NO. 3185<\/b><\/p>\n
A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 17TH, 1910,<\/b><\/p>\n
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,<\/i><\/p>\n
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.<\/b><\/p>\n
\u201cMy beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies. Until the day break, and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of Bether.\u201d \u2014 Song of Solomon 2:16, 17.<\/i><\/p>\n
Other Sermons by Mr. Spurgeon, upon parts of the same passage, are Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, No. 1190, \u201cA Song among the Lilies;\u201d No. 2,442, \u201cMy Beloved is mine;\u201d and No. 2,471\u201d Darkness before the Dawn.\u201d<\/p>\n
IT has been well said that, if there is a happy verse in the Bible, it is this one: \u201cMy beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies.\u201d So peaceful, so full of assurance, so over-running with happiness and contentment is it, that it might well have been written by the same hand which penned the twenty-third Psalm: \u201cThe Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.\u201d The verse savours of him who, just before he went to Gethsemane, said to his disciples, \u201cPeace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you … In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.\u201d Let us ring the silver bell of this verse again, for its notes are exquisitely sweet: \u201cMy beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yet there is a shadow in the latter part of the text. The prospect is exceedingly fair and lovely, earth cannot straw its superior; but it is not entirely a sunlit landscape. There is a cloud in the sky, which casts a shadow over the scene, it does not dim it, everything is clear, and stands out sharply and brightly: \u201cMy beloved is mine, and I am his.\u201d That is clear enough, yet I say again that it is not altogether sunlight; there are shadows too: \u201cUntil the day break, and the shadows flee away.\u201d There is a mention also of the mountains of Bether\u201d \u2014 the mountains of division; and to have anything like division is bitterness. I see here a paschal lamb, but I see bitter herbs with it. I see the lily, but I think I see it still among the thorns. I see the fair and lovely landscape of assured confidence, but a shadow, just a slight shadow, takes away somewhat of its glory; and he who sees it has still to look for something yet beyond: \u201ctill the day break, and the shadows flee away.\u201d<\/p>\n
The text seems to me to indicate: just this state of mind; perhaps some of you may at this time exemplify it. You do not doubt your salvation; you know that Christ is yours; you are certain of that, albeit you may not be at present enjoying the light of your Saviour\u2019s countenance. You know that he is yours, but you are not feeding upon that precious fact. You realize your vital interest in Christ, so that you have no shadow of a doubt that you are his, and he is yours; but, still, his left hand is not under your head, nor doth his right hand-embrace you. A shade of sadness is cast over your heart, possibly by affliction, certainly by the temporary absence of your Lord; so even while exclaiming, \u201cMy beloved is mine, and I am his,\u201d you are forced to fall on your knees, and pray, \u201cUntil the day break, and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of division.\u201d<\/p>\n
We may occupy the time profitably, if God the Holy Ghost shall enable us, in speaking upon these matters. We have here, first, a soul enjoying personal interest in the Lord Jesus Christ<\/i>, or, personal interest assured. We have, next, a soul taking the deepest interest in Christ, and longing to know where he is<\/i>, or, the deepest interest evinced, and then we have a soul anxiously desiring present communion with Christ<\/i>, or visible fellowship, conscious communion sought after.<\/p>\n
\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n
I. <\/b>We have here, first, Personal Interest In The Lord Jesus Christ Assured.<\/p>\n
I do not mean to try to preach to-night; I should like my text to preach, and the way in which I should like it to preach would be to see how far we can get hold of it; how we can take it word by word, and drink it in; come to each word as to a well, and sit down on the brink, and drink a refreshing draught; come to each word as to a palm tree, and eat of the fruit thereof.<\/p>\n
The text begins with the words, \u201cmy beloved.\u201d Come, soul, canst thou venture to call Christ thy beloved? Certainly he should be beloved by thee, for what has he not done for thee? Favours rich and rare have been the gifts of his hand, gifts purchased by his own most precious blood. If thou dost not love him, my heart thou art a most ungrateful thing indeed deceitful, rotten, loathsome above all things, and desperately wicked art thou, O my head, if, Jesus being thy Savior, thou dost not love him. He ought to be beloved by the most of you here, for you profess to have been redeemed by his blood, and adopted into the family of God through him. You professed, when you were baptized, to be dead with him; and when you come to this communion table to-night, you will profess that he is your meat and your drink, your life, your soul\u2019s stay and comfort; so, if you do not love him, what shall I say to you I will let you say it to yourselves, \u2014 <\/p>\n
