God's Love By Jack Nattress

You heard a little astrologist I was reading about last night, a man who had laboured,
whether a preacher or not, I forget, he'd laboured for years and he'd never been able
to make much of an impression on the hard, hard hearts around him.
And in his sleep that night, he had a dream and he dreamt that he was a labourer, just
a labourer working for his daily bread.
And his job was most unusual, he had a hammer, a heavy hammer, and he had to break stones.
And anyhow he was working away at these stones, they just simply didn't break.
They wouldn't break, they were heart stones.
This went on for a long time and he finally put his hammer down, it was inside, and the
voice of his master said, what did I employ you for?
Well he said, sir, it was to break stones.
And he said, why do you not persist in doing what I pay you for?
And he went out again, oh he thought I'd better, in his dream, and he started again on these
stones and behold he found after a while that they started to break.
And anyhow, you know what I mean, the hearts of the people, maybe some are going to break
and maybe we should continue, and maybe we've done something toward them and used the hammer
and they're going to break.
And it was just a little illustration, it suited me, I don't know about you.
And now we come to this song, and I just read the first few verses, we won't get very far,
the Song of Solomon in chapter one, and it begins the Song of Songs, which is Solomon's,
Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for thy love is better than wine, because
of the savour of thy good ointments, thy name is as ointment poured forth, therefore do
the virgins or the righteous love thee.
Draw me, we will run after thee, the king hath brought me into his chambers, we will
be glad and rejoice in thee, we will remember thy love more than wine, the upright love
thee.
I am black but calmly, all ye daughters of Jerusalem as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains
of Solomon, look not upon me because I am black because the sun hath looked upon me.
My mother's children were angry with me, they'd made me the keeper of the vineyards, but mine
own vineyard have I not kept.
We'll just leave our reading there, may the Lord bless that word to us.
Now we come to this song, this song, it's entitled The Song of Solomon, ancient books
call it the Song of Songs, or the most excellent song, the most excellent song, and the Holy
Spirit gives this song a very lofty place in human literature, in everything that's
written on earth, the original tells us that it's the song high above all others, and it
answers the many objections against this portion of scripture, and the divine wisdom speaks
of its superior excellence, its superior, and not only to the thousand and five songs
that Solomon wrote, but it's indicated that it is the highest of all songs that's ever
written.
Now poetry is the expression of the best and most beautiful things, that is why I believe
we should intently look at it, it's the expression of that which is beautiful, and it speaks
of exalted emotions, it's something that God has given to the earth, of exalted emotions,
and it's something in our prosaic age, in our mechanistic age, you'll notice that people
get away from poetry, it's not taught very much, the common poems that were just rattled
off by everyone, schools like Tennyson's Brook and different things, are almost unknown,
and there's a reason for it, and it is a shame, and it is the best and the most beautiful
of all languages, poetry, or it should be, and the best poetry must have the noblest
theme, you'll notice when you read a good poem, when you get to Thackeray and you get
to Longfellow and different ones, their themes are very high and very beautiful, often natural
but they're very good, and they've got lofty ideas, and God has put every form of beauty
before us, and formed us with a capacity of receiving pleasure from it, you see it's one
of the wonders of human nature that we have fearfully and wonderfully made, we can see
beauties all around us in little things, in plants and flowers and hills and valleys,
sunsets and 10,000 times, 10,000 things, because God has put in us an appreciation of beauty
if it's developed and not marred, lovely thing that God has done for our souls, and of course
we need it to see with the beauty of the scriptures and the Lord, now so in giving
us scripture, in conveying to his truth, God has made it attractive, you see when you hear
a person say that the scriptures are dry and this is dry and that sort of thing, well I
don't have to tell you what is dry about it, I know I used to say that years ago in my
feeble attempts to read the bible as a boy, being fond of literature and saying it was
dry, I don't have to tell you who was dry, whether it was the scriptures or me, it was
my desperate condition, I was a dead, as it were a dead branch, just absolutely dead and
I thought the scriptures were dry, but God has made these scriptures beautiful, and he's
made them attractive and he has to put this love within us to see the beauty of scripture
and once he did I'll never forget, I might have told you before that very few words,
I and the light of the world came into me, it was so clear, God had done this for me,
something that wasn't in me, now love and beauty is the very excellency and essence
