Well, it's a joy to be with you
this morning, as I tell people as I
travel around the world that it's always good
to meet the rest of the family.
And I'm your brother, whether you like it
or not, and your brothers and sisters are
mine and I can't do anything about that
either, but we're all redeemed by the same
blood, all part of the same family, all
going to that one great eternal abode in
the presence of God.
Let's just look to the Lord in prayer,
shall we?
Father, we just confess again our need of
you.
Lord, unless you build a house, we labor
in vain.
And so, Lord, come and do what you
promised to do.
You said, I will build my church.
Lord, we recognize this is your church.
We recognize your leadership, your headship, your lordship.
Father, we bow again in submission to you
today, Lord.
Have your way, we pray, in Jesus' name.
Amen.
I want to speak to you this morning
on the presence of God.
My wife and I had the privilege of
raising our family in the city of Christchurch,
New Zealand.
And if you are familiar with that city,
you know that it is built around a
wonderful old Anglican cathedral.
Not too many blocks away, there is a
museum called the Canterbury Museum.
And as you go into the entrance of
that museum, there is a verse of scripture
taken from the book of Job, Job chapter
26, verse 14.
And it says this, Lo, these are a
part of his ways, but how little a
portion do we hear of him.
Lo, these are a part of his ways,
but how little a portion do we hear
of him.
I spent many hours in that museum when
our children were younger.
We now have grandchildren.
But going down the various corridors, looking in
all the display cabinets, admiring all of God's
creation.
I've seen children grab the hand of a
parent and point to some animal or bird
or reptile and say, what's that or where
does this come from and so on.
And yet in all the hours that I've
spent in that museum, I don't ever remember
anybody attributing all of that handiwork to God
himself.
So that verse is a fitting verse, these
are a part of his ways, but how
little a portion is heard of him.
And while that may be a good verse
for a museum, it is a tragic verse
to put over the house of God.
And yet I think we could write it
over many congregations.
I'm not sure about Singapore, but I know
in America we could write it over dozens
and dozens of congregations.
These are simply a part of his ways,
but how little a portion we hear of
him.
I was given a book a number of
years ago by my father, a book by
one of my favorite authors, Dr. Martin Lloyd
-Jones, in the preface of that book on
the Sermon on the Mount, he makes a
statement that I have told Bible school students
is worth at least one semester in most
Bible schools and seminaries that normally gets their
attention.
And the statement is simply this, there is
nothing so likely to lead to error or
heresy as to begin with the parts rather
than the whole.
Let me say that again.
There is nothing so likely to lead to
error or to heresy as to begin with
the parts rather than the whole.
There is incredible insight and wisdom behind that
statement.
Years and years of experience as that man
was one of the great writers, great teachers,
expositors of our day.
I was in India back in 1986, I
think, we were living in New Zealand at
the time, and I was ministering there just
for a week.
A friend of mine was in charge of
a Bible school and invited me to come
over and speak.
There in the compound of the school there
was a brand new Jeep, belonged to the
director, and I was trying to get across
the importance of that statement to those students,
that again, there is nothing so likely to
lead to error or heresy as to begin
with the parts rather than the whole.
And I said, if I came to the
school and using the Jeep as an illustration,
I said, suppose as a visiting lecturer, I
spent the entire year speaking about the carburetor
on that Jeep.
And I talk about all the different types
of carburetors, you know, single barrel, two barrel,
four barrel, six barrel, if you are into
drag racing, I talk about the evolution of
the carburetor into fuel injection, an hour after
hour after hour, day after day after day,
week after week after week, month after month,
all I do is stress the importance of
the carburetor.
At the end of that year, you have
a graduating class and they spread out all
over India and they establish the carburetor movement,
group of churches that emphasize carburetor theology.
The following year, there is another guest speaker,
he comes, he has got a revelation on
another part of the engine, let's say the
distributor, and like the carburetor man, he talks
about the importance of the distributor, what it
does, the components that make up the distributor,
he gives you the Greek word for distributor
and the Hebrew word for distributor, he gives
you books to read about the great distributor
developers and so on, there's exams and tests
about distributors and so on, and at the
end of the year, once again, these students
have been steeped in distributor theology, and now
all over India, there's a brand new movement
called the Distributor Churches.
Following year, there's a guest speaker, takes out
of his pocket a little gadget about 3
.5 inches long, 4 inches, and it's white
at the top, black at the bottom, and
he begins his class by saying, I want
to tell you the most important part of
a car engine is this little thing here,
without this, it's impossible to please, I mean,
start the car, and he talks about the
importance of the carburetor, sorry, about the spark
plug, and hour after hour after hour, all
they hear about is this little spark plug,
he says, you can have a brand new
Ferrari, that thing may cost you a million
Singapore dollars or more, it's capable of doing
200 plus miles an hour, it's got Connelly
leather seats and so on and so forth,
Pirelli tyres, and you know, Bose stereo system
that will blow you from here to Indonesia,
but he says if you take out that
little plug, that car will not even move,
so I'm here to tell you the most
important part of a car engine is this,
and of course, they are absolutely convinced, they've
never heard of a carburetor, never heard of
a distributor, never heard of the block or
the pistons or anything else, and this man
convinces them because of his eloquence that this
is the most important thing.
