Good morning. He is risen. He is risen indeed. Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn to the book of the Song of Solomon. We're looking at chapter 8, verse 6 through 7. If you're not familiar with that, it's right in between Ecclesiastes and Isaiah. And when I was in seminary, we had a worship class and we had to go to different churches throughout the semester, and one church we went to, it was the week before Easter, and the pastor, he preached on, I believe it was Lazarus and the rich man, and his concluding point of the whole thing was that we need to prove to Jesus that we don't need the resurrection. And when I was leaving, I met him at the door, and he asked me who I was, and I told him that I was from RTS, and we were just visiting the church for the day, and he said, oh, well, I bet you've never heard a sermon like that before. And let me tell you, he was right. I had never heard someone say, we need to prove to Jesus that we don't need the resurrection. So hopefully what I preach today is something you have heard, because preaching a new message is not necessarily a good thing. But what I would like to do is look at a text that maybe you haven't heard before, and maybe a text that does not come to mind initially when we think about the glorious resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So if you've found Psalm in chapter eight, I would invite you to stand as we read together verses six and seven. This is the bride speaking. Set me as a seal upon your heart. as a seal upon your arm, for love is strong as death, jealousy as fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, the very flame of the Lord. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. If a man offered for love all the wealth of his house, he would be utterly despised. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. And we thank you for this glorious day when we can come together and remember that day when you rose again from the grave. Father, when you did the unthinkable, when you sent your son to die for us and then brought him again to new life, that we might have new life in him. Lord, I pray that you would even now send your spirit to open the eyes and the hearts of your people. Father, would you be with me as I preach your word? Would you make me an adequate vessel to proclaim your glory? And we ask that as we go forth, that we would live for your glory and that this good news of the resurrection would be the driving impulse every day that we have here on earth. And we ask all of us in Christ's mighty and matchless name. Amen. You may be seated. Well, Song of Solomon, many of you may have read it, many of you have never read it before. It's one of those books that sometimes you read it and you wonder, am I really reading this right now? Is this verse really in the Bible? It can shock, it can maybe even make someone blush. And in fact, Song of Solomon is one of the most hotly debated books in the Old Testament. What exactly is it talking about? What could this love song be about? Is it just an inspired love poem from Solomon to his bride? If you go back to the Middle Ages, men like Bernard of Clairvaux, they'll say this whole thing is an allegory, a picture of the relationship between Christ and his church. The debate goes on and on. What is this song talking about? And if I may offer my own humble opinion, this song was written by Solomon, as we see. It was written for his bride, as a wedding gift for his bride. And as divinely inspired, it teaches us the unique beauties of sex and marriage. It is actually the only book in the entire Bible that teaches us explicitly about marriage. But that's not all. Because we learn that Christ and the bride is the true substance of marriage. Christ and his church coming together, that's what marriage has always been about. Wedding days are not about the bride and the groom. Wedding days are about Christ and his church. And if that's the case, then we can say that this book teaches us about the joys of earthly marriage, but it should point our eyes more and more to the love that Christ has for his church, the love that God has for his people. Any blessing, any good coming from earthly marriage as portrayed in the Song of Solomon must be emphasized to the nth degree between Christ and his church. And any good thing that we read about marriage in Song of Solomon must be pushed to the furthest limits than about what Christ has for his church. And this song shows us something very special about the relationship between God in Christ and his people. At the core of that relationship is nothing less than love. As one of my seminary professors used to say, the last word of the universe is love. And when we think about divine love, we can't help but think about 1 John 4, 8. That famous passage that God is love. And John is saying something very important here. He's telling us that love is at the very center of what it means for God to be God. Love is at the very core of who God is. But if that is the case, and that means God had to be love before you existed, before anyone ever existed, before anyone even came into his mind as an object of his love, he had to be love itself. See, God's love transcends all of creation, it transcends all of us, it transcends all the things he made, and it rests in those eternal relations of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Those eternal relations between the three persons of the Godhead. See, those three persons, Father, Son, and Spirit, have been united for all eternity in love. For all eternity, Father, Son, and Spirit have been loving each other. And just take a moment and imagine what the white hot heat of that love must be like. Where all persons loved are divine. Where the people loving are divine. The persons loving, let's say people, we don't wanna commit a heresy there. The persons loving are divine. And even as we see taught by St. Augustine, the love itself is divine. This ferocious love at the core of who God is between Father, Son, and Spirit. And a few weeks ago, you may remember Dr. Jacobs preached on what he called the covenant of salvation, or the pactum salutis, if you're feeling fancy. The fact that the Bible teaches us that for all time, for eternity past, God has been planning the salvation of his people. And when we talk about the covenant of salvation, what we are talking about is that God has decided in his eternal triune will to open that triune love to you, his people. He has planned to open up the bonds of love that are Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to you, his bride. That's what we confess when we talk about the covenant of salvation. We could think about the movement of the covenant of salvation like this, right? God is eternally loved as Father, Son, and Spirit, loving themselves for all eternity in this perfect divine love. And then in creation, he designates a people with whom to share that love with. In creation, he designates a people to whom he is opening up this divine love. And then lastly, he designates exactly how this is going to take place. How is it that a created people will take part of this eternal triune love? The covenant of salvation is the answer. That God is making a way for you to do just that. We could sum up this covenant of salvation by saying out of his eternal love, the Father elects a people for this divine love. If you're part of God's people, the Father has elected you before all time for this divine love. But out of his eternal love, the Son agrees to save this people for divine love. The Son agrees to take on flesh and to win you, his bride, over to himself. And yet at the same time, out of his eternal love, the Holy Spirit agrees to take this work and apply it so that you, his people, can take part of this eternal love. See how it all coheres together? The Father elects out of his divine love, the Son comes out of his divine love, and the Spirit applies out of his divine love. All of it centered around the God who is himself love. Well, in our passage this morning, we have the summary statement of love. Summary statement of what it means to love. And it starts out with the bride begging, imploring the bridegroom to do one thing. Set me as a seal upon your heart, upon your arms. In other words, she's asking, bind me to yourself in such a way that I become a part of who you are. that I become one with you and you with me. So this seal, this idea of the seal, the Hebrew word chotam, it was the sign of ownership and it was the sign of identity. Just remember the rather scandalous story of Judah and Tamar. Tamar takes the signet ring, the chotam, from Judah and his staff, And when it's announced that she has been amorous, right? When they find that she is pregnant outside of marriage, they're about to stone her and she says, the one to whom these things belong is the father. And it's Judas, right? That sign, that signet identifies who is the owner, who the father is. You can think about it another way, right? A king, we don't have seals, much to our dismay these days, but when a king would send a letter, he would take that wax, drip it on the paper, he would take that ring, that seal, and he would stamp that letter down so that people would know this letter is from the king. This letter belongs to the king himself. The thing upon which the seal was impressed showed that it belonged to whoever had that seal. The bride is asking, implant me upon your heart. Implant me upon your arm so that people know that I am yours and you are mine. She wants to be not just upon his arm, not just a wedding ring, but upon this bridegroom's very heart, the core of who he is. And here with this language of seals on heart and hand, we start to hear some resonances of the Old Testament. And all the way back in the Pentateuch, we see that this language of sealing, hotam, and heart, leiv, come together in a very important point in the Pentateuch. When Moses is being shown the plans for this tabernacle, for how God's people are to interact with him, he is revealed the priestly garments. And you may remember the priest, he's got a turban, he's got the ephod, he's got the dress thingy, maybe a little improper to call it a dress thing, but I'm forgetting what it's called right now. And then, on top of all that, sort of binding it all together, he's got the breast piece. He's got this breast piece, and on the breast piece, on the front, he's got 12 precious stones lined up. It says, upon this breast piece were gemstones with the names of Israel written upon them. Hear this, like signets. Chotam, that same word. The name of Israel were set upon the priest's chest like seals. Just a few verses later, we see that these signets were born on the heart of Aaron as he went before the Lord. But not only that, but later on in Deuteronomy 6, right, the most famous, most central portion to the Jewish religion, the Shema, right, that confession that binds all of Israel together. Here is where the Lord thy God, the Lord is one. Here's what it says. These words that I teach you today shall be on your heart. This confession shall seal it upon your heart. You shall bind them as a sign, different word, but the same idea. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. Are you picking up what's being put down here by the Old Testament, right? The people of Israel were supposed to bind the confession of God themselves upon their hands. They're supposed to bind him between the frontlets of their eyes. If you remember, I flew to Israel about 12 years ago. And I mean, I'm from Nashville, southern boy. I don't know a lick about anything. And I'm flying out of JFK to Israel. And I don't know if I've ever been around a nationally Jewish person my entire life. And everyone on this flight is an Orthodox Jew, right? Everyone. When we're flying into Tel Aviv, right as we get about an hour out, so we're just breaking into the Mediterranean Sea there, about to land, maybe 400 miles out, suddenly all the Orthodox Jews get up. Right? And they start wrapping these things around their arms, right? Then they've got what they call the phylactery, right? The thing they bind on their forehead. So they took this very literally. But it's this picture of they have bound themselves to Yahweh. Yahweh is telling his people, bind yourself to me. Make it so that whoever you are, you can't be without me. There's this mutual embrace going on. Israel is to bind Yahweh to themselves, but it's because and only because God has already bound himself to us. I remember that covenant promise mentioned time and time again. I will be your God and what? You will be my people. You will be my people. I will be your God. You will be my people. We will be His, and He will be ours. That's what this language of sealing on heart and hand is signifying. Or we could go all the way forward to Isaiah 49, six, and listen to these words. It says, Yahweh, speaking to Israel, behold, I have engraved you in the palm of my hands. I have made you a part of who I am. Now we could think about this forever, and guess what, Christian, one day we will think about this forever. This triune salvation will be the one thing that takes up our minds for all eternity, and it will be glorious. But for now, we must only note that through his covenant, both in eternity past, right, among Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and in his covenant made with his people in Genesis 3.15, and Genesis 12, and Genesis 15, that God has promised, sealed himself to be your God. In the words of one theologian, he has obliged himself to save you. Meaning, because of the promises of God, he wouldn't be God if he didn't save you. He wouldn't be God if he didn't save his people. That's this language of covenant love. Now the bride describes this bond, this covenant love, in a few different images. She's trying to get at the core of what this love is. And when we think about love, right, there's a bunch of different ways we could use that word, right? I love my dog. I love my dog probably more than some people, right? I mean, my dog is precious in my sight. I love my pen, right? I love my pen. But even when we hear those things, right, we get the sense that that's not really what we're talking about when we say love, right? That there's something missing. I love my wife. Now we're getting somewhere. Now we're getting somewhere when we talk about a love between two people. A love between two people that goes as far as death. And that's how we see the bride describing it, right off the bat, right? For love is as strong as death. And we know that, right? If you're married, you made the vow before God and man himself, you made the vow till death do us part. Love, as we know it, should go all the way to the grave. The only termination point that we see in scripture for any covenant is death. The only time a covenant is finally ending is through death. In the ancient Near East, when King and his servant would come together and make a covenant, the only way that that servant was getting out of that covenant was if one of them died. King dies, he's freed. Or if he dies, he's free. But that's the only way he's getting out of that covenant. We even think about John 15, 13, right? The words of Christ himself, greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. Love as we know it, if it's to be true love, it has to go all the way to the grave, right? And go all the way to the grave, that means the person I love doesn't have to go to the grave. Love, if it's really love, goes all the way to death. But even as we say that, right, there's a deep sense in each of us that love should go farther than that. I mean, just think about the way all the fairy tale stories ended, happily ever after. There's no death in ever after. It's just happiness. We get this feeling that Yeah, marital love is great, but there's something wrong with it ending even at death. And you feel that every time a spouse dies, hopefully just one spouse dies. You feel that every time a parent dies, a friend dies, God forbid a child dies, that this is not the way it's supposed to be. Love isn't supposed to end. We have this innate sense that whatever true love is, whatever real love is, it has to go well beyond death. And this was part of the Israelite mindset. This was, as Chris said, this was part of their hope. God had promised to be their God. He had told them that he had loved them. And to a Hebrew, knowing who God was, Yahweh, the one who is being itself, being told that he loves them, being told that he had covenant with them, meant that they were sure that something had to happen about this whole death thing. Knowing God is the faithful one who brought them up out of Egypt meant that somehow, in some way, he would be faithful even beyond death. That somehow his love would reach even into the place where there's no more life. That was part of the Hebrew Israelite expectation. And we see hints of this all throughout the Old Testament, not just in Psalm 16, as Chris read for us, but even all the way back in Genesis 3.20. God extends the curse of death upon his people. And then immediately, what does Adam name his wife? Eve, because why? She was the mother of all living. So here you have the first man faced with the curse of death, And yet he's naming his wife the mother of all living. There's this expectation that life would continue on even after death. Or in Hebrews 11, we're told that Abraham believed that he would receive Isaac back even if it meant back from the grave. Abraham was going to offer Isaac up as an offering to God. He trusted God that somehow, in some way, he would receive Isaac back. Or we could look at Job 19, or all throughout the prophets, right, that they didn't know how, they didn't know the details, but they had this veiled notion that there was something beyond death, that one day their God, Yahweh, would do something about death. And there are really three different ways of thinking about death. We could think about physical death, But there's also, if you were an Israelite, there'd be the ancient Near Eastern God, mot, death, Hebrew word for death, right? There are these forces of death at work. But most importantly, it's that final curse. And all the way back in Genesis 2, when God tells Adam, if you eat this tree, you will certainly die. Or in Hebrew, mot tamut, right? You will certainly die. to God's love, they trusted that God's love was going to overcome the physical reality of death. It proved stronger than any other so-called God out there. But most importantly, God's love would have to fulfill his very own sentence and condemnation for sin. Death was a part of God's own judgment, so whatever the answer was, it had to come straight from God. God's love meant he would follow his people into death, do battle with the forces of evil, and answer the great problem of sin. And he would somehow overcome it all. Somehow God would prove stronger than death. And yet we see that there's another way that the bride describes this covenant bond, this seal. Not only is love as strong as death, but look there at in the middle of verse six, jealousy is as fierce as the grave. Or another way to translate it, jealousy is as relentless as the grave. It's as relentless. And I've never been in the grave, but I've heard it's pretty relentless, right? I've heard that once the grave's got you, you're not getting out again, right? I've never been to a funeral where someone steps out of the coffin and says, ah, I'm gonna take a few more days, right? Not ready for that. See, the grave is jealous. It's fierce for all those who are His. It's not giving you up once it's got you. And this jealousy that we see ascribed to the grave, but ascribed to love itself, is that fierce commitment one has for his beloved. It's that fierce passion and fury when something stands between me and my beloved. When I love my wife, I don't want anyone else to have her. I don't want her to be with anyone else. Right? She is mine, and I am hers. God Himself is described as the jealous God. Or if you go all the way back to Exodus 34, 14, we see that goes so far as to say that His name is jealous. I am Yahweh, whose name is jealous. Or I love the way that Zechariah 8-2 puts it, that I, Yahweh, am jealous for Zion, his beloved, with great jealousy, and I am jealous for her with great wrath. God's wrath is poured out on those who would dare keep him from his beloved, who would dare try and keep Yahweh from the one to whom he is covenanted with. God's love for his people means wrath on anyone and anything who would try and keep them from him. And here the author of the song is telling us that real love, true love, not only is it going all the way to death and then some, but the lover is going to pursue his beloved with all the ferocity of the grave. Right? As strong as the grave holds on to those who are his, so God is pursuing those who are his. Put it very simply, God is not going to let his beloved be taken from him. Before he went to the cross, before he was lowered into the grave, Jesus gave his disciples a picture of what he was going to do. Jesus being the perfect picture, he uses a man that he says he loves, a man named Lazarus. And you know the story, Jesus hears that Lazarus has been taken sick. The brother of Mary and Martha is on the verge of death. And instead of bolting right to Lazarus, what does he do? He waits. He waits for two days longer than he was planning to, he waits. And Jesus as much tells the disciples that he intentionally waited so that Lazarus would die, that they would be able to see the glory of God. Here's what he says, he says, Lazarus has died, and for your sake I am glad that I was not there so that you may believe. That seems an odd thing, right? If Jesus loved Lazarus, why in the world did he let him die? Why in the world would he let him be lowered into the grave? And they get to Bethany, right, Jesus comes to the tomb. And there's this interesting word there that we see translated twice, right, it's translated twice as deeply moved. Jesus was deeply moved as he stood before the grave. And the word there in Greek is embrimomai, right, embrimomai, kind of a tongue twister. And while it's talking about Jesus' inner emotions, right, his inner life, The root word brimomai is talking about whenever the word brimomai, whoever brimomais, it's most often used with a war horse snorting out of rage. So you get this picture that Jesus is this great war horse snorting before his great and last enemy death. Here is the fierce, jealous king standing before the enemy of his people. Every inch we see of this divine love that propelled Jesus, every inch of this divine love is focused into this white hot ferocity before the grave. Jesus will not let the grave take his people, amen? Jesus will not let the grave have the last word. And our song doesn't end there, right? Not only is love stronger than death, not only is it more relentless than the grave, but it is like a flame. It's a flame, but not only a flame, the very flame of the Lord. That word there is, Shal-hev-teh-yah, right? Shal-hev-teh-yah. Shal-hev-teh is the word for flame. And then it's got that little ending there, yah. Yah. We know that ending when we say things like hallelujah, praise the Lord. This flame, love, whatever it is, is the very flame of Yah, the flame of Yahweh. So love is not only the thing from which, it doesn't just come from God, but it is the burning force of God. At the core of who he is, as we've said, God is love. Burning, white-hot, triune, eternal love. On Good Friday, our king came before the grave. He stepped into it. His love for his people meant that he would go where they would go. His relentless, ferocious, jealous love that meant that not even the grave could hold his people. And then in three days, today, he proved the victor. At the cross, we can say, look at how much he loved his people, dying for them. But in the resurrection, he shows that his love is a love that is stronger than death. He rises so that his bride might rise and be with him forever. Now here's the eternal mystery to ponder. Today, we celebrate, we remember the physical reality that God loves us. This is not just God loves you and has a wonderful plan for his life. This is not a trite word of comfort about God's love. This is the physical fact that Jesus who was dead, whose heart ceased to beat, whose neurons no longer fired, whose lungs ceased expanding, this Jesus rose again. And he rose because of one thing, love. Love for his people. All right, this flame, this love is so vibrant, so consuming that nothing can possibly come against it. See how the bride continues on detailing this love. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. There is nothing Nothing that can extinguish this love of God. Now, if you're like, if you're a man and you were a child, you were probably some sort of pyromaniac like myself. You know from burning things, the bigger the fire, the more water you're going to need, right? The bigger the fire, the more water. And, but sometimes to our human eyes, right? Flames get so big that they seem almost unstoppable. We think about the forest fires just 100 miles north of us in Gatlinburg, right, seven years ago, that ripped through almost insatiably across thousands, tens of thousands of acres. Right, but even as we think about fires like that, we always consider that there could be enough water technically to extinguish that fire. I just think, I mean, if there was a fire ripping through Blairsville right now, Right? And burning houses, burning acres. If you really need to quench it, all you need to do is just tear down Notley Dam, right? And then there would be no fire left. No matter how big that flame was, there would be nothing of that flame left. But this love, this love that finds its source in Yahweh will never be extinguished. Right? Entire oceans will be licked up by the flame before it goes out. See, Christ's love proves stronger than death. His jealousy for his people more fierce than the grave. And there is nothing that you, nor man, nor king, nor ruler, nor prince, nor principality, there's not a thing you can do to change that. Nothing can extinguish the love of God and the love that he has for his people in Christ. Because get this, to extinguish that love, would be to extinguish God himself. To extinguish the love that God has for you in Christ would be to extinguish God himself. Now Easter is a, it's a joyous day. It's actually turned out to be a pretty beautiful day. And while you're somewhat lacking in pastels and bright colors, right, it's often the excuse we have to dress up in bright colors to get our kids as cute as possible. To remind ourselves of the good things God has given us. If you were like my grandmother, the one time of the year where you would cook lamb and mint jelly, which is repulsive, in my opinion. And you better believe, though, that when my child is on this side of the womb, that I'm going to dress him or her up as cute as you could possibly imagine on Easter. And while I'm not a big fan of mint jelly, as I've already said, if there ever was a day for a feast, it's today. But this great, glorious, marvelous day that we are celebrating today is more like VE or VJ Day than New Year's Day. It's not the day when we come around reminding all the good things we have, but it is the day when 2,000 years ago, war ceased. And if we truly understood the gravity of that war, None of us would be able to get off our faces in worship. On this day, the Lord triumphed over the enemy who had laid scourge to every soul since Adam. On this day, God's love in Christ Jesus showed itself stronger than death, more powerful than the grave, and there is one thing we can do, marvel at a God who set his people as the apple of his eye. That's all we can do. Look at how great God loves us. But some of you might be asking, right? Some of y'all, no judgment, right? Maybe you're CEOs, infamous Christmas, Easter only Christians. Maybe y'all are visiting with family. Maybe you haven't stepped foot in a door in a church for a long time and you may be asking, how do I get this love? Because we all want it. If you say you don't want love, guess what? You're lying to yourself. Everyone wants love. Everyone wants love that lasts. So how do you get this love? And our song has something to say even about this. The very end, it's got this little, almost humorous line. If a man offered for love all the wealth of his house, he would be utterly despised. If a man brought all the wealth in the world and tried to buy someone to love him, He's despised. We know inherently, you can't just buy love. People try. People try year after year. They try and woo with money and gifts. And if history has taught us anything, it always proves empty. How many marriages you know that were built around money that really lasted? People try it, but over and over and over again, buying love amounts to nothing. And if that's the case for human love, how much more for divine love? What could you possibly give God for you to get his love? The cattle of a thousand hills are his. Gold that we find so precious are the things he paves his streets with. What could we possibly get? And here's the point of this whole song, right? You can't just get this love. You can't get this love by giving something for it. The only thing asked of you is to believe. To believe. Believe that God himself took on flesh in the form of a person, Jesus Christ, and that this Jesus went to the grave for you. that he went to the grave for you. Not only that, that he rose up from the grave after three days so that you might have eternal life. Believe that. And then you'll see that you've always been loved. Believe that and you'll see that you are at the very core, the very object of God's love. If you don't get this love, you are given this love. and God gives it to you in Christ Jesus. Whether believer or unbeliever alike today, he is our source, he is our hope. He is the one whom we turn to for a love that is divine and everlasting. Let's pray. Mighty Jesus, we thank you that we get to come together and marvel and ponder the great depths of your love that took you to the cross, that brought you to the grave, but the great love that brought you out of the grave, Lord, for us, for your people. Heavenly Father, we pray that you would continue to implant in us, develop in us this knowledge of this great divine love, this love that is stronger than death, more fierce than the grave. I pray for those who do not know you this morning, that you would show them in all your glory on who you are, that your love knows no bounds, that your love never ceases nor fails. And that is in you and you alone that we find rest in life. Holy Spirit, we pray now that you would come and that you would seal these things upon our hearts. Holy Spirit, anything that is not from you, I pray that it would vanish, that it would be consumed by your bright, eternal love. Lord, but anything that I have said that is of you, would you seal it upon our hearts? Would you seal it into the very core of who we are that we would go out knowing and be sure of one thing, that we are loved by you? We ask this in the mighty and matchless name of Jesus Christ. Amen. If you would now stand for the benediction. Lord bless you and keep you. Lord make his face to shine upon you and give you peace. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and be with you. Amen. Praise him, all the nations, he reigneth long. Praise him, all the people, he reigneth long. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.