Well, it has certainly been a full and wonderful time. The theme has been the King and the kingdom. We have heard much concerning the relationship of the kingdom and the church, the dynamics of each working upon the other, bringing it to the end, the bride, and the New Jerusalem—all these wonderful things we have heard.
And then Lance was faithful to speak about the King and His character, and took the whole time I was supposed to speak about the King—and he spoke about the King. But, as he explained in his excuse, the character of the kingdom is the character of the King. And so the Lambert kingdom rambled all over my material.
As we come to this last meeting, we are so thankful that the Lord Jesus is the Alpha and the Omega. I especially take confidence in that, since I have turned out to be the first one to speak and the last one to speak.
But I believe that the Lord is telling us to lift up our heads, that the King of glory may come in. How we need to see the kingdom of God in our midst, and the church perfecting that kingdom. What a wonderful reality we have heard this week.
Again tonight, we want to read some passages. We begin in the Gospel of John, chapter 15.
And, as you will soon see tonight, I am left with a burden I want to share on the King of love, which unfortunately Lance spoke on this morning—although he called it, I think, the kingdom of love.
John 15, beginning in verse 9:
Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love.
If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.
These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.
This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you.
Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.
You are My friends if you do what I command you.
No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.
You did not choose Me, but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you.
This I command you, that you love one another.
And then in 1 John, chapter 4, beginning in verse 7:
Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.
The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.
By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit.
We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.
Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.
And we have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.
And then finally, we want to turn to the Song of Solomon. Let us read verses 1 through 4 of chapter 1:
The Song of Songs, which is Solomon’s.
May he kiss me with the kisses of his mouth!
For your love is better than wine.
Your oils have a pleasing fragrance;
Your name is like ointment poured forth;
Therefore the maidens love you.
Draw me after you and let us run together!
The King has brought me into his chambers.
We will rejoice in you and be glad;
We will extol your love more than wine.
Rightly do they love you.
And then verse 12 of chapter 1:
While the King was at his table,
My perfume gave forth its fragrance.
My beloved is to me a pouch of myrrh
Which lies all night between my breasts.
My beloved is to me a cluster of henna blossoms
In the vineyards of En-gedi.
How beautiful you are, my darling,
How beautiful you are!
Your eyes are like doves.
How handsome you are, my beloved,
And so pleasant!
Indeed, our couch is luxuriant!
The beams of our houses are cedars,
Our rafters, cypresses.
I am the rose of Sharon,
The lily of the valleys.
Like a lily among the thorns,
So is my darling among the maidens.
Like an apple tree among the trees of the forest,
So is my beloved among the young men.
In his shade I took great delight and sat down,
And his fruit was sweet to my taste.
He has brought me to his banquet hall,
And his banner over me is love.
Sustain me with raisin cakes,
Refresh me with apples,
Because I am lovesick.
Let his left hand be under my head
And his right hand embrace me.
Just a word of prayer.
Our Father, we come to You tonight. We thank You so much for Your Son, the Messiah, the King of glory, our Lord, the friend of sinners, the lover of little children.
So many ways we have seen You and touched You this week, as You have drawn near to us by Your mercy and through the Holy Spirit. Once again, we come for a final session and ask that You would quicken us—mind, soul, body, spirit—that we could receive the things of God and have revealed to us that which You desire to reveal.
We place this into the hands of the Holy Spirit, the divine Teacher, who writes Christ into our hearts and transforms us from glory to glory. We thank You for these precious times we have had together, and do continue to work in our hearts even as we are together in this last hour. We pray in Jesus’ precious name. Amen.
We know from the Scriptures that there is a throne, a transcendent throne above all time and space, full of glory. It beams with emerald, gold, and white light, as living ones circle over the top, saying, “Holy, holy, holy. Heaven and earth is full of Thy glory.”
There is this place, this throne, that has been there before the foundation of the world. And there is a divine counsel there.
There was a stirring, a mysterious stirring in the divine counsel, and the question: “Whom shall We send, and who will go for Us?” Long before Isaiah was ever born, the Son of God said, “Here am I. Send Me.”
In the fullness of time, this King of glory took off His raiment of glory and His standing before all those bowed before the throne, and came to earth—a secret King, a servant King.
