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Now, in Song of Solomon chapter 5, the Bible reads in verse number 1, I am coming to my garden, my sister, my spouse. I have gathered my myrrh with my spice, I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey, I have drunk my wine with my milk, eat, O friends, drink, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved. Now in the book of Song of Solomon, we're continuing on right where we left off in chapter 4, the talk about going into the garden, and that was just a term that was being used for a special time between the husband and wife that they were going to spend alone together being intimate with one another. Now the book of Song of Solomon is primarily a book that is dealing with marriage. It's dealing with the relationship between husband and wife. And so whenever we read the Bible, I think it's wise to always focus in on the primary interpretation first. I mean there are a lot of symbolic things and secondary applications for pretty much any book in the Bible you look at. We should always make sure that we don't miss just the obvious surface meaning. Sometimes preachers are so busy digging down deep and trying to find all the symbolism and all the hidden meanings that it's almost like they just pass over what's right there on the surface, what the Bible is actually saying. And so we don't want to pass over that. You hear a lot of preaching on Song of Solomon that just passes over the marital application, the relationship between husband and wife, and just goes straight for the symbolism. That's not what I'm going to do tonight. Now there is some symbolism in this passage, just as there is in all parts of the Bible, but the first thing I want to take is the literal application here. And when we see the husband speaking to his wife, he says, my sister, my spouse. The word spouse means your wife. And his sister simply because they're brother and sister in Christ because they're both saved. God is their father. He says, I'm coming to the garden, my sister, my spouse. I have gathered my myrrh with my spice. Now what is he referring to there with myrrh and spice? Well these are things that smell good. That's what he's talking about. He says after that, I've eaten my honeycomb with my honey. I've drunk my wine with my milk. Eat, oh friends, drink, yea, drink abundantly, oh beloved. Now these are things that taste good, right? Wine, honey, milk, and then things that smell good like myrrh, spice. If you jump down to the end of the chapter, if you go down to verse number 13, it says, his cheeks are as beds of spices as sweet flowers, his lips like lilies, dropping sweet smelling myrrh. If you look at the last verse, verse 16, it says, his mouth is most sweet, yea, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved and this is my friend, oh daughter to Jerusalem. So there's a lot of talk in this passage about a lot of tastes and smells and about the fact that his mouth is very sweet and that he's eaten honey and milk. You know, when I look at this, the first thing I think of is the importance in your marriage of keeping your breath fresh. Now again, this might sound like a joke, but I am 100% serious right now. I'm dead serious. I mean, people sometimes in their marriage, they don't take this seriously that, you know, they want to make themselves attractive to their spouse. I mean, think about it. If we're going to have a close relationship with our wife, if we're going to do all the kissing that it talks about in other chapters in the book of Song of Solomon, you know, shouldn't we make sure to take care of ourself and take care of basic hygiene? I mean, there are a lot of men today, and you know, we could preach on the women about this, but we're not going, we're talking about the men here. There are a lot of men that, you know, they don't take a shower often, they're not using deodorant, they're not brushing their teeth. You know, and this is not going to help your relationship with your wife. And here we see that this guy, you know, cares about his wife enough and cares about his marriage enough and wants to spend time with his wife, so he tells her, honey, you know, I've drunk my milk and my honey and my wine, you know, I've got the myrrh and the spice here. I guess that's like Old Spice or whatever, you know. Basically, he's taking care of himself. You know, we as men should be clean. And the Bible says anyway that the servants of the Lord should be clean. But especially in order to be respectful to our wife, we should not maybe clean ourselves up when we go to a wedding or clean ourselves up when we go to be around other people, but when we're at home, we're just a slob. When we're at home, we're not brushing our teeth, we're not keeping our breath fresh, we're not taking a shower, we're not using deodorant, because it's just my wife, it's just her. Well, that explains your marriage. You know, you need to take this seriously. And so that's just the first thing right on the surface that I see in this passage, is just, you know, get that mouth and make it a sweet-smelling mouth, guys. But not only that, but we could then take a symbolic interpretation here, because obviously a lot of the things in Song of Solomon are symbolic of Christ and the church, because the Bible says, husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it. If you think about this in regard to the Lord Jesus Christ, go to Psalm 19, because remember he's describing his mouth as having eaten honey and milk and wine, and it talks about his mouth being sweet. Look at what the Bible says about the word of God in Psalm 19. It says in verse 7, the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. We're talking about how perfect God's word is. The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the symbol. We can be sure that God's word is true, and it will make those that are unintelligent wise. It says in verse 8, the statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart. The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever. The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous all together. Look at verse 10, more to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold, sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. So the Bible actually describes God's word as being sweet to the taste. And so if we think about the husband's mouth being referred to as being sweet, and obviously when we think of the mouth, we can also think of words that are being spoken, and the word that comes out of the Lord Jesus Christ's mouth, the Bible says he has a sword coming out of his mouth in Revelation 19, and the Bible says that his word is sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. God's word is sweet. God's word is clean. The Bible says, O taste and see that the Lord is good. And so that's a good secondary application. God's word is something that can be refreshing to you, and it does taste good. Now look down if you would at verse number 2 in Song of Solomon 5, it says, I sleep but my heart waketh. Well what is meant by that in verse 2? I sleep but my heart waketh. What she's talking about is basically having a dream. Her body's asleep, but her mind is active. Her heart is awake there. So she says, I sleep but my heart waketh. It is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, open to me my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled, for my head is filled with dew and my locks with the drops of the night. So basically she's lying there and having a dream in her bed that her husband is outside knocking on the door, it's raining on him, and he's standing out in the rain and he's