\u201cA very wretch, Lord! I should prove,
Had I no love for thee:
Rather than not my Savior love,
Oh may I cease to be!\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
\u201cMy beloved.\u201d He ought to be so, and he has been so. There was a time when you and I did not love him, but that time is over now. We recollect the happy moment when first, by faith, we saw his face, and heard him say, \u201cI have loved thee with an everlasting love.\u201d Oh, the happiness of the day of comes! You have not forgotten it. How alive and zealous some of you were then! In those first months when you were brought into the house of mercy, and we washed and clothed, and had all your wants supplied out of the fullness that is treasured up in Christ Jesus, you did indeed love him. You were not hypocrites, were you? And you used to sing with such force of voice as well as of heart, \u2014 <\/p>\n
\u201cJesus, I love thy charming name,
\u2019Tis music to mine ear;
Fain would I sound it out so loud
That earth and heaven should hear.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
Yes, we did love him, but we cannot stop at that, we do<\/i> love him. With all our faults, and imperfections, and frailties, the Lord, who knoweth all things, knows that we do love him. Sometimes, brethren, it is not easy to know whether you do love Christ, or not. I have heard many remarks about the hymn containing that line, \u2014 <\/p>\n
\u201cDo I love the Lord, or no?\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
but I believe that every honest Christian sometimes asks that question, and I think one good way of getting it answered is to go and hear a faithful minister. Last Sabbath morning, I sat and listened to a very simple-minded preacher in a Wesleyan Chapel; he was a most unsound Wesleyan, but a thoroughly sound Calvinistic brother; and when he began to preach about the love of Jesus Christ, the tears streamed down my cheeks. I could not help letting them fall upon the sanded floor as I sat there; and I thought to myself, \u201cWell, now, I do love the Savior.\u201d I had thought that perhaps I did not; but when I heard of him, and the preacher began to play upon my heartstrings, the music came; when I did but have Christ set before me, that woke up my soul, if indeed it had been asleep before. When I heard of him, though only in broken accents, I could not but feel that I did love him, and love him better than life itself. I trust that it is true of many here that Christ is our \u201cbeloved.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the text says, not only \u201cbeloved\u201d, but \u201cmy<\/i> beloved is mine,\u201d as if the spouse took him all to herself. It is the nature of love, you know, to monopolize. There is a remarkable passage in the third chapter of the prophecy of Hosea, which I need not quote except in outline, where the prophet is bidden to take one who had been unclean, and unchaste, and to say to her, \u201cThou shalt be for me, so will I also be for she.\u201d This was meant to be typical of what Christ does unto his Church. Our love goes gadding abroad unto twenty objects until Christ comes, and then he says, \u201cThou silly thing, now thou shalt fly abroad no more. Come, thou dove, I will give thee a new heart, and my wounds shall be thy dovecot, and thou shalt never wander away again. I will be altogether thine, and thou shalt be altogether mine; there shall be a monopoly between us; I will be married unto thee, and thou shalt be married unto me. There shall be in communion between us. I will be thine, thou wandering sinner, as thy husband, and thou shalt be mine.\u201d<\/p>\n
Every heart that has been subdued by sovereign grace takes Jesus Christ to be the chief object of its love. We love our children, we love all our dear ones; God forbid that we should ever fail in love to them; but, over and above them all we must love our Lord. There is not one amongst us, I think, who would be it a matter of question about, which we would sooner part with; it would be a melancholy experience to have to follow the partner of one\u2019s own to the grow; but if it were a choice between wife and Savior, we could not deliberate for a moment. And as for the children of our love, whom we hope to see springing up to manhood and womanhood, it would be a sorry blow to us to have them laid low, but it would not take us a second to decide whether we should lose our Isaacs or lose our Jesus. Nay, we should not feel that they were lost if God took them from us, but we could not afford to think for a single instant of losing him, who is our everlasting All-in-all. The Christian, then, makes Christ his beloved beyond all beside. Let other people love what they will; but as for him, he loves his Savior. He stands at the foot of the grass, and says, \u201cThis once-accursed tree is now the blessed bulwark of my confidence.\u201d He looks up to the Savior, and he says, \u201cMany see no beauty in him that they should desire him, but to me he is the chief among ten thousand, and the altogether lovely.\u201d Let the scholar take his classics, let the warrior take his weapons of war, let the lover take his tender words and his amatory lyrics; but, as for the Christian, he takes the Savior, he takes the Lord Jesus, to be to him Alpha and Omega, the beginning, the end, the midst, the All-in-All, and in him he finds his soul\u2019s solace.<\/p>\n
