Song Of Solomon 4:7-16 - Homiletics

Further conversation.

I. THE WORDS OF THE BRIDEGROOM .

1 . His entire love for the bride. If the view of Song of Solomon 4:6 indicated above gives the true meaning, the bride has left the bridegroom for a time. In the evening they meet again, and the king again expresses his affection: "Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee." Such shall the Church be in the eyes of Christ, when he has sanctified and cleansed her with the washing of water by the Word; when she is clothed in the fine linen, clean and white, which is the righteousness of saints; when he "of God is made unto her Wisdom, and Righteousness, and Sanctification, and Redemption" ( 1 Corinthians 1:30 ). Such shall the saints be in his eyes when they have "washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb;" "they are without fault before the throne of God" ( Revelation 14:5 ). But it is Christ who has cleansed them. They were stained with many sins, as David was when he cried in the anguish of his deep penitence, "Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than show" ( Psalms 51:7 ). We have sinned so long and so greatly, we have so often fallen back into sin after imperfect repentance, that to be "whiter than snow" seems a hope altogether too high for us, out of our reach. But we have the sure Word of God. He is able to "present us faultless before the presence of his glory;" he is able to "cleanse us from all unrighteousness;" "the Lamb of God taketh away the sins of the world." Indeed it is true that "we are all as an unclean things and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags" ( Isaiah 64:6 ), but we may have, if we come to Christ in faith, "that righteousness which is through the faith of Christ;" that righteousness which is his, not our own; and yet, if we abide in him, it becomes through his grace our own; for it is given to us, imparted to us, infused into us by the indwelling influences of the Holy Spirit of God. Then we may dare to hope for that spotless righteousness; we may, we must, long for it and strive after it. Not to do so is not humility, but unbelief; not distrust of ourselves, but distrust of God; for we have the sacred word of promise, "Blessed are they that do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled."

2 . His invitation. The Hebrew words are full of life: "With me from Lebanon, O bride, with me from Lebanon shalt thou come." The bride is henceforth to be with the bridegroom, with him always: she is to forget her own people and her father's house ( Psalms 45:10 , Psalms 45:11 ). She is to come away from her old haunts—from Amana, Shenir, and Hermon; for even Hermon in all its grandeur is but a "little hill" in comparison with the spiritual glory of Mount Zion, where God is pleased to dwell (see Prayer book Version of Psalms 42:6 ). She must come from the lions' dens, from "the violence of Lebanon" ( Habakkuk 2:17 ), to Jerusalem, the foundation of peace. The Church, the bride of Christ, shall be in the eternal blessedness "forever with the Lord." She shall come away from her old habitation, the earth which is filled with violence ( Genesis 6:11 ); away from the raging of the roaring lion, who walketh about, seeking whom he may devour ( 1 Peter 5:8 ), to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. And the Christian soul, which looks forward in living hope to the inheritance of the saints in light, must now come with Christ away from other masters, from the lusts of the flesh and the lust of the eye, and the pride of life. "To depart and to be with Christ," St. Paul says ( Philippians 1:23 ), "is far better"—"by much very far better," for such is the full meaning of the emphatic words. Then the soul that hopes to be with Christ in Paradise must be much with Christ now; with him in the daily life of faith, in prayer and praise and frequent communion. He bids us come. "Come unto me," he says, "and I will give you rest." He only can give peace. "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you." If we listen to his voice, and come with him away from Lebanon, which, though fair to look upon, with grand and wide-reaching prospects, was yet the haunt of noisome beasts; if we leave the love of the world, with its enticements and its dangers, for the blessed love of Christ, we shall have all that we need for our soul's peace and safety. "Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid."

3 . His praises of the bride. He calls her repeatedly, "My sister-bride." His heart is hers; every little thing about her, the very smell of her garments, is dear to him; her love is by much better than wine; her voice is sweet as honey. He dwells now less on graces of person, as in Song of Solomon 4:1-5 , than on her looks of affection, the depth and beauty of her love, the music of her voice. These words tell of a great love; but the love of Christ for his Church is beyond the power of language. Solomon left his first love—he loved many strange women; but the love of Christ for his Church is "an everlasting love" ( Jeremiah 31:3 ), unchangeable, unutterable. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends;" but "God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" ( Romans 5:8 ). And because he loved the Church with so great a love, the responsive love of the Church is very dear to him. "He is not ashamed to call us brethren" ( Hebrews 2:11 ). The voice of the Church lifted up to him in prayer and praise, making melody in the heart unto God, is sweet to the Saviour. He praises the graces of the Church, though those graces come all from him; they are his gift. He praises in the Book of the Revelation the Churches of Smyrna and Philadelphia; he sees the beauty of holiness in those afflicted and despised Churches: "I know thy works, and tribulation, and poverty, but thou art rich;" "Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life;" "They shall know that I have loved thee; Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God: and I will write upon him my new name" ( Revelation 2:9 , Revelation 2:10 ; Revelation 3:9 , Revelation 3:12 ).