saying, open up, you know, let me in, my hair's getting wet here. And then it says in verse 3, I've put off my coat, how shall I put it on? I've washed my feet, how shall I defile them? So he's standing at the door knocking and he's saying, look, I've already taken my shoes off, I've taken my coat off, I'm out in the rain, I'm trying to get in, you know, let me in. This is the dream that she's having. It says, my beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door and my bowels were moved for him. So again, she has an intense desire unto her husband. She's right outside that door. She wants to be with him. She gets up, it says in verse number 5, I rose to open to my beloved and my hands dropped with myrrh and my fingers with sweet smelling myrrh upon the handles of the lock. I opened to my beloved but my beloved had withdrawn himself and was gone. My soul failed when he spake. I sought him but I could not find him. I called him but he gave me no answer. So in this dream that she has, she's laying on the bed, the husband's at the door, he's knocking at the door, he's begging to be let in, finally she gets up, she lets him in and there's nobody there. He's not there. She's looking for him, he's not there. Now again, if we wanted to take a symbolic meaning here, we could think about what Jesus Christ said in Revelation chapter 3 to the church at Laodicea. Now look, he was speaking to the saved in Revelation chapter 3. A lot of people mistakenly use that verse as a salvation verse when it says, behold I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, not into him, but in to him, two separate words, and will sup with him and he with me. Supper, dinner, that's fellowship. He's saying I'm going to sit down and have a meal with you. We're going to commune one with another. And so Revelation chapter 3, he's talking to the church at Laodicea and he says that I know thy works that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would thou work cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth because thou sayest I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing and know it's not that thou are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire that you may be rich and white raiment that thou mayest be clothed and that the same of thy nakedness do not appear. He says anoint thine eyes with eyes to have that thou mayest see. So look, he's telling them look, you're lukewarm. You think you're rich, you think you can see, but he says you're lukewarm. You're wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. He says as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. What does rebuke mean, to tell you that you're wrong? Repent means what, to discipline you or to give you a spanking. He says as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten, be zealous therefore and repent. What is being zealous? It means you're fired up, it means that you're passionate, it means you're doing. It's the opposite of being lukewarm. When you're lukewarm, you're half in and half out. When you're zealous, man, you're all the way in. And Jesus says look, I am outside the door of your church knocking. He says to the church of the Laodiceans, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him and will sup with him and he with me. He's saying look, I want to have fellowship with you, but you're too lukewarm. I can't fellowship with you. Now look, you can be saved and be lukewarm, because the only thing you have to do to be saved is just believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible says what must I do to be saved? And they said believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. But look, if you're lukewarm, you don't have a close fellowship with God because he says I want to spew you out of my mouth. You know, when we are lukewarm or when we're not zealous about the things of God, when we're apathetic about the things of God, when we don't care about the things of God, he says look, I can't sup with you. I'm knocking. You need to let me in. Now it's interesting because he's talking to the individual, because first he addresses the whole church saying like you guys are all a bunch of lukewarm Christians, makes me sick. But then he says if any man hear my voice, that's the individual, and open the door, I will come in to him and will sup with him. Look, that's encouraging for somebody who's in a dead church. Somebody who's in a lukewarm church, somebody who's in a dead church. You know, they still individually can get fired up about the things of God. They can still be a soul winner. They can still get zealous, and they can have a close fellowship with God. Look, I do not believe in this movement today where people just don't go to church anywhere and they just say, well, I can't find a good church so I don't go to church. Look, I'd rather go to the church of the Laodiceans, you know, and I'll be fired up even if they're not. Now look, I'd rather get in the church of Philadelphia or the church of Smyrna. You know, I'd rather be in a fired up church. Obviously you should go to the best possible church you can find, because look, these are the last days. We need church more than ever, and we need to be in a fired up church. But let me say this, it'd be better off to be like the ones at Sardis, who they were worthy, even though the rest of the church had a name that they lived and were dead. Jesus Christ wants to have fellowship with us, but He wants us to be zealous. He will have fellowship with us when we're zealous. The Bible said if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another. Look, there's no darkness in Him at all, the Bible says in 1 John 1. So we need to get all the way in, we need to be fired up if we want to have a close walk and fellowship with God. Now look, here the spouse, you know, she is already married to Him, but she's not in fellowship with Him. He's gone for whatever reason. And she's having a dream. He's standing at the door knocking. She doesn't come and let Him in right away, and then it's like, okay, I'm ready for you now, and He's gone. You know, that's like us sometimes, basically we just think that we can just make a convenient time for Jesus later. You know, like we do it on our timetable. We say, well, you know, right now I'm just at a time in my life where I just have other things going on, and maybe later on, you know, I'm going to get excited about church, later on I'll get faithful to church, I'll start coming to church, I'll read my Bible, I'll do so any, but you know what, just not right now. Right now I'm just too busy. And you know, this is a good example of the fact that, you know, opportunities that are here today are not always going to be here tomorrow. You know, and Jesus is standing at the door right now. He wants to have fellowship with you right now. He's not just going to stand there and knock forever. I mean, He says I stand at the door and knock, but you know what, He wants you to open the door right now, okay? And so we need to make sure that we don't put Jesus off and put Him on the back burner, and then we think, oh yeah, I'll serve God later. But you know what, in the meantime, before you're serving God, when you're living a life of sin or living a life that's half in, half out, living a life that excludes church, you know what, what kind of damage are you doing to your life in the meantime? You know, while you're waiting, and you think you can just, oh, just any time I want to, I can open that door, so I'm just going to keep Him waiting because I'm too into sports right now. I'm too into, you know, sin right now. I'm just too into my job right now. You know, I just need to make some money. I just need to get ahead. You know what, and you just think He's just always, whenever I want to, I can just open that door and I'm going to serve God and everything's going to be great. You know what? You don't lose your salvation. You can never lose your salvation. They're still married in the story here. It's not like there's divorce papers waiting at the door when she opens it. You know, she finally goes to the door and there's a lawyer there with the divorce payer, the sheriff, you know, serving her. That's not what it is. But what we do see though is a lack of fellowship. You know, she's trying to find Him. She's trying to, now, oh, okay, okay God, I'm ready to serve you. I'm ready to have fellowship. And you've already done a lot of irreparable damage that you have to suffer for. Let's keep reading this dream. Now I don't know, I struggle with this passage like where the dream ends and where reality begins or if it's all a dream. Because I was wondering if maybe she just dreamed He's at the door, so then she goes there and He's not there because He never really was there because it was just a dream. I don't know if this whole thing is a dream, but she's going to end up getting beaten by the police. I don't know if that's part of the dream. I don't know if that's part of the dream or if that really happens, but let's keep reading. So she opens the door and her beloved's gone, her husband's gone, and it says she sought him. That means she looked for him, she searched for him. But I could not find him, I called him, but he gave me no answer. The watchman that went about the city found, these are the police, okay, the watchman that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me, the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me. Now look, some things just never change, you know, there's nothing new, there's nothing new under the sun. This woman's getting beaten by the police for no reason. Well it's like, what were you doing out at this time, you know, or whatever. So they beat her and said, take that veil off. We need to see who you are, we need to identify you. I don't know if the, I think if you go back to the Hebrew it says that she's tasered, but I don't know, no I'm just kidding. That's probably what the New Living translation changed it to, she's probably beaten and tasered both. So you know, she gets beaten by the police or whatever, they take away her veil, I hope that was just a dream. I hope that didn't, I've had that dream a few times, so maybe that was just a dream. But anyway, it says the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me. I charge you, O you daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved, that you tell him that I am sick of love, meaning not that she's sick of it, but that she's lovesick. You know, she's so in love that it's actually making her sick. Now look what it says in verse 9, it says, what is thy beloved more than another beloved, O thou fairest among women? What is thy beloved more than another beloved that thou dost so charge us? They're saying, you know, what is so great about this guy that you're, you know, your husband, you're praising your spouse, you're praising your beloved, you're telling us how great he is. What's so great about him, they're asking? You know, tell us why he's any better than any other guy that's out there, right? And again, if we were to take kind of a symbolic view on this, you know, it's kind of like, well what makes you think that your religion's right? You know what I mean? And everything else is wrong. You know, why do you think that the Bible's right and that the Quran's wrong or that, you know, the Book of Mormon's wrong or that the Tao Te Ching is wrong or whatever else? And you know, to those of us that are saved, it's a ridiculous question because we know that God's Word is so much greater than all of these other so-called holy scriptures. They can't even hold a candle to it. And it's funny because every once in a while, somebody will quote to you something from the Book of Mormon maybe or something from the Quran and you always just, you just have to just shake your head at it like, are you serious? I mean, it's pretty easy to tell them, you know, you look at the Apocrypha a little bit, you'll see a real big difference. I mean, God's Word cannot be duplicated and plenty of people have tried to duplicate it. I mean, that's what Joseph Smith was doing with the Book of Mormon. I mean, he's trying to duplicate scripture. He thinks he can write his own scripture. It's so obviously a fraud. It's so clearly not God's Word. Same things with these Apocryphal books, same things with the, you know, the Book of Enoch and all this, the Gospel according to Thomas and the, you know, the Quran. I mean, you look at it. It's easy. You say, well, how do you know what's real? You just put them side by side and it's pretty easy to tell the diamond from the cubic zirconium because one's made by man and one's made by God and you can tell a difference. You know, it's, I always, I always tell people like this, you know, the cell phone towers that are made to look like a palm tree, okay, you don't have to be an arborist to be able to tell the difference between a real palm tree and a cell phone that's made to look like a palm tree because what God made is much different than what man made. Man tries to duplicate God's creation and basically, you know, these phony scriptures are like a cell phone looking like a palm tree. You know, we laugh at it. Say it's ridiculous. It's not even close. But that's how these scriptures are. It's funny, I was giving the Gospel to some Muslim teenagers today because we were out soul winning in what I call Little Africa. It's these apartment complexes where everybody's directly from Africa. So we're giving the Gospel to some Sudanese, you know, they're from Sudan. And so they were Muslims. And I gave the whole plan of salvation to these Muslim teenagers and basically I told them, I said, look, I said, here's what the Bible says, you know, that Jesus is the Son of God. You've got to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. You can't just believe Jesus is a prophet like Muhammad teaches, you know, or believe that Jesus is just a messenger. No, the Bible says you must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. I said, do you believe that Jesus is the Lord? And they said no. Said, do you believe he died and was buried and rose again? No, they don't. And I said, you know what, the Bible teaches that you must believe on the Son of God. And I said, the Quran says that Allah has no son. So I said, can both the Bible and the Quran both be true? And they said no. Because one of them says that Jesus is the Son of God, one of them says there's no such thing as the Son of God. So therefore they cannot both be true. So I said, you know, so I said, you know, and he's like, well how do you know that the Bible's right and that the Quran is not right? You know, it's kind of like that. Well, what's your beloved better than the, you know, why is the Bible better than the Quran? I said, okay, I said, let me explain to you why the Bible's better than the Quran. I said, I said, you right now believe that to be saved, to go to heaven, that you have to live a good life, you have to obey the Quran, you have to do these, you know, abstain from sin and do the right things and do the five pillars of Islam, you know, praying and fasting and, you know, going to Mecca, you know, if you can or whatever. But anyway, you know, I have to like water it down. You know, you got to go down, bow down to that giant black, you know, game cube or whatever it is, you know, a giant black cube that they bow down to. But here's the thing, I said, look, I said, I said, you sin every day. I said, you're a sinner. I said, I don't even think you're good enough to go to heaven according to Islam. I don't even think Islam is going to get you there. I said, I said, you're not even that into Islam. I said, you don't even follow Islam. Just because, you know, you just look at these teenagers, they didn't look like they were just devout. They didn't look like they carry a prayer rug everywhere they go, you know what I mean? They're just young teenagers playing basketball. I said, you guys are, and they're like, well, we're a little bit, you know, we kind of, we're kind of following Islam. I'm like, you don't follow Islam, you know what I mean? So then I said, I said, well, look, I said, you have all these sins, right? I said, well, I'm a sinner too. I've got all these sins too, but the difference is that Jesus Christ died on the cross for all my sins, and in him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins. So I said, I just believe that to be saved, I just have to believe on Jesus Christ and all my sins are forgiven. I said, your religion teaches you just be good, follow the rules, follow the commandments, and I said, you've already failed. There's none that doeth good, save one, and that's God. The Bible says, as it is written, there's none righteous, no, not one, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And then he said, well, no, no, no, he's like, this is how it is. In Islam, it's like our good is going to be outweighed by our bad, you know, like if we get to heaven it's going to be like, okay, you've done bad, but then the good makes up for it. I said, okay, try that, try stealing a car, okay? Get arrested for stealing a car and then just go to the courtroom with a list of all the good things you've done. And I don't care how long that list is, I don't care if that list is as long as a receipt from whatever grocery store, you know, that's five feet long, you know, I don't care how long that list is, it's not going to matter at all. They're not even going to admit it as evidence. The prosecutor is going to say, objection, your honor, you know, this is not relevant. You've stolen a car, it doesn't matter how much you gave to charity, it doesn't matter all the good things you've done. I said, good things cannot outweigh bad, but I said, you know, if you were in court for having stolen this car and maybe it was said that, you know, you can either pay a fine of a hundred thousand dollars or go to jail for five years, you know, I said, you don't have a hundred thousand dollars, you're going to jail, but I said someone could step in and pay that fine for you. Some benefactor could produce that hundred thousand and pay that bill and get you off the hook and free you. I said, that's what Jesus Christ did. I said, Jesus Christ is paying for your sins by the fact that he died on the cross for you and if you believe on him, it's paid. But I said, what you're doing is basically you're telling Jesus, no Jesus, I got this. I got this. I'm going to do this on my own. I said, you're going to jail. And I said, are you really confident right now? I said to these Muslim teenagers, I said, are you confident right now to stand before God? Do you really think all the good you've done is going to outweigh all the bad you've done? Are you really confident right now to stand and look at God in the face with your life right now and you think he's just going to let you into heaven? They said they didn't, they didn't, they didn't like that. And I said, I want you to think about this. I said, you know what? This is your life. This is your eternity. Just because you're born Muslim, just because you're born Hindu or Christian or Buddhist or I, you know, you need to think for yourself. You need to figure this out. This is your, this is heaven and hell. You know, they didn't get saved today, but hopefully a seed was planted. You know, hopefully that will get them thinking about the fact that their religion offers no real salvation. So it's pretty easy to tell when you put God's word and when you put the Gospel side by side with the so-called Gospel of Islam, it just doesn't add up. You know, you put it next to the Gospel of Mormonism, you know, the King James Bible is so dramatically better than the Book of Mormon. You know, it's not even able to be compared. It's not even close. So that's what I think of when I see this scripture where they say, you know, well what's your beloved more than another beloved? Kind of like, well, you know, what's the Bible more than all these other holy books? You know, ask some long-haired hippie wearing a tie-dyed shirt at the university, you know. Well, what about all these other holy books? You know, yeah, here's the difference. Because this book is in every nation in the world. I'm sorry, every nation in the world is not filled with Muslims. Every nation in the world is not filled with Hindus. I mean, if you run into Hindus, you pretty much know what country they're from, right? What country are they from? India. Okay, you run into people that are Buddhist, they're usually Asian. Or they're just like these trendy rockers that are just like, yeah, I'm Buddhist, dude, you know. But they're not really that, they're not really Buddhist, you know. They're not, you know, they probably don't, they don't know kung fu or anything, you know. So they're not really a Buddhist. But anyway, you know, you run into people that practice Judaism, 99% of the time, they're, you know, they're basically from Israel or that descendancy or Eastern Europe or whatever. But the bottom line is, the Bible is in every Dollar Tree, every 99-cent store, every country in the world. It's everywhere, every single person almost has at least heard John 3.16 or at least heard John, I mean on the planet. Because God's Word has gone forth unto the ends of the earth and people have heard the name of Jesus. He's the most famous person that has ever lived. He is the most well-known individual that has ever existed in the world. And some people just say he didn't exist. He's the most famous person ever. There's more written about him, there's more said about him, there's more people following him than anybody else, okay. So you know, it's pretty easy to tell why our beloved is better than their beloved. And I like what it says in the Old Testament, you know, their rock is not as our rock. Their God's not like our God. All religions are not equal, my friend. There's the God of the Bible and then there's everything else, which is just a cheap imitation. The Bible says in verse 9, what is thy beloved more than another beloved, O thou fairest among women? What is thy beloved more than another beloved that thou dost so charge us? Verse 10, my beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand. His head is as the most fine gold. His locks are bushy and black as a raven. Now look, obviously everybody looks different. Not everybody's white, not everybody has black hair, not everybody, I mean there's people with blonde hair, there's people red and yellow, black and white. So this isn't saying, well you know, in order to be the best looking, according to the Bible, you know, you're going to be white, you're going to have black hair, you know, you're going to, no, that's not the point. This is just her describing her husband physically. She finds him to be the most handsome man ever, you know, so she's describing, you know, it's okay if you don't fit this bill, it's okay if you look differently than this, I don't have black hair like a raven, you know, I don't really want black hair like a raven, you know. So, you know, everybody looks different, that's not the point. So don't get too hung up on that, but she's just talking about his looks, she's just talking about how handsome he is. She says, his eyes are as the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, washed with milk and fitly set. His cheeks are as a bed of spices, as sweet flowers, his lips are like lilies dropping sweet smelling myrrh. Now look, is that what your wife says about your mouth, back to that first point of the sermon? You know, is your mouth like lilies and sweet smelling myrrh? It better be, right? But anyway, it says in verse 14, his hands are as gold rings set with the barrel. His belly, you say, wow, this guy's got a serious belly. Well but it says, his belly is as bright ivory overlaid with sapphires, okay. Sapphire is the second hardest stone because, you know, diamonds, I mean, I'm not a jeweler or anything, so if I'm getting this wrong, forgive me, but that's what the salesman told me one time. But anyway, you know, diamonds are the number one hardest stone, I guess, from my understanding, and then the sapphire is number two as far as hard. So basically, you know, we're talking about, you know, a strong stomach, you know, if it's being compared unto sapphires. And then it says in verse number, because I don't think she's saying it's blue, you know what I mean, so she's probably referring to the hardness there, the solidness of his stomach. I lost my place. What verse am I in? Help me out. Alright, his, so his belly is as bright ivory overlaid with sapphires, remember how white this guy is, so that's the bright ivory. And then verse 15, it says his legs are as pillars of marble set upon sockets of fine gold, and his countenance is as Lebanon, excellent as the cedars. His mouth is most sweet, and we'll get to that last part. So she's describing him, she's describing his hands, and she's describing his belly, and she's describing his legs, and basically, you know, what we get from this is that this guy's a strong guy, I mean, he's got legs like pillars of marble. Now one thing I would point out about this is that, you know, again, back to what we started out the sermon with, you don't want to just let yourself go just because you're married. You know, people that are single, it's like they really take care of themselves. You know, like when you're single, you shave like twice a day. When you're married, you don't shave at all, you know, at least if you're like me. But anyway, you know, you let yourself go sometimes, the tendency for both male and female is to just say, well, you know what, we've already made a vow till death do us part here, why would I spend any time taking care of myself or making myself look good for my spouse? But you know what, honestly, you should take the time to take care of yourself. And look, I'm not saying that you should sit there and just worry about your appearance and spend all this ton of time, and you know, there are people who spend way too much time on their appearance. You know, there are ladies who literally spend hours in the morning getting ready. And you know what, that would be time probably better spent reading your Bible and praying so that you could have internal beauty, so that you could be right with God. You know, so just spending an inordinate amount of time on your appearance is not what I'm talking about. You know, I'm not saying that you need to spend an inordinate amount of time, you know, organizing or, you know, taking care of yourself and just getting your hair just quaffed just so. But at the same time, you shouldn't just totally let yourself go either, okay, because you don't want to just be a total slob. Just so, I mean, look, when your wife married you, she didn't want you to just become this huge slob. That's not what she wanted when she married you. You know, she didn't want you to just get bigger and bigger and bigger and the showers to get more and more infrequent, you know, and the dental hygiene to just keep getting worse and worse and worse and you just get uglier and slobbier and slovenly and you dress like a slob and you're dirty and you wear, you know, just, I mean, look, I like to try to, honestly, I like to dress nice around my house or at least I like to look presentable around my house. Because I don't have this attitude of, well, when I go to church, how I look is important. And when I get together with friends, how I look is important. I have a philosophy that says when I'm at home with my wife and children, how I look is just as important because the most important people to me in my life are my wife and children. So I want to look my best around them. So I don't just look like a complete slob around them, completely let myself go and then, oh, well, I'll fix myself up for somebody else. Now, look, I don't do a lot of fixing up of myself, okay. I don't comb my hair, I don't, you know, shave except like once a week I'll kind of trim around the edges a little bit. I'm not saying to spend a bunch, but you know what, at least I shower, I brush my teeth, I put on nice clean clothes, I try to look my best and, you know, I just try to stay healthy. I don't, I don't, I'm not going to become a glutton and I'm not going to become sedentary. You know, I just want to be healthy and I want to be, you know, the best possible husband that I can be. And you know what, the same thing goes the other way for wives obviously, you know, should take care of themselves and take care of their body, take care of their health, take care of their appearance. Okay, that's what I get from this passage, you know, she's praising him. And by the way, you know, I think this verse just basically disproves skinny jeans. You know, this thing of like, his legs are like pillars of marble, okay. What is up with these jeans where you're just trying to make your legs look as skinny as they can? It look, you look like a queer when you wear these really skinny jeans, and especially when they're like sagging and showing your underwear. I mean, that's disgusting. My children will get a swift kick in the pants if they ever even thought of dressing that way. And some of these guys, like, they can't even pull their pants up. Like literally, you say to them, pull their pants up, they can't. Because the jeans are designed to where they pull them up and this part right here, the inseam, is that what it's called? The inseam hits, you know, something and it's like they don't get all the way to the waist and they're pulling and pulling, it's not even possible. Don't you dare buy pants like that and call yourself a real man. Get a real pair of pants that go all the way up to your waist and that make your legs look like pillars of marble, not make your legs look like strings of spaghetti or something. You know, you need to get some manly pants and, you know, if you're confused about what men dress like, you need to limit yourself to like Carhartts and Dickies, should be the only two brands you even touch. I mean, look, if you know how to dress as a man, you can wear whatever brand you want. But if you're confused, if this is an area you struggle in, limit yourself to those two brands for a while because I don't think they make skinny jeans. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong. You need to get out of Urban Outfitters, get out of Abercrombie and Fitch, you know, pass by the Gap, okay, and you need to just get dialed in with like some work clothes. Look like a man. Men work. Men wear clothes that are not tight and revealing of their backside. Cover your backside for crying out loud. Okay, so anyway, let's get off that point. I'm deriving that. You say, well, preach the Bible. Pillars of marble. Pillars of marble, and all God's people said, amen. No skinny jeans in the book of Song of Solomon, but it says in verse 16, it says, his mouth is most sweet, yea, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem. I want to finish the sermon tonight just by talking about that word friend because according to the Bible here, our wife should be our friend. Your husband should be your friend, right? Not just a business relationship, not just a roommate, and you know what? A husband and wife should be friends. Let's look at some scriptures in the Bible on friendship to understand what God means here when he talks about a husband and wife being friends, okay? Go to Proverbs. I'm going to show you some scriptures from Proverbs, then we're going to go to the book of John, and I'm going to show you why marriage is supposed to be a friendship and why your husband should be your friend. Your wife should be your friend. And by the way, when you get married, you don't really need as many outside friends because you know what? I like to spend time with my wife more than anybody else. And it's great to have outside friends, but you know what, something's wrong when you're just constantly spending time with everybody else and you have these real close friends and then you're not that close with your wife or you're not that close with your husband. That's not good. I think that your spouse should be your best friend. That should be your main friend, okay, that you spend the most, you know, that should be your preferred companion, in my opinion. Look at Proverbs 17, verse 17. Here's a great scripture on friendship and this could be applied, I think all of these could be applied to husband and wife. It says in Proverbs 17, 17, a friend loveth at all times and a brother is born for adversity. So what is a friend? It's somebody who's there for you in times of adversity. That's who you go to when things go bad. When you're having problems, when you're going through adversity, you go to your friend for support. You go to your friend for encouragement when things are going badly. Well think about this, and it also says a friend loveth at all times. That's in sickness as in health and poverty as in wealth. For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer. Because it's the bad times when we need to show extra love to our spouse, not back off from our spouse. See, you want to be the type of person for your spouse that they can go to you when things are going bad, and they can go to you and you're going to encourage them, not make them feel worse. Right? I mean, you want to be the type of husband where when your wife has a problem and she comes to you with that problem, you're not going to make her feel worse about it, but that you're going to be there for her in a time of adversity. You know, let's say she makes a mistake and does something, you idiot! You want to be there and say, hey, you know, it's alright, we're going to fix this. And you know what, men need to be the pillar of strength in the home because, you know, men need to be there to provide stability. Because women are more emotional than men, and that's not a criticism of women, it's just a fact. I mean, women are just, they're more emotional, they tend to react a little bit more to circumstances than men. Men tend to be able to stay a little more even keeled, okay? And so therefore, as a man, you need to be there when your wife is going through adversity, maybe she's having a really bad day or she's really stressed out about something or something went wrong or she made a mistake or things are going bad. You need to be there to basically talk to her and encourage her. Talk her down sometimes. You know, you got to talk her down and say, hey, everything's fine, you know, and set her mind at ease. Be someone there that's providing stability, okay? Not someone who just makes it worse. Oh great, what are we going to do? But rather trying, you know, and the same thing, you know, husbands, husbands sometimes, you know, have adversity in their lives, right? Let's say, you know, there's a, let's say your husband, you know, loses his job, right? That's bad, that's horrible, right? You know, and he comes home and you know what, obviously any man who loses his job probably, maybe gets laid off, maybe gets fired, maybe it's just, you know, whatever, the work dries up, there's no more work, or whatever. And you know, he comes home and says, you know, I lost my job today. You know, what are you going to say? What are we going to do? You know, he's already upset about losing his job, you know, are you going to just make it worse? Oh you idiot, why can't you hold down a job? You loser. Or are you going to say, that's alright honey, you know, you're going to find a job, it's going to be great, you know, I know you're a hard worker, you know, let's get you a resume together, let's help you find a new job, we're going to get through this, you know, I can cut back some of my spending, we'll figure this out. You know, I'm just saying, and I'm just throwing out some random examples, but look, you want to be somebody as a husband or as a wife who's ready to go through adversity with your spouse. You know, if they become ill, like for example, what if one of the spouses, you know, gets a really bad illness or gets in a horrible accident? You know, there are people who have literally divorced their spouse because their spouse is in the hospital dying of some illness or suffering with some kind of an ailment, you know, that's terrible, that should be the time when you're there the most for that person. And you know, if they're injured and they're hurt, you say, well now, you know, this is just a liability now, but you know what, marriage is not about just take, take, take, it's about what you can give. And the Bible says, a friend loveth at all times and a brother is born for adversity, right? Adversity. Go to chapter 18 verse 24. Proverbs 18 verse 24 says this, a man that hath friends must show himself friendly and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. What the Bible is saying there is that, you know, if we want to have a friend, we need to be a friend. And so instead of sitting and listening to this sermon right now and saying, well man, I do wish my husband would be more of my friend or I wish my wife would be more of a friend. You know, you need to just be a friend. Show yourself friendly and then hopefully the other person will eventually reciprocate. Look at chapter 27. There's a lot of good information on friendship in Proverbs chapter 27, because remember, she said about her husband, you know, she said, he's not just my beloved, he's also my friend. Look at Proverbs 27 verse 5, it says, open rebuke is better than secret love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. You know, look at that verse in verse 5. Open rebuke is better than secret love. Now you know what that tells me? That tells me that not expressing love to your spouse is very hurtful to your spouse. Because he's saying, look, secret love, meaning love that's not shown, love that's not demonstrated, love that's not expressed, love that nobody knows is even there, can be even worse than open rebuke. Now let me ask you this. Do you think that my wife would like it if I just openly rebuked her right now in front of everybody? If I just openly rebuked my wife publicly, obviously that would make her very upset. But you know what? What is worse, according to the Bible, is if I did not express any love to my wife. If I just didn't show any love to my wife. Open rebuke is better than secret love, and open rebuke's not that good necessarily, okay, as far as what you want. So what that tells me is that it's important, and look, the whole book of Song of Solomon is all these expressions of love between husband and wife. That tells me that it's important to us that we express, it's great that you love your, I'm glad you love your wife, but you need to verbalize the love for your wife. You need to tell your wife that you love her often. And wives need to often tell their husband, say well he doesn't care, he's not that romantic type. But you know what? He still needs to be told that you love him. You know, you should still express it. Now some people basically what they'll do is they'll say well, you know, I'm not going to tell my wife that I love her, I'm just going to do nice things for her. That's how I'll show my love. Or maybe wives will say, you know, well I'm not going to tell my husband that I love him, I'm not going to praise him and compliment him, but what I'm going to do is I'm just going to do things for him, like I'll just do some really nice things, I'll make some really good food for him, or I'll, you know, do some things to help him out. But you know what though? You need to also verbalize your feelings also, because sometimes, you know, some people are different in this area. Some people you do something nice for them and they feel very loved. You know, other people need to hear it spoken. And you know, some people are the opposite. Some people you can tell them that you love them all day long and they don't listen, but then when you do something for them, you know, now they believe you, now they feel loved. So you need to express your love toward your spouse in as many ways as possible, you know, and in a way that they understand. You know, and you know what, you need to open your mouth and speak that you love your spouse. And not just say, well, I've told her that I love her and if I change my mind, I'll let her know. You know, I told her five years ago and I'll let you know if that changes. Look at verse number ten. It says, thine own friend and thy father's friend forsake none. And by the way, back to that point in verse five, open rebuke is better than seek or love. You know, your friend will tell you the truth. And sometimes the truth is a rebuke. You know what I mean? Sometimes, I mean, here's the thing, somebody who I'm not that close with, I'm less likely to rebuke them because I don't really feel comfortable rebuking people that I don't really have a strong relationship with. But you know what, the Bible says, rebuke a wise man and he'll love thee. And so someone that I know really well and I know, hey, this is a wise person. This person can handle being rebuked. I'm going to rebuke this person. So if I ever rebuke you, take it as a compliment. It means I believe that you're very wise. You can handle it. But anyway, it says in verse ten, thine own friend and thy father's friend forsake not. See how it says forsake not your friend and forsake not your father's friend? And see, here's the thing, Jesus Christ promised us I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. That should be our motto as husbands to our wife. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. And that should be every wife's motto toward her husband, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. And look, never means never. Amen. No reason. Well, what about this? Nope. What about if this happens? Nope. No exceptions. You say, you don't mean that. Yes, I do. Amen. Yes, I do. Well, what about, you know, what if he's a drunk and what if he, you know, hits me with a pillow and what if he, you know, look, it's for better for worse. Be careful who you marry, you know, but once you're married, you need to stick with them through thick and thin. I mean, it's life. It's marriage. Look at verse 17. It says, iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend. You know, we as friends should make each other better. We should build each other up, not tear each other down. You know, my wife and I have been married for 13 years and, you know, I've learned a lot of great things from my wife that have helped me grow in the Lord and she's learned a lot of great things from me that have helped her grow in the Lord and so we've been able to sharpen each other, okay. We can both grow together and be better as a result of each other. You know, often opposites attract, right, and we talked about this a lot in Song of Solomon chapter 3, how in a lot of ways opposites attract. Now sometimes people get married that are very much alike, you know. Most of the time, husband and wife are very different from one another in a lot of ways. My wife and I are very different in a lot of ways and probably if you thought about you and your spouse, there are probably a lot of differences between you and your spouse, right? This is another thing about internet dating, you know, which didn't really exist when I was dating so I dated everybody in the human realm but the thing is, like, the thing about internet dating is that some of these internet dating sites, they say they'll match you up on like 50 points of compatibility. Who knows what I'm talking about? Basically they say we're going to match you up on, you know, 35 points of compatibility, make sure that you guys are just totally compatible and I'm thinking to myself, okay, if I go on this dating site, right, and type in all my stats, is my sister going to come up? I mean, is this going to tell me to marry my sister? Because I mean, look, who are you probably the most like? Your sister. I mean, you know, because you grew up together. So it's like, you know, I don't want to marry my sister. I don't want to marry somebody who's just like me. Why would I want to marry somebody who's just like me? What's, you know, I want to marry somebody who's different than me, okay? And here's the thing, if you marry someone who's just like you, you're probably, whatever bad traits you have are just going to be compounded. But what's great is, what's great is when you can marry someone, because you might be sitting here tonight thinking, man, you know, me and my spouse are just not compatible. eHarmony never would have approved this marriage, you know. We are incompatible on every point. But in some ways that could be good. Now if you and your spouse are a lot alike, fine, but I'm just saying, you know, if there are a lot of differences between you and your spouse, that's actually good. Because the differences can help you balance each other, right? You know, basically her strengths can kind of help out with your weaknesses. And your weaknesses can kind of help out with her strengths. For example, what if you have two people who are kind of like slobs? Think about how bad that house is going to look. Think about how those kids are going to grow up, right? Okay, but what if you have two people that are just neat freaks? You know, that might not be the best thing either, you know. It'd be good if maybe the one who's a little bit looser with the organization can kind of get you to chill out a little bit if you're obsessive compulsive, right? And then also the one who's more of a neat freak can kind of get Mr. Slob or Ms. Slob, you know, to get things cleaned up a little bit. Do you see how we can actually help each other grow and basically I can use my strengths to help my wife and help her fix things about herself. And then my wife's strengths can kind of make up for some of my weaknesses. And that we don't just, oh, you know, we're both matching up on 35 points of compatibility. You know, we're both vegan, we both