By the Rev. JAMES DURHAM, Glasgow.
SERMON 1.
Preached 19th October, 1651.
I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys (Song ii. 1).
WHEN we began to speak of this book we showed that it was taken up in some short, secret conferences betwixt Christ and His bride, or believer wherein the sum (if we may so call it) of that most intimate fellowship that they had together is held forth, sometimes He speaking of His bride, sometimes she speaking of Him, holding out the excellence of the Bridegroom and the happiness of the bride.
The first two verses are the words of the Bridegroom, for the first verse sets down a description and commendation of His own worth; for the second verse, a description and commendation of the excellency and worth of His Bride who had all her excellency and worth from Him, and partakes of it in, and through, Him. He tells there is as great odds between her condition and the world’s as there is between a lily and thorns, and that her condition in the world is as bitter as the tender lily among pricking thorns. The rest of the chapter is the Bride answering the Bridegroom with a commendation of Him. The chapter has two parts; First, a speech of the Bridegroom in the first two verses; Second, a speech of the Bride from that to the end. For though the Bridegroom be brought in sometimes speaking, yet it is the Bride who is the immediate speaker repeating His words.
Some esteem the first verse to be spoken of the Bride, but I give two reasons why I consider it to be the Bridegroom speaking of Himself. First, the dependence it has on the former words and the connection it has with the words that follow. That He that speaks in the following words is the Bridegroom is clear, and there is no reason that can be given why the same person that speaks and calls Himself “I” in verse 1 is not the same person that speaks in the second verse. And the scope and dependence of these words on the former does also clear it; for in the last verse of the former chapter the bride has been commending Christ, the Bridegroom; and upon her commending of Him, He commences in the first
verse of this chapter and takes the commendation out of her mouth and commends Himself, and puts something to the commendation and, then commands her in the following words. Second,—The majesty of the words and excellency of the description tells it is Christ and cannot be appropriated to another. It is a style like Himself, and bears a stamp of Christ speaking as where He says, “I am the bread of life” (John vi. 35); “I am the light of the world” (John viii. 12); “I am the true vine” (John xv. 1). And those that would appropriate this verse to the bride must say it is Christ’s commendation, and the bride’s commendation as she is in Him.
For this first verse there are these five things to be considered; (1) The Person commended,—I, the Bridegroom; (2) The commendation in two expressions, (a) I am the Rose of Sharon. The rose which is one of the most excellent flowers for beauty, savour, and use; and the Rose of Sharon, one of the most excellent soils where roses blossomed best, as Isaiah xxxv. 2. The excellency of Carmel and Sharon are brought in and these two put together; the rose, and the rose of Sharon intimates a most excellent beauty to be in Christ. (b) The second expression is the lily of the valley, which is brought in for the same purpose added for even as the lily has a distinct beauty and kind of majesty in it, that our Lord says that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of the lilies (Matt. vi. 29). Such a majesty and so many draughts of God’s wisdom and wonderful workmanship may be seen in it. So has Christ a distinct beauty of His own. And this expression is added to the former to show that any one expression, nay multiplied expressions and similitudes borrowed from creatures set out Christ’s beauty. When all their beauties are gathered into one, it is in Christ and much more; and the lily of the valley, because these places were most hot and so most fruitful, beautiful and comely. (3) The manner of the expression. It is not, I am like the rose, nor, I am like the lily, as when He speaks of the bride in verse 2, “As the lily among thorns so is my love among the daughters.” It is not comparatively as the bride often speaks of herself, but simply, I am the rose; I am the lily. The reason whereof ye shall hear. (4) The Person that gives the commendation, and it is Christ Himself. (5) the scope of the commendation, or wherefore Christ commands Himself so here.
