Chapter 2, the song of Solomon,
chapter 2, verse 16. I've been reading this over and
over and over again this week, and I've come to the conclusion
that these have got to be the happiest words in the Bible.
My beloved is mine, and I am his. He feedeth among the lilies. Those words reflect a heart full
of peace, assurance, contentment, joy, happiness. My beloved is
mine and I am his and he feedeth among the lilies. And it seems
so strange that those happy, happy words should be followed
in the very next verse with a cloud. The next verse seems to blot
out the sun. It seems to be a cloud that just
comes right over at noonday, as it were, and just turns the
whole sky into darkness. 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 Bitha. Now, looking at that, I think
the text probably is intended by God the Holy Spirit to reflect
a state of mind with which many of you, myself certainly, are
familiar. You don't doubt your salvation.
You know upon good grounds, on the grounds of this and this
alone, because you trust Christ, you know he's yours. Because
you trust him, nothing else. I wish I could Make everybody
hear that. This is the grounds of our assurance. I trust Christ. Therefore I can
say, my beloved is mine and I am his. I don't doubt that. But
my soul doesn't always feel nearness to him. I don't always feed with
him and upon him. You are in your heart assured
that you have a vital saving interest in Christ. But you don't
sense His left hand under your head and His right hand embracing
you all the time. There are times when the believer
sings in tenor and bass at the same time. We sing with delight
and with joy, blessed assurance, Jesus is mine. Oh, what a foretaste
of glory divine! Heir of salvation, purchased
of God, born of His Spirit, washed in His blood. And yet we turn
right around and sing, As Judy just did, how tedious and tasteless
the hours when Jesus no longer I see, sweet prospects, sweet
birds and sweet flowers have all lost their sweetness to me.
It may be, I don't know, it may be that there are some of God's
saints who never lose sight of the Savior's face. whose communion
with him is always undisturbed. There may be some who always
walk continually on the mountaintops with him, maybe so. I'm not sure
that such persons exist, but I wouldn't be so bold as to say
they don't. But those believers with whom I am most intimate
and familiar have a different experience. And those that I
know who always boast of their constant peace and satisfaction
and delight, who boast of always walking on the mountaintops,
are not the most reliable folks. They're not the kind of folks
I'd want to lean on very much. But for myself, speaking from
my own heart's experience, I've always had a mixture of joy and
sorrow. Every year of my life has its
wintertime as well as its summer. Every day has its night. I've
seen the clear shining of the sun of righteousness and walked
in the blessed, blessed joy of it. And I felt the heavy, heavy
rains and the storms and walked in the fear of it. I've walked
in the warm breezes of summer evening, and I've made my way
through the snowy blizzards of winter night. And I expect many
of you are the same. We're kind of like the oak tree,
by the way. The sap's always there, but not
the leaves. We go through terrible, terrible
seasons of not seeing his face, not knowing the kisses of his
mouth, and not knowing the warm embrace of his grace, We're not
always rejoicing. We have our downs as well as
our ups, our valleys as well as our mountains, and sometimes
we're in heaviness through manifold trials, grieved by the fact that
our fellowship with Christ is not always full, not always clear,
not always intimate and sweet. Grieved by it, but that's just
the way it is. Rex, the Lord Jesus ought to
be constantly our soul's rapturous delight. He ought to be, ought
to be. And it's our fault when he's
not. Not his, it's our fault. But the fact is, he's not always. We ought to always rejoice in
the Lord. We ought to always walk in the
joy, the joy of his presence. But we don't. That's the fact.
At times we have to seek Him, crying, Oh, that I knew where
I might find Him. Now, if I understand it correctly,
that's the sense of this text here in the Song of Solomon,
chapter 2, verses 16 and 17. It is both a song of joy and
a song of sorrow. The sweet song of assurance and
yet an earnest longing for fellowship and communion with Christ. Does
that make sense to you? I believe that's exactly what
we see here. This is the thing I want you to see this evening.
Though we may experience times of spiritual trial, when our
fellowship and communion with Christ is broken, there is no
reason for our assurance of acceptance with God in Him. Our assurance
that my beloved is mine and I am His to be interrupted at all.
I've heard fellows talk about assurance, and they talk about
assurance in such a way as to say, well, you know, if you're
not walking with Him in just confident joy and peace and contentment,
then you don't have any assurance. That's false assurance. That's
not it. Our assurance does not depend
on us, but Him. Now, we change, but He doesn't.
Assurance is based upon Christ's finished work for us. Fellowship
and communion with Christ may vary greatly by our daily experiences. I don't always enjoy my wife's
company. I was away from her a couple
of days this week, but I always enjoy the assurance of her love.
