Let's read verse four to seven. Hear now the word of God. I want you to swear, O daughters of Jerusalem, do not arouse or awaken my love until it pleases. Who is this coming up from the wilderness, leaning on her beloved? Beneath the apple tree, I awakened you. There your mother was in labor with you, there she was in labor and gave you birth. Put me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm, for love is as strong as death, jealousy as severe as shale. It's flashes are flashes of fire, the very flame of the Lord. Many waters cannot quench love, nor will rivers overflow it. If a man were to give all the riches of his house for love, it would be utterly despised. Now we saw something of this, that it's the closing of the Song of Solomon, the climactic song, and the love between Christ and his bride has matured. And then we saw that she is now leaning on him in a way and with a constancy that she hadn't before, that her love has matured through these experiences and that Christ gives us these experiences to mature our love, these distances and desertions that we experience, these trials, our own fallings and failings. Once these things are then mended by God and we're restored to Him each time they happen, there should be a maturing of our love for Him and a more steadfast following of Him. She's leaning upon him, and I pointed out to you that although it says she leans upon her beloved, the image that's seen here is of the beloved himself coming up with her, and he is supporting her. She's leaning, but he must be there for us for there to be a leaning. And I highlighted for you, emphasized for you, that we must always remember to think of that, that as important as our leaning is upon Jesus Christ, And it's his support of the individual believer that is most precious and fundamental to their salvation and their perseverance in the faith. And that's a wonderful thing. And I'm sure if you've been on the road, the Christian walk for some time, you've come to know that, that it's his faithfulness to you. As Paul says to Timothy, when we are faithless, he remains faithful. She leans on him and she's coming to the nearness of the end of her pilgrimage, coming up out of the wilderness, leaning upon him. And strangely, she's called to look back. As she finally has peace in him, and he's near, and she's not apart from him this time at the beginning of this song, as she wonders at that, God says, well, I awakened you under the apple tree. and there your mother who was in labor brought you forth. So although she's coming to the end, she's called to look to the cause and the origin of her faith, which was she was woken up, she was brought into being spiritually under the apple tree. I said that was Christ to you. She was born there, and God and Christ had been with her since that moment. So she shouldn't be surprised that she's now near him and that he's worked that. into her life and tried and tested her because he began that work when she was awakened and when her mother brought her forth and she was born again and how precious the new birth is and it's a powerful thing to look at her new birth and just to see the marks of it now or to remember the the undoubtable marks of it that we remember when it happened, the clear changes that took place, that we can see. These can be used for great reassurance and even awakening our love in the present when we remember that. God says through Jeremiah, famously to Israel, that she had forgotten that as a bride, that she had forsaken the fountain of living waters and hewn for herself cisterns that cannot hold water And he says, I remember you, Israel, when you were betrothed to me. I remember the youth of your espousals when you walked in the wilderness with me. Israel was holiness to the Lord, but you are no longer that anymore, he says to her. And he tells her to remember that. It is powerful for us to remember that initial influx of life and has been introduced to Christ and the clarity with which it happened. it is important for us to look and say, I am born again. And God's grace was clear then, and there have been ups and downs, but I can see his purpose towards me is of kindness and love and not evil to destroy me. And we should never be in the position that Israel was then. Let God never say of any of us that he remembers the youth of our engagement, of our espousal to him, only the youth of it. and that we were holiness to the Lord then, but our zeal is completely gone. Let our love never, as Christ says, grow cold. In the last days, he says, the love of many will grow cold. So she's called to look back. So we saw the bride upheld, then we saw the bride's birth. Let's just take these other two verses now and try and understand them. we see the bride's request here based on those truths. Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm, for love is as strong as death, jealousy is as cruel or as severe as the grave. Set me as a seal. Now that must be a response to this culminating closeness that they have. that she's so delighted with. She's yearned from him far away before, calling him back and these things, but when she is seen here coming up, leaning close upon his bosom, upon his shoulder, and coming up and she's remembering the grace and the love with which he was brought forth. She then issues forth her own request, a prayer that really only a bride can confidently ask. Set me as a seal upon your heart and a seal upon your arm. Now these seals, as they're mentioned here, refers to an ancient practice of engraving names upon gems and precious stones and binding them on parts of the body. There are other ways of applying this that are just applications that are cultural for us, like a locket with a photograph in it or an engraving or some special object that's given. A man might even carry photographs of his wife or of his children or loved ones, brothers and family members, in his wallet and so on. And these are there to remember these people and to stir the affections. That can be applied in our own culture. But in the one that Solomon's writing