4 . He compares her to a garden enclosed. She is like a garden shut up, barred against intruders, kept sacred for its master's use; she is like a spring shut up, a fountain sealed as with the royal signet which none but the king can touch. The garden, or paradise, is full of the choicest fruits, flowers, and spice-bearing plants, the produce of many countries, some of them brought in Solomon's time by his navy from Arabia or India. The fountain is a well of living waters, fresh as the gushing mountain streams of Lebanon. Solomon praises the bride not only for her beauty and her rare endowments, but also for her purity and faithfulness. The "garden enclosed," the "fountain scaled," remind us of our marriage vow: "Wilt thou … forsaking all other, keep thee only unto him so long as ye both shall live?" Such should the wedded pair be each to the other; such was not Solomon. We cannot but think and believe that the bride, innocent and artless as she is described, kept herself pure unto the end. The Church, which is the bride of Christ, should be as a garden enclosed, kept sacred for the one Lord. The garden of Eden was a garden enclosed, but Satan marred its sanctity; he, in the words of Milton,

"At one slight bound high overleaped all bound

Of hill or highest wall, and sheer within

Lights on his feet …

So clomb the first grand thief into God's fold:

So since into his Church lewd hirelings climb."

The Lord has said, "He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber." Again he has said, "I am the Door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and shall find pasture." They who are called to minister in the Church of God must ever remember that it is God's Church, that "he hath purchased it with his own blood" ( Acts 20:28 ); that it should be "a garden enclosed," kept for the Master, tilled and watered for him; that every barren tree should be carefully tended, that it may bring forth fruit before the awful word goeth forth, "Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire." The trees in the Lord's garden differ much from one another. There are pomegranates with their pleasant fruit, henna with its fragrant flowers, spikenard with its costly perfume, frankincense for sacred uses; all manner of sweet spices—myrrh and aloes, which tell of the bitter healing cup of sorrow, which point to death and burial. The saints of God differ much from one another. Enoch, Abraham, Moses, Daniel, St. Peter, St. John, St. Paul, have each his own place in the garden of the Lord. All bring forth the fruits of the Spirit, but in different forms and degrees; one we call the apostle of love, another the apostle of faith, a third the apostle of hope; "but all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will" ( 1 Corinthians 12:11 ). It is the Lord himself who giveth the Spirit. Mary Magdalene, on the first Easter Day, supposed him to be the gardener ( John 20:15 ); and in a very true sense he is the Gardener of the garden enclosed. And here we may remember that it was in a garden that he suffered that dread agony, when his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground. That blood taketh away the sins of the world; it waters the garden enclosed with its cleansing stream. And again we are told that "in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. There laid they Jesus" ( John 19:41 ). The Lord suffered in a garden; he has purchased with his own blood the Church to be his own, his garden enclosed. But the Church is also "a spring shut up, a fountain sealed;" shut up in a sense, sealed with the Master's signet, as his own sacred tomb was sealed in the garden of Joseph, but yet (verse 15) "a fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and streams from Lebanon." The fountain is sealed, for it is the Lord's; it hath "this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that nameth the Name of Christ depart from iniquity" ( 2 Timothy 2:19 ). But its living waters go forth to fertilize the Lord's garden. The healing waters which the Prophet Ezekiel saw in his vision issued out from under the threshold of the temple; they brought fruitfulness wherever they went "because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary" ( Ezekiel 47:1 , Ezekiel 47:12 ). In a true sense the whole world is the Lord's field: "The field is the world" ( Matthew 13:38 ); and the Church has the Lord's commandment, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature" ( Mark 16:15 ). The well is the Lord's; it is sealed with his seal; but the living waters of that sacred well must issue forth, that "the wilderness and the solitary place may be glad for them: that the desert may rejoice and blossom as the rose" ( Isaiah 35:1 ). And as the Church, the bride of Christ, is for him "a garden enclosed, a fountain sealed," so must every Christian soul be wholly his. "We are Christ's," St. Paul says. "Whether we live or die, we are the Lord's;" and again, "God, whose I am, and whom I serve" ( Acts 27:23 ). Each Christian soul must keep itself as "a garden enclosed" ("barred," or "belted," is the literal meaning of the Hebrew word). We must strive earnestly to keep out earthly passions, earthly ambitions, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God. We must keep the gate barred against the entrance