I don't have any question about that. I'm not worried about somebody
else being over here taking my place when I'm gone. I'm just
confident the woman loves me. And though I do not see her face
and do not feel her embrace, I enjoy the blessed assurance
of that relationship. And that's not near as certain
and sure and stable as this. My Lord, for reasons wise, good,
and gracious, because of my need, will often hide his face from
me, but he never forsakes me. You got that? He often appears
not to hear me, but he always does. He often appears not to
watch over me, but he always does. And the reason he appears
not to hear me, he appears not to watch over me, is that he
might draw out my heart after him so that I might be maintained
in love for him. Now this evening I want us to
look at three things. The first will be the most important.
First, I want to show you that it is possible and profitable. for believers to enjoy the assurance
of salvation, a personal interest in, yes, the possession of the
Lord Jesus Christ. It's profitable and it's possible
for believers to walk in the assurance. Paul puts it this
way, the full assurance of faith. Now, I don't suggest that every
believer does. I know better. I know better. Peter, sometimes,
Had some problems with that. Just read the Gospels, you'll
see it. Paul appears at times to have had problems with that.
Some folks say they try to get everything fit into a box, you
know, well, if you don't doubt you're damned. Another fellow
says if you do doubt you're damned. Well, sometimes believers doubt, sometimes
they don't. Sometimes believers walk as they
ought with confident faith, and sometimes they don't. But I do
know this. Every believer can and should
enjoy the blessed assurance of a saving interest in Christ.
These are the words of confident faith and blessed assurance.
My beloved is mine. And I'm his. Right now, though
the shadow is between us and though he hides his face, right
now, my beloved is mine and I am his. Most people, you see, look
in the wrong places for assurance. They seek it on the wrong grounds. People seek assurance either
by remembering something, or feeling something, or doing something.
That's almost always where folks look to it. You say, well, how
do you know that you're a believer? Well, I remember when I was a
boy, when I was a young man, when I was an older man. I remember
yesterday or I remember this morning. If you've got to look
back to this morning for a sure that you're looking at the wrong
place. It's not a remembrance of some experience we've had.
It's not a remembrance of something that happened to us yesterday.
Our assurance is sitting on the right hand of God. He is God
himself sitting on his throne. Jesus Christ, the God-man, our
mediator. He's our assurance. Other folks,
they say, well, you know what? I feel so close to the Lord.
I've just had such a change in my life. I just, I feel like
I walk with him all the time. Your feeling's not it, Lindsay.
That's not it. Feelings come and feelings go
and feelings are deceiving. I trust the living word of God,
naught else is worth believing. Other folks say, well, I'm confident
that I'm the Lord because my life has been so changed and
now I serve him and I do this and I do, oh no, that's not it. That's not it. If you want assurance,
If you want to walk before God continually, while you're sitting
here in his house, or Oscar, when you're out there on your
tractor planting your tobacco, or you're sitting in your living
room, or you're sitting in the funeral parlor, if you want to
walk before God with a peace that he's yours, quit looking
to yourself. Look to him. Look to him. Look not to your experience,
but to His expiation. Not to your repentance, but to
His ransom. Not to your faith, but to His
faithfulness. Not to your works, but to His
worth and His works. Look not to your feelings, but
to His fullness. Look not to your prayers, but
to His promises and His prayers, who sits yonder on the right
hand of the Majesty on high. Look not to your righteousness,
but to Christ the Lord our righteousness. Look to Christ alone. Hold your
hands here in Song of Solomon and turn to Colossians 2. It's
a text of scripture I frequently quote, but I want you to read
it. And at your leisure, read it in its context. Paul is urging
these saints of Colossae to let no one beguile them with the
subtleness of vain philosophy and religious tradition. And
He says to them as they make their way through this world.
And what He says to them, Bob Pontius says to you and He says
to me. Look what it says, Colossians 2 verse 6. As you have therefore
received Christ Jesus the Lord. As you have received Him. How
have you received Him? I came to Christ empty-handed,
filthy. polluted, guilty, depraved, lost,
helpless, and dead. I didn't have anything. I didn't
have anything. Nothing in my hands I bring,
simply to thy cross I cling. Naked come to thee for dress,
helpless look to thee for grace. How did you come to him? That's
how you came to him, isn't it? Don't ever outgrow it. If you grow a hair above that,
you got too big. As you have received Christ Jesus
the Lord, so walk ye in Him. How? Lord, I trust you for everything. Everything. I trust you for everything
God requires of me. I trust you for righteousness
and redemption. I trust you for my next breath.