of God, love and beauty, almost beyond understanding and the bible says that God is love, and love
is the purest and the deepest and the most powerful emotion that a human being has, now
it's beautiful, I just thought it was apt that I might attempt to say some of the wonderful
things that are in this, we've had good doctrine, we've had much good doctrine, well we need
that, it's a background, but this good doctrine in the right sense must lead us to see God's
love and power, it must lead us, that's where doctrine must lead us, and nothing can be
more beautiful than the subject of the song, and being a song it must be the best and the
most beautiful of the language, and it is, if we could read this in its original and
understand it, it would far surpass what we've got in our English language, although this
particular version of the bible, it keeps as close as possible, and as beautiful as
the song is, in our language we must remember its poetry and idiom is remote from the early
language, the fact that the song is so much rejected is proof of its excellence, the fact
that it's rejected, half dead theologians, people who just have a form of godliness,
they cannot stand this book because they do not see the beauty of it, but as God's
children I think that we will hear, now it has to be discovered to us by the Holy Spirit
and it's beyond the common mind, we must cultivate a refined taste for this song, we must cultivate
it, to see the beauty of it, we need the supernatural aid of divine grace, not only
must we understand scripture by revelation, it must come to us, revealed from God, but
he has to do another work in us, he has to give us the capacity to understand it, it's
like a double work, it's revelation and a work inside of us, but we thank God to a good
degree he's done that.
Now even when the highest beauty and excellence was personified in the Lord Jesus, now just
think of this, I thought of it as I was reading it, that here he stood before the people and
his words and his beauty, the pronunciation, the grammar, the way he spoke, they stand,
his voice and everything about him must have been truly wonderful, and what did they say?
They said there's no beauty in him that we should desire him, but thank God we do not
say that, we say there's everything in him that we desire him, but that's what they said
because their hearts through sin and the fall of man had lost the capacity to see the most
beautiful one in heaven and on earth, they'd lost that capacity, so we should pray that
God restores that capacity, that we'll see this beauty, and then if we see his beauty
in a proper sense, a spiritual sense, we go through fire and flood, through adversity
and affliction, and it wouldn't move us a great deal.
Now that's what we need, to see something of the beauty in him.
And we see it by, we have to see it as one Corinthians tell us that no man can call him
Lord except by the Holy Spirit.
They can't say this wondrous term, Lord Jesus.
They can say Jesus, they can say a few terms, him up there and all this sort of thing, but
they can't call him Lord except by the power of the Holy Spirit.
And our Lord is the personification of the beautiful and the good and the true.
If we could gather all that was beautiful in the world, and it is a beautiful world,
the smaller things, the great things, it's exceedingly beautiful.
Getting out on the ocean, we went for a little drive yesterday, and we've seen that drive
so many times up in King Edward Park, with the bay and the ships and the ocean, but still
exceedingly beautiful.
The whole world is filled with his glory and beauty, but he is beauty and goodness personified.
And in him, God has put his own treasures of beauty and glory in the Lord Jesus.
He's representative unto us, those abstract spiritual excellencies is sensible bodily
form.
In his form, we see all the beauties combined of heaven and earth, if we have the eyes to
see them.
And I might ask, what attracted you to the Savior?
What attracted you to the Savior?
You answered.
And this is the object of the song, the celebration of the love which led us to this union, its
beauty, its attraction, and its glorious results.
There are results of this.
There are the songs and scriptures celebrating some particular thing flowing from this love.
Now, we have the song of Moses, and it speaks of the praise of Jehovah for their deliverance.
Now, we should have a song of deliverance too.
Like them, they were delivered from Egyptians, awful slavery and bondage, and we, have we
got this praise of God, how he delivered us out of the darkness, out of the satanic power
that we were in, out of our earthly propensities to do our own things and ways?
Have we got that song of deliverance?
And then the Psalms are utterances of pious feelings for various mercies.
Well, we do read the Psalms a lot, and I believe that we've learned some of this.
They're utterances of the pious and godly souls for various mercies.
And then this song goes to the spring of all that is beautiful, good and true, and it celebrates
the love which is the fountain of all blessedness.
Now having a head full of scripture is quite a good thing.
You know, I wish my head would contain more, but it's not sufficient.
And knowing the doctrines, which are beautiful and true, and in adversities we can rest upon
them.