of the evil one. And we must take heed that the house be not left empty; it must be kept for "a habitation of God through the Spirit" ( Ephesians 2:22 ). We must strive to keep out worldly cares, coming to God in all our troubles, whether great or small, that so the peace of God, which Passeth all understanding, may keep (guard, protect) our hearts and thoughts through Christ Jesus. The garden must be barred; the peace of God must rule there ( Colossians 3:15 ); and it must bring forth fruit, the blessed fruit of the Spirit, which is "love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance" ( Galatians 5:22 ). The tree that beareth not fruit must be hewn down at last; it cumbereth the ground; "every branch that beareth not fruit is taken away." How carefully, then, we ought, every one of us, to watch for the fruit of the Spirit in our daily life, to see in diligent self-examination whether we are exhibiting these holy graces in our Christian walk and conversation; and if, alas! we find them not, how earnestly we ought to pray, with fervent, untiring supplication for the help of the Holy Spirit of God to work within us, to assist our prayers, to make intercession for us with groanings that cannot be uttered, to lead us nearer to Christ, that we may evermore abide in him, without whom we can bear no fruit, without whom we can do nothing! The garden needs the living water; the saint of God is a fountain sealed. The living water is the Lord's; it bears his seal. The Lord himself is, in the truest sense, the "Fountain opened … for sin and for uncleanness" ( Zechariah 13:1 ); with him is "the fountain of life" ( Psalms 36:9 ). He leadeth his redeemed to living fountains of waters ( Revelation 7:17 ). But they who have received from him the living water become themselves fountains, as the Lord hath said, "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." And again, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water" ( John 4:14 ; John 7:37 , John 7:38 ). The saint of God is indeed "a fountain sealed," sealed with the Lord's seal, dedicated wholly unto him; "a spring shut up" from all other waters save only the living water which the Lord giveth, not "a fountain which sends forth at the same place sweet water and bitter" ( James 2:11 ). But he must be "a fountain of gardens" (verse 15); he that is watered of God must water the thirsty ground ( Proverbs 11:25 ). St. Paul, who had received the gift of the Spirit from the Lord, passed on the living waters to Apollos; Apollos watered the garden of the Lord at Corinth ( 1 Corinthians 3:6 ). So must all God's people do. They know in their own hearts more or less of that holy calm and blessedness which the living waters of the indwelling of the Spirit ( John 7:39 ) bring to the faithful; they must do their best to extend to others the blessings which they have themselves received; they must pray and labour for the spiritual well being of those nearest to them, within the sphere of their personal influence; they must do their best to help missionary work through the world, resting not till "the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea" ( Isaiah 11:9 ). But each must keep himself as "a fountain sealed" for the Lord and the work of the Lord, that at the last he may be sealed with the seal of the living God, and stand on the Mount Zion among the mystic hundred and forty and four thousand who have the Lamb's Name and his Father's Name written in their foreheads ( Revelation 7:2 , Revelation 7:3 ; Revelation 14:1 ).

II. THE VOICE OF THE BRIDE . She accepts the bridegroom's parable. She is a garden enclosed. She calls upon the winds, north and south, to blow upon the garden, that the fragrance of its spices may flow forth to give pleasure to the bridegroom. The garden is hers; for it is herself, her love. And yet it is the bridegroom's, for she has given herself, her love, to him; she invites him to come into his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits. So the Church, the bride of Christ, longs for the heavenly Bridegroom; so each Christian soul seeks the Saviour's presence. The soul that would give itself wholly to the Lord as a garden barred against all other masters, and enclosed for his use, strives ever to please him more and more; she would have her inward life of prayer and meditation and spiritual communion with him to become more and more pleasing to him, more and more fragrant. Therefore she calls for the north wind as well as the south to blow upon the garden, that the spices thereof may flow out. She is willing to submit to the cold blasts of adversity, as well as to be refreshed with the soft breezes of joy and holy gladness. She knows that God will make all things, joy and sorrow alike, to work together for good to them that love him ( Romans 8:28 ). Therefore she prays only that his will may be done in her, whether by chastisements or by spiritual joy and blessing. She would have the garden bring forth more fruit, even though it must be purged with the pruning knife of affliction. For the garden, though it is herself, her own heart, is yet the Lord's; for she has given it to the heavenly Bridegroom; therefore she yearns for his irradiating presence, praying him to enter into his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits.