most universally understood and
most tender expression of affection and love known to man is a kiss. The very first thing a mother
does with a newborn baby as she holds it on her breast is lean
over and kiss it. The very last thing we do with
someone we love as they leave this world and we expect to see
their faces no more, is to plant a kiss on their face. In this text this afternoon in
the Song of Solomon chapter 1 and in verse 2, we see a bride longing
to be kissed and kissed and kissed. by her beloved. The bride is
the Church of God. Her beloved is the Lord Jesus
Christ, the King of Glory. Look at the text with me. Let
him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for thy love is better
than wine. And we've gathered once more
this afternoon around the Lord's table. And I hope we've come
here with this prayer, you who are believers particularly. We've
come here with this prayer upon our hearts, with this great noble
and ennobling desire burning in our souls. Let him kiss me
with the kisses of his mouth until I see him face to face. and am able as I want to, to
tell the story saved by grace, the next best thing is that he
will come and kiss me. Now I realize something of what
an enormous desire this is. It is a privilege beyond comparison
to have the Lord Jesus Christ himself kiss us. In days of old
it was considered a high, high honor. for a king to just stretch
out his hand and let one of his subjects kiss his hand. Why folks
would, they count themselves to be most blessed people in
the land if the king would just stretch out his hand and let
them kiss his hand. But here the Shulamite expresses
a desire which would be utterly unthinkable. She desired that
King Solomon The wisest, greatest, most beautiful, gorgeous, peaceful,
well-known king who had ever lived would kiss her with the
kisses of his mouth. But that's nothing. She desired
that the king kiss her. Not only kiss her, but kiss her
repeatedly, intimately, and passionately with all the kisses of his mouth.
And the desire would have been unthinkable except for one thing.
She was just dead sure he wanted to. She was just absolutely sure
he wanted to kiss her with the kisses of his mouth as much as
she desired to be kissed of him. But what I have to talk about
this afternoon is much more than a story of romance between a
Shulamite maid and the King Solomon. This is an expression of a soul
in love with Jesus Christ, the Son of God. longing for him to
come in sweet manifestation of himself, in sweet manifestation
of his love, with the kisses of his mouth. Now we've come
here, you who are believers, to observe the Lord's table.
You who are not yet believers, you who are not yet born of God's
Spirit, have not yet learned to discern your need of the Lord's
body of his sacrifice. You who are unworthy to breathe
God's air, much less to approach his throne because of your sin. You who are unworthy because
you have no substitute, no savior, no advocate between you and God.
You watch and listen Maybe God will be pleased to grant you
faith in Christ. Maybe he will come to you and
kiss you now with his sweet manifestation of grace and mercy through his
blood atonement. But for us who are believers,
as we prepare to eat this bread and drink this wine at the Lord's
table, as we endeavor to celebrate our redemption by Christ's shed
blood one more time in remembrance of him, I want us for just a
few minutes to meditate on two things, just two things in this
sentence. First is the request. Let him
kiss me with the kisses of his mouth. I read that and I've been
meditating on this text now for months. I'll probably come back
and preach to you on it toward the end of our study in the Song
of Solomon later, but this keeps coming across my mind. How can
the Lord of Glory, how does Jesus Christ the Son of God, who set
yonder on the throne of heaven, come here and kiss us with the
sweet, intimate kisses of his mouth? How are these kisses expressions
of his love to us? Now obviously the kisses with
which the Son of God kisses his people, the kisses by which he
manifestly expresses his love, by which he assures us of his
everlasting love for us, are manifestations of himself as
the world can never have him manifest to them. The very first
thing I have to say, the very first thing I must say about
these kisses is this, we owe our entire salvation to his kisses,
all of it. The first is the kiss of regeneration. Let me show you how to illustrate
it. I'm going to be very brief, but listen to the illustration.
You remember the story of Hosea and Gomer, Hosea chapters one,
two, and three, particularly. Gomer, that's Harlot who was
loved of Hosea. She gives him three children
and then she abandons the children and her husband and she goes
back to the red light district and Hosea found her. And at last
he found her on the auction block, derelict, abominable, wretched,
old, broken, nobody'd have her, nobody wanted her, nobody loved
her except Hosea. And he, he bought her. And he
took her by the arm. And he walked down the street
with her. And he brought her to his house. And I can just
imagine what kissing went on. She had been bought by the prophet
of God and she had been restored by the prophet of God to his
house and to his favor and that's a beautiful picture of what Jesus
Christ has done for us. Not only did he buy us for himself,
Bob he came down here where we were in bondage, in iniquity,
broken, derelict and abominable and he gave us life and he spread
over us the skirt of his righteousness and he washed us and cleaned
us and he He'd manifest himself to us for
the first time, made himself known to us and thus kissed us
in his regenerating mercy and grace. Turn to a text over in
Psalm 85. Psalm 85. This kiss of regeneration
comes only after the kiss of redemption. And this is the very
language of scripture here. This is not a allegorical interpretation. This is just the very language
of scripture. In Psalm 85 and verse 10. How is it that Jesus
Christ saves sinners? How is it that God can be just
and justify the ungodly? Mercy and truth are met together. Here's mercy, David. The Lord
God said, I will pardon their iniquity. I will forgive their
sin. I will heal their unrighteousness.
Here's truth. He said, the soul that sinneth
it shall die. I will by no means clear the guilty. He says, I
will not cover your sin. But now in Jesus Christ, mercy
and truth, truth have met together. Righteousness and peace have
kissed each other. One together. Mercy and truth,
righteousness and peace have kissed each other in the sin
atoning blood of our Savior. And then there is the kiss of
reconciliation as well. Being born of God's spirit. given
life and faith in Jesus Christ to believe him who is our Redeemer,
to believe the merit of his blood and righteousness, to trust our
souls upon his merit, brings the kiss of reconciliation. You
probably know by now one of my favorite stories in scripture
is the story of the prodigal son. That prodigal son, when
he was down in the hog trough, And Fain would fill his belly
with the husk that the swine ate. But no man gave him anything
to eat. He said, how many hired servants
are there in my father's house who have bread enough and to
spare? Here I perish with hunger. That's nonsense. That's foolishness. I will arise and go to my father.
And I'll say to him, father, I'm no more worthy to be called
your son. Make me as one of your hired servants. And as he gets
up and heads home, His father saw him when he was yet a great
way off. He stood up and he ran to meet
him and he fell on his neck and kissed him and kissed him and
kissed him and kissed him. Oh, what a picture that is. The
only time in all the book of God when God Almighty is pictured
as being in her, he hurries to meet us at her in mercy and grace. Now then, turn to Psalm chapter
2, the second Psalm. Not only, Lindsay, does the Savior
kiss us, we're commanded to kiss Him. Look at this, Psalm 2. Serve the Lord, verse 11. Serve
the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. We're talking
about the Lord God Almighty. And it doesn't matter how much
you know about his grace, doesn't matter how much you know about
his mercy, doesn't matter how much you know about his love
and compassion, understand you walk before God who is the Lord
and you walk before him with trembling. You walk before him
with great care that you please and honor him. And then look
at this, kiss the soul. kiss the sun. You folks who are fathers and
who still exercise good sense before your minds got polluted,
I hope they haven't with the philosophy of the world, and
you took the paddle to your daughter or your child, the child misbehaved
and they'd really messed up. You get your paddle and they
know what's coming. They know what's coming. surest
way for them to get out of it. I mean the surest way. Surest way on this earth. When
my little girl was growing up, surest way on this earth for
her not to get a paddling is to get up here and hug my neck
and kiss me. That's surest way to get out of it. I mean, that's
tough. That's tough business. Listen
to this. The heathen rage. People imagine
a vain thing. They would cast the Son of God
out. And now God says, kiss the Son. lest he be angry, and you
perish from the way when his wrath is kindled but a little.
Blessed are all they that put their trust in him. That's what
it means to kiss him, that's trusting. Trusting. Quit fighting against God. Lay down your weapons of warfare.
Oh you who are without Christ, quit fighting God. Just quit
fighting His dominion, His rule, His being. Kiss the Son. and live forever. Our heart's
desire now is that our Savior may graciously meet us here,
one more time, at this his table, in this his house, and kiss us
again, reviving our souls and enabling us to kiss him. In the last 30 years, it hasn't
happened very often. You probably would know that
just by knowing me, my sweet disposition. I don't often cause
Shelby to get upset with me. That doesn't happen often. The
reality is she's real patient. But I don't often cause her to
get upset with me. But when there's a barrier, when
there's a wall, when there's just cold Nothing is sweeter
than lay down at night and have her put her arms around me and
kiss me. And with my heart so dead and
cold and barren, and he seems so far from me, I cry, oh, let
him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth. I'll know everything's
all right, everything's all right. All right, what's the reason
for this request? Let him kiss me with the kisses
of his mouth, for thy love is better than wine. The love of Christ, that love
with which he loves us, that love which is in its length longer
than eternity, in its breadth broader than the universe, in
its depth reaching to the lowest of sinners, and in its height
ascending to the throne of God, is better than wine. Now listen
for just a minute, I'll tell you how. Wine is set before us
in scripture as a temporary cordial for the body's weakness. If you
can't sleep, have a little wine to help you sleep. If your stomach's
a little upset, have a little wine. It'll settle your digestive
system. But it's just a temporary cordial
for the body's weakness. Christ's love is the everlasting cordial for
our immortal souls. That's eventually going to cure
everything forever. Wine may relieve worldly sorrows
for a brief moment. You folks who listen to Western
music, if my memory serves me well, I don't listen to much
music of any kind, but if my memory serves me well, you've
always got somebody who's trying to drown his sorrows in a bottle.
Well, it's because it'll work for a little while. It'll work
for a little while. but only for just a brief little
while, whereas Christ's love is soon going to drown and cure
all our sorrows forever, forever. Wine is used often too freely,
and when it is, not only is the person left thirsty, He's a drunk
too. Christ's love is better than
wine, because you can't use it too freely, and you can't drink
too deep a draught. And he who drinks the deepest
draught of Christ's love, those who are the most intoxicated
by it, are most blessed forever, and never injured. with the kisses of his mouth.
For thy love is better than wine. The love of Christ is more pleasant,
but it's more than more pleasant. The love of Christ is always
effectual. It raises sinners dead in trespasses
and sins to eternal life. It raises us from the dunghill
of fallen humanity to sit as princes among the sons of God.
The love of Christ delivers us from all the curse and condemnation
of the law, and makes us to be the sons of God. It infallibly
saves us forever. The love of Christ infallibly
secures us from judgment, condemnation, eternal wrath, and the second
death. So I ask you as we look together
at the bread and the wine, as you hold it in your hand in a
moment, These symbols of our crucified
substitution. These pictures of his holy humanity,
his body, especially prepared by God the Holy Spirit in the
womb of the Virgin to be a sacrifice for sin. And the wine, that picture
of his blood, the blood of God incarnate. The blood of him who
is God in human flesh. The blood of the new covenant
shed for many by which we have the remission of sins. That wine
which pictures all that Christ has done for us when he was made
to be sin for us. As you hold these remembrances
of his love for us. This bread, this wine. Let our
hearts taste again the love of Christ. Let our souls drink again
from this sweet wine, and if we do, we'll be constrained to
speak as the Shulamite again and say, stay me, oh stay me
with flagons, comfort me with apples, for I am sick of love. Now, as the beacons come and
serve the Lord's table as we sing a hymn together. Let this
be the prayer of our hearts. Let him kiss me with the kisses
of his mouth. For thy love is better than mine. If he has never yet granted you
the kiss of regenerating grace, to make you know the redemption
that's in his blood, to grant to you the blessed reconciliation
that only he can give to God Almighty. Oh, it is my prayer
that he will now kiss you and cause you to kiss him in repentance
and thanks. Amen.