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Song of Solomon 6 By Jack Nattress

Now we're going to have a look at this and of course here we see that the Bible in this book is truly an Eastern book.
We have to look at it carefully and in the former chapter there's a description that this woman who is seen in a sense the Saviour which is speaking of and has tried with all her heart to describe Him.
And of course she makes a lot of statements here about He's the cheapest among 10,000, His head is fine gold, His locks are bushy and different things like that.
And she says many wondrous things trying to describe His glory.
And anyhow after reading this such a description of the Beloved might well make the daughters of Jerusalem anxious to see who she was looking for.
They should, anyone who heard these words should make people anxious to see who she was looking for and inquire where He might be found.
Now a wise holding forth of the character and the beauty of Christ has always been the leading means of drawing sinners to Christ.
A lifting up of His glory.
Now I remember if ever there was a dead soul in the town it was myself.
And the way the first inklings of grace that ever I felt in my heart was this dear old man that turned sideways from a vast hall over there in Islington, holding his hand up like that and pointing and describing Christ in his beauty.
He just pointed, Christ the glorious one and he named some of the wonderful things.
And that was the first impression that ever I had of my need.
Now this is our work to uplift Him in our own hearts and we cannot at first attract people by solid blocks of doctrine.
Now I love doctrine because it's good but I believe that that comes a little later.
And we must glorify Him and lift up His perfections and His glorious character before people.
We have to do that.
We'll be happy doing it and many might be happy in hearing it.
Now the salvation of souls is affected by the preaching of Christ crucified.
Not discoursing on matters of evolution and different things like that.
But basically on Christ crucified for sinners and thereby God applies His power to all those He will save.
And thereby the heart is opened and the spiritual door of the soul is unlocked.
And Christ crucified just the same as in that day when He was raised up on the cross
and those that saw the centurion and other soldiers and probably many were impressed at that scene.
And we have to do the same.
We've got to see this in our hearts, Christ as our substitute.
Now people in Bible times who saw Him and His mighty works
and who were the subjects of His healing power said nothing.
If they had said nothing and many whose lives were spared would have perished.
But the people who saw and understood they spoke and they told the known world of what they saw.
And you must do so too.
In God's method of salvation it is usually the preaching.
And the preaching I believe in the world to come it will not be the great mass evangelism which we do not decry.
Nor the masses preach in the church.
I believe it will be the individual unknown works of man.
The countless thousands who face to face preached to one another.
Even the mighty Bunyan, how was he affected?
Not by all the learned discourses.
He had four women, he was around the corner once and he stopped.
And there were four women whether they were fishery women or what they were.
Four ordinary women in a poor suburb discoursing on the glories of Christ.
And he stopped around the corner and listened and it began a seeking in his heart.
So keep on making his glory known.
The Bible says ye are the light of the world, ye are the light of the world, every Christian.
Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel,
but on a candlestick and it giveth light to all that are in the house.
It gives light.
God doesn't say it might give light.
So it gives light.
Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works
and glorify your father which is in heaven.
Simple scriptures that we know and strange that there should be such a backwardness
amongst Christians to speak to each other of the Lord
and in commanding his grace to sinners.
There is a backwardness in the human heart.
It's amazing isn't it?
That has to be overcome.
Love breaks through this icy restraint which is in the fallen heart of man.
An icy cold restraint.
Even at the risk of being looked upon with disfavor where you are.
The speaking of the Lord Jesus will always be a blessing to the soul of the speaker and the hearer.
If you want to have your soul blessed speak of his glories and speak of his love.
Now when the woman of Samaria went her way into the city,
we get that in John, John 4, what was the result?
Verse 40 says he abode there two days after many things of course,
she went through the town and she said come and see a man that told me all things that ever I did.
She was really enthused.
She was delighted.
She'd heard bad things and she'd heard wonderful things.
When she asked, when she suggested the Messiah would come he says I am he that speaketh to thee.
But look at the result.
In verse 40 I think it is, it says that he abode there two days.
Just think of it, who he was.
The Lord of glory, the creator of heaven and earth.
Now I don't know what happened in those two days.
The Bible doesn't tell us very much.