He came and proclaimed good news to seeking people. The King and the kingdom of God had come. The people were excited. The land was explosive as this Anointed One walked through Galilee especially, performed miracles, spoke in the light, and redeemed and recovered that which was broken and that which was lost. He had come to save sinners.
What a wonderful King this was, but only seen by revelation as the King—and only by a few.
It was finally through the death of this King that the kingdom opened up to all. And praise God, since that time, when Jesus rose from the dead and ascended up on high at the right hand of the Father, once again King in glory, having finished the work, the mystery of God was revealed.
God loved the world. It is a mystery that, as our brother Lance shared this morning, who can understand it? But this is the proof that God loved the world: He sent His Son into the world, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but be transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of His beloved Son.
What a tremendous King this is that we have been looking at in these days. Since that time, multitudes have been transferred into this kingdom of the Son of the Father’s love.
Most of us have been there too, and have experienced that grace, the forgiveness, the freedom, the healing in our lives, the peace, and the love of the Father. As John, in his letter, speaks to the little children, he says, “Behold what manner of love the Father has given unto us, that we should be His children and be called the children of God.”
What wonderful love we have seen from the Father. And the Holy Spirit has been given to us, within us, upon us, and around us, in order to transform us, prepare us, and bring us from glory to glory until we can stand in that kingdom as sons of glory with the King Himself, the Messiah, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Then we heard this plan being unfolded, and our brother Stephen brought to us this great picture of destiny, the Parousia, and the soon fulfillment of all these things that have been recorded in the Gospels of the kingdom of God.
There is only one more thing I want to say tonight, and it is one more revelation. My thought as I came and was preparing was that I wanted to share those things that need to be revealed to our hearts.
The King of glory needs to be revealed to our hearts. The more clearly we see how glorious our King is, the more our devotion, submission, and service are marked by His character.
I tried to share the fact that, though we know the words so well—Jesus is the Christ—we need a revelation of the Christ in such a living way that the Holy Spirit will be poured out upon us. You see, it is His very personal anointing upon each one and upon the church for specific commissions and specific callings.
Jesus, the Anointed One and the Anointing One, has come to pour out His Spirit on us and make us effectual servants in the kingdom. We have tried to talk about these two revelations, and now tonight, just one more revelation of the King.
We are introduced to it by the disciple whom Jesus loved—John. If you will turn to John again, to chapter 14, I want to show a few words in John 14:21.
The disciple whom Jesus loved recalled some very intimate conversations that Jesus had with His disciples just before He went to Calvary. John records some of these things uniquely in his Gospel, including John 14:21:
He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him.
What a wonderful promise for those who keep His commandments. And verse 23:
Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him.”
Jesus begins to share intimate things with His disciples. Now, we know that the Father’s love is impartial. He loves all His children. He gives us grace, grants us forgiveness, and holds us in His hand.
We know the Father’s love. He loves all equally, and there is no child of God who can say in truth, “Our Father has neglected us.” No, the Father’s love is known by us.
John says, “Now, little children, I am writing to you: now you know the Father. Little children, I am writing to you: now you know your sins have been forgiven.” All of us, all the children of God, enter into the Father’s love.
But there is something further for those who would go further. There is something more and deeper in this intimacy, which comes about when there are those who abide in His love and keep His commandments.
In John 15, Jesus shares very precious and intimate words regarding this abiding. Sometimes, as Christians, we think this is automatic: “I abide in Christ; Christ abides in me.” Well, that is our position for sure in Christ Jesus. But now He is talking about a relationship that remains in Christ, keeps His commandments, and listens to His voice.
We remember these words in John 15:9: “Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love.” Then, in John 15:14: “You are My friends if you do what I command you.”
Very interesting, is it not? “No longer do I call you slaves.” Let us remember: this word slave, as our brother has shared several times, is the word bondslave. This is the word doulos.
A bondslave is not just a bondslave; a bondslave is somebody who is a loving bondslave. “I no longer call you My bondslaves. I know you came to Me of your own free will and gave yourself to Me. You bowed in service before Me. So I no longer call you My beloved bondservants. Now I bring you into a friendship, and I declare to you things that the Father has spoken to Me, because you are My friends.”
We have what we might think is a paradox, but it is not really one at all. God the Father loves all His children. But then there are those whom Jesus loves, even as John, who writes this Scripture. There are those who have become His friends.
