Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Song of Solomon 8:7
Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if [a] man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned.
7. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it ] Better, neither can rivers drown it. The word translated drown may also mean sweep away (cp. Isa 28:17): but as love has just been compared to a fire, and the waters in the first clause are said not to be able to quench it, it seems necessary to give to the verb in this clause the similar meaning of drown which it also has. Cp. Psa 69:2. All this she has felt, and she beseeches her lover never to let her go, since otherwise she would be utterly forlorn and given up to the fury of unrelenting jealousy. In these verses we have the climax of the book. Even Budde says Son 8:6-7 undoubtedly contain the deepest thing said of love in the book. The sensuous aspect of love falls entirely into the background, the whole nature is irresistibly seized and indissolubly bound to the beloved one. But that is not enough. It is towards this declaration that the author has been making from the first. Consequently this ethical conception of love should be regarded as underlying all that goes before, and the book thought of as a unity. The writer of these words must have had an ideal of love, with which the coarseness, inevitably found even in the most simple and deeply felt descriptions of natural scenery by those who regard the book as a collection of professional laudations of the more sensuous side of marriage, is totally incompatible. And this ideal must have been an elevating influence of very great importance for the moral life of a people among whom marriage was a mere matter of contract, and the price given for the bride a subject of pride, as it still is among Orientals. Immediately and inevitably this statement of the nature of love leads on to a condemnation of the common point of view in an arrow-like phrase, which having first transfixed the gorgeous and voluptuous Solomon, goes straight to the heart of the ordinary practice of the time.
if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned ] Better, he would be utterly despised. Literally, the words are ‘men would utterly despise him,’ or, ‘it.’ In this Budde sees only an ordinary commonplace of popular poetry. But surely its connexion with the previous verses raises it far above that level. It is the practical application of the deepest thing said in the book. But in any case it could not have been a commonplace at marriages such as have been described. To sing words like these at an ordinary Oriental wedding would have been little short of unseemly.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Son 8:7
If a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned.
Unpurchasable love
That is a general truth, applying to all forms of real love; you cannot purchase love. Who, for instance, could purchase a mother s love? Take, again, even the love of friends; I only instance that just to show how true our text is in relation to all forms of love. Damon loved Pythias; the two friends were so bound together that their names became household words, and their conduct towards one another grew into a proverb. Yet Damon never purchased the heart of Pythias, neither did Pythias think to pay a yearly stipend for the love of Damon. No; if a man should give all the substance of his house even for human love, for the common love that exists between man and man, it would utterly be contemned. Rest assured that this is pre-eminently true when we get into higher regions, when we come to think of the love of Jesus, and when we think of that love which springs up in the human breast towards Jesus when the Spirit of God has renewed the heart and shed abroad the love of God within the soul. If a man should offer to give all the substance of his house for either of these forms of love, it would utterly be contemned.
I. We will begin at the highest manifestation of love, and commune together upon it. So let me say, first, that The Love Of Our Lord Jesus Christ Is Altogether Unpurchasable. This fact will be clear to us if we give it a moments careful thought. It must be quite impossible to purchase the love of Christ, because it is inconceivable that He ever could be mercenary. The pure stream of His love leaps like the crystal rill, and there is no sediment that can be found in it; it is altogether unmixed love to us. Besides, there is another point that renders this idea of purchasing Christs love as impossible as the first thought shows it to be incredible; for all things are already Christs. Therefore, what can be given to Him wherewith His love could be purchased? Let us also note that, if Christs love could be won by us by some thing we could bring to Him or do for Him, it would suppose that there was something of ours that was of equal merit and of equal value with His love, or, at any rate, something which He was willing to accept as bearing some proportion to His love. But, indeed, there is nothing of the sort. But what a blessing it is that we have the love of Christ, though we could not purchase it! The Son of God hath loved us; He has bestowed upon us what He never would have sold us; and He has given to us freely, without money and without price. The greatest wonder to me is that this unpurchasable love, this unending love is mine; and you can always say, each one of you, if you have been regenerated, This love is mine; the Lord Jesus Christ loves me with a love I never could have purchased. Peradventure, some one is saying just now, I wish I could say that. Do you really wish it? Then, let the text serve to guide you as to the way by which you may yet know Christs love to you. Do not try to purchase it, abandon that idea at once. But surely, surely we may do something. We will give up this vice, we will renounce that bad habit, we will be strict in our religiousness, we will be attentive to all moral duties. So you should; but when you have done all that, do you think you have done enough to win His love? Is the servant who has only done what he ought to have done entitled to the love of his masters heart because of that? Thou shalt not win Christs love so; if thou hast His love shed abroad in thy heart, thou hast infinitely more than thou hast ever earned.