But he, the Lord of glory, abode with those people two days.
How wonderful to have the presence of God himself.
Sometimes to have a nice visitor, Christian visitor, how wonderful it is to have him for two days.
But this was the Lord.
Now in verse 2, my beloved has gone down into his garden,
to the beds of spices to feed in the gardens and to gather lilies.
Now we've mentioned some of these things before,
but all the gardens mentioned in scripture are not just around the residence.
We have our garden at our back door and our front door.
They didn't have that.
They were always removed half a mile or two miles from the city.
And Josephus relates how Solomon used to go with great pomp to Ethan.
About a mile and a half or two miles from Jerusalem to a pleasant place abounding with gardens
and beauties and little rivulets and Springs.
Josephus mentions it.
And he used to go there to feed or to eat his pleasant fruits
and to have his senses as it were regale with the blooming flowers
and the luscious fruits and the exhilarating fragrance
and the beautiful scenes and the melodies of the nightingales.
It is said that he would leave early in the morning in the hot eastern days
and with a great train he used to go according to Josephus
who was a fairly true historian.
He used to go down to this beautiful place.
And of course it's recorded in scripture for a special reason.
And it says here to gather lilies.
One of the poets said, Elliot I think it was,
and from the meadows thy fragrant banks that bound
plucked the sweet lilies gaily blooming round.
Now just like the seven golden candlesticks in Revelation 1-20.
The garden means the Lord's churches and the lilies his saints.
The pure in heart who will see God.
As we learn from the Beatitudes,
blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God.
And the spouse knew well where to find her beloved.
Though he had withdrawn, she knew where to find him.
He was still amongst his churches in the midst of the saints
and he will always be there
even when our hearts are comparatively barren
when he appears to have left us, which he never really does.
Where will we find him?
As Solomon was found in his garden at certain times
will always find Christ amongst his churches,
amongst his lilies.
He'll never leave the community.
And if we remain true in our hearts, pure in our hearts,
he'll never leave us.
We'll know the very presence of the Lord Jesus.
Now she must go there to find him.
Though he may withdraw from the believer,
he never forsakes his church.
He said, I'll never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
And when our own hearts appear to be forsaken,
it will be found in the spiritual garden of the church
enjoying its delights
and it is a delight to him as well as to us.
Having their connection to the earth,
this is a believer,
one day the connection to the earth will be broken by death
and it's only for a reason that they may lie nearer to his own heart
in glory and adorn his heavenly home.
So as we learned this morning, we've got nothing to fear
while we live and while we die
because every death is one of his lilies
to adorn his own glorious place.
Now in verse 3,
I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine.
He feedeth among the lilies.
Now as I said before, think very carefully.
It is the Lord Jesus,
God in Christ,
giving the impression,
telling us spiritually,
his thoughts of his saints.
And it's just wonderful, isn't it?
To think that he thinks of his saints in such a manner.
Now through the whole scene we notice
after waking from a careless sleepiness,
he still has ardent affection for a beloved,
though his presence is withdrawn.
And we do find that, don't we, in our own souls.
Although we're in a sense barren,
we've got an ardent affection.
Where is he? And we become alarmed, don't we?
Love to him may remain ardent and strong
even without those manifestations of his presence.
And the very act of speaking concerning his glory and beauty
and commending him to others
will bring happy results to ourselves.
As the end of chapter 5 indicates
and brings the full assurance of hope.
See, she said after, as it were, departing from him,
his mouth is most sweet.
Yea, he is altogether lovely.
This is my beloved and this is my friend,
O daughters of Jerusalem.
She described him.
Now verse 4,
Thou art beautiful, O my love, as Terzar,
calmly as Jerusalem, terrible as an army with banners.
The very name Terzar, it means delight.
And it speaks of the beauty of the scenery.
Now this Terzar was mentioned in Joshua,
chapter 12, verse 12.
And it was remarkable for its elegance,
the way it was built and the beautiful place it was.
At one time it was chosen as a royal city,
at one time in the early days.
And it was beautiful for situation.
You remember that portion of scripture we sing.
Beautiful for situation, the joy of the old earth.
The most splendid city of the east.