Now, let us make a distinction here. I do not want you to be confused. When we sing the gospel song, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” it is absolutely correct, absolutely wonderful, and absolutely true. What a friend we have in Jesus.
But John 15 is talking about whether we are His friends. Can Jesus say, “What a friend I have in you”? That is a different song.
Indeed, Jesus is our friend, and we count on it many times. But now this is talking about His friends. His friends have gone deeper. His friends have abode with Him, not merely come in and out, and in and out, and in and out.
His friends have listened to Him and kept His commandments. They have not just said, “I will think about it, Lord. I will come back later. Give it to me again. What was that? Oh yes, I forgot. Well, I will think about it.”
No, these are ones who have come to a deeper level. They are bondslaves, but now friends. And some things begin opening to His friends.
I want to get to the point of the revelation that I believe is something so mysterious and so deep that, even as I speak it, it will not be seen except by those who know.
For those who have given their hearts to the Lord, for those who are His loving, free-will bondslaves, for those who have abode with Him and listened to Him and pressed into Him and desired to know Him—for those who have a heart after Him—the day comes when He comes to one of His friends.
And He kisses him on the mouth.
Suddenly, you are struck and lovesick, as something is opened to you that you never realized before. You had known the love of a Father, but never known the love of a lover.
But it turns out that the King is a lover.
We are so hesitant to say that, and with good reason, because lover means everything wrong today. But how else can we say it? He is a true lover.
This King is true love—a lover of such passion and strength and jealousy and joy and aggressiveness and delightfulness and intimacy that we cannot talk about it. It is there, and it happens, and it captures, and it is mysterious.
We dare not even talk about it because it would seem presumptive. Who can say, “Hey, I have been kissed by Jesus”? It just sounds like something is wrong. It seems too intimate, something we could never initiate.
But you see, He initiates it. There is nothing you can do except receive the kisses upon your mouth.
And so the Shulamite falls in love and becomes lovesick. We need to go over there and look at that, because there is a picture for us in the Song of Solomon of a great mystery.
What is the great mystery? This is about Solomon and a Shulamite woman—translated, a nobody. It is a tremendous mystery because this is the greatest king upon the earth.
When we think of a kingdom, of course, we think of all those outward things that make for pomp and ceremony and authority and armies and a courtroom and a throne and emissaries and people bowing down and victories and prosperity and gold upon gold—all those things, all of which Solomon possessed.
He was a glorious king. I do not know who had more wealth, Solomon or Herod, but Solomon had real wealth: wealth of wisdom in the fear of the Lord, as well as all that he accumulated during his lifetime.
What a kingdom this is. These are the things we sense about the kingdom. Even when Jesus, though He was a hidden King, was on this earth, we saw a kingdom. We saw authority. We saw purpose. We saw Him moving. We saw things happen. We saw the enemy bound. We saw really powerful things from the King.
Now we are a kingdom. What do you think of when you hear kingdom? You think of bearing the cross and serving the Lord; using His authority to bind and to loose; finding the keys of the kingdom; praying, worshiping, standing our ground, and saying, “Jesus Christ is Lord,” here upon this earth.
We are a testimony to that. In the kingdom there is violence, there is service, there is reality, there is hiddenness, and there is heavenliness. We talk about the kingdom and think about all these things.
We know that at the center of the kingdom, for everybody who is in the kingdom, there is a cross. So there is persecution, suffering, and sacrifice in this kingdom.
But now I ask you a simple question: What did the kingdom look like to the Shulamite woman?
There was Solomon’s kingdom, but what did it look like to the Shulamite woman?
When we go back to the Song of Solomon and open it up at the very beginning, we see that the great mystery has already happened. She says, “May he kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for his love is better than wine. Your oils are a pleasing fragrance. Your name is like purified oil; therefore the maidens love you.”
She has already been kissed, and she wants some more. She is in love. We do not know the mystery story behind it, but you have to imagine something happened.
We have to picture perhaps a young Solomon, who one day left his blueprints for the building of the temple, left all the people coming in for counsel and wisdom, took a horse—or whatever—and went out into the country. There he spied this dark maiden.
He went to her, looked in her eyes, and talked to her. He told her she was beautiful and lovely. Then all of his poetry snowed her royally with statements of her loveliness.
As she bowed and smiled and looked up at him, he kissed her—and then went away.