I trust you! That's all. That's where assurance
is. Now then, the Lord Jesus says,
He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved. He that believeth
not shall be damned. I believe it. That's all. That's all. Mark these words
in this text, my beloved. Will you delight to call Christ
your beloved? I can almost hear somebody start
sitting at the table now and trying to talk pious and use
this kind of language. I'm not talking about that, I'm
talking about in your heart. My beloved, my beloved. Certainly,
he should be beloved by you and by me. Who's done so much for
us? Who ever lavished such gifts
upon us? Who's ever shown us such indescribable love? Indeed,
if you do not love Him, now you listen to me. If you don't love
Him, you're lost. You don't know Him. You don't
know Him. If any man loved not the Lord
Jesus Christ, Paul said, let him be damned. It is not our
love for Him that gives us a saving interest in Him. It's faith in
Him. But faith in Him loves Him. Believers love the Son of God.
All who are redeemed by His precious blood and saved by His matchless
grace can say with the Apostle John, we love Him because He
first loved us. Now, I don't want you to be presumptuous. I don't want to be presumptuous.
But if you know Him, you love Him. If you know the Lord Jesus
Christ, call Him in your soul, my beloved. Look at Him that
way. Your man and woman, Married to
one another have special terms of endearment with which they
speak to one another in private that they never use in public.
And I don't suggest, as I mentioned earlier, that you use these words
with an air of piety. That's the last thing I suggest.
What I am saying is in your soul, speak to Christ as your beloved. Call him such. He deserves such
a title. Child of God, he redeemed you
with his blood, adopted you into his family, saved you by his
grace, keeps you in his love, for he loved you with an everlasting
love. There was a time when he became the beloved one of your
heart. He came and made himself known
to you and conquered your heart by the revelation of himself
so that you could not resist loving him. And it's true today
more than ever. We do love him. Oh my Lord, it's
true. Peter spoke the truth. He spoke
the absolute truth. Embarrassed as he was to say
it, he spoke the absolute truth. Humbled and broken as he was
to say it. I can almost see the quiver in
his lips and the tears in his eyes and the shake in his voice
as he said, Lord, you know everything. You know everything. You know
that I love you. Because it's just true. It's
just true. Spurgeon said, every heart that's
been renewed by sovereign grace takes Jesus Christ to be the
chief object of its love. My beloved is mine. Is he or
is he not your beloved? Is he or is he not? My beloved
is mine. And I'm his. I'm his because in eternity he
looked on me and said, I love him freely. He chose me and he
purchased me with his blood. Like Hosea said to Gomorrah,
I bought you with the silver of my sweat and the gold of my
blood and you're mine. And he called me. by the power
of his irresistible grace, and he's mine by the most deliberate,
calculated, willful choice I've ever made. Not just the choice
I made 30 years ago, the choice I make right now, willfully,
deliberately, no matter what I have to give up for Him. He's
mine, or I choose Him to be mine. That's exactly right. Say, well,
you folks don't believe that. Oh, we're the only ones who do.
Believers constrained by His love are overcome in their hearts
and cannot resist choosing Him as the highest object of their
affection. Are you a believer? If so, then
Christ is yours and you're His. You're his sheep of his pasture,
partners of his love, members of his body, branches of this
vine. You belong to him. I'm his. Totally, unreservedly yours. And Lord, that means you can
do with me whatever you will. I'm yours. Spoke to Bob earlier
this morning, chatted with him a little bit, and he said, I'm
not concerned about the surges, I'm in the Lord's hands. He can
do what he will. That's what I'm talking about. He can do
with me what he will. And I'm glad for him to do with
me what he will. Are you? I'm his. How can you
have such assurance as this? How can you speak like that?
Peter says, sanctify the Lord God in your hearts and be ready
always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason
of the hope that's in you. Well, preacher, how can you speak
like this? How can anyone speak like this
with such confidence and deliberate forthrightness on this reason
or on this grounds? He's revealed himself in me. And because he has revealed himself
in me, I rest my soul on him alone. I trust Christ alone. I keep my flesh just like yours.
I keep wanting to find me something in me. Surely I can get something
here that's mine I can hold on to. I can find some feeling or
some work or some deed or some thought, some imagination, some
aspiration and say, there, there, there, I've got something I can
hold on to. Oh, when you find it, throw it
away like you had hold of a hot piece of iron. I cast my soul
on Christ alone, nothing else. And now, just as in the past,
I've not yet been moved away from the hope of the gospel.