Of course, Jerusalem then became the capital
and then all of these words then come back to Jerusalem.
The most splendid city of the east,
that is Jerusalem, rising majestically on its verdant hills
with towers and walls and palaces of pure white marble.
One time, one of the most beautiful cities in all the east.
So the beloved compares the spouse to his people
as a city set on a hill.
People would come from way down,
a place now we call Yemen, southern Arabia.
People would come from there.
And people would come from Ethiopia.
We know of those that came,
the Queen of Sheba came from Yemen.
The Ethiopian, the treasurer, he came from Ethiopia.
And different ones would travel to different parts
to see the beauty of the city.
And then he likens his people to this.
He compares his people to a city set on a hill.
And this expresses the characteristic of beauty
and loveliness found preeminently in the bride.
Which so impresses the beholder
with this sense of dignity and majesty.
So that it strikes with terror and repels evil men.
And causes feelings of respect and veneration.
Holiness, true beauty, piety that causes respect.
And she possesses something more than beauty.
It's beauty allied with majesty and dignity and grace.
Now speaking of the believer, the true believer.
And especially the believers gathered together.
Beauty, dignity and grace.
And in these descriptions the Lord Jesus wishes
to give us an idea of the impressions of beauty
and pleasure he has in contemplating
the souls of the saints.
So he must use the resemblance of things
we can see and enjoy.
Now if our Lord say gave us visions
or spoke of the angelic hosts
and the glories of the other world,
we wouldn't comprehend them.
We couldn't understand them.
As we heard was it this morning or last night,
I just forget which.
That it was not lawful to speak of certain things
that Paul had seen.
You see so our Lord uses natural things
to stir up our senses
that we might lay a hold of what he sees.
You see we can understand beautiful valleys.
We can understand certain fruits.
We can understand sights over the hills.
I know one particular person who loves to see scenery anyhow.
And I guess there's quite a lot here.
Mountains and valleys and he stirs our souls
from these very material things
that we might see in the spiritual
what he thinks of us.
We he might have used comparisons drawn
from angelic hosts and superior beings
but such illustrations would have done us no good.
They're beyond our comprehension.
So he uses the beauties of nature
and the pleasure had in viewing those natural objects.
And do not think in any of these expressions
that there are exaggerations.
God never exaggerates in the Bible.
We do and we shouldn't but God doesn't.
And the scripture just means what it says.
All these beautiful things that he sees in his people.
Now the pure in heart.
A growing light God who is light.
Blessed are the pure in heart
and every child of God is being sanctified.
All we say to ourselves I see no growth in myself.
But it's not true.
He says that he will sanctify all those
and conform them to the image of Christ that have believed.
He is doing it.
And you know sometimes we see it in one another.
We see and hear the changes, don't we?
We keep it to ourselves.
But how often do we observe the wonderful changes going on?
And it is God who is sanctifying.
Like the old sculptor that we mentioned.
He goes and selects a great big rough block of marble
out of the hillside and looks at it
and sees it's big enough and he gets to work on it.
And through time he makes a beautiful image
or picture or statue.
And the Lord is doing that with us.
Much work to be done on us.
Now our Lord is pointing out what hidden beauty
he sees in the soul.
He sees hidden beauty because he is putting it there.
He's changing the thoughts
and the intentions of the heart are now different.
The mind is renewed.
You don't think if you're a Christian like you used to.
You might get caught a little
but oh we soon recoil from that.
And he's doing his work of beauty and glory in you.
Now wonderful.
And Christ is a spiritual being
and these likenesses must exist
in the emotions of the soul.
They don't exist outwardly.
And remember the living word affects man in his entirety.
It affects him all, not some of him.
His intellect and his emotions
or his affections and his will.
You see he's affected.
If you're a Christian
you're not what you were in your affections.
You're not what you were in your will.
You don't do the things you used to.
You're different in your mind.
Your mind sees things.
Sometimes we get for instance
we'll get people that come in to the business
and they use this Dale Carnegie psychological stuff.
Oh what a tidy yard you have.
Tidest I've seen.
And then don't we shudder when we think of those remarks.
And then we get on different things like that.
They're not genuine remarks.
Plenty of tidy yards and they all start on this kind of thing
and we discern people.
Not nastily but we discern that which is truth.
And that which is not.
That which is proud and that which is humble.
We can discern it.
So we're different.
And that is what a book like this does.
It strikes at the emotions of the heart.
Christ wishes to draw out our affections
because that's godly.
And that's how he made the first man.
I believe Adam in his pristine glory.
Oh what a worshiper he would be.
How he would love God with all his heart
and soul and mind and strength.
How he would be just perfect
and do everything that God said before he fell.
And of course God is conforming those people he saved
back to that image and beyond it.
And then he says in verse five,
thy turn away thine eyes from me
for they have overcome me.
Thy hair is as a flock of goats that appear from Gilead.
Now thy hair it says is a flock of goats
that lie down from Gilead.
Lie down I read in one part, one translation.
Now the hair of the oriental goat
has the fineness of silk
that comes from that angora species.
Like we see an angora rabbit, there's an angora goat.
Beautiful fine hair.
And the hair of the oriental goat
has the fineness of silk.
It has been observed by an ancient oriental naturalist
to resemble the fine beautiful ringlets of a woman's hair.
And of course the writer, the Bible writer
under the inspiration of the Spirit uses that.
Now the country of Gilead is the most beautiful and fertile
and abounding and rich pastures.
And what we call aromatic groves.
A lot of that tree called the balsam.
Most beautiful smelling plant.
We've got some of it grows here in our land occasionally.
More of a little shrub.
It grows here.
And it has beautiful fertile valleys
and they extend to Jordan.
Right across to Jordan and south to a place called Jaybuck.
And such beautiful scenes would be more beautiful
with the flocks of white goats lying down upon the hillside.
Very beautiful scene.
And how pleasant to see these flocks
on the verdant slopes of Gilead on a calm clear day.
A place of beauty.
And it conveys to us the satisfaction
that our Lord Jesus has and delights in his saints.
Just imagine these places in the eastern lands
coming across those hot deserts from Sinai or Arabia.
And into this place of Gilead.
How beautiful.
See the verdant land and the rivers.
Two or three small rivers flowing into the Jordan
with the beautiful flocks on the hillside.
Oh what a peaceful scene.
How happy it would make us.
Would I suppose if we were a traveler there
we'd feel that we never wanted to leave.
And this is the satisfaction that God sees in his dear saints.
Now I hope you think this.
Think over this matter in your heart.
His apprehension of you.
How often we're thinking of our thoughts of him.
Our hold upon him.
But this is impressing us with his love and hold upon us.
Which is a thousand times more powerful and wonderful.
He delights in his people.
Don't have those fears.
Let those fears depart.
Those legal fears.
And those terrors.
As a true believer,
rest in his love and work upon you and for you and in you.
Do that.
This is part of the rest of God for the soul of the believer.
Rest in it.
Delight in it.
Because it's true.
That's what this is telling us.
Now in verse 6.
Thy teeth are as a flock of sheep which go up from the washing
where of everyone beareth twins,
and there is not one barren among them.
Indicating the flock all the same size.
Now don't think you're a little unimportant person in the Church of God.
Or in Christ's sight.
There are no tiny little backseat saints with him.
All are precious in his sight.
Beautiful and precious and it costs the same to redeem you as anyone else.
Equal in his sight.
Glorious.
Now the twins indicate that they were together.
The people were together.
Most times that the Bible mentions twins and that sort of thing.
There's one or two references.
I haven't got time to go into them in the early books of the Bible.
About being together.
And they stood close together.
And the people of God ought to stand together.
Firmly.
It's wonderful to see the people of God together.
And it expresses the perfection of the flock.
Everyone beareth twins.
And there is not one barren among them.
And they've come up from the washing.
They were clean.
They came from the place of washing.
Perfect in growth and whiteness.
They were all productive.
Don't leave certain works to others.
You do them yourself if you find those capabilities.
Don't leave it for this person and that.
You all have your gifts.
All productive.
There is a flood of delightful thoughts in this.
Now, in verse 7,
As a piece of a pomegranate are thy temples within thy locks.
Now, it also shows us the delight that God has in contemplating his saints.
Now, this simile is still common in the East.
And the design of the passage is to express the peculiar freshness and beauty
and rosy color of the cheeks.
Now, I've seen pomegranates here.
They don't seem to be like those I saw imported from Spain and other parts.
We get some in England from California.
They're usually great big ones like that.
Beautiful red, like of a person.
Beautiful things.
And when you cut them, of course, there's these row after row of seeds.
And it has a peculiar freshness and beauty and a rosy color of the cheeks.
It is a fruit the size of a great big orange.
And the seeds are tinged with red and shine like crystals.
And the skinners are the richest vermilion.
That's bright red.
And the hair indicates the style of the Persian ladies with the loose hair falling over the forehead
and cheekbones and highly perfumed, like a beautiful woman, just for the hair here.
It was the style then.
See, this is how Christ is describing how he sees the beauty in his saints.
And verse 8, there are three-score queens and four-score concubines and virgins without number.
And it's speaking of the Eastern Court or palace where there is one superior to all the others.
You remember this queen Vashti in the Old Testament.
That was Hester.
Hester superseded her.
And she was distinguished by wearing a royal crown and being called queen.
She was higher than all the others.
And the message of the passage is clear.
The beloved wishes to make the spouse feel the greatness and importance of his love.
And shows that while he was surrounded with a retinue of beautiful and noble and splint ones in the court,
he was surrounded with them.
There was one that was outstanding.
And it is the same when Christ looks upon the earth.
Look at the masses of the people.
The countless millions of them.
And the beauties of the nature which he put there.
And the clouds effect.
But that's not what he is seeing.
It is the beauty, the queens, his saints he sees.
He has bought them.
And he loves them.
And they are precious to him.
Now there's the message of this verse and the chapter.
And as we said, the beloved wishes to make the spouse feel the greatness and importance of his love.
And shows that while he was surrounded with a retinue of beautiful and noble and splint ones of all ranks,
she stood preeminent among them in his affections.
And the word three scores meant for an indefinite number.
An amazing thing among such a company that one who was as dark as the tents of Peter.
Who was as lovely as the rose of, lonely and lowly as the rose of Shannon.
And had treated him with such neglect.
Who had so many others to love.
But he specializes in her.
How lovely that he would sort out her out of so many.
And in verse nine, he says,
My dove, my undefiled is but one.
She is the only one of her mother.
She is the choice one of her that bare her.
The daughter saw her and blessed her.
Yea, the queens and the concubines and they praised her.
The meaning is notwithstanding the attraction of the princesses.
Another splendid women of all ranks in the palace.
There was one in whom I can see no blemish.
One who is perfect.
One undefiled.
One preeminent among all others.
And that's his saints.
How wonderful.
Now, there was no jealousy evidently in this.
They were all with one accord admired a beauty.
In the out of mighty God he quickens the soul of beasts to the extent of their corporal senses.
But man's spirit, he draws out to a spiritual understanding to the thinking believer
by these very illustrations in this ancient and marvelous book.
He over and over repeats the believer's standing in his own affection because of the work of Christ.
Know how hard as I've often said it is to persuade an unbeliever that Christ will receive him.
A plain statement.
Every unbeliever that hears the gospel is invited to come to Christ.
And then when he is come it's not very easy to persuade believers the intense and glorious love of Christ for them.
Their safety and their position.
The perfection that he has done upon them.
Very hard.
But we will try, ever try to do this.
It's a perfect work that it might attain to the understanding of all eternity.
The mysteries that are spiritual and indescribable beauties of the world to come.
He gives an understanding of the world to come.
Do you remember before conversion the world to come was just blankness.
Just words.
Foolishness, easily forgotten but not so now.
There's an understanding of the world to come.
The ages, the eternal ages, Christ in his unspeakable glory.
Worshiped by countless millions of people through all ages.
In a place of beauty and the various descriptions that we get in the book of Revelation will tell us some of those things.
Now...
Yet among these the soul of the redeemed is to him what the spouse is to the beloved his perfect one.
His angel, an object of special endearment.
The one that stands out with preeminence above all the others in that glorious host.
Love with an affection that human language can only express in type and in sense.