II. In our case, nothing can ever serve as a substitute for love. If Christ has loved us, or if we are desirous of realizing that He has done so, the one thing needful and essential is that we have true love to Him. Gods demand of each one who professes to be His child is, My son, give me thine heart. Love He must have; this is His lawful demand. His people delight to render it; if thou dost not, then thou art none of His.
III. The saints love is not purchased by Christs gifts. The love of saints to their Lord is not given to Christ because of His gifts to them. We love our Lord, and we love Him all the more because of the many gifts He bestows upon us; but His gifts do not win our love. Oh, it is Jesus Christ Himself who wins the love of our hearts! If He had not given us Himself, we should never have given to Him ourselves. All else that may be supposed to be of the substance of His house would not have won His people s hearts, until at last they learnt this truth, and the Spirit of God made them feel the force of it, He loved me, and gave Himself for me. My beloved is mine, and I am His, is now one of the sweetest stanzas in loves canticle. The spouse does not say His crown is mine, His throne is mine, His breastplate is mine, His crook is mine; she delights in everything that Christ has as a King, and a Priest, and a Shepherd; but, above all else, that which wins and charms her heart is this, He Himself is mine, and I am His. But I meant mainly to say, under this head, that there are some of Christs gifts that do not win our hearts, that is to say, our hearts do not depend upon them. And they are, first, His temporal gifts. I am very thankful, and I trust that all Gods people are also, for health and strength. I have lost these sometimes, but I did not love my Lord any the less then; neither do I love Christ this day because I am free from pain. If I were not free from pain, I would still love Him. I meant also to say that we do not love Christ because of His temporary indulgence of us in spiritual things. You know our Saviour very frequently favours us with manifestations of His presence. We are overjoyed when He comes very near to us, and permits us to put our fingers into the prints of the nails. He takes all the clouds out of our sky, and gives us the bright shining of the sun; or He opens the lattices, and shows us Himself in a way only second to that in which we shall see Him when we behold Him face to face. And oh, how we love Him then! But, thank God, when He draws the lattice back again, and hides His face, we do not leave off loving Him because of that. Our love to our Lord does not depend upon the weather. Even if we should be called to pass through terrible trials and adversities, and should have to walk a long time in clouds and darkness, yet still would we love Him and rejoice in Him.
IV. The love of saints cannot be bought off from Christ at any price. The saints sell Christ? No, they are too much like their Master to do that. You recollect how Satan took their Master to the top of a high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said, All these things will I give Thee, if Thou wilt fall down and worship me. Wicked thief! It was not his to give yet he tempted Christ in that way, but Jesus answered, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve. If any of Christs followers are tempted in the same fashion, let them give the same reply. All the substance of the devils house could not win the love of that man who has set his affection on Jesus. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 7. Many waters] Neither common nor uncommon adversities, even of the most ruinous nature, can destroy love when it is pure; and pure love is such that nothing can procure it. If it be not excited naturally, no money can purchase it, no property can procure it, no arts can persuade it. How vain is the thought of old rich men hoping to procure the affections of young women by loading them with presents and wealth! No woman can command her affections; they are not in her power. Where they do not rise spontaneously, they can never exist. “If a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would be utterly contemned.” Let the old, as well as the gay and the giddy, think of this.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
It is the nature of love in general, and of my love to thee, that it cannot be taken off, neither by terrors and afflictions, which are commonly signified in Scripture by waters and floods, Psa 32:6; 52:7, and elsewhere; not by temptations and allurements. Nothing but the presences and favour of the beloved person can quiet and satisy it. And therefore do not put me off with other things, but give me thyself, without whom, and in comparison of whom, I despise all other persons and things.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
7. watersin contrast with the”coals of fire” (Son 8:6;1Ki 18:33-38). Persecutions(Ac 8:1) cannot quench love(Heb 10:34; Rev 12:15;Rev 12:16). Our many provocationshave not quenched His love (Ro8:33-39).
if . . . give all thesubstance . . . contemnedNothing short of Jesus ChristHimself, not even heaven without Him, can satisfy the saint (Php3:8). Satan offers the world, as to Jesus Christ (Mt4:8), so to the saint, in vain (1Jn 2:15-17;1Jn 5:4). Nothing but our love inturn can satisfy Him (1Co13:1-3).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it,…. The love of the church to Christ, which is inextinguishable and insuperable, by the many waters and floods of wicked and ungodly men; neither by their flattery and fair promises; nor by their cruel edicts, force and persecution; by neither can they withdraw the love of the saints from Christ, nor tempt them to desert his interest: nor by all the afflictions God is pleased to bring upon them; rather their love is increased thereby, which they consider as effects of the love, wisdom, and faithfulness of God, as designed for their good: nor even by their sins and corruptions; for though, through the aboundings of these, their love may wax cold, yet it never becomes extinct; it may be left, but not lost; its fervency may be abated, but that itself remains: nor by Satan’s temptations, who sometimes comes in like a flood, threatening to carry all before him; but the Spirit lifts up a standard against him, and maintains his own work of faith and love,
Isa 59:19; nor by the terrors of the law, and the apprehensions of divine wrath, they are sometimes pressed with, signified by waves and floods, Ps 88:6; nor by all the hardships and difficulties, scoffs and reproaches, which attend believers in their Christian race; which are so far from alienating their affections from Christ, that they rather endear him the more unto them, and make heaven, and the enjoyment of him there, the more desirable;
if [a] man would give, all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned; it is true of the love of Christ to his people, as also what is said before; but is rather to be understood of the love of the church to Christ; which is a grace so valuable, as not to be purchased with money: if this, or any other grace, is to be bought, it is to be bought without money and without price; it is to be had freely of Christ; and, where possessed, will not be parted with for anything that may be offered; if a rich man’s whole estate was offered for it, to a lover of Christ; yea, the riches of the Indies, or the vast treasures of the whole globe, on condition of his parting with him, and deserting his cause and interest, and dropping or neglecting his love to him, it would be treated by him with the, almost disdain and contempt; see Php 3:8. Now all this is used by the church as an argument to gain her request, “set me as a seal”, c. So 8:6 since my soul is all in flames of love to thee, which cannot be quenched by all I suffer on thy account; nor will be parted with for all that the world can give me. This love of the church reaches to Christ, and to all that belong to him, even to a little sister, as in So 8:8.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
(7) It would utterly be contemned.Better, he would be, &c, and literally, to despise, they would despise him; infinitive absolute before finite verb expressing intensity. (Comp. 1Sa. 20:6; Amo. 9:8, &c)
This fine passage, with its reference to the invincible might and untempted constancy of true love, hardly leaves a doubt that the poem, while an ideal picture of the passion, is also a reminiscence of an actual history of two hearts that had been tried and proved true both against difficulties and seductions.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
7. Many waters cannot quench love “Therefore” is to be supplied before “many.” It has often been observed that the lack of logical particles in Hebrew causes an appearance of independent, proverbial statement, when there is real connexion. In this respect it is even more obscure than Latin, and contrasts forcibly with Greek. For the reason that love is a flame from the Eternal, “many waters cannot quench it.” If a man, etc. The allusion to the efforts and the failure of the King is very plain. The idea of the holy origin of love is still kept in view. It cannot be bought and sold for money, for houses and lands. Only a heart can buy a heart; and in dark, polygamous times, and in the case of such a king, it is good to see this truth, on the delicate and conscientious regard for which the happiness of the individual and the welfare of society must for ever depend, so firmly, though gently, asserted. The brothers of whose care over the Shulamite, honest (though perhaps rigorous) mention has already been made appear upon the scene in anxious discussion, to which their sister listens. One says to the other:
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned.