Some people have thought that there is a tautology in the text when it says, \u201cMy beloved is mine<\/i>.\u201d Why, of course, if he is my beloved, he is mine, what need is there to say that? Well, those who are acquainted with the Christian\u2019s experience know that all believers are subject to many doubts and fears, and that they feel that they cannot make their assurance too sure, so that they like to double their expressions of assurance when they can, so each of them says, \u201cMy beloved is mine.\u201d There is no tautology; the speaker is only giving two strokes off the hammer to drive the nail home. It is put so that there can be no mistake about it, so that the spouse means what she is saying, and intends others also to understand it: \u201cMy beloved is mine.\u201d<\/p>\n
But I think it may mean more, than that, because we may love a thing, and yet it may not be our own. A man may call money his beloved, yet he may never get it; he may pursue it, but not be able to reach it. The lover of learning may court the love he covets in all the academies of the world, yet he may not be able to win the attainment of his desires. Men may love, and on their dying beds may have to confess that their beloved is not theirs; but every Christian has that upon which his heart is set. He has Christ, he loves him, and possesses him too.<\/p>\n
Besides, dear friends, you know that there is a time when men are not able to say that their beloved is theirs. He who has been most wealthy or most wise can take neither his wealth nor his wisdom with him to the tomb, and when the sinner who died, and was buried, wakes up in another world, Croesus will be as poor as Lazarus, and the wisest man without Christ will find himself devoid of all wisdom when he wakes up in the day of resurrection. They may stretch out their hands, but they will only clutch emptiness, and have to cry, \u201cOur beloved is not ours.\u201d But when we shall wake up in the image of Christ, and shall see him, \u2014 whether we shall fall asleep or whether we shall be changed, in either case we shall be present with him, \u2014 then shalt each believer say, \u201cYes, he is mine, still mine. I have him, truly have him: \u2019My beloved is mine.\u2019\u201d I am inclined to think that, if a man can truly say this, he can say the grandest thing that ever man said, \u201cMy beloved is mine.\u201d \u201cLook,\u201d says the rich man, \u201cdo you see far away beyond those stately oaks yonder? Do you see as far as that church spire? Well, as far as ever you can see, that is all mine.\u201d \u201cAh!\u201d says Death, as he lays his bony hand upon the man, \u201csix feet of earth, that<\/i> is yours.\u201d \u201cLook,\u201d says the scholar, as he points to the volumes on his shelves, \u201cI have searched through all these, and all the learning that is there is mine.\u201d \u201cAh!\u201d says Death again, as he smites him with his cold hand, \u201cwho can tell the difference between the skull of the learned and the skull of the ignorant when the worm has emptied them both?\u201d But the Christian man, when he can point upwards, and say, \u201cI love my Savior,\u201d has a possession which is surely his for ever. Death may come, and will come, even to him; but all that Death can do is to open the door to admit the Christian into still fuller enjoyment of that which was already his. \u201cMy beloved is mine;\u201d so, although I may have but little, I will be satisfied with it, and though I may be so poor that the world will pass me by, and never notice me, yet I will live quite content in the humblest possible obscurity because \u201cmy beloved is mine,\u201d and he is more than all the world to me. \u201cWhom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now I want to stop and see whether we have really got as far as this. How many of us have said, \u201cMy beloved is mine\u201d? I am afraid there may be some poor Christian here who says, \u201cAh, I cannot say that.\u201d Now, my dear hearer, I will ask you a question, \u2014 Do you cling to Christ? Is he your only hope? If so, then he is yours. When the tide goes down, have you ever seen the limpets clinging to the rocks, or holding fast, perhaps, to the pier. Now, is that what your faith does with Christ? Do you cling to him? Is he all your trust? Do you rest on him? Well then, if you do, you do not need any other mark or sign, that one is quite enough; if you are clinging to Christ, then Christ is yours. She who did but touch the hem of his garment received the virtue which came out of him. If you can cling to him, and, putting away every other confidence, and renouncing all other trust, can say, \u201cYes, if I perish, I will cling to Christ alone,\u201d then do not let a single doubt come in to take away the comfort of your soul, for your beloved is yours.<\/p>\n