And the glory of kings in a higher order is unfolded to us in the appearance of the angel of the sepulcher.
Whose countenance was like lightning and his raiment white as snow.
Of the mighty angel who came down from heaven clothed with a cloud and as a rainbow on his head.
And his face as it were the sun and his feet as pillars of fire.
These are the noblest and the highest orders of creatures in heaven we are told about some of them.
And yet where does he set his affection?
And it says in one part, it says clear as the sun and terrible as an army with banners.
No, an army with banners.
I don't know if you ever thought about the ancient armies.
How they would line them up row after row and column after column as far as the eye could see in perfect order.
In absolute silence they would stand there and how terrifying they would be to the wicked oppressors.
When these great and vast armies are there, the soldiers with their stern faces, their generals standing in line.
And their banners raised erect everywhere without a sound and then they would hear the blast to attack.
Terrible it says and it means just this terrible as an army with banners.
What a wonderful thought.
And this is the strength of the saints in Christ.
This is part of the glory that he is given.
And we shall be made like Christ and he's glorified.
Glorified with the glory you had with the Father before the world was.
John 17.
Who can know what was the eternal glory of God?
Who can know?
Who can know these wondrous things?
Who can speak of the glory awaiting the saints of light?
Who can speak of it?
Thus was the Jewish orphan raised to a position above the Queen and all the people of the Oriental Palace.
Joseph drawn from the dungeon, the worst despicable place that a man could be.
Probably extremely filthy.
Drawn from the dungeon.
And taken before the Emperor and arrayed in fine linen with a ring on his hand and a position of power.
Everything but the Emperor's scepter.
And he was invested with preeminence and authority over all the land of Egypt.
And Daniel, a Hebrew captive, to be clothed with scarlet and to be preferred before the presidents and princes.
This is the comparison of his saints brought out of the world.
Princes and kings and intellectuals bypassed.
And it says, and he himself, Christ, was made a little lower than the angels.
Crowned with glory and honor and raised far up above principalities and power and might and dominion.
And given a name that is above every name, not only in this world, but that which is to come.
And of course he was crowned with many crowns.
And this is part of the glory that his saints will come to.
The Beloved still continues his commendation in verse 10.
We looked at it partly.
Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and verbally as an army with banners?
Believers are now in a process of change into this glory.
We get the verse in Christ that we are changed from glory unto glory.
And Job 11 17, it says,
Thine age shall be clearer than the noonday.
Thou shall shine forth, thou shall be as the morning.
She who was once black as the tents of Kedar.
That tents of Kedar were made from the black goatskins, extremely black and weather worn.
And the Christian was like that in his former life.
But is now glorious as the morning, the moon, and the noonday sun.
And in the spiritual conflict of the present world, bearing the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit,
and the shield of faith that believers distinguished by the light of the Holy Spirit, kindled thereby Christ.
That's your position.
Wearing the helmet of salvation.
And the shield of faith.
And the sword of the Spirit.
The wisdom of God.
Christ is the wisdom of God and he has done this.
But in heaven, he'll be, that is the saint will be vested with a splendor which comparison will be,
as he is now on earth, as a candle is to the sun itself.
And in Romans 8, 18, it says,
For I reckon the apostles said that the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
How difficult it is for the saint to lay hold of this in a proper manner at all times.
But it is true.
He says, which shall be revealed in us.
Now in rearing a statue to commemorate a victory, the artist forms his conception as what is beautiful.
He thinks of what is beautiful and he gets going and puts up this statue.
His conception is what is beautiful and then he erects it in marble, cold marble.
And it's just a cold resemblance, but God does not form an ideal,
but a real holiness he puts in his people, a real holiness after his likeness, in the likeness of his own image.
He embodies this in their spiritual bodies for being pillars in the temple of God and that's what he will do.
And his people are just finished now living, his people are living triumphant statues,
purer than transparent marble.
And what must they be when the streets they walk on in the world to come will be transparent gold.
And it speaks of the gates of precious stones and we'll just read and finish with a few verses in Revelation 21.
Now I ask you as you read this to think of the saints who will be in these places.
We'll just take from 21 verse 21.
Now what will the people be like who dwell in such an habitation?