He could go back and pick up the blueprints again and do all the things one does in the kingdom. But that Shulamite woman—her vision of the kingdom was Solomon.
She was in love.
This is a great mystery that we see among God’s children. In the midst of our serving, loving, pursuing, and living, sometime when we least expect it, our King—this King of glory—comes down to us.
He speaks something into your heart that captures your heart. He speaks something so personally to you that it is a fearful thing. It is beyond imagination. You cannot make up what He would say to you.
If we truly are loved and kissed by the King, there is a secret there that you should keep. He shared His heart.
Can you imagine this glorious King sharing His heart with this dark, simple maiden? Can you imagine the King of glory sharing His heart with you or me? Is this even an issue of her worthiness? Is that even on the table?
But what she could say was this: after saying, “Please, raisin cakes, please. I am lovesick”—I do not know quite how that is a connection; she just needed something to chew on—she could confess one thing:
He did it. I did not do it.
Now listen, please. A servant girl in the kingdom of Israel under Solomon would never go and take the initiative with the king and say, “Hey, what is going on, buddy?” You did not speak unless you were spoken to. You did not look into the eyes of somebody unless they said, “Look at me.”
He did it. He took the initiative. There is no doubt about that. He is the One who had to approach her.
As she would say to her friend, “He chose me. He came and told me. He said, ‘You did not choose Me; I chose you.’” You remember what He said to His friends back there in John 15.
And then, after kissing me, you know what He did? He brought me into this banqueting room, and He had a big sign up there: “Solomon loves Shulamite.” He said, “Here, honey, you sit down right there.” Then they brought in—I do not know—a cow, chickens, sushi, and oh my goodness!
She could smell the fragrances and all of the things. We all know there are three little couplets in the Song of Solomon that you all know. As a result of this encounter and the initial conquest, the Shulamite says in Song of Solomon 2:16:
My beloved is mine, and I am his.
She is reckless in her love. You have to sense that somewhere in there, because she has put herself first: “My beloved is mine.” You get the feeling that somehow she reckons she caught him somehow. Absolute joke. She caught him? Oh yes—she is the prize, and he is the smitten suitor.
But that is what Solomon let her think.
She had no status at all until that day. She was neglected, or belittled, by her own family and made to work in places that made her dark with suntan, with hands rough from work and all that kind of thing.
She had no status in herself, but suddenly there was Somebody who loved her. How do you say it? The King of kings, the glorious Solomon, is the One who loves me.
Even though she did not quite understand what he was saying, he spoke to her, swarthy and dark as she was—and perhaps plain; I do not want to say plain, she must have been beautiful—he spoke to her as if she were a queen in full blossom, beautiful, the picture of perfection.
That is what he spoke to her. Of course, she could not believe it, but she was glad he was blind with love. She took it and said, “Give me more, honey. Tell me more. How about my arms?”
He poetically could describe everything. She was lovesick. He protested his love for her in every way and showed her that he loved her.
We can say that she was foolish or silly for saying, “My beloved is mine, and I am his,” but she was lovesick. He knows how insecure she was.
God’s children are so insecure. They are sure they are barely saved, and wonder, “How could the King look upon me?” Until the point is clear that the King loves you and sees you perfected in glory, you could never believe it.
This Shulamite could never have believed it. So we see, in this first stage very simply, and I want to pause and ask you this question: Is she you?
Have you been serving God? Have you been reading the Word and praying, desiring to be His witness, trying this and that, perhaps failing or succeeding, growing in the Lord in fits and starts? However you perceive your Christian life, you have been devoted to the Lord.
Has He kissed you? Do not ask me to explain what that means. But you know if you have been kissed, there is nowhere else to go.
You might even want to escape your responsibility, your charge, your school, your environment, but you know there is nowhere to go but to Him. You have been kissed.
What word has He been speaking to you? Have you been just rolling it all off your back, like a duck rolls water off there? Do you believe the Word of God?
Or do you say, “No, no, no, that cannot be about me. It must be somebody else. No, no, no, I could never be a son in glory. No, no, no, part of the bride? I do not think so. I think I will be outside, gnashing my teeth.”
There are a lot of Christians who say, “Please, just let me be outside gnashing my teeth. That is fine. No mansion for me, just a little shack. That is all I want.”
But if the King has ever come and spoken to you of love, He does not speak in incomplete terms. He does not speak of partiality, or say, “You are halfway,” or, “You are only going to make it halfway,” or, “You are a half-wit,” or whatever. Those are our descriptions, and those are lies of the enemy.
When the King comes and kisses you, there is something He wants to bring home to your heart forever: you are His, and He is yours.
When that issue is through, when you have solved that issue, and you can say, “Jesus is mine,” it has nothing to do with how perfect I have been, how good I have been, or anything like that. I just know Jesus is mine.
That assurance of salvation—the Moravians were very strong about assurance of salvation. The Moravians always talked to John Wesley: “Now John, do you have the assurance of your salvation?” Because until that happens, you are in and you are out; you are saved and you are lost; you do not know where you are.
When you can say, “My beloved is mine; I am his; and his banner over me is love,” then we are coming into this mystery.
The second couplet is found in Song of Solomon 6:3. Now she has gone through some things, which I will try to briefly describe. In chapter 6, verse 3, she says:
I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.
Now you notice that Jesus is in first place. Solomon is in first place: “I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.” He is the One who counts. I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.
Thank God for that confidence. In chapters 3 through 6, her perspective has changed, and now Solomon comes first.
When she was first lovestruck, she came first: “My beloved is mine. Tell me some more love. Come on, come on.” Now, “I am my beloved’s. I am going to tell him how much I love him.”
Some things have happened during this period of time. There has been a series of events that have deepened that love. She has had panic attacks, where she woke up in the middle of the night and could not find him. She ran out into the street and said, “Where is he? Where is he?” And immediately, boom, boom—he grabs her, hugs her, and says, “Here I am.”
Sometimes in our lives, that separation, that longing, makes us realize how precious His love is. Oh, what we take for granted until it is removed for a little while. Sensing that dryness, we fly and say, “Where is He? Where is He?” He says, “Here I am,” and calms our fears.
We get these panic attacks: “Oh, I do not think He loves me anymore. I have done something wrong. He does not love me anymore.” Yet when you read these things, Solomon never says anything negative to her. Most of her negative estimate is her own.
As she watches, Solomon starts coming on the scene in different ways. She looks at him and keeps looking at him, and she starts to see his glory, his beauty, his power, and his kingdom.
She starts to realize, “Wow, this guy is doing important things. This guy is big.” I do not know whether this Shulamite woman could comprehend Solomon’s real authority and responsibilities as a king. She just knew a lover, could I say?
Now she watches him and says, “Wow, this is a king of kings. This guy is clever. This guy is handsome. This guy is loved by everybody. Everybody loves this guy, and he loves me.”
Now his value has shot way up on the stock market. Her love is going deeper because she sees him as he is.
She also decreases. There is that little adventure where he comes knocking on the door in the middle of the night and says, “Come, come out, my beloved, come out.” She says, “Oh, I cannot come out. I am already in bed.”
She is hoping to hear a little more: “Oh, honey, I love you so much. Please, please come out.” No—suddenly, just silence. She says, “Wait, wait, wait. I did not really mean that. Oh, wait!” She opens the door, and he is gone.
Now she is humiliated, reproving herself: “What have I done? Have I missed a chance? What is going on? How could I do this?” She starts running out, and people start knocking her around.
She gets a little desperate and realizes how much her status, identity, and everything is wrapped up in him. By reason of distance, and by reason of his vanishing as it were, she becomes a seeker after him.
All this time he continues to speak his love to her, but now she is starting to chase after him. Everybody she meets, she says, “Where is he? Where is he? You know who I am talking about—the most lovely person in this world. Where is he? I have to find him.”
“I made a mistake.” And, of course, they find each other. Oh, how wonderful! She is decreased, and he is increased. The longing caused by separation, and the love stirred through separation—these exercises in love are part of this relationship.
She realizes there are walls separating him and her: walls that other people are putting up, and walls that she is putting up. All of that needs to go. She does not want walls anymore, because, “I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.”
He is first. He is her status. He is the focus. She is glad, and she wants to hang on to him. Thus we come to the second profession.
The third one we find in Song of Solomon 7:10. It has changed just a little bit:
I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for me.
Through chapters 6, 7, and 8, she goes on through more parts of this deepening relationship. Now she is getting a little incredulous that he could ever really think anything of her, because she has decreased, but he has increased.
“I am my beloved’s.” He is no longer merely number one. He is all to her.
This is the point where the dear apostle Paul says, “For to me, to live is Christ.” No more, “Jesus is number one.” No, Jesus is all. Jesus is life.
Once it was the blessing; now it is the Lord. Here comes somebody who sees that this is life. Life is Christ. Life is this union. Life is this love.
She has found a union with him, and she has said, “I never want to be apart from you.” He says, “I never want to be apart from you.” Now they are abiding.
They are abiding and speaking in this abiding. There is a relationship, a dialogue, and a continual talk of love one to another.
Look at Song of Solomon 8:5:
Who is this coming up from the wilderness
Leaning on her beloved?
She knows where to be. If he is riding, she is riding. In the second stage, she did not realize how important the King’s missions were. Now she goes with the King and co-labors with him in all his doings. They go visit the vineyards.
His fragrance has become her fragrance. They find time to help her little sister come into love and fullness and blessing. The picture is now love that has found this kind of union, where their love is entrusted one to another.
The lover and the King of love are together. And it ends:
Hurry, my beloved,
And be like a gazelle or a young stag
On the mountains of spices.
There is so much you could say about this. There are so many pictures and wonderful devotional thoughts with every one of these pictures. But very simply, the song ends, and there is still singing, and there is still great love for one another.
Now I make a simple point tonight, and here it is: the kingdom is a serious reality involving our submission, our bearing the cross, and our obeying the King.
But if we miss the backstory—that behind all of the kingdom, the working, and the serving, there is the love of a lover pursuing a lover—we have missed the whole point.
At the deepest level, you find the apostle Paul is not serving God saying, “Well, I am serving Him anyway, even though I am here in jail, because I know one day I will get my reward, even though it really stinks right now.”
No. What do you find the apostle Paul saying? Is not Philippians a lover pursuing a lover? Paul has been kissed, and he is pursuing the One who has laid hold of him. He is going to pursue Him up to heaven.
He knows who is his life and what is gain to him. Do you see it? Philippians, very simply, is lover running after lover. Paul has been kissed and is running over.
There is a love story behind so much. I do not know if you remember—it was, I think, the first message of our dear brother Stephen. He said, “We go from glory to glory by tribulation to tribulation.”
But do you remember the last little thing he said? “The secret is we discover His love.” You remember that?
What do we discover in our kingdom service? Do we discover, “Ah yes, I served well,” or, “I am a great servant,” or, “Oh, look how wonderful the kingdom is”?
No, what we really discover is, “Oh, I love the King, and the King loves me.” Our motivation is to pursue this One who has pursued us.
This is a deep revelation, or a deep secret. I do not know if we can understand it unless we have been kissed.
But I do know, when we look around and think of that parable in Luke 15, there are many, many children of God who are like the elder brother: dutiful, fastidious, keeping records and accounts, jealous of anything that he does not get, working hard and trying to gain approval.
All the time, he is missing the hugs and the kisses of his father. He just cannot conceive of a father who would do that.
When the prodigal comes home—that worthless character—and the father kisses him, hugs him, and puts a robe on him, the elder brother is infuriated.
There are so many Christians who have never been hugged and never been kissed by our Lord, and all they are is full of anger: “Why am I left out?”
Such a shame.
In the end, He kisses by grace. What was there about the Shulamite? Was there some great mystery? Grace. Love. Love is love. God is love.
He found her. He wooed her. He captured her. Now she is running after Him, and He is running after her. That is the story. That is the end of the story.
Behind the story of servants of the kingdom, you will see this. Let me give you just a couple of examples.
Our brother Lance keeps bringing up C. T. Studd, so I am going to ask a question: How many of you have read C. T. Studd: Pioneer Cricketer?
You have heard this C. T. Studd guy enough that all of you have an assignment. About thirty hands went up here. You really need to read his story.
The point I would like to make is this: C. T. Studd had been kissed by the Lord and pursued Him all his life. But C. T. Studd was not an emotional guy. He does not tell a romantic story. This guy is tough.
But I will tell you how love is expressed just as really as romantic ravishing: he delighted in obedience. The Lord asked him to do things, and he said, “I will do it, Lord.”
“Now, You will have to take care of my body because it is falling apart. But if You tell me to…” In the last year of his life, he was translating, I think, the New Testament into a local African language. He was working at it seventeen or eighteen hours a day, even though he had problems with gallstones and was in great pain.
But he said, “The Lord told me to do it. That is it. Never mind my body. He will sustain me if He told me to do it.” He delighted in obeying the Lord.
This was the thing that so touched F. B. Meyer. F. B. Meyer was a young, wonderful preacher in England, but in the early days of his ministry, as he confesses, his life was a little up and down, hot and cold.
On one occasion, he had a chance to stay in the same house with C. T. Studd and another Cambridge cricketer who loved the Lord. Early in the morning, he heard rumbling and rambling and noise. Of course, it ruined F. B. Meyer’s sleep.
Finally, he goes in and sees C. T. Studd. He has his Cambridge jacket on, wrapped around him with some kind of rug or something. He is walking back and forth, walking back and forth.
F. B. Meyer said, “What are you doing? What are you doing?” He said, “Oh, I woke up this morning, and I am checking off the commandments of Jesus that I find in the Bible to see if there is any one of those commands He wants me to do, and maybe I have neglected it or have not read it. I am just checking them all off.”
F. B. Meyer said, “Oh, how can I be like that?” This C. T. Studd delighted to do the will of God.
Over his grave—and I do not even know where his grave is, probably in Africa—it should be written:
I delight to do Thy will, O God.
With all else that could be said about that man, he delighted to do the will of God. You can tell somebody who has been kissed, even when they are not emotional, because they do the will of God. They are not mumble, grumble, rumble—the murmuring multitudes.
We have murmuring multitudes in the church. How about those who delight to do the will of God? It is so refreshing, is it not? It is a sign of real love.
Here is another love story we find in the Bible besides the apostle Paul. I do not know if you believe this: Jacob and the Lord. It is a love story.
You say, “No, it is not a love story. This is terrible—terrible Jacob doing terrible things, and God letting him do it until finally God tackles him and tears out his arm, his leg. This is terrible business.”
No, it is God’s love. No, it is. It is. Our problem with love is that we have some kind of pitiful little romantic love that comes from a record in the 1960s that we heard.
God’s love is vital and dangerous. You are surprised by His jealousy, His dealings, His passion, His loving, His sometimes forgiving, and the latitude He gives you. Then He restricts you. His love is indescribable.
But you look at Jacob’s life, and there it is. He never let Jacob go. He was never going to let Jacob go. “Jacob, I have loved you with an everlasting love.”
That is why Romans 9, 10, and 11 is a continuation of the Jacob-and-the-Lord love story. You say, “What?” Yes, yes, yes. Do we understand God’s love? When He chooses, He does not let go.
But it is love. It is love. When you give into it, it is sweet. If you fight it, you have a fight on your hands—and I think He wins.
The King’s love is so surprising. It is surprising what the Lord will speak to your heart, especially in a moment of failure and discouragement—what He says to you.
Sometimes perhaps He will just say, “You are My child.” That is all it takes to turn you around.
When you hear Him say it, it is a kiss. You rise up from the ashes, and by the mercy of God, you faint not.
His love is so wonderfully strong. I just want to say a few more things. I know we have heard a lot this week.
I would like us finally to go back to 1 John and notice what this disciple whom Jesus loved says. First John 4:16:
We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.
I was just thinking about what he was saying here. John is speaking of himself and the others with him. He says, “We, we—we have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us.”
God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. At first, because you have heard it many times before, this may sound like la, la, la. But could I just rephrase this a little bit?
The disciple whom Jesus loved, and who obviously loved the Lord Jesus, says, “We have come to know the love which God has for us.” What does he mean by that?
The Lord says He loves us, and we find ourselves in Christ and in the love of God. But John says, “Now I have come to know the love of God. It is a reality to me—the love of God. And I have come to believe.”
Well, now wait a minute. “Whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life, for God so loved the world.” From the moment you believe in Jesus, you believe that God loved you and Jesus died for your sins.
But now, “I have come to believe the love that God has for me.” I think he is talking about something that is a further assessment.
We believe. We know. Years later, we believe and we know. He who abides in God abides in love, and God abides in him. “I have come to know that by experience. I have come to know that.”
This disciple whom Jesus loved, who sat and laid his head on Jesus’ chest, says, “You know, I have come to know, and I keep on knowing, and I keep on believing the love that God has for us.”