Or perhaps, to put it another way, I may ask you, \u2014 Do you love Jesus? Does his name wake up the echoes of your heart? See the little child in its mother\u2019s arms. You want to take it for a little while; but no, it will not come away from its mother; and if you still want to take it, it puts its little arms around its mother\u2019s neck, and clings there. You could pull it away, perhaps, but you have not the heart to do so. It clings to its mother, and that is the evidence to you that she is its mother. Do you cling to Christ in that way, and though you feel that the devil would pull you away from Christ if he could, do you still cling to him as best you can. Do you remember what John Bunyan says about the prisoner whom Mr. Great-heart rescued from Giant Slay-good\u2019s clutches? Mr. Feeble-mind said, \u201cWhen he had got me into his den, since I went not with him willingly, I believed I should come out alive again.\u201d Is that the case with you? Are you willing to have Christ if you can have him? Are you unwilling to give, him up? Then you shall never give him up; he is yours. Do not think that Christ wants a high degree of faith to establish a union between himself and a sinner, for a grain of mustard-seed of faith is sufficient for salvation, though certainly not for the highest degree of comfort. If thou canst but trust Christ, and love Christ, then let not Satan stop thee from saying, in the words of the text, \u201cMy beloved is mine.\u201d<\/p>\n
Well, we have got so far, but we must remember the next words, \u201cI am his<\/i>.\u201d Now this its true of every Christian. I am his by Christ having made me his. I am his by choice; he elected me. I am his by his Father\u2019s gift, God gave me to him. I am his by purchase; he bought me with his blood. I am his by power, for his Spirit has won me. I am his by my own dedication, for I have vowed myself unto him. I am his by profession, for I have joined with his people. I am his now by my own deliberate choice of him, moved by his grace to choose him. Every Christian here knows that this is true, Christ is yours, and you are Christ\u2019s. You are the sheep of his pasture. You are the partners of his love.<\/p>\n
You are members of his body. You are branches of his stem. You belong to him.<\/p>\n
But there are some persons who get at a more practical meaning of this sentence, \u201cI am his,\u201d than others do. You know that, in the Church of Rome, they have certain orders of men and women who devote themselves to various benevolent, charitable, or superstitious work, and who come to be especially considered the servants of the Lord Jesus. Now, we have never admired this form of brotherhoods and sisterhoods, but the spirit of the thing is just that which ought to enter into the heart of every Christian man and woman. You members of Christian churches, if you are what you ought to be, are wholly consecrated to the Savior. \u201cPure religion and undefiled before God and the Father\u201d should be practiced by the whole Church of Christ, not merely by certain \u201corders\u201d thence to be called \u201creligious.\u201d Every Christian woman is \u201ca sister of mercy.\u201d We hear of men who belong to the order of Passionists, but every believing man ought to be of the order of Palmists, moved by the passion of the Savior to consecrate himself to the Saviour\u2019s work.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am his.\u201d I would like to have you take this for your motto, you professed Christians, if you own honestly do so. When you wake in the morning, breathe a short prayer while you are dressing, and before bowing the knee, feeling \u201cI am Christ\u2019s, and the first thing when I wake must be a word with him, and for him.\u201d When you go abroad into the world, I want you to feel that you cannot trade as other men trade, that you cannot imitate their tricks and sharp practices because something whispers within your heart, \u201cI am his! I am his! I am different from other men. They may do what they will, for their judgment is yet to come; but I am different from them, for I am Christ\u2019s man.\u201d I wish all Christians felt that the life they live is given to them that they may glorify Christ by it. Oh, if the wealth that is in the Christian Church were but devoted to God\u2019s cause, there would never be any lack of the means of sustaining missions, or of building houses of prayer in the dark localities of London. If some rich men gave to the cause of Christ as some poor men and women that I know of do, there would never be any lack in the treasury. I have sometimes rejoiced over some of you; I have had to bless God that I have seen in this church apostolical piety. I have known men and women who, out of their little, have given almost all that they had, and whose one object in life has been to spend and be spent for Christ, and I have rejoiced over them. But there are others of you who have not given a tithe, nay, not a fiftieth part of what you have, to the cause of Christ; yet, perhaps, you stand up and sing, \u2014 <\/p>\n