Again, at the end of the year, you
have a graduating class now, and you have
the spark plug movement all over India, and
of course, spark plug churches gather together, and
they have spark plug conferences, and they call
in their spark plug speakers, and they perpetuate
the spark plug theology, meantime, across town, there
is a carburetor conference going on, and next
month, there's going to be a distributor conference
going on, and never the twain shall meet,
and I know that's rather humorous, but tragically,
it's true, you see in America, at least,
we have movements, we have an entire movement
devoted to faith, another movement devoted to prosperity,
another movement signs and wonders, another movement holiness,
another movement evangelism, another movement into inner healing,
or whatever it may be, and there is
nothing so likely to lead to error or
heresy as to begin with the parts rather
than the whole.
If you put all those parts together, you
have a person, his name is Lord Jesus
Christ, he said, I am the way, not
a part of the truth, I am the
truth, and as I've studied the lives of
great men and women of God over the
years, I've come to this conclusion, they all
had one common denominator, and that was an
insatiable longing for the presence of God.
That was the one thing, you see it
in the life of Paul, that I may
know him, not just about it, Paul had
his theology down pat, he's still confusing people
as to what he really meant on certain
things and so on, but he didn't say
I know what I believe, obviously he did,
he said I know in whom I have
believed.
It was a relationship, it was Paul's passion
to know him, not just know about him,
not have all his theology or eschatology and
so on figured out, but he wanted to
know, again, that intimacy with God, that longing,
that desire, writing to the Colossians, he says
that he might have preeminence in all things,
it's not faith, it's not prosperity, it's not
some facet of truth, it is the truth,
it is to have the place of supremacy,
the place of centrality in our Christian life,
and you go to all of these great
men in the Word of God, and again
that is their longing, Jeremiah says if you're
going to boast about anything, don't boast about
your prosperity, your riches, don't boast about your
wisdom or your intellect and so on, don't
boast about your strength, your ability to shred
phone books, but he says boast in this,
that you know and you understand me, saith
the Lord, that's what it's all about, isn't
it?
It's not about human strength, it's not about
our mind and our education and so on,
those may be good things, but ultimately it's
about how do I know him, how much
do I know him?
We see men like David, who time after
time throughout the Word of God expresses his
longing for the presence of God, who have
I in heaven but thee, and there is
nothing on earth I desire beside thee.
I still think that's one of the most
challenging verses, I've been stuck on it for
many, many years, it's very easy to agree
with the first part of the verse, who
have I in heaven but thee, I have
a father there, mother, a few relatives and
friends and so on, but basically it's easy
just to say who have I in heaven
but thee.
The second part of the verse is a
challenging part, and there is nothing on earth
I desire beside thee.
David is a king, looked over that vast
kingdom, he had the power, the position to
have whatever he wanted, and you and I
again face that every single day, there are
billboards screaming at us, if you don't drive
this sort of car, live in this sort
of a house, wear these sort of clothes,
have this sort of watch or whatever it
is and so on and so forth, you
know, you're not going to be satisfied, and
David was able to bypass all of that
and he says, I can look past every
single billboard in the country, because he says,
there's nothing on earth that I desire beside
thee.
What a statement.
Who have I in heaven but thee, he
says.
And there in the Psalms over and over
and over again, David expresses that longing, as
the deer pants for the water brook.
So longs my soul for thee, O Lord.
I was with a wonderful man of God
some years ago, and we were ministering together
up in the northwest in America, and he
touched on that psalm, and I have still
not forgotten what he said, he said, the
only reason the deer is panting is because
the deer is being pursued.
He said David as a shepherd boy would
sit on a rock and in the early
hours of the morning the deer would saunter
by down into the valley, drink their fill,
disappear into the forest or thicket somewhere, and
this would be a sort of routine, but
he says on this occasion David is sitting
there and suddenly the deer comes flying by
and he can hear the heaving and the
panting of that deer as it's being pursued
and chased by maybe a mountain lion or
something.
And he says that deer knows instinctively there's
only one place of protection, and that's to
find its way into the water brook, because
there in the water brook it can shake
off the scent, or its scent, and the
predator cannot pick up the trail, and so
he says the water brook becomes a place
of protection.
But he says not only that, he says
the water brook becomes a place of satisfaction,
because there in the water brook he can
replenish that thirsty, tired, exhausted, weary body and
drink in that cool life-giving water.
And he says I believe David wrote this
when he was being pursued by Saul, and
Saul has made threats on his life, and
David is running, fleeing, and David knows there's
only one place of protection to come under
the shadow of the Almighty.
That's the only place.
But he says it's a place of protection
in the presence of God.
