ishmael. Cast out this bondwoman and her
son, for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son,
even with Isaac. And then skipping down to the
second half of verse 12, Genesis 21-12, God said to Abraham, In
all that Sarah hath said, hearken to her voice. For in Isaac shall
thy seed be called. Oh, that we might all come at
the call of God. As God calls His people. In Isaac,
thy son shall be called. Turn please to Galatians 4 verse
24. So Sarah's offspring was an heir
of promise who was born after the Spirit. And Sarah gave suck
to her son even in her old age, And she's called the free woman,
and her son Isaac is called a free-born heir. And in all of these things,
Sarah is a figure of the covenant of God's grace. In Galatians
4, beginning in verse 24, Paul calls these two mothers, Hagar
and Sarah, the bondwoman and the free woman. He says, these,
these two women, are the two covenants, the one from Mount
Sinai which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar, and skipping to
verse 26 he says, but Jerusalem which is above is free, which
is the mother of us all. Now turn please to Hebrews 11
verse 11. As we look at the blessings that
God gave to Sarah, all of this teaches us a lesson, I think,
that Sarah's freedom, Sarah's promise, Sarah's spirit, Sarah's
life, Sarah's blessing, Sarah's son, Sarah's faith, all of Sarah's
blessings came to her from the covenant of grace and she received
them all as a free gift. In Hebrews 11, 11, God tells
us that it was through faith also that Sarah herself received
strength to conceive seed and was delivered of a child when
she was past age. because she judged him faithful.
She judged him faithful who had promised. She's talking about
Jesus Christ. God blessed Sarah by giving her
the faith of Jesus Christ. And we may observe too that the
commandment of the Father and the law of this mother both come
from this covenant of grace. Faith is called the law of the
spirit of life in Christ Jesus. which makes us free from the
law of sin and death. And as the Holy Spirit writes
the law of faith in the heart, and is called the Spirit of faith
on that count, so also the word of life is applied by the same
Spirit." Turn please to Isaiah 59 and verse 21. Again, I say,
hear this carefully. It is the truth from God, the
truth that God has given to me from His Word to preach to you
this morning, It's the truth from God that the spirit of faith
and the promise of life both come from the same covenant promise
which is given in God's grace to His children and they always
come together. As God's prophet said in Isaiah
59-21, so also I'm saying to you today, God says, As for me,
this is my covenant with them, saith the Lord. My spirit that
is upon me, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall
not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed,
nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, saith the Lord from hence
forth and forever." Here is our mother Sarah. She is the covenant
of grace. She is the heavenly Jerusalem.
And here is the word of life and of faith which we preach.
Here is the spirit of faith which is promised to all the seed of
Abraham. Jesus Christ, who is our wisdom,
says to his children, My son, keep thy father's commandment
and forsake not the law of thy mother. Bind them continually
upon thine heart. If God is your teacher, we may
be fully persuaded in our own mind of the truth that we bear
as we preach. Paul says in Romans 14, 5, let
every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. But this persuasion
must come from God. It cannot come from us. It must
come from God. I can't persuade you, though
I try. And you can't persuade yourself,
though you may try. As Genesis 9, 27 says, God shall
enlarge or God shall persuade Jephthah and he shall dwell in
the tents of Shem." But understand this. The heart isn't fixed. It isn't changed until it purges
the conscience and washes our conscience clean. As Hebrews 9.14 asks, How much
more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit
offered himself without spot to God, how much more shall he
purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God. We read also about some folks
who for a while they believe but in a time of temptation and
stress then they tend to fall away. Well this is a temporary
faith that they have which abides for a season and then when it's
most needed in times of trial it fails. And we read about the
miraculous faith which will remove mountains. But it's a faith that
brings no charity. It doesn't bring love, that kind
of faith. Now faith, when it's in your
mind, may for a while keep a person in firm hope and expectation.
And that temporary faith may abide there for some time. And
yet things are not clear. They're not sound. The soul isn't
fully satisfied. It isn't settled. It isn't firm.
Far from it. There's only worry and doubt,
and there's no trusting in Christ with a faith that is only in
your mind. Turn to Hebrews 10, verse 22. But when faith reaches
down into the heart, when God puts it in the heart, when it
reaches the conscience of a believer, because God has applied the atonement
of Jesus Christ to your heart, then there is the God-given faith
of Christ in your heart, which Paul calls having your heart
sprinkled with an evil conscience, sprinkled from an evil conscience. In Hebrews 10, verse 22, Paul
says, Let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith,
having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies
washed with pure water. This is the pardoning of God's
grace in the heart, which removes evil from the conscience. We
are washed clean by the blood of Jesus Christ. And so I'm sure
that it's a good thing to have the heart established by grace.
As God says in our text, bind them continually upon thy heart,
though it is all the work of Christ. Faith is a law and laws
are binding. But the faith of Christ always
works by love because love is the bond which binds us to God. Faith is a uniting power which
unites God and His children. You read in Scripture, and I
preach about the unity of faith, and when God gives us the faith
of Christ in our hearts, faith takes root in the heart and it
works by love, and it very pleasantly assures the soul of its interest
in Christ as it sweetly constrains us to obedience, as it powerfully
engages the whole body, mind, and soul with the love of God.
There is such a thing as a growth of faith. It's a groin which
God accomplishes in us as we observe the actions and the working
of faith. Our faith grows by using it and
by stirring it up with constant and continual approaches to God,
especially when we're in times of trouble. It's then as we have
turned in our need to God that we see the faith of Christ working
in us as we see faith's successes and the returns that are granted
by God to his children through the prayers of faith. Faith grows
in our hearts as we observe the liveliness of it sometimes and
its deadness at other times. But faith seems to grow best
when we cherish and nourish it by reading and hearing and conversing
and meditating about Christ. Especially about Christ as our
Savior. Prayer is critical to the growth
of our faith. We pray for an increase of faith
and that our faith might not fail and then God answers our
prayers. Because as we watch and guard against those besetting
sins which weaken and discourage faith, we find an enabling faith. David's faith with a good conscience
faced and overcame Goliath. But with a bad conscience and
without faith, David fled from Absalom and Absalom was his own
son. To bind faith in your heart by
love is to encourage faith powerful constraints because the love
of Christ bows, bends, influences and draws the heart of a believer
to cleave to Christ. Faith which works in the heart
by love brings in fresh power from Christ and so we're kept
by that mighty power through faith and we're made to stand
fast in Christ by faith and our love for Christ. To bind the
word of promise to the heart is to receive the love of the
truth and the truth in the love of it which is called binding
up the testimony. Love is a strong cord. Love means
that a thing loved is held fast and so it can't be forced away
as long as that love lasts. And what we love is uppermost
in our thoughts and so it's always present with us. It's often thought
about and is greatly delighted in because we love it. And so
it is if we love Christ. And the more we know of Christ,
the more our love for Christ grows. The Holy Spirit, as He
leads our mind into the Word, giving us an anointed experience
and understanding of the truth of God, the Holy Spirit causes
God's truth to become familiar to us, and so our love for Christ
grows and continues to grow. The corruption of the heart are
much put off and the inclinations and requests are much weakened
where truth is held fast in love, where truth is meditated on and
where truth is delighted in, which sweetly entertains the
soul with knowledge and understanding. Bind them continually upon my
heart as you look to Christ for all things. Amen. Turn in your
hymnals, please, to hymn number 111. Let's stand as we sing. Nearer, still nearer.