I shall begin at the last two. (1) Of the Person commanding, and it is Christ Himself; and that His commanding Himself comes in on the back of the spouse commanding Him. Observe (1) That there is none that can command Christ as Himself, or Christ can only command Himself and His own worth sufficiently to people. Would angels and ministers command Him, and let believers speak forth all their experiences they can say something, but none of these nor all of them can command or teach about Him as Himself can. None can manifest Christ to people but Christ Himself (John xiv. 21). “He that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love Him, and will manifest myself to him.” This is a privilege Christ has in His own hand. The manifesting of Christ is a mercy that no other can teach to a believer; and if we look through the Revelation where Christ comes frequently to John, especially chap. xxii. 16, He takes it upon Himself to point out His own worth.
“I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.”
Reason 1. None knows Christ’s worth as He Himself does. “Though I bear record of myself yet my record is true, for I know whence I came and whither I go. But ye cannot tell whence I came or whither I go” (John viii. 14); and, “No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father he hath declared him” (John i. 18). All others stand at a distance with God. Jesus Christ is in His bosom, and knows how to bring forth His worth.
Reason 2. Because Jesus Christ has gotten the full dispensation of grace in all the parts of it to hold out to people, and therefore He must not only bring souls to glory but He must instruct them in His own worth. “… Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom” (1 Cor. i. 30). And hence it is that in Proverbs iv. and viii. Wisdom is so frequently brought in crying for simple, and all sorts of people, to instruct them, which is none other but Jesus Christ, the co-equal of the Father, executing that part of His office in making Himself known to souls.
Reason 3. That Christ might be all to believers, and they might have nothing, not a lesson of His own worth, but what they get from Him, that as it is in 1 Cor. i. 31, “He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord,” that no flesh may have it to say, such a minister or such a good book taught me Christ, but, Jesus Christ Himself taught Himself to me.
Use 1. For instruction in two things (1) To tell us who is our right master. (2) To show the reason why we make so little progress in the knowledge of Christ. For the first our right master is Christ who has these properties in His teaching which others want. (a) He teaches savingly; other folk’s teaching kills. But Christ makes the heart take with His teaching. “I (Paul) have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase” (1 Cor. iii. 6). (b) None teaches satisfyingly and convincingly but Christ. All the teaching of others is but from hearing such things as we have heard and ye have heard before, and therefore if Christ comes not with His finger and add the demonstration of His Spirit, folks will be but fleeting to and fro for all our teaching. (c) Christ’s teaching is like Himself. None can hold out Christ to be like Himself but Christ. Ye may by the teaching of others imagine a beauty and excellency to be in Christ, but till Christ Himself comes, it is at best like a portrait drawn on a board, or a written copy, where Christ is the true pattern.
The words of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon (looking on him as the type) confirms this. She heard much spoken of Solomon in her own country but when she came and spoke with him herself she acknowledged that the half of it was not told her, of what she had seen and heard (1 Kings x. 7).
(2) The reason why folks come so little speed in the knowledge of Christ is this. Folks would learn Christ and not be beholden to Christ. They will go to the Bible or some godly book to read of Him but they seek not unto Him, to draw their hearts to reverence Him, and to put a lustre on what they read or hear of Him. Ye all come to hear us preach, but who are waiting for Christ’s teaching? or, when ye get home do ye sit down to learn at His feet, and will ye ever win to the knowledge of Christ without Christ? The time will come when many
shall find they have had much lost labour and spent time in hearing, reading, conference and the like duties, because they did not wait in such duties to be taught of Christ.
Therefore take the warning and exhortation, and as ye would know Christ and His worth begin at Himself which is the Second Use.
Use 2, for direction. Come to Christ in the first steps of your receiving Christ. Folks may come to Christ to get good of Christ, or to get a lesson from Christ to direct them in their practice. But who comes to Christ to get a knowledge of Himself and His worth, or such as Moses in Exodus xxxiii. 18, “I beseech thee show me thy glory?” Folks would first study Christ, and they seek to know how to make use of Christ and yet they do not wait upon Him and prize His lessons as if they knew Him not. But to know Christ and how to make use of Him you must be in His communion. He must reveal Himself to you. There is no providing of the first step of knowing Christ or His worth without usemaking of Christ to make Himself known. And to clear this further I shall branch this direction in these few heads. (1) Carry a conviction of this along with you in all duties, that there is no way to win to know Christ or His excellency but by Christ. This will make a humble and direct way of going about ordinances, and make the praise of any good ye get redound to Christ when ye know that except He bless and quicken ordinances they will do you no good. (2) For the sense of this conviction keeps your heart in a stayedness and earnestness in attaining to this end of getting Christ and His worth savingly known. Keep your heart in the exercise of waiting for it. “Blessed is the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of my doors” (Prov. viii. 34). A man that would find the durable riches of wisdom must be daily waiting and hanging on, not only on the ordinances but in the ordinances on Christ for an open ear to hear Wisdom’s lessons. “He wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned” (Isaiah 1. 4). And it is He that wakens the ear thus to hear and drink in His lessons.
Use 3. For trial. If it be the right knowledge of Christ’s worth and excellence that ye have gotten try it by this. Who brought that knowledge to you? How came ye by it? Ye think ye know Christ, and esteem Him, and there is no place of Scripture that speaks of Him but ye have it. But who taught you? Did you take it up at your own hand, or did ye learn it out of some book? And ye have no more knowledge of Christ than ye got that way then certainly ye know not Christ, but have only an imagination of Him. The Jews saw Him and yet He says they knew Him not. What knowledge or light ye have ye have not gotten it from Christ, and no light will reveal Christ but His own. To clear this use a little more take some few differences between that knowledge that is got from Christ Himself and that which is got from any other. (1) When folk know Christ savingly they see something in Christ which they saw not before and they think that all the knowledge they had of Christ before was but ignorance in respect of that they now know. So that while a man is in nature all the knowledge he has of Christ is like a man dreaming that he is eating and drinking and when he awakes his soul is empty, as the prophet speaks in Isaiah xxix. 8. But a believer’s
knowledge that he has got from Christ Himself is like real eating and drinking which is sensible and lively. It is like that knowledge which the Queen of Sheba had of Solomon when she came and spoke with him herself. The other is but like the report she had of him. Eye has not seen, ear has not heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man to consider of this, till God reveal it by His Spirit (1 Cor. ii. 10). Therefore when folk go on from day to day and from year to year with the same knowledge they had, and they know no other but what has been taught them by man, they have not been as yet taught of Christ; for where Christ shows Himself He is another thing than when any speak of Him. (2) Other knowledge that folk have of Christ’s worth before He reveals Himself is but an uncertainty. This has a certainty with it, and here pose your own hearts. If ye durst say that Christ is worth all that He is called, from your experience of His manifesting Himself to you, your knowledge is like that of the Samaritans after they had heard Him themselves. John iv. 42, which being compared with verse 39 shows the difference. When the woman told them of such a man it is said many of them believed on Him, that is, gave their assent to what she spoke. But when they heard Christ Himself they say, “Now we believe, not because of thy saying; for we have heard Him ourselves.” They had a sort of faith before, but it was an external and doubtful faith (as all historical faith is), but when they hear Christ themselves their faith has a certainty with it. “We have seen and know that this is indeed the Christ. And as Peter says in Matthew xvi. 16 and 17, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” and Christ says, “Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.” (3) When Christ becomes a teacher folk cannot abide to want Christ’s teaching, or they cannot abide to be taught without Him. When He lets out His worth in a sermon or at the sacrament it is well. But when He absents Himself ministers are of no worth, nor the Word itself except Christ make it lively (Song iii. 3, 4). The watchmen cannot content the spouse when Christ Himself is away. As they miss Christ they have an increased desire to have Him coming again. Were there a thousand ministers and teachers to be had He is to be preferred to them all. When the King sits at the table her spikenard sends forth a smell, but when He is away there is drooping. Therefore it is an evil token when folk come and go alike from ordinances not missing, nor being weighted, for the want of Christ. I am afraid that ye have not Christ’s teaching.
(To be continued.)