\u201cI love my God with zeal so great
That I could give him all.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
Stop that! Do not sing lies, for you know very well that you would not give him all, and do not give him all; and you also know very well that you would think it the most absurd thing in all the world if you were to give him all, or even to dream of doing so. Oh, for more consecration! We are, most of us, up to our ankles in our religion, very few of us are up to our knees; but oh, for the man that swims in it, who has got off the earth altogether, and now swims in consecration, living wholly unto him who loved him, and gave himself for him!<\/p>\n
I am afraid I shall have to stop here, and ask the question, without getting any answer to it, \u2014 How far can we get toward this second sentence, \u201cMy beloved is mine, and I am his.\u201d Do you feel as if you could not say that? Do you feel that you must not say it? Then let this be your prayer, \u201cLord, if I have not yet done all that I can do, if there is anything left which I might have done for thee, and which I have not done, give me grace that I may do all I can for thee, and give all I can to thee!\u201d There ought not to be an unconsecrated hair on a Christian\u2019s head, nor an unconsecrated drop of blood in his veins. Christ gave himself wholly for us; he deserves that we should give ourselves wholly to him. Where reserve begins, there Satan\u2019s dominion begins; for what is not Christ\u2019s is the property of the flesh, and the property of the flesh is the property of Satan. Oh, may the spiritual consecration be perfect in each one of us that, if we live, we may live unto Christ; or if we die, it may still be unto him! I hope, though we may have to make many grave confessions, that we can still say, My beloved is mine, and I am his.\u201d If he stood here at this moment, if we could just clear a space, and on a sudden he should come, and stand in our midst, with his wounds still visible, it would be so sweet to be able then to say, \u201cMy beloved is mine, and I am his.\u201d But I am afraid that, in his presence, we should have to say, \u201cJesus, forgive us; we are thine, but we have not acted as if we were; we have stolen from thee what was thy purchase, and what thou hast the right to keep; from this day may we bear in our body the marks of the Lord Jesus, and may we be wholly thine! \u201c<\/p>\n
\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n
II. <\/b>I cannot say much upon the: second part of the subject, for our time is already nearly gone. The Soul, Being Assured Of Its Personal Interest In Christ, Longs To Know Where He Is.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere is he?\u201d asks the soul, and the answer comes from the text, \u201cHe feedeth among the lilies.\u201d The worldling cares not where Christ is, but that is the Christian\u2019s one subject of thought.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere he is gone I fain would know
That I might seek and find him too.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
Jesus is gone, then, among the lilies, among those snow-white saints who bloom in the garden of heaven, those golden lilies that are round about the throne. He is there in \u2014 <\/p>\n
\u201cJerusalem the golden
With milk and honey blest;\u201d \u2014 <\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
and it makes us long to be there, that we may feed with him among the lilies.<\/p>\n
But, still, there are many of his lilies here below, those virgin souls who-<\/p>\n
\u201cWheresoe\u2019er the Lamb doth lead,
From his footsteps ne\u2019er depart.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
If we would find Christ, we must get into communion with his people, we must came to the ordinances with his saints, for, though he does not feed on<\/i> the lilies, he feedeth among<\/i> them, and there, mayhap, we may meet with him, you are here to-night, dear friends, many of you members of this church, and some of you members of other churches, and you have come to the place where Christ feeds his flock. Now that he feeds among the lilies, look out for him. At the communion table, do not merely partake of the elements, but look out for him. Look through the bread and the wine to his flesh and blood of which they are the symbols. Care not for my poor words, but for him; and as to anything else of which you have been thinking, get beyond that unto him. \u201cHe feedeth among the lilies,\u201d so do you look for him where his saints gather in his name.<\/p>\n
If you would meet with him, look, too, in the blessed lily-beds of Scripture. Each Book of the Bible seems to be full of lilies; yet you must never be satisfied merely with Scripture, but must get to the Christ of Scripture, the<\/i> Word of God, the sum and substance of the revelation of the Most High. \u201cHe feedeth among the lilies.\u201d That is where he is to be found. Lord Jesus came and seed us among the lilies to-night; come and feed our hungry souls, and we will bless thy holy name!<\/p>\n
\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n
III. <\/b>I must leave that part of the subject unfinished because I want to speak of The Soul, Assured Of Christ\u2019s Love Desiring His Conscious Presence: \u201cUntil the day break, and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of Bether.\u201d<\/p>\n
You observe that the soul speaks here of the day breaking. All of us who love the Lord have to look for daybreak, but the sinner has a night to come. Sinner, this is your day; and when you die, that will be your long and awful night, unbroken by a single star of hope. But, Christian, this is your night, the darkest period that you will ever have; but your day will break. Yes, the Lord will come in his glory, or else you shall sleep in him, and then your day shall break. When the resurrection trumpet shall sound, the day of the Lord will be darkness and not light to the sinner, but to you it will be an everlasting daybreak. Perhaps, at the present moment, your life is wrapped in shadows. You are poor, and poverty casts a shadow. You have a sick one at home, or perhaps you are yourself sickly in body; that is a shadow to you. And the reflection of your sin is another shadow, but, when the day breaks the shadows will flee away. No poverty then; no sin then, which is better still; and \u2014 <\/p>\n
\u201cNo groans to mingle with the songs
Which warble from immortal tongues.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
Brethren, it is so sweet, to know that our best things are on ahead. O sinner, you are leaving your best things behind, and you are going to your worst things; but the Christian is going to his best things. His turn is coming; he will have the best of it ere long, for the shadows will flee away. No longer shall he be vexed, and grieved, and troubled, but he shall be eternally in the light, for the shadows shall<\/i> flee away.<\/p>\n
While the shadows last, you perceive that the soul asks Jesus Christ to turn, as though he had withdrawn his face from her. She says, \u201cHast thou turned away from me, my Master? Then, turn to me again. Have I grieved and vexed thee by growing worldly, carnal, careless, reckless? Then, turn to me, my Lord. Hast thou been angry with me? Oh, love me! Hast thou not said that thine anger may endure for a moment, but that thy love is everlasting? In a little wrath thou hast hidden thy face from me; but oh, now turn unto me!\u201d You know that the proper state for a Christian to be in is not a state in which Christ turns away his smiling face, but the state in which Christ\u2019s love is beaming full in his face. I know that some of you think it is best for you to be in the shade; but, beloved, do not think so. You need not have shadows for even, you may have the presence of Christ even now to rejoice in; and I would have you ambitious to get two heavens, \u2014 a heaven below and a heaven above; Christ here, and then Christ there; Christ here making you as glad as your heart can be, and the Christ for ever filling you with all the fullness of God. May we seek after that double blessing, and may we get it!<\/p>\n
Then the soul says, \u201cTurn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of Bether.\u201d Dr. Thomson, who wrote The Land and the Book<\/i>, tells us that he thinks he knows the mountains of Bether. It matters little whether he does or does not, but he has seen the roes and the harts skipping over the precipices. Certainly, those wild creatures, that are accustomed to craggy rocks, will go where human footsteps would not dare to follow. And such is the love of Jesus Christ. Our love is easily turned aside; if we are badly treated, we soon forget those who seemed to be so fond of us; but Christ is like a roe or a young hart, and he skips over the mountains of our sins, and all the dividing mountains of our unbelief and ingratitude which might keep him away. Like a young hart, he skips over them as though they were nothing at all, and so hastes to have communion with us. There is the idea of fleetness here; the roe goes swiftly, almost like the lightning\u2019s flash, and so does the Savior come to the soul in need. He can lift you up from the lowest state of spiritual sorrow from the highest position of spiritual joy; may he do so! Oh, cry to him; cry to him! There is nothing that can tell with a mother like the voice of her child, and there is nothing that can tell with Christ like the voice of his dear people; so come to him. Say, \u201cSaviour, show thy love to me. Dear Savior, do not hide thyself from thing own flesh. I love thee; I cannot live without thee; I am grieved to think that I should have driven thee away.<\/p>\n