run, we're both obsessive compulsive neat freaks, we both love cats, you know, for dinner, you know. We both, you know, we both, whatever, and you know, we both grew up in the same town and, you know, we're both white with blonde hair and blue eyes and, you know, it's like, are you sure you're not related? You know, you better check a genealogy, buddy. You might be marrying your second cousin, that might not even be legal. You know, because, I mean, do you really know all your second cousins? You could probably easily accidentally marry one on one of these dating sites. You know, you better be careful, right? Better check, you know, I know the Bible says to avoid genealogies, but this might be a case where you might want to whip one out and just do a quick double check, but let me close my sermon with this, John chapter 15, and look, if you met your spouse on the internet, I'm not down on you at all, I'm just saying that that's a danger if you're going online just trying to find somebody identical to you, and I know some people met their spouse online that are very different from one another, okay, but I'm saying some of these websites, they advertise this, you know, like, we're going to find somebody that's just like you. It's like, I already have me, you know, I want someone different, but anyway, look at John chapter 15, John chapter 15 verse 12, it says this, this is my last verse on friendship here, it says, this is my commandment that you love one another, as I have loved you, greater love hath no man than this, than that a man lay down his life for his friends. So that's a pretty strong love that friends should have. He loved hath no man this, than man lay down his life for his friends. And then, but watch verses 14 and 15, it says, ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you. Henceforth I call you not servants, for the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth, but I have called you friends for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you. Now here's what's interesting, is that, does friendship mean that there's no authority structure in place? I mean the Bible clearly teaches the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ the head of the church. The Bible commands wives to obey their husbands, to submit to their husbands, to be subject unto their husbands. And it says in 1 Peter chapter 3, even as Sarah also obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, whose daughters ye are, as long as ye do well, and are not afraid with any amazement. So the Bible teaches that the husband is the Lord of his wife, the head of his wife, that the wife is to obey her husband. That's what the Bible says. Now listen, that doesn't mean that they're not friends though. You say, oh, oh, your wife's just a slave, oh, oh, you know, you ah, you ah. Shut up. But anyway, it says in John chapter 15 here, he says, the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth, but I've called you friends for all things that I've heard of my Father I've made known unto you. So look, it's not that Jesus wasn't the boss, because Jesus said in the same exact sermon that he's preaching, in the book of John, same sermon, he said ye call me Lord and Master, you do well because that's what I am, you're Lord and Master. Okay, but he says, you know what though, you're not just servants to me. You're more than a servant. You're above a servant. You're my friends. I mean, wouldn't that be great to be sitting at that table and Jesus says, you know what, you're not just my servant, Stephen Anderson, you're my friend, you know, or whatever your name is. You know, you are my friend. And so look, people have the wrong view of marriage. They think, oh, if the husband's the boss, that means that it's just this cruel, cold arrangement. You know, no, the Bible says you could be friends and they're still a boss. You know, you can still be friends and still do whatsoever they command you and still be friends. And look, it says that the servant knows not what his Lord is doing. So it's not like because I'm my wife's lord or head of the household, it's not like I just say to her like, you know, if she asks me about something about, you know, our household or about our finances, you know, it's not like I'm just going to say, you just don't worry your pretty little head about that. You know, you don't need to know about that. You don't need to know. I mean, I should communicate with my wife and I can talk to my wife and tell her what's going on and include her in what's going on and what we're doing, just like Jesus does with us. He's not leaving us in the dark. He's not telling us, just shut up and do what you're told. That's not what Jesus said. And you know, there's this trendy new thing of saying that, you know, we are Jesus Christ's slave. We're his slave, dude. You know, and they have these like, these trendy pastors. You know, the trendy pastors, like the spiked hairdo and the skinny jeans and, you know, the graphic t-shirt. And they're like, dude, you guys need to realize that, you know, our relationship with Christ is that we're his slave. As they like don't do anything that he told them to do, as they ignore all his commandments, as they live a licentious, lascivious life, dude, we're his slave. And you know, you look at modern Bible versions, sometimes they'll even put the word slave in. I don't remember off the top of my head if it's the ESV or the NIV or the HIV or whatever. But you know, these new versions will put in, you know, instead of saying that we're the servant of Christ, that we're his slave. Well, you know what? When the Bible says servant, it's leaning more toward the friend side of the spectrum than just a slave. I am not Jesus Christ's slave. I'm sorry. I'm not. I'm his friend. I'm his servant. I want to serve him, but I'm not a slave. That is not what the, and by the way, people always say, oh, the Bible teaches slavery. The word slave is never in this book one time. The word slave is never used in this book one single time. And you know, I think it's John MacArthur that has some, you know, the guy who denies the blood of Christ, he has a book out, you know, we're Christ's slave for the intellectual, you know, not the, because you know, you've got these modernist, liberal, rock and roll, rock on for Jesus, dude. You know, you've got those type of pastors. Then you've got the more intellectual, you know, John MacArthur, John Piper. We're his slave. We are Jesus Christ's slave. No we're not. We're his friends. And you know what? People say, ah, your wife's your slave. Look, she's my friend. She's my friend, but I'm still the boss. That's what the Bible says. Doesn't the Bible just have all the answers? Song of Solomon's a great book. There's a lot there. You know, sometimes you pass over stuff, but you know, hopefully you're learning this stuff as you come. You know, we've got three more weeks in Song of Solomon. You know, you need to put this stuff into practice in your life and not just say, oh, that was a cute sermon. You need to read the Bible. You need to listen to the sermon. I hope you're going home and reading Song of Solomon more, trying to understand it, trying to grasp it, and trying to implement it in your own marriage and in your own home. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for your word, and we thank you that we are your friends. I mean, what a blessing to be called your sons and your brethren and your friends. And you've given us the great privilege of not just being a slave, not even just being a servant, but rather being a friend and a brother and so forth. Please just help us to walk worthy of that calling.