I just finally come around to this question. Maybe you have not understood this tonight. Maybe you think it is just some nonsense.
But for those of you who have been kissed on the mouth by the King and the Lover of your soul, is it possible to forget your first kiss?
Some of you, I know, have had tough times and reason to quit. But I do not think the Lord Jesus was yelling at the church of Ephesus when He said, “Remember from where you have fallen, and repent, and do the first works.”
I think all He had to say was, “Do you not remember your first love? Do you not remember? Do you not want to come back?”
If He has kissed you, can you ever forget that kiss? If He has kissed you with the kisses of His abiding love, is it possible that you could not want to be kissed again?
Is there not something that causes you to say, like the Shulamite, “Kiss me with the kisses of Your mouth, for Your love is better than wine”?
Some people have been kissed, and I think they have gone out and tried to kiss the world. It must be an awfully sour taste.
Even if you failed, and you have forgotten, do you know all it took for the Shulamite woman to get stirred up? Just the smell, the fragrance of his presence as he was coming to her.
He had not even got there yet, and she could already smell the fragrance of his coming. Does not the fragrance of His coming stir up in you a desire to rise up and love Him?
Our brother shared that wonderful word this morning. How can we describe kingdom life beyond those two great commandments our brother shared with us? How do we love God with all of our heart, mind, soul, and strength?
By the grace of God, one day we are captured by this One, and we find it to be a joy, despite our problems, to confess our love for Him. Where else can you go?
Do you realize, once you have been kissed by the King of glory, is there any other kiss that is going to do it? He is the satisfaction of our soul.
We, as His servants and as His children, as we realize it, discover there is a whole backstory to our lives.
When you read biographies of people who made such great sacrifice and who were persecuted, and when you meet people like that, what do you meet? You find a countenance full of joy and some kind of peace in them.
You say, “How can that possibly happen?” It is because there is a love story behind the persecution, and a Lover who was discovered.
This becomes the motive of life. Whether we live in this life or go to be with the Lord, we want to glorify Him—whether in our body here on earth or when we go to be with Him.
“For to me to live is Christ; to die is gain.” Now that is spoken by a lover.
Are you caught by Jesus Christ? Is He still a far-off Savior? When you come to the Lord’s Table, is it still a Father who loves you and saved you, a Son, a Savior who shed His blood for you, but it seems so far away and so many years ago?
Have you not met Him, heard Him, seen Him? Is not yours a captured heart?
Then we would just suggest that you seek out the One whom you love. When we are saved, the Lord puts a love for Jesus in our hearts. If we will pursue it, the Spirit will fan it into flames.
He is the King of the kingdom and the King of glory, to be respected. Even in this message, I do not want in any way to give anybody the idea that Jesus is One to whom we can just talk familiarly, as if He is a nobody.
Years ago, I went to seminary to train for ministry. I was there at a time when Episcopalian priests had come out with this stripped-down version of Jesus.
One guy wrote a book called Are You Running with Me, Jesus? He had daily devotions that just said, “Hi, Jesus, how are You doing? How are You doing? Is everything going okay with You? Well, I am having a terrible time. How about helping me out?”
Just familiar—no reverence, no respect. There was nothing of the King in any of these devotions that this man put out.
No, Jesus is the Messiah, the King, the Lord, the One to be bowed before, the King of glory and the Messiah.
Bow before Him. Worship Him. Serve Him. Obey His commandments.
If you are doing that, He will come to you and share with you His love in your heart.
This is the revelation that we find here and touch on in the Song of Solomon. May the Lord bless you and give you a real and fuller love of Jesus in all of our hearts.
May His kingdom come and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Our Father, we thank You so much for the Lord Jesus. There are so many aspects of Him and His kingdom—how could we even start to tell? Even as the week has ended, there is so much more that could be said.
But Lord, if there is only a glimpse of Jesus revealed by the Holy Spirit, then our time together has been of great value. Thank You, Lord, that we could gather before Your throne.
Help us realize how near You are to us. Help us open up our hearts again to a living God and serve Him all our days for the sake of His kingdom.
Thank You, Lord, that we can love one another for the sake of the King. O Lord, seal these words into our hearts, and speak Your special and precious words to those who faithfully seek after You.
We pray in Jesus’ precious name. Amen.