But not only that, a place of satisfaction,
because the river of God is full of
water.
And there we can drink in again the
Spirit of God and find refreshment.
And David again goes on and on and
on about this longing that he has.
Just a day in your courts is better
than a thousand elsewhere.
I'd rather be a doorkeeper in the house
of the Lord than dwell in the tents
of wickedness and so on.
If you have your Bible this morning, turn
with me to the book of Exodus, Exodus
chapter 32.
And here we find another man who has
this longing for the presence of God.
His name is Moses.
And we find him in this chapter in
the presence of God.
God has summoned him to come up the
mountain.
And there he is in the presence of
God.
God has been speaking to him.
In the meantime, the children of Israel have
become restless.
Moses has been gone for many, many weeks.
And they go to Aaron, Moses' brother.
And they said, listen, we don't know what's
happened to Moses.
He's obviously died.
We need a God that will go before
us.
We need new leadership and so on.
You know the story how Aaron bows to
the pressure, gathers together all the jewelry from
the ladies, throws it into the fire, and
out popped the golden cup.
At least that was his explanation.
It wasn't quite that simple, but it's amazing
what we say when we're backed into a
corner, isn't it?
He said, you know, it wasn't my fault.
I just, you know, it just sort of
happened.
And around that golden cup, there really is
nothing less than a sexual orgy that is
going on.
The people are out of control.
The worshipping as the nations round about them
worshipped and most of their gods were fertility
gods in those days still are in many
of our nations.
And so much of their worship again was
unclean.
It was based, it was essential in its
nature.
And God is angry with what he sees.
Not only is it because of the immorality
and not only the idolatry that is going
on, but they've done something that is possibly
the most serious thing of all.
And that is they touch the glory of
God because it says there they've attributed all
of the great acts of God to this
creation of their own hands.
Notice it says in verse eight, they quickly
turn aside from the way which I commanded
them.
They made for themselves a molten calf.
They've worshipped it, sacrificed to it and says,
this is your God.
Oh, Israel, who brought you out of the
land of Egypt.
In other words, this creation is what delivered
you.
This is the one that turned the Nile
to blood.
This is the one that brought lice and
plagues of frogs and so on and so
forth.
This is one that ultimately slew the firstborn.
This is the one that parted the Red
Sea.
This is one that is responsible.
And one of the most dangerous things that
you and I can do is touch the
glory of God.
God will share everything with us apart from
his glory.
He'll give us his love, his patience, his
kindness, his righteousness and so on.
But my glory I will not share with
any man.
And they were taking again the glory of
God, robbing God of his glory.
That along with the immorality and idolatry, we
find God as angry, I think, as you
ever see him in the wood of God.
And he says there in verse 10, leave
me alone, Moses, that my anger may burn
against them, that I may destroy them and
I will make of you a great nation.
Moses here has the opportunity of replacing Abraham.
Isaac and Jacob, if you've ever studied this
portion, this is a most amazing situation that
here Moses literally can take the place of
Abraham.
Abraham would have been forgotten.
God would have established a new nation.
The father of that nation would have been
Moses and he would have gone down through
the years as the leader of the nation
of Israel, the most important man, if you
like.
And yet in the pressure of that situation,
Moses does not bow.
He is a shepherd.
He is interested in seeing his people again
forgiven and he begins to pray.
We pick up his prayer in verse 13.
He says to God, remember Abraham and Isaac
and Israel, your servants, to whom you did
swear by yourself.
You said to them, I will multiply your
seed as the stars of heaven.
All this land that I've spoken, I will
give to your seed and they shall inherit
it forever.
And so on the basis of covenant, we
find that Moses begins to intercede.
And basically what he says is this, God,
listen, we have contracts.
If we were to use today's terminology, we
could say, God, we have a contract here,
a contract that you made with Abraham and
Isaac and Jacob and it's got your signature
on it.
See right here.
You can't back out of this.
You can't renege on your promise.
We can take you to court if you
like.
We've got your name on these contracts.
After all, God, you're supposed to be the
great promise keeper.
You're supposed to be the one that says
that I never change.
With me there's no variable.
There's no shadow of turning.
You're the one that says I'm the Lord
and I change not.
You're the one that says all the promises
are yea and amen in Christ.
You're the one that says my word is
more important than my very name.
God, you cannot do what you said you
would do.
And if you do, we'll never trust you
again.
If you break your promise, if you renege
on these promises, how will we ever know
if you mean it from now on?
If you're going to be fickle like that
and change your mind, these are covenants.
These are promises we've held on to for
400 years in bondage that God was going
to keep his word.
And now if you change it, we will
never know again if your word is reliable
from this day on.
And so basically that's his argument.
And God says you got me.
Verse 14, the Lord changed his mind about
the evil that he said he would do
to his people.
We now go to the next chapter and
it is now God's turn to remind Moses
that he is a covenant keeping God.
Moses reminds God of his covenant.
Now God reminds Moses of his covenant.