about here, this is an ancient practice of engraving the name on precious stones, perhaps small stones, but certainly it can be proven even slab-like stones, a stone perhaps that size. that is made of something very expensive and things can be engraven on it and it was tied to the upper arm, especially if this was a royal wedding. You can imagine royal families still do those kinds of things. And remember, Solomon is a king, Christ is a king, and his bride is the princess here of peace. And these would be tied to the upper arm or hung with a string or a chain around the neck. Or even, there's historical records and ancient poetry and so on, of the stone then being placed in an inner pocket in the cloak so that it was then near the heart and easily accessible, just like we would with these precious things. Now, that's probably the the historical allusion here that Solomon's using, that he's seen this or he's doing this in one of his marriages himself. And she says, spiritually through the Holy Spirit here, through the Spirit of God speaking, that the believer or the church, after all of these alienations from the Lord, that when she has experienced this closeness and she's leaning upon him, she calls out here, that the Messiah would do that for her as her husband, that he would set her as a seal upon his heart and as a seal upon his arm. And I think the reason for that is clear if we understand this book spiritually, that the Old Testament church waited for Christ and Israel often departed from the Lord and so on and Christ came and he is near the New Testament church but he told his disciples he was going away and although I've preached this to you before the fact that he says he's going away does not mean he's entirely absent because a greater effusion of the spirit comes with his presence and he closes Matthew's gospel saying I am with you lo I am with you until the end of the aeon, until the end of the age. I am with you. And that's not some empty sentiment he's saying. That is a tangible, real thing. He is truly with his church. But as glorious as that is, the scripture has some contradictions in it that we have to raise our minds up to understand. It is true that he says, I'm with you, but we all know as well that there are difficulties with that, and Christ knew that, and that's why he gave that discourse in the upper room. I will not leave you orphans, and he keeps reassuring them, because he knows how they're going to react. They're going to feel orphaned, because they can't see him anymore. He will ascend, and that will be it, and they must now rely on him in spirit and in truth, but there are difficulties, aren't there? I mean, we cannot see Christ. We cannot see his face. We cannot hear his audible voice. And we have never seen a full manifestation of his visible glory. So as true as it is for us to maintain, no, he is still with us and he can be known and loved. There are clear difficulties with the absence that even Peter acknowledges in his first letter. He says, whom having not seen you love, and you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory. Peter acknowledges even he finds it hard that he cannot see the Lord anymore. It may be something like this. She has learned to be close to him. I hope I'm learning that. I hope you're learning that in various ways as there is that distance and then that closeness. I hope we are growing in being near to Christ. But we know that he is in heaven. we know that there is a way in which he is distant. And that makes our heart fertile for discouragement, questions, doubts, and being weary on the way. We're going through the wilderness trying to lean on him spiritually, but there is difficulty that comes along with it. And I think that's the situation here, because often these ancient oriental kings and so on, they would give these kinds of things so that when the couple was apart, each would be reminded of the gift. When your beloved wasn't there, or he was off at war or whatever, then you could look at the stone he had given you and be reminded of him. And be assured yourself as a wife staying at home that though he is far away on the battlefield or on a journey, that he has hanging over his heart where he is a reminder to him to not forget you. We do these kinds of things. We send each other messages and text messages and so on because we want that contact. We want to be reminded of one another. That's the kind of thing that's here. She is coming up leaning on her beloved, but the song closes spiritually, not by promising us in the New Testament church that I will be physically leaning on Christ all the way to heaven, but that I must spiritually lean on him, but there will be times where I have need and I will have to call upon him to show me again and reassure me again that he actually does love me because I want to experience that from him. Any relationship has that. There's the longing for the other to express their love and to state it and to act upon it and so on. She says here, set me as a seal upon your heart and as a seal upon your arm. On the heart that she would be engraved in his affections, impressed upon his heart like a seal. And this is so true of us and Christ. Any true believer wants to know that Christ loves them. wants to enter into that love more fully and understand it better, it is easy to begin to doubt it or for our view of it to go dim and to be insensitive to it. But if we're in our right place and we read the scripture and we know who Christ is and what he's like, we will want some kind of communication from him and assurance from him that he does love us. The sacraments themselves are that, especially the Lord's Supper. It's an expression from Christ of his love. a visible symbol with a spiritual promise attached to it, that he is feeding us and nourishing us with the bread and the wine and so on, and that he's there at his table as a bridegroom, as a king, and he's gathered his people for that fellowship meal. That is a gift he's left the church. I mean, it says when he was in the upper room that He loved