Here is the same obscurity in this verse, as in the former, whether the words are principally applicable to Christ or to his Church. If we consider the Church as thus expressing her affection, every believer ought to be enabled to adopt the sentiment contained in them. For as some blessed martyrs in times past have waded not only through waters and floods under the persecutions of the ungodly, but through blood, to testify their love to Jesus; so ought believers in every age. Neither the malice of enemies, nor the slights of friends, the unkindness of relations, and the sneers of the world; the infidelity of men, nor the rage of devils; since none of these can separate from the love of Christ; surely none of them ought to have influence to lessen in our hearts that love. But as it is not to be bought with money, so ought every child of God to prize it above all things. They should despise everything the world holds dear, in order to keep alive the immortal spark, not to be extinguished by the floods or waters of immortal hatred. But if we read the verse with an eye to Christ, the subject contained in it riseth in glory. Such indeed was the love of Christ to his Church, that neither the view of his Father’s burning anger against sin, nor all the sufferings he had to sustain in his own sacred person, when doing away the evil of sin by the sacrifice of himself, could for one moment make his holy soul remit his love to his redeemed. Yea, if possible, more deeply wounding still to his tender heart, not all the baseness and ingratitude of his redeemed, could extinguish the holy flame of his love. Reader! pause over this subject, and contemplate well the wondrous contents of it, and then say, Is not the love of Christ in the heights and depths, in the breadths and lengths of it, a love of God, which passeth knowledge?
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Son 8:7 Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if [a] man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned.
Ver. 7. Many waters cannot quench love. ] Water was proven long since to be above fire, in that ancient contest between those two nations about the precedence and precellence of their gods, the one worshipping fire and the other water. But though there be “gods many,” and “lords many,” yet to the Church there is but “one Lord,” and to him she will go through thick and thin, through fire and water. Her love to him is such as no good can match it, no evil overmatch it; it cannot be quenched with any calamity; nay, it is much kindled by it, as fire in the smith’s forge, or as lime that is the hotter for the water that is cast upon it. Elias would have water poured on the sacrifice (covered therewith), that the power of God might the more appear in the fire from heaven. Similarily Christ suffers the ship of his Church to be covered sometimes with waves of persecutions and afflictions, that the strength of their love to him may be the more manifested, and the “thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.” Luk 2:35 It is easy to swim in a warm bath, and every bird can sing in a summer’s day, but to swim to heaven (as Queen Elizabeth did to her throne) through a sea of sorrows, to sing (as some birds will do in the spring) most sweetly, then when it rains most sadly, that is a true trial indeed. Many will embark themselves in the Church’s cause in a calm, that, with the mariners in the Acts, will flee out of the ship in a storm. Many will own a prospering truth, a blessing ark, but he is an Obed Edom indeed that will own a persecuted, tossed, banished ark, an ark that brings the plague with it. God sets a high price on their love that stick to him in affliction, as David did on those men that were with him at Gath, those Cherethites and Pelethites that stuck to him when Absalom was up. 2Sa 15:18 And notwithstanding their recent rebellion at Ziklag, he takes them to Hebron with him (where he was to be crowned), that as they had shared with him in his misery, so they might partake of his prosperity. Lo, thus likewise deals our heavenly David with all his fellow sufferers. He removes them at length from the ashes of their forlorn Ziklag to the Hebron of heaven. And at the general judgment, in that great amphitheatre of men and angels, Christ will stand forth and say, “Ye are they that continued with me in my temptations, and I appoint unto you a kingdom,” &c. Luk 22:28-29
Neither can the floods drown it.
If a man would give all the substance of his house, &c.,
a .
b His life, by Mr. Crashaw.
c Spec. Europ.
d Joh. Bapt. Gell., dial. 5.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
cannot quench: i.e. earthly things cannot destroy that which is divine.
a man. Hebrew. ‘ish. App-14.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
28.
Unpurchasable love
Son 8:7
If a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would be utterly contemned.