They are good, they're wonderful, but they've got to go beyond this, as we mentioned before.
And it sings of the same love which is the burden of the new song in heaven.
See, this should put a song in our hearts unto him who loved us and gave himself for
us and washed us in his own blood.
Beautiful song, made us clean, fit for heaven.
And then the glorious chorus of the completion, at the completion of creation.
The morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy.
The song in the heart.
And there are some songs that no man can learn unless redeeming grace has brought him out
of the earth into the family of God.
No one can learn these songs.
No one can have them in his heart unless by the grace of God.
We'll pass our introduction by saying the song is an equal in the earth.
It is only to the spiritual man.
It teaches the great theme, knowing God, and is an insight to spiritual love and glory.
It opens the way into glories.
Now we should pray that we might understand some of these glories.
Now verse two, it reads, let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for thy love is better
than wine.
Now I believe every heart can get an understanding of that and permission to kiss the hand of
a sovereign, it's a very special thing.
With our queen it is only done by those who are being knighted and special dignitaries
and people of high places and in the east it was a very special sign and it's considered
a great honor but that sovereign to kiss another is a very high honor.
We have in Psalm 2 a call from our savior and it says, kiss the son lest he be angry
and you perish in the way.
The kiss is the representation of course of love and affinity.
Now the language of the spouse is a desire that he would give us manifestation of love
and grace which none but his dearest friends can receive and expect.
Now we can expect it, we that are God's children can expect it, a manifestation of this love
and we should expect it and we should desire it.
He said in John 15, 15, henceforth I call ye not servants for the servant knoweth not
what his master doeth but I call you friends for all the things I have heard of my father
I have made known to you.
See God has made known to us his purposes, the father's purposes toward us and we are
his friends and that's a tremendous thing to understand in the soul.
In John 14, 21 these manifestations are very different from what the world can receive.
They consist of the influences of the Holy Spirit and it's a point of the greatest importance
that a man should know the absorbing desire of his communication with Christ and it should
be the leading principle of our lives, this communication with the Lord Jesus Christ.
One of the benefits that we heard about in justification, it wasn't just mentioned like
that but it's there, justification brings communion with Christ.
Preparation for heaven does not consist in rising to an imaginary state of piety, it
doesn't consist of that.
Many of the heathen people they seek, Buddhists and different ones and Eastern religions they
try to get to some imaginary state of the piety but it consists in being controlled
by the Holy Spirit.
They are the people of God who are led by the Holy Spirit or controlled by the Holy
Spirit and seek with undeviating and self-sacrificing purpose the powerful influence of the Spirit
of Christ.
Let us seek it and then we'll be strong.
Pray for this powerful influence of the Lord Jesus, the gift of the Spirit of Christ.
Now the gift of the best robe and the costly ring and the shoes were not to the prodigal
son the proof of his father's love, there was another proof, the real proof and I believe
it was the kiss of affection when the father fell on his neck and kissed him.
This would be the proof of the father's love especially in the East.
Isaiah 40-11 says he shall feed his flock like a shepherd, he shall gather the lambs
with his arm and carry them in his bosom and gently lead those that are with young.
I recall to mind the Italian hero and general Garibaldi.
He was passing through mountainous country with a battalion of troops and passing a cottage
the woman was extremely distressed.