Paul said, I'll present you perfect in Christ if you continue in
the faith grounded and settled and be not moved away from the
hope of the gospel. This is it. And how can you say
my beloved is mine and I am his? Because it's the truth. I love
him. I love him. Now then, here's
the second thing. It will be wise for us to know
where Christ is and where he makes himself known. If a woman
wants a happy marriage, she will be wise to know her husband,
know his habits and his ways, and put herself in his way. You'd
be wise to do that. I watch Bobby and Judy, and she
has a chance to, she just gets out and rides in the hot sun
on the side of that tractor with him, because she loves him, puts
herself in his way. And if you want a happy marriage,
you find out who you're married to, find out his habits, find
out his ways, and put yourself in his way. She says, My beloved
is mine, I'm his. Now, where is he? Where can I walk with him? Where
will he be this morning? Where will he be tonight? He
feedeth among the lilies. I suppose there's a sense in
which you could say he feeds himself, for there he takes delight
in that which is the travail of his soul, which he sees with
satisfaction. But I'm certain the text means
that he feeds his saints, and he feeds among the lilies. That is, he feeds among the saints
of God in the house of God. He comes here and this is where
He feeds His sheep. He feeds His saints with the
ordinances of the gospel. As we sing His praise, as we
worship His name, as we call on Him, as we observe this blessed
ordinance of the Lord's table, He comes and feeds among the
lilies. There's something special, something special about the assembled
body of believers. Turn to 1 Corinthians chapter
3. You're familiar with that text in Matthew 18. Our Lord
said, where two or three are gathered together in my name,
there am I in the midst of them. Look here in 1 Corinthians chapter
3. The apostle Paul is talking here
about those who would disrupt, disturb, divide, destroy the
church of God. And here he says in verse 16,
Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of
God dwells in you? If any man defile the temple
of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy,
which temple you are." Now that's not talking about your physical
body. That's not what it's talking about. That's talking about the
assembled body of believers. When we come together, Ron, in
the name of Christ, as He promised to meet with us, gathered in
His name. Not the building. That's irrelevant. But when we come together in
His name, the Church of God is His temple, and God, the Holy
Spirit, resides here. That's what the temple was all
about. That's what it portrayed. It portrayed this temple, which
temple we now are. Oh, yeah, there's something special
about the Assembly of God Saints. Folks think, well, I'd get along
without that. Ask somebody who has to do without
it. Just ask somebody. Where does he feed? Oh, he feeds
among the lilies of these pages. I'm not a counselor. I don't
pretend to be. I'm not a psychologist. Don't want to be. But every now
and then, I meet with one of you or a preacher friend, somebody
else, a believer going through trouble. and heartache, sorrow. And they come and want some advice. What do you do, Pastor? How am
I going to handle this? And this is my counsel. I give
it to you now. And when you come to me in the
middle of the night, I'll give it to you then. Bury yourself
in this book. Just bury yourself in this book. Your tendency is to walk the
floor and wring your hands and say, this is what I'm going to do.
I'm going to get out. Your tendency is to neglect the word, neglect
the worship of God, the house of God, and the people of God.
That's the worst thing to do. Bury yourself in this book where
he feeds among the lilies. And one last thing. It's the
desire of every believer to know the conscious presence and fellowship
of Christ. Look at verse 17. Until the daybreak
and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved. Be thou like Aurora,
young heart, upon the mountains of Bitha. For this is our night. Soon daybreak will come. When
our Lord Jesus came and the gospel day broke forth, the shadows
of the law fled away. And when our Lord comes again
and takes away this veil of flesh, then the day shall shine brightly
and we'll walk in everlasting day. And when our Lord comes
in our night of trouble and takes away our cloud, then we'll walk
again in the day and the sunshine of the beams of the sun of righteousness.
The mountains which separate us from our Lord Mountains of
our making are no trouble for him to overcome. Turn, my beloved,
be like Aurora, young heart on the mountains of Beethoven. Come
on, come after me. But you'll have to do the turning. Turn to me, because I just can't
turn to you. Come to me. Oh, God, come to
me, because I just Try as I will, I can't come to you. The mountains
are too high for me to overcome. I can't, I can't tear them down. But that's no trouble to you.
So turn, my beloved. Come across the mountains like
a rower, young heart. As the heart panteth after the
water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee. Oh, my God. Now come to us. As we break this
bread and drink this wine in remembrance of our Savior, blessed
Savior, turn and come skipping across the mountains to your
beloved. Amen. Linda, you come lead us
in a hymn, please.