Love is unpurchasable. That is a general truth, which may be applied to every form of true love. You cannot purchase love. True love cannot be bought, nor sold. It is free, spontaneous, and faithful. I am not talking about the silly, sentimental passions and emotions that people call love. That is bought and sold at a very cheap price. It is as fickle as water. But true love, that love that is self-denying, self-sacrificing, and devoted, that love which is more interested in its object than it is in self, true love cannot be purchased; and it cannot be sold. Love is strong as deathMany waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it. Love is both free and faithful. It cannot be bought; and it cannot be destroyed.
The love of a husband or wife cannot be purchased. Every young man and young lady, who is wise, will lay this fact to heart. You cannot buy the love of a husband. You cannot buy the love of a wife. Many homes would be much happier if there were a tithe as much love as there is wealth. It takes more than money, reputation, social standing, and luxury to build a home. A home is a place where love dwells. A home is a place where love is felt, expressed, and active. Many times, love will come in the poor mans door, making his home a bright and happy place, when it cannot enter the luxury of the rich.
Who could purchase a mothers love? She loves her own child especially, because it is her own child. She watches over her baby with care. She denies herself necessary sleep at night if her baby is sick. She would be ready to part with her life at a moments notice to spare the fruit of her womb. Bring another womans child, and endow her with great wealth to induce her to love it; and you will find that it is not in her power to transfer her love from her own child to the son or daughter of another. Her own child is exceedingly precious to her. Another infant, that to an eye unprejudiced by love might be far more beautiful, can never receive the love that belongs to her own. Offer her any price; it would be utterly despised. Love cannot be purchased.
Even the love of friends is without price. I am showing you that the language of this text applies to every form of true love. The love of Jonathan and David for one another was so great that they entered into a covenant with one another. David did not buy Jonathans love, nor Jonathan Davids. And no price could purchase their hearts from one another. It may or may not be true that every man has his price; but love has no price. No, if a man should give all the substance of his house even for human love, for the common love that exists between man and man, it would be utterly despised.
But here the Holy Spirit speaks of a much higher love. All that I have said about love is pre-eminently true when we come to think of the love of Christ for us, and when we think of that love which springs up in the human heart for the Lord Jesus Christ when the Spirit of God has renewed our hearts and shed abroad the love of God in our souls. Neither the love of Christ for us, nor the love of our hearts for him can be purchased. If a man should offer to give all the substance of his house for either of these forms of love, it would be utterly despised.
Christs love for usunpurchasable
We will begin at the highest point and the original source of all true love. The love of the Lord Jesus Christ for his people cannot be purchased. Our Savior is no mercenary. He does not auction his love and grace to the highest bidder. It would be a profane and monstrous blasphemy to suppose that the love of his heart could be bought with silver, gold, and earthly stores.
If anything could enrage the heart of the eternal God, I am sure it would be the attempts of men to purchase his love and the favors of his love by what they suppose they do for him or give to him. The pride and stupidity of man is so great that he dares to suppose that the love of God is for sale, like the love of a common prostitute. Paul very plainly tells us that those preachers who are peddlers of self-righteousness who preach up law and works, as a basis of salvation, are nothing more than prostitutes. They have prostituted the gospel of Christ. (Compare Php 3:2 and Deu 23:18). The love of Christ is not for sale!
If it were, what do you suppose you might give him to buy his love? He has need of nothing. Everything in the vast universe belongs to him (Psa 50:7-12). There is nothing, which he conceives in his infinite mind, that he could not fashion at once by his mighty power. There is nothing his heart could desire that he cannot command to appear before him.
What do you suppose you might do for Christ to win his love? What proud worms we are to think that by giving or doing anything, we can win the love and favor of the infinite God. He is not like us. His love is not for sale. His favors cannot be purchased. The Almighty cannot be bribed.
If the love of Christ could be won by us by something we might give or do for him, then it must be concluded that our works and our gifts are of equal merit and of equal value with his love. That cannot be. The silver and gold, which we so highly treasure, is nothing more to the Son of God than the gravel in your driveway. As Augustus Toplady wrote, Christ loved money so little, that he had but one thief, and he made him his purse-bearer.