What is the matter he called he was evidently a kindly man and she said that she'd lost
one of the lambs and this man in his feeling he got his troops to go out getting towards
evening and they searched everywhere and they came home and it got dark and none of them
could find him but anyhow this man was still missing the general himself and one of his
aides he went to where to the camp and he was surprised to find him late in the morning
still sound asleep it was most unusual because he was noted for his early rising and anyhow
when he went to wake him he said sir he says it's very late yes he says I know and what
happened to you sir he said well he kept waiting all night to find the lamb and then he noticed
alongside of him a little lump and there the little lamb was alongside him in bed this
kindly old general had continued the lamb just reminds us of the savior what he does
with us so in your distress when we troubled there's one just like that 10,000 times more
than that kindly old general will take us with him as he did with the little lamb now
good news from the far country is refreshing someone stole my illustration this morning and
more so the better by the well-known hand best of all is the return of the absent friend pleasing
are the gifts of his Providence but our greatest happiness is when he impresses our hearts with
his love through the Holy Spirit that's the great thing that we want when our hearts are impressed
this love is the antidote of spiritual death you see though I speak with the tongues of men and of
angels I take it that it means that we've never experienced we've never experienced the true love
of Christ you see we're a sounding brass and tinkling symbols the principle of eternal life
and when agent feebles the body and makes cold the heart which it will do this love so powerful
so reviving keeps the spirit vigorous and the mind active and the affections warm and don't we find
that with some people some of the old saints that we know their affections are always poor
although that they are fading in natural warm Isaiah 40 29 31 it's quite familiar between look
at that again
says he giveth power to the faint and to them that have no might he increases strength even
the youth shall faint and be weary and the young men shall utterly fall but they that wait upon the
Lord shall renew their strength they shall mount up with wings as Eagles they shall run and not be
weary they shall walk and not faint beautiful verses which we should memorize now in verse
three it says because of the save of thy good ointments thy name is as ointment poured forth
therefore do the virgins love thee thy perfumes are rich in fragrance used in the east for health
and beauty used to use today but not so much as in former days thine name is used as a formula to
denote his moral greatness the sum of his attributes and character thy name is as ointment
poured forth a glorious name a name whereby that men who have been attacked by actually had
spiritual attacks by devils and demons have used one name I saw it with a young relative of mine
who was being attacked and all the chick of others she told me was one name and got freedom had a
terrible attack and in the Lord Jesus we have the full exhibition of God's moral and spiritual
excellence and beauty see God is unknowable without the Lord Jesus but in him every time
we hear what he says full of grace and truth and what he said what he did to her shows the
excellency of God the nature of Christ is here illustrated by the richness and the pleasantness
of the best perfume and is the very best known to man it was not good enough for him to rep to
represent him who was fairer than the sons of men the very best you remember that God in a special
compound that tells us in the early books of the Bible he had a compound for the express purpose
it was never used it was never only known by a few though the apotheries I think they termed
them and they would make up this beautiful compound and and the high priest was the new
high priest was the anointed one the appointed one was always anointed with this special ointment
believe it must have been very beautiful but no man has discovered those secrets because it was
given by God very special the whole nature of Christ is as this fragrant oil it's just telling
it telling us something so pure and so delightful and so excellently divine it's from heaven and the
three chief means of purification on the law they were blood and water and oil and the last was a
type of the Holy Spirit and as the course of healing and life nothing to the senses more
precious and fragrant than the holy oil they love to use these aromatic oils now so the Holy Spirit
is termed the oil of gladness in Hebrews 1 9 now a savior was never anointed by this special oil
he was never anointed he was anointed by the Holy Spirit as with we could put it as with a
limitable sea of liquid perfume we could get the representation by the anointing of the priest but
if we could see an ocean and a tremendous ocean of liquid perfume still it wouldn't it would not
picture to us how he was anointed far beyond that of man and in Psalm 47 that we sang all his
garments smell of myrrh aloes and cassia as he came out of the ivory palaces of heavenly
glory using these tremendous terms to reach our hearts to re to using the terms of the oil and
this this book goes through it uses plants flowers hills animals everything that is beautiful to stir
our senses that we might see this love love of God his superior excellence over his fellows the
angels and the prophets and the Saints consists in him having all the riches of the Godhead our
Lord has all of those riches and the object and filling his human nature with an overflowing
degree of the Holy Spirit was this oil of gladness might be poured forth amongst men
amongst his churches amongst his in individuals that was why it was given because he had that in
glory is his divine nature but in his human nature he was given that this superior anointing of the
spirit that he might give gifts of gladness and grace and glory and beauty to churches and to