Come to me; come to me; return to me, and make thee glad in thy presence.\u201d Cry thus to him, and he will come to thee. And you, poor sinner, who have never comfortably seen his face, remember that there is life for a look at him. God give you grace now to trust him, and may you see his face here so that you may see him hereafter with everlasting joy!<\/p>\n
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON.<\/p>\n
2 THESSALONIANS 1.<\/b><\/p>\n
(This exposition belongs to Sermon No. 3,179, \u201cA Comprehensive Benediction\u201d but there was not sufficient space available for its insertion there.)<\/p>\n
Verse 1. Paul, and Silvanus, and Timotheus, unto the church of the Thessalonians \u2014<\/i> <\/p>\n
Paul loved to associate his fellow-workers with himself when writing to his brethren and sisters in Christ. Although he had a superior experience to theirs, he put Silvanus, and Timothy, his own son in the faith, with him as his fellow-evangelists in writing to \u201cthe church of the Thessalonians\u201d \u2014 <\/p>\n
1. In God our Father \u2014 <\/i><\/p>\n
What a wonderful expression! The Church is in God as God is in the Church, what a blessed dwelling-place for the people of God in all generations: \u201cin God our Father\u201d \u2014 <\/p>\n
1, 2. And the Lord Jesus Christ\u2019s grace unto you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.<\/i><\/p>\n
This is the apostle\u2019s usual salutation when he is writing to a Christian church. When he is writing to a minister, it is \u201cgrace, mercy, and peace,\u201d for God\u2019s most prominent servants especially need great mercy on account of their heavy responsibilities and many shortcomings; but to the church Paul\u2019s greeting is, \u201cGrace unto you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n
3. We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity of every one of you all toward each other aboundeth; See The New Park Street Pulpit, No. 205, \u201cA Lecture for Little-faith;\u201d and Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, No. 1,856, \u201cThe History of Little-faith;\u201d and No. 1,857, \u201cThe Necessity of Growing Faith,\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n
What a kind of sacred network Christian love makes, intertwisting every believer in Christ with every other believer! \u201cThe love of every one of you all toward each other boundeth.\u201d Oh, that this might really be the case in all the churches of our Lord Jesus Christ!<\/p>\n
4, 5. So that we ourselves glory in you in the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure: which is a manifest token of the righteous judgement of God,<\/i><\/p>\n
One of the clearest proofs of the judgement to come is to be found in the present sufferings of the saints through persecutions and tribulations; for if they, for the very reason that they love God, have to suffer here, there must be a future state and time for rectifying all this that is now so wrong.<\/p>\n
5-7. That ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God for which ye do suffer: seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you; and to you who are troubled rest with us,<\/i><\/p>\n
For us who believe in Jesus there is a long Sabbath yet to come, to be spent with the apostles and the other holy ones around the throne of God and of the Lamb, even as Paul wrote to the Hebrews, where remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God.\u201d<\/p>\n
7-11. When the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: who shall be punished with everlasting instruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power, when he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe (because our testimony among you has believed) in that day. Wherefore also we pray always for you, \u2014 <\/i><\/p>\n
The very people in whom Paul gloried, and over whom he rejoiced, were those for whom he continued still to pray; and he did well, for the highest state of grace needs preserving, and there is a possibility of going beyond the utmost height to which any have yet attained. Hence Paul says, \u201cWherefore also we pray always for you,\u201d \u2014 <\/p>\n
11, 12. That our God would count you worthy of this calling, and full all the good pleasure of his goodness, and the work of faith with power: that the name of Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NO. 3185 A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 17TH, 1910, DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON, AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON. \u201cMy beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies. Until the day break, and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart … Continue reading “\u201cA SONG OF MY BELOVED.\u201d”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4512\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}