In time of pain and trouble, in heaviness and sorrow, in sickness, bereavement, and death, try to find comfort for your soul in your works or in your gifts if you dare. You will find them to be a source of torment for your conscience, but never will they bring comfort to your soul. Nothing can give our souls peace and comfort, except a saving knowledge of the love of God in Christ. If these things will not satisfy you, they certainly will not satisfy God!
There is no emotion we have ever felt in our most sanctified moments, there is no holy desire that has ever passed through our hearts in our most hallowed times, there is no heavenly longing that has been begotten in our souls by the Spirit of God, that we should dare to put side by side with the love of Christ, and say, This is worthy of my Saviors love.
Everything we have belongs to Christ already. Everything we could possibly do for Christ, we are already lawfully obliged to do for him.
Yet, though we could never purchase the love of Christ by any price, every believing sinner, saved by Gods free grace has his love in all its infinite fulness. Child of God, rejoice! The Son of God loves us. He has freely bestowed upon us what he never would have sold us, what we never could have purchased from him. He said, I will love them freely (Hos 14:4), and he does. He has bestowed his love upon us freely, Without money and without price.
His love for us is an eternal and everlasting love (Jer 31:3). His love for us is a sovereign and free love (Rom 9:13). His love for us is a self-sacrificing, redeeming, saving love (1Jn 4:9-10). His love for us is an immutable and indestructible love (Mal 3:6). His love for us arises entirely from within himself. The source, the spring, the cause of our Saviors love for us is in his own holy Being.
Here is the greatest marvel in all the world to me This unpurchaseable love, this eternal, unending love is mine. He loved me and gave himself for me! You, my brother, my sister, if you have been saved by his grace, can always say, This love is mine. The Lord Jesus Christ loves me with a love that I never could have purchased.
Truly, the love of Christ passeth knowledge. It is, like himself, infinite. It emerges out of every storm or flood. It survives all unworthiness, and unbelief, and rejection. It is this that fills the soul, that liberates us from bondage, that gladdens our hearts in the most sorrowful hour. Love is the true sunshine of life; and with this love Christ is to fill, not heaven only, but also earth when he comes again in his glory.
Perhaps the one who reads these lines might think, O how I wish I could have the love of Christ in my heart. If you really do want the love of Christ, let this word from God guide you into the way by which you may know the love of Christ. Do not try to purchase the love of Christ; abandon that foolish notion at once. Receive the love of Christ as a free-gift, for which you are utterly unworthy, by simply trusting him.
Our love for Christ unpurchasable
As Christs love for us could never be purchased, the believers love for Christ is not purchased, not even by all the Lords many gifts to us. It is true, We love him, because he first loved us. The Lords love for us caused our love for him. And we are and should be grateful for the many gifts of love he has so freely and bounteously bestowed upon us. But the true believer does not love Christ because of all the gifts his love has given us.
Satans accusation against Job was false (Job 1:8-12; Job 1:20-21; Job 2:3-10). The believers love for Christ does not vary and alter according to our temporal circumstances. Our love for Christ does not vary with our spiritual experiences (Son 5:8; Son 5:10-16). Even the many blessings of grace, which Christ has given us, are not the cause of our love to him.
It is the Lord Jesus Christ himself that we love, not the things he gives us. There are several small items I possess that are precious to me. They would not be, except for one thing They were given to me by people who love me and by people I love. In much the same way, we cherish our Saviors gifts to us because they are his gifts; but the Object of our love is Christ himself.
Christ himself has won our hearts. I believe all the doctrines of the grace of God: Election, redemption, justification, and regeneration. I rejoice in all the blessings of grace: forgiveness, righteousness, adoption, salvation, and eternal life. I rest in the blessed promises of grace: resurrection, glorification, heaven, and eternal glory. But the love of my heart is reserved for Christ alone. I love him. All these other things are the substance of his house. They could never have won my heart until Christ himself was revealed in my heart by the Holy Spirit.
My Beloved is mine, and I am his. I am truly thankful to know that his crown is mine, his throne is mine, his home is mine, his grace is mine, and his name is mine. But it is Christ himself who charms and wins my heart. Christ himself is mine. And I am His.