men and he has given that we are not aware of it we need the senses the spiritual senses to
apprehend what he's done for us and just occasionally when it seems when we may be
full of faithful right with God we begin to get some idea of these beauties now they lift us out
of the mundane things the pressing things will always have those with us the little difficulties
of human nature they'll abide with us till we die we need and think that we're going to get rid of
them because it's part of our training and sanctification you'll have them with us but
what we need is not so much to get rid of those difficulties is to have this grace from God this
oil of gladness to walk through them Lord give me grace and he showed that to the Apostle when he
had this awful affliction could have been blind part blindness which would be terrible for this
man because he loved to see the people he'd love to see many things but it appears these that he
was blind and he called upon God and God says that my grace is sufficient for thee and we should
learn from that it's great to go through these matters and as we said there's no way of sending
it down to us but through the human nature of the Lord Jesus the only way it can be transformed to
man now we've got to look to the Lord Jesus when our difficulties they're not just a theoretical
glance or a knowing proposition and we can't say like we did when we did geometrical propositions
and right after them QED the Latin words meaning as required to be proved and then it's finished
with no constantly this is what we are to do now his crucifixion in a sense was the breaking of
this alabaster box if he'd never been crucified it would never been released a man and was the
breaking the breaking of the bread this morning the breaking of his glorious body the thrusting
over the awful sphere the spiritual agony and looking out and and being separated from the
father with the breaking of his body and soul that he might give to us this oil of gladness that he'd
been anointed with that's the only way that I could think to put it the breaking of the
alabaster box that he might give it to us that precious oil then the fragrance of his it began
to spread over the world when it says that they went everywhere preaching the gospel what were
they doing they were spreading these wonders and of his power they were spreading this broken
crucified body and the benefits of it over to the world and it's gone on and on and come down to us
in this building the beauties and the glory and the fragrances come down for the crucifixion even
to us and when we feel it and know it as we get that capacity to understand it people will hear
us better I know that we're intellectually can explain many things I have this problem myself
but they want to read our hearts too and feel this divine fragrance that he came and has given us he
brought forth from heaven this treasure of sacred truth deposited not in vessels of gold they didn't
put them in the treasure cities like the like the children of Israel build ramesses and that other
one but in humble men in earthen vessels and he's put them in his churches and sometimes we forget
it put them in his people his dear people these ordinary people in earthen vessels gathered at
random on the shores of Galilee at first that the excellencies might be and show the power of God
he didn't go to the king's palaces he didn't make a show with 50,000 gorgeously dressed troops went
to the poor and he's come to us in a little wooden building different people from different works
walks of life ordinary people and he's done that for us if only we can apprehend it now in verse
4 draw me we will run after thee the king had brought me on into his chambers we will be glad
and rejoice in thee we will remember thy love more than wine the upright love thee there's an
imagery in this that Solomon had according to oriental custom gone forth to meet his bride on
the road see Solomon did things in a very stately manner in a very beautiful manner when he had
tents and pavilions they were beautiful beyond description the tents of the king would be set
up with royal magnificence at the place where he was to meet her now we can't imagine a tent we
see some canvas and some ropes and some things tied up in the flap not like that at all these
tents were exceedingly beautiful it is known in our times that certain places certain Arabians
that were extremely wealthy they had tents that must have cost hundreds of thousands something
millions they were actually studded with precious stones the things that held them together they had
made a beautiful camel's hair and different things like that the Turks have something like
that too even the day even recent times they had special tents one cost 25,000 I forget their
currency but it's far above ours and it was made in Persian took nearly four years to make it was
lined with a single piece of woven camel hair and beautifully decorated it seems that the bride
came in sight of these magnificent tents and the conveyance was hardly swift enough to carry the
there she gives opens to the words draw me hurry and when we see the beauty of our Savior we should
draw me draw me now we should be in a hurry not to wait maybe when I get a little bit more pious
we probably won't but we should have this anticipation so the perfections of Christ
a transcendent in excellence the word means carry to another transcendent be able to be
given to another and beyond the limit of ordinary comprehension and experience and variety and
extent and they're nothing less than the excellencies of the Godhead Christ in you the
hope of glory he are the temple of the living God in a doctrinal sense of saying this but the
excellencies of God are given to his children because he said that they will be like him and
that's his mighty work he's complete salvation given them the glories that come from him the
glories and delight centered in the Jehovah is the fountain life and beauty are an illimitable
treasury they're a treasury you see we need that faith to see the beautiful things that God has