Verse 1, and the Lord spoke to Moses
saying, Depart from here, you and the people
who you brought out from the land of
Egypt to the land which I swore to
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, saying to your descendants
I will give it.
I'll send an angel before you.
Drive out the Canaanite, the Amorite, the Hittite
and so on.
So it's now time for the children of
Israel to advance towards their goal of going
into the promised land.
This was a dream again that they had
nurtured over the years.
This was the thing that kept them going.
If you like, this was the carrot at
the end of the stick that sort of
kept the donkey moving ahead, so to speak,
through all the years of bondage and servitude
and so on.
It was this promise that one day we're
going to be free.
One day we'll have our own land, a
land that flows with milk and honey.
And God says to Moses, This is the
day I want you to begin to advance
towards that goal.
And I can imagine a ripple going through
the camp as they heard, as they began
to pack up their possessions and got ready
to begin to advance towards the promised land,
the excitement of that.
Again, we have a description of what the
land was like.
It says in verse 3, it was a
land flowing with milk and honey.
It wasn't literally, of course, flowing with milk
and honey.
They were not wading across rivers of milk
and trying to walk through knee deep honey
and so on.
But that was descriptive of God's abundance, God's
blessing.
Deuteronomy chapter 6, I think it is.
You have God describing what the land is
like there.
Let me read a little bit of that
to you.
Verse 10, It shall come about when the
Lord your God brings you into the land,
which you swore to your fathers, to Abraham
and Isaac and Jacob, to give you great
and splendid cities which you did not build.
That was a very important piece.
Yes.
By the way, you don't have to build
these ones.
I can imagine when they heard, listen, I'm
going to give you great and splendid cities,
there was a sigh that went up.
Listen, I couldn't build another city if you
paid me.
You know, because their entire life had been
one of servitude, of building cities for Pharaoh.
In fact, the psalmist says, I've relieved your
shoulder of the burden.
The margin says, literally, I've taken the brick
load off your shoulder.
This was a nation bowed down from the
moment you could work as a little child
again, as a slave, you had to carry
bricks and they were just bowed down again.
He's my glory and the lifter of my
head.
They were a nation stooped down, weighed down
with anxiety and fears and so on and
so forth.
And God says, I'm going to give you
great and splendid cities.
God is no man's debtor.
God keeps the books.
And he says, I'm going to give back
to you all those cities that you built.
I'm going to give you great and splendid
cities and you don't have to build them.
Then he says, houses full of good things,
which you did not fill.
In other words, not all derelict houses that
need a lot of refurbishing and all the
material inside needs to be thrown away and
you've got to start all over again.
No, these are houses loaded with good things.
He says, shun cisterns, which you did not
dig, vineyards and olive trees, which you did
not plant.
What an incredible promise.
This, again, was the dream, what we would
say in America, the American dream.
I'm sure you have that same dream, the
Singaporean dream of having your own little house
somewhere or apartment or whatever all paid for.
In this case, it was a little better.
They weren't all sort of next door to
each other.
You had a little bit of land, houses
and vineyards and olive trees.
You weren't all squished up against each other.
You had your own water supply in the
backyard.
You didn't need to have desalinization processes and
so on.
You had a well there, an abundance of
clean water and so on, all of that.
I mean, this was an incredible promise that
God had given to the children of Israel.
Then God drops a bombshell.
He says, by the way, Moses, as you
go in, you're going in without my presence.
I will not go with you.
Notice there in verse three, go up to
a land that flows with milk and honey,
for I will not go up in your
midst because you are a stubborn people or
an obstinate people lest I destroy you on
the way.
Moses now is faced with a dilemma.
What do I do?
Do I go in to the presence of
God or do I stay?
He had two choices.
We've described one of those choices already.
Again, houses and lands and vineyards and olive
trees, great splendid cities, everything that in the
natural man would love to have, but no
presence of God.
Now, if you had to make a decision
this morning, what would your choice be?
If you were faced with a situation that
Moses is faced with, do I go in
and take the children of Israel in?
This is the thing that has kept them
going over those 400 years of bondage.
You say, well, that's very carnal.
That's very materialistic.
Houses, lands and vineyards.
Well, let me sweeten the deal a little
bit.
I'll send an angel before you.
Not a demon, an angel, an angel that
will do signs, wonders and miracles, things that
you're incapable of doing.
When you run into a rough patch, all
you've got to do is call on the
angel.
He'll drive out the Hittite, the Perizzite, the
Jebusite and so on.
He'll do all these signs, wonders and miracles,
but still not have the presence of God.
That's choice number one.
Choice number two is to stay where you
are.
Let me describe where you are.
The Bible calls it a waste howling wilderness,
a place of intense heat by day, freezing
temperatures at night.
The sun will not smite thee by day,
nor the moon by night.
Again, the temperatures would plummet.
It was a place of scorpions, the Bible
says.
It was just the most desolate place.
There were no cities.
There was no vegetation.
There was no possibility of looking after yourself
apart from the supernatural supply of manna.
It was not exactly the American dream or
the Singaporean dream.
Again, just a waste howling wilderness.
Moses, of course, had an advantage that the
children of Israel didn't have as he is
faced with this decision.
You see, Moses was raised the son of
Pharaoh's daughter.
Moses grew up in the finest home in
all of Egypt, the equivalent in America of
the White House.
He had the finest education.
He didn't go to school.
The teachers came to him.
He rode around in the latest model chariot.
He had all the finest clothes of Egypt.
After all, he was a king's kid.
He was a kid that had incredible privilege.
He had everything going for him, everything that
money could buy.
Money was no option.
After all, he was royalty, possibly being groomed
to be one of the pharaohs.
And yet the day came when the Bible
says that it didn't satisfy us.
We've heard so often there was a God
shaped blank, if you like, in the heart
of Moses.
The Bible says that Moses chose to suffer
affliction with the people of God rather than
all the treasures and pleasures of Egypt.
And he turned his back on that.
And as we have the saying in America,
I've been there and done that.
He knew that no house, no vineyard, no
olive tree, none of those things could satisfy.
There's only one form of satisfaction.
It's the presence of God.
And so he does what Moses does so
well.
He begins to pray.
And he says now in verse 13, Now,
therefore, I pray thee if I found favor
in your sight, let me know your ways
that I may know thee so that I
may find favor in your sight.
Consider, too, that this nation is thy people.
I notice his prayer is not one of
compromise, but he says, Let me know you
that I may know your ways.
Let me know your ways that I may
know you.
What a strange prayer, don't you think?
I say a strange prayer given the circumstances
because my prayer would have been totally different.
I have to be honest.
If I was Moses, I'd have said to
God something like this.
God, let's reason together.
After all, you're the one that suggested it.
Come, let's reason together.
So I'm going to take you up on
your offer.
You know, let's talk man to man, face
to face.
Let's be real.
God, there's a part of me that loves
houses and lands and vineyards and all the
normal, natural things.
But there's a part of me that wants
your presence as well.
So why don't we have some sort of
compromise here?
Oh, I know we get on your nerves.
You know, you're still upset.
Boy, you said you were so mad the
other day.
And I know we sometimes say things.
We get emotional and afterwards we regret because,
you know, we just said too much in
the heat of the moment.
But now that you've had time to settle
down and so on, let's, you know, I
mean, you accused us of being stubborn.
And God, I say this reverently.
I think you've been a little stubborn yourself
here.
I mean, that would have been my argument.
Lord, there's some sort of compromise.
It would be nice if you if you
came every once in a while.
I know we get on your nerves.
You know, don't you don't need to hang
around us all night.
In fact, the fact is, God, I'll tell
you a secret.
And I know you know secrets anyway.
But we get along pretty well without you
most of the week.
Oh, we've got our degrees and, you know,
we're educated and so on.
But, you know, we need you in times
of crisis.
You're a present help in time of trouble.
But, you know, the rest of the time
I get by with my degree.
I mean, that would have been my argument.
God, let's compromise.
I mean, why don't you come up and
see us every once in a while?
The great feast days.
It'd be nice if you came there.
Moses doesn't mention houses, lands and vineyards.
All he says is, God, I want to
know you.
Teach me your ways, Lord, that I may
know you.
And as the Bible says, deep calls unto
deep and God responds and he says to
Moses, my presence will go with you and
I will give you rest.
And Moses said, how can it be known?
And I think this is one of my
favorite verses in the Bible.
How can it be known that I found
favor in your side and thy people?
Is it not by thy going with us
so that we and thy people may be
distinguished from all the other people who are
on the face of the earth?
Moses said there's only one thing that distinguishes
us.
It's not our long sideburns.
It's not our kosher diet.
It's not even our Ten Commandments, not even
our feast days.
It's not even our tabernacle.
The only thing that makes us unique is
the fact that your presence dwells in our
midst.
And if your presence doesn't go, we just
end up with a form of godliness.
But there's no power.
And I'm sure in Moses' mind, he was
thinking the nations ran about.
They had their temples.
They had their priests.
They had their sacrifices.
They had their holy days.
They had their songs and rituals and so
on that they went through.
But he says, listen, we have the presence
of God and they don't.
And if you take away your presence from
us, Lord, we're no different.
We may dress differently.
We may eat a different diet.
We may do this and that.
But we're really no different.
The only thing that distinguishes us, the only
thing that sets us apart is your presence.
Lord, we can't live without your presence.
Turn with me to Song of Solomon.
You see, we've been looking at men this
morning that have this craving, this longing for
the presence of God.
But it takes two to have a relationship,
isn't that right?
I understand you guys have a lot of
weddings here, and I was privileged to go
to one last night.
What a wonderful affair that was.
But I can imagine in a congregation of
this size, there's a young man who already
has his eye on some young lady.
And every time he sees her, his heart
sort of skips a beat, you know, and
he's just totally blown away by her beauty
and so on.
And he doesn't quite know how to approach
her.
And he's sort of frustrated.
Maybe a quiet, shy young man, you know,
would love to meet her.
And one day, he just sort of lets
everything out to his sister.
And lo and behold, the sister knows this
girl and says, Oh, you mean Mary?
I know Mary.
Oh, that's her name, Mary.
He said, Well, listen, sort of, you know,
just next time you see her, sort of
ask her, you know, be careful, sis.
I mean, you know, just find out, you
know, she's even interested in me.
And so, of course, the next day at
school, you know, she comes running, Mary, Mary,
listen, guess what I found out?
My brother's crazy about you, man, he talked
to me for hours last night about you.
And so Mary says, I didn't know you
had a brother.
Not a very good beginning.
She says, Yeah, you know, he's a tall,
skinny guy that plays a flute there, you
know, church.
That's your brother.
I didn't know that.
Listen, don't tell him this, please.
I can't stand your brother.
Pretty hard to have a relationship with somebody
that can't stand us, isn't it?
And yet here a man again longing God,
I want to have a relationship with you.
I want to know you.
You know, the good news is God longs
to know us.
I said and I've said many, many times
that long before there are any God chases,
there was a God that chased, you know,
it wasn't up to us.
He's been chasing you.
He's been chasing me and pursuing us for
years.
And here in Song of Solomon, of course,
you have this beautiful relationship with the bride
and the bridegroom and they have fallen head
over heels with each other.
And it begins there in chapter one and
verse two.
Kiss me with the kisses of your mouth,
she says, for your love is better than
wine.
Wine for the world is a coping mechanism.
You know, when you've got bad news and
you need to drown your sorrows and have
a little bit of a lift again, it
takes the edge off things.
And for a while it exhilarates and stimulates
and you're able to get over whatever worries
you've had.
Maybe there's been a divorce or maybe some
death in the family or maybe you've lost
your job or something.
And, you know, that's all the world has
to turn to.
Thank God we've got something better than wine.
But she says your love is better than
wine.
There's something about our relationship, something about you,
your caresses, something about your kisses that stimulate
and exhilarate and don't have a hangover as
a result of it.
So they begin this relationship together.
They express their love for each other.
Verse 15 and 16, you're beautiful, my darling.
And she says, you're handsome yourself.
And so they skip over the hills together.
You know, he takes her out to dinner.
He's got his hallmark greeting card there.
My banner over you is love.
And then we come to chapter five.
And chapter five, we have a setback in
their relationship.
She says, I was asleep, but my heart
was awake.
A voice, my beloved, was knocking open to
me, my sister, my darling, my dove, my
perfect one, for my head is drenched with
dew, my locks with the damp of the
night.
And so he's shown up unexpectedly.
She's already gone to bed.
Obviously, this is a night scene.
And some people say it's a dream.
We don't have any proof of that.
I tend to think that she is just
beginning to, you know, go into a deep
sleep and all of a sudden she hears
him knocking at the door and he begins
to express his love for her.
I want to be with you, open to
me, my darling, my dove, my perfect one.
My head is drenched with dew, my locks
with the damp of the night.
I want to be with you, my darling.
And she has a decision to make in
that moment.
And notice what is going on.
And I think this is something that's going
on internally.
I think this is going on in her
mind.
I don't think she is stupid enough to
express this verbally.
But this is what she's thinking in verse
three.
I've taken off my dress.
How can I put it on again?
I've washed my feet.
How can I do to them again?
In other words, listen, if I answer right
now, if I get up, I'm going to
have to get dressed again.
I've just had a shower.
I've just washed my feet and prepared myself
for bed.
And I'm going to have to wash my
feet again after he goes.
And this is not a good time.
It's not convenient.
It's not according to my schedule and so
on and so forth.
And, you know, I'm not so sure I
want to get up right now.
And so she pauses.
She hesitates.
In the meantime, verse four, my beloved extended
his hand through the opening and my feelings
were aroused for him.
And so maybe he's trying to reach in
through the latticework, trying to open the door.
He knows that she's in there.
He wants to be with her.
And one of the things I don't like
about the word of God is that we
don't have the time element so often.
You can read this in 10 seconds, but
it could have been a lot longer than
that.
She may be the sort of gal that,
you know, it takes her a while to
get ready.
And she, you know, is very particular about
making sure that her hair is just right
and whatever needs to be put on needs
to be put on and so on.
And that could take five minutes or 10
or, you know, even longer, 20, 25, 30,
30, 40.
Thank you.
And she's she's he thinks maybe she's fussing
around.
I don't know.
But he waits, he's patient and he waits
and he waits and he waits and he
waits.
And finally, in verse five, I rose and
I opened to my beloved.
My hands drip with my fingers with liquid
myrrh on the handles of the bolt.
I opened to my beloved, but my beloved
had turned and gone.
And here we have this tragic ending now.
By the time she reaches for the doorknob,
he's being grieved, he's being wounded, he's being
hurt.
How many of you know that the one
that is capable of loving you most is
the one that is also capable of inflicting
the most pain?
It doesn't matter what your neighbors think about
you, but when your spouse, your girlfriend, your
fiance says something with a little bit of
an edge to it, it's like somebody taking
a knife, isn't it?
Plunging it into you.
And he is madly in love.
This is his darling, his dove, his perfect
one.
And instead of opening the door and say,
darling, I love you, I'm so glad you
dropped by.
She hesitates and he stands there waiting, waiting,
waiting, waiting, waiting.
And finally, I'm sure he began to manufacture
information.
You know, when you don't have it, you
begin to manufacture it.
Is there somebody else?
Is she seeing somebody else?
What's going on?
She seemed fine last time.
She said, listen, I can't wait till we
get together again.
But you know, in the meantime, it's been
a few days I've been out of town
on a business trip.
I mean, has she fallen in love with
somebody else?
What's going on?
And after the minutes roll by, he finally
leaves.
But the thing I love about this story
is that she realizes the mistake that she's
made.
And she gets out of bed and she
begins to get dressed.
She says, my heart went out as he
spoke.
I searched for him and I did not
find him.
I called and he did not answer me.
The watchmen who make the rounds of the
city found me.
They struck me and wounded me.
The guardsmen on the wall took away my
shawl.
And so here she is now, she's been
wounded.
She's been beaten up.
She's lost her covering, if you like.
Her shawl now has been taken from her.
The night dew has come down.
And I'm sure, you know, she was looking
a little bit of a mess.
And then she comes across the daughters of
Jerusalem.
Verse eight, I adjure you, O daughters of
Jerusalem, if you find my beloved as to
what you'll tell him, for I'm lovesick.
And so she's making her way through the
city of Jerusalem.
It's night time again.
And as she comes around the corner, she
sees these young ladies coming towards her.
And she's all emotional, I'm sure.
And she says, oh stop, stop, stop.
Have you seen my beloved?
And they look at her.
And the question is, what kind of beloved
is your beloved?
What's so special about this guy?
I'm sure they looked and here she was,
maybe with a black eye or a bloody
nose.
She's been beaten up.
She's lost her shawl again.
Her hair is all matted with the rain.
What would you think if you met a
lady like that?
I know what I would think.
Another case of domestic violence.
You know, she's living with a boyfriend.
He's come home drunk.
They've had an argument.
He's beat her up.
He's left the house.
Codependency.
You know, can't break off this relationship even
though it's bad.
And she's out looking for him.
I mean, anyway.
Yeah.
What's so special about this guy?
Almost beautiful among women.
In other words, you know, listen ladies, about
time you looked in the mirror.
You are gorgeous.
You could have anybody in town.
Why would you want to hang around somebody
that treats you like this?
What's so special about him anyway?
And all of a sudden she opens up.
Verse 10, my beloved is dazzling, ruddy, outstanding
among 10,000.
His head is like gold, like pure gold.
His locks are like clusters of dates as
black as a raven.
His eyes are like doves.
She goes on, his cheeks are like balsam.
His hands are like rods of gold.
His abdomen is like carved ivory.
Now notice, she's not describing his assets.
She's describing him.
She's not talking about his riches.
She doesn't say, listen, have you ever heard
of Donald Trump and Bill Gates?
My beloved would make those guys look like
a pauper.
My beloved owns the cattle on a thousand
hills.
My beloved owns all these banks in the
city here.
I mean, when we get married, I won't
have to work another day in my life.
I'll have all the silks and linens and
diamonds and sapphires I've ever dreamed of.
My beloved is one of the richest men
in the world.
No, she's not describing his assets.
She's describing him.
Let me tell you about him.
He's got the most beautiful eyes, most beautiful
hands, most beautiful hair.
And she begins to describe in detail.
She knows him, but she's lost him.
And she summarizes everything in verse 16.
His mouth is full of sweetness.
He's wholly desirable.
Oh, there's not a single thing that I
can fault.
There's not a single thing I would change
if I could change him.
Every single thing about him is desirable.
This is my beloved and this is my
friend.
Oh, daughters of Jerusalem.
Oh, I'm sure if she elaborated, she'd say
something like this.
You know, when I first met him, I
had him in such awe.
And please don't get me wrong.
I still do.
He's a king, you know, not just an
ordinary king, but the king of kings.
And I felt so unworthy.
And there was a period of time there
where I looked at myself like a servant
and he was a master.
And one day he said to me, darling,
no longer do I call you servants, but
I call you friend.
And she said, our relationship changed.
I still reverence him.
I still have him in awe, but he's
the best friend I've ever had.
He's a friend that sticks closer than a
brother.
He means more to me than anything else.
Everything about him is desirable.
And then notice their response.
Chapter six.
And of course, there's no chapter divisions originally.
Where is your beloved gone?
Oh, most beautiful among women.
Where is your beloved turned that we may
seek him with you?
Do you mind if we tag along?
Listen, could we seek him with you?
What you've described is what we're looking for.
You've wet our appetite.
You've got us excited about meeting him.
Is there any chance that your friend could
be my friend?
I've been looking for a friend like this
all of my life.
Oh, I've tried this and that.
In fact, we're just coming home from a
night of, you know, playing around on the
town and so on and so forth.
We're looking for something.
We're looking for reality.
You've got it.
I mean, just as you begin to share
about him, your very countenance seemed to change.
Could we seek him with you?
Would you introduce us to him?
Isn't that really what the relationship of the
church is supposed to be?
That we're so in love with him that
when we talk about him, we're not describing
a building.
We're not describing anything else than the beauty
and the majesty of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And the world says, I want what you've
got.
I want what you've got.
You see, this story is told one more
time in the Bible.
Once in the Old Testament, once in the
New Testament.
You find the story in the New Testament.
Our time is gone.
But there in Revelation chapter three, we have
the beloved again knocking.
Behold, I stand at the door and knock.
I want to come in, darling, my darling,
my dove, my perfect one.
I want to be with you.
You're the one that I've purchased with my
blood.
You're the one that I've chosen.
You're the one that I want.
I want to know you intimately.
I want you as my friend.
And her response is, not now, Lord.
You see, the problem with this woman was
simply this.
She was clean, but she was comfortable.
Oh, there's nothing wrong with being clean, is
there?
I've taken off my dress, my old filthy
garments again.
Oh, righteousness is filthy rags.
But I've washed my feet.
Jesus said to Peter, Peter, if I wash
your feet, all of you is clean.
She was clean, but she was comfortable.
And the most dangerous place for a Christian
to be is clean and comfortable.
And that was the Laodicean problem, wasn't it?
Lukewarm, comfortable, indifferent, lethargic.
Not now, Lord.
We're rich.
We're increased with goods.
Try somebody else.
I don't want to open the door.
You know, I'm comfortable just the way I
am.
And I think so often in our Christian
life, it's easy just to settle down, isn't
it?
Oh, we've not gone into any depths of
sin.
We've not really turned our back on God.
But somehow there's a breakdown in our relationship.
Somehow that intimacy that we once knew is
no longer a part of our life.
And he's saying, listen, my darling, my dove,
open.
I want to come in.
I want to be with you.
Don't put it off.
Don't grieve him.
Don't say, well, you know, I'm right in
the middle of exams right now.
I'm just getting involved in business.
You know, a more convenient time, Lord.
Come back in a couple of weeks when
things quiet down a little bit.
I'd love to spend some time with you
then.
Oh, I'm so grateful this woman understood.
Listen, I've lost the most important thing in
my life, my relationship.
And even though it's the middle of the
night and even though it's going to cost
me, I'm going to pursue him until I
find him.
That's what it's all about, isn't it?
Let's close in prayer.
Father, we ask today that you would come.
Lord, even as you stand at every single
heart's door this morning, your knock is open
to me, my darling, my dove, my perfect
one.
I want to come in.
I want to be with you.
I want to know you.
Father, I pray that every single person here
this morning would open that door in response.
Lord, they won't even hesitate.
They won't say not now, Lord.
Let's just put it off a little while.
But Lord, there would be a congregation that
would respond and say, Lord, I want your
presence more than anything else in the whole
world.
And the Lord out of that, the world
would look on and say, is there any
chance we could have what you've got?
There's something about your church.
There's something about your congregation.
There's something about you as an individual.
You found something that I've been searching for.
You've got something that satisfies.
I want what you've got.
Can I seek him with you?
Let's stand to our feet.
Our time is gone.
These altars are available this morning.
If you have been one of those individuals,
and maybe the last number of weeks, the
last number of months, maybe it's even been
longer than that.
Maybe there's been a distance that has come
in your experience.
Again, you've been busy with other things and
you know that you've been neglecting him.
You know he's been pleading with you.
He's been saying, listen, you need to get
back to the word of God.
You need to get back to that secret
place, that place of prayer.
You've lost my presence, but I'm here this
morning in my grace.
I'm here this morning in my mercy, and
I want to invite you to come again.
Open to me, my darling, my dove.
Don't let it go any longer.
Find him again this morning.
He wants you.
He loves you.
He's pleading with you this morning.
Come.
Come back.
Just open your heart.
Don't wait for somebody to come.
Just open your heart to the Lord and
say, Lord, I need you.
I need you more than anything else, Lord.
Right now, I just close the door to
everything else.
Welcome home, Holy Spirit.
Come and take up your residency again.
Come and find a dwelling place.
God longs for a dwelling place.
Where is a house you'll build for me,
he says.
Just let him touch you this morning.
Let him touch you.
Don't be afraid of tears.
Just let them flow if necessary.
Open your heart.
Lord, I'm here to meet with you this
morning.