No substitute for love
Our Lord Jesus Christ will accept no substitute for love. The Lord God says to each of his children, My Son, give me thine heart (Pro 23:26). There are many who wish to think they are Gods children who will give him anything, but love. Man will offer God anything, except that which has to do with the heart. A man will say, or do, or give most anything except bow his heart to God.
Until you give Christ the love of your heart, you will never be accepted by him (Luk 14:25-27; Luk 14:33). We receive the Savior by faith in him, not by love for him. But faith in him causes love for him. Any faith that does not bring with it true love for the Son of God is false faith.
The believing heart is motivated by love for Christ. Unless love for Christ is the motive and principle of our worship, our service, and our gifts to him, he will never accept them or us (2Co 9:7). Love is a better motive than law. It does more. It gives more. It produces more. Love is devotion. Love withholds nothing. Love gives all.
Here is a point of examination. I have challenged, searched, and tried my own heart by these questions. I call upon you to do the same. Would I do more for Christ than I am now doing for him if I thought it would have any bearing on my eternal salvation? Would my worship, devotion and faithfulness to Christ be any more sincere if I felt that my eternal salvation depended upon it? Would I give more to Christ of my time, my talents, or my money if I thought that by doing so I would gain greater riches in this world, or greater reward in heaven, or if I feared that God might punish me for giving so little as I do?
In other words, would I be more faithful to Christ than I now am if I truly felt in my heart that my salvation and my eternal relationship with God depended upon the works of the law, rather than upon his free grace? Of this I am sureIf the threat of punishment or the promise of reward could persuade a person to do more, give more, or behave better than the constraint of love, that person is utterly void of the grace of God. I repeat, it is not love for Christ that brings salvation. Faith brings us into a saving union with Christ. But where there is a heart faith in Christ, there is a heart love for Christ (1Co 16:22).
But those who truly love Christ will not sell their love for him at any price. Offer them what you will. Bribe them with money. Bribe them with imprisonment. Bribe them with their lives. The price that you offer would be utterly despised. True love is not for sale. If a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned. By this test we will prove what we are. True love cannot be purchased.
Our Savior would never give us anything as a substitute for love. Let us never attempt to give our Savior anything as a substitute for love. Though we give our body to be burned, what would that be without love? If we bring him gifts, offerings, prayers, tears, money, everything but love, we bring him nothing. Without love, what are the riches of the universe? It is love that our Savior gives. It is love he wants from us. What shall be given in exchange for love?
Not for sale
If a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would be utterly contemned. Look at this from another angle. The believers love for Christ can never be purchased at any price. It is not for sale. As his love for us is not for sale, so the love of our hearts for the Lord Jesus Christ is not for sale.
I have seen many sell their professed love for Christ at a very cheap price. There are many Esaus among Gods professed people who are ready and willing to make a deal with Satan to sell their birthright for a bowl of soup. There are many Judases among the saints who are quite willing to sell their Master for thirty pieces of silver.
I love the Lord, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live. The sorrows of death compassed me, and the pains of hell gat hold upon me: I found trouble and sorrow. Then called I upon the name of the Lord; O Lord, I beseech thee, deliver my soul. Gracious is the Lord, and righteous; yea, our God is merciful. The Lord preserveth the simple: I was brought low, and he helped me. Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with theeO Lord, truly I am thy servant; I am thy servant, and the son of thine handmaid: thou hast loosed my bonds. I will offer to thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and will call upon the name of the Lord (Psa 116:1-7; Psa 116:16-17).
We love him, because he first loved us (1Jn 4:19).
Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life (Jud 1:21).
Fuente: Discovering Christ In Selected Books of the Bible
waters: Isa 43:2, Mat 7:24, Mat 7:25, Rom 8:28-39
if a man: Pro 6:31, Pro 6:35, Rom 13:8-10
Reciprocal: Gen 29:20 – for the love Gen 39:19 – his wrath Jdg 16:15 – when thine Son 5:2 – my head Joh 21:7 – when Rom 12:20 – coals 1Co 13:7 – Beareth 2Co 5:14 – the love 1Th 1:3 – and labour 1Th 5:19 – Quench