done for us to gaze through the person of the man Christ Jesus he is the door John 10 7 through
which during eternity we shall be seeing and hearing things which I have not seen nor hear
heard he's the door now to salvation he's the door to everything and he will be the door in glory to
see these beautiful things that are beyond our comprehension now now the first words are of
prayer to know him nothing is more attractive than a lovely character to those capable of appreciating
that character the Holy Spirit alone can restore the perceptive powers of the heart that we and
then we are drawn to him we should make these our prayers that we can perceive the glories which he
has done and when we have inclined toward our Lord with animated affection running after him receives
us he brings us into his apartment the place where none had admitted but his confidential friends and
this is the meaning of Psalm 27 5 he shall hide me in his pavilion another word for tent in the
secret of his tabernacle he shall hide me speaking of that intimate dwelling with him Psalm 91 1 in
the heat that dwells in the secret places shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty how
beautiful was the Holy of Holies if we could think back long ago with its sides they were overlaid
with gold it's vial of blue and purple and scarlet and the mercy seat of pure pure gold overshadowed
by the cherubim standing one on each corner while the cloud of glory was the only light there was no
natural artificial light it was lit by the cloud of glory and the secret of the Lord is with such
people he treats them as personal friends very hard to understand but it's true that God speaks
ye are my friends if you do whatsoever I commanded you our Lord said now he revealed secrets he
revealed to Noah the secret of the flood others didn't know it there's no doubt they would laugh
and scoff that Noah building a boat on dry land what's he doing what a joke he would be and then
to Abraham he received revealed the secret of the destruction of Sodom would anyone tell me that
Abraham that godly brave man didn't tell the population that God would destroy I believe he
would he was a brave man but would they hear it they couldn't understand the secret Genesis 1817
so he will speak to us and the still small voice of the Spirit and give us the white stone and which
is written a new name he'll give us a white stone do we need wisdom we certainly do our
confidential friend is Christ the wisdom of God do we need protection our dearest friend is the
Lord Jesus able to save to the other most all who come unto God by him even from hell and the grave
safe from our own propensities our own fearful dispositions we know that we are weak we
determined to spend the day walking Cooley and calmly and the slightest thing that upsets our
poor little natures isn't that so but we have him now he binds up the broken heart and sets
the captives free and then he's a friend no changes of circumstances can alienate in him
or hid all the treasures and with wisdom and knowledge in him are durable riches and
righteousness no friendship is so intimate reliable honorable and confidential as the
existence that existing between Christ and the same the words I will be glad and rejoice in me
it is God only that is our exceeding great reward our exceeding joy he said to our Abraham I am
thy exceeding great reward the father of the faithful Abraham with our Lord we have great
peace in present recollections in our pleasant present recollections in this atmosphere where
we think of the things of God we have great peace we say to ourselves I'm not without hope I know
that I'm not what I should be but I'm not what I used to be we have great peace pleasant and we
have a glorious hope for the future we can look to the future we have a hope God tells us thousands
of things and then haven't we got present memories of the past when God has given us light and
understanding when we spoke with joy to some soul and they received it past present and future all
things are good in his sight he given us light and understanding the upright and loved thing
blessed are the pure in heart today shall see God in verse 5 I just have to be very quick she's
received into the tents with royal magnificence I am black but calmly all ye daughters of Jerusalem
as the tents of Peter's curtains of Solomon in the chambers to which we are brought not only do we
have communion with him but we have communion with one another when we meet God's people when
we meet God's people here or anywhere doesn't matter what persuasion they are there's a communion
it's always there whatever differences of apprehension and affection there may be among
Christians in other things this they all agree on that Jesus Christ is precious to them we all agree
on this don't be high over everything else doesn't matter what kind of name a person has if we've
never been met him before we we have this affinity precious to us and then she says I'm black but
calmly now it seems contradictory but it's not she was aware of her deficiency and points of duty
points of beauty she was aware of that and so we yet she was aware of the excellency that had been
in part to her and so were we were aware of this our condition by nature is one of atheism as
Ephesians 2 tells us to Ephesians 2 12 without God in this world at that time you without Christ
being aliens from the Commonwealth of Nations we were aliens atheism as one said is well-defined
and invincible ignorance imagining itself the highest knowledge the atheist always says and
denies God with a kind of a proud term as if he had excellent knowledge in the study of every
science knowledge on earth certain fundamentals are necessary every kind of knowledge has its
fundamentals and Christianity we must know ourselves and our true condition and this woman
did she says I'm black but then she says I'm calmly and the actual word is exceedingly beautiful she
could say the two things it's found and there there our condition is found in the scriptures
it's learned only at the feet of Jesus in the light of the whole