his own who were in the world. He loved them until the end. And he says, this is my body given for you. Take, eat. This is the cup of the new covenant in my blood for the remission of your sins. These are expressions of love that Christ has left the sacrament in the church through which he expresses these things to us. But she's saying, engrave me on your heart. set me like a seal impressed upon your heart. Now, we need to know that in the sense of Christ being in heaven. Thomas Goodwin, the well-known Puritan preacher, had a sermon that still stands tall to this day, and it's the kind of epitomization of this truth that's never been matched by anyone, really. The heart of Christ in heaven towards believers, or is it sinners? Towards sinners. But the heart of Christ in heaven towards the believer. And what he brought out in that sermon was that we start off in the Christian life not really having a fully formed idea and understanding and sense of the fact that Christ is very aware of us personally in heaven. And that his affections are continually moved towards us in heaven, that though we cannot see him, he can see us. Though our love grows cold, his never does. And that sermon was based around the truth of Christ's priesthood. And that's why I read Exodus to you, because as she says here, set me as a seal upon your heart and upon your arm, we have a scriptural example of that for Jesus. in the Bible, and it's in Exodus, that the high priest actually had the names of the children of Israel engraved on his shoulders on two stones, six and six, and then had them on precious stones, very expensive, large jewels, diamonds and so on. And a very skilled craftsman engraved deeply the names of each of the sons of Jacob, upon those stones and he wore them over his heart. That's what the believer wants. That's what the believer needs to understand. That Christ in heaven is engaged as a priest. That he is our great high priest who has passed through the heavens but he is there interceding for us and he is there personally aware of us So the priesthood of Christ is a beautiful and wonderful thing for a believer to consider, that he stands there for his people, that their acceptance with God is standing in him in that place, that their names are born over him in the presence of Almighty God. as he intercedes and requests and prays for his people. Now how important that is. Do you ever feel I'm forgotten? Or Christ doesn't know me personally? Or why would he take interest in me personally? Is that even a pipeline of Christianity that you've ever struck? That you have that personal channel between you and him? But that's what he does. That's exactly what his priesthood is. He stands there and in him you are accepted, but the duty of the high priest is to pray for his people. Do you never think Christ has prayed for you? Set me as a seal on your heart. Am I in his heart? Does he ever think of me? Does he ever pray for me? Does he ever act on my behalf? Or am I part of an indeterminate mass of people? and Christ theologically did something for the church, but is he aware of me? Do you not think Christ has ever spoken about you or requested of the Father something for your life? I think he certainly has. He said to Peter, Satan has desired to sift you all as wheat and I have prayed for you, Peter. There's something very personal about that and how could that be true in his lower state between him and Peter and not true for him and his people in his exalted state. Surely the Holy Spirit is frequently bringing things to Jesus in his exalted state of the needs of all his people throughout the earth and Jesus is aware of who his people are. And what's been taught in this verse is the desire for the believer not to be a bride, to be known personally by him and personally loved, and to not disappear into some large mass of people. I mean, that's why people are depressed today. That's why There's suicide, that's why there's antidepressants. People feel they're part of an indeterminate mass that no one really cares about them, no one understands them, no one knows them, and so on. There's nothing as fundamental to being human as that desire. Is it not the case? that when we're told here that the lover here asks to be sealed and placed upon the heart of the one who loves her. Is it not the case that that is true of Christ as it's brought out in this song? That if you go to his heart there is a love that cannot be measured or fully understood by us A love that we can barely begin to describe or know exactly what it's like. A divine love. A love untainted by sin. And a love that never gives up. A love that doesn't become sinfully frustrated. A love that doesn't sinfully say, well, I've had enough of them this time, or not now, and things like that. Is it not the case that if we could see inside of the mind and heart of Christ, we would find an immense love for his people, each personally? And that is a big deal. What a difference that makes in your life. To properly stop and meditate that I am loved personally by Christ, that when Peter failed, He met Peter alone on the day of the resurrection, not in front of all the others. He found Peter and dealt with him alone first. And he does that with us. Do you know that you are known? Will that affect your prayer life? as sinful as you are, that this person loves you as a jewel, a distinctly cut jewel in his breastplate. And as much as Aaron could say, this one is for Reuben, this one is for Levi, this one's for Simeon and Judah and Gad and Asher, They were all specifically named, even though all these brothers had faults and these tribes had faults, Benjamin and so on. Is it not the case that our names are known in that way to Christ? How can it not be the case? So she's calling on him here and saying, love me. engrave me, remember me, show me that you love me. As you are away from me in a sense, as I'm seeking to know and love you and lean on you, impress me like a seal upon your heart that I would be written on your very heart and that I would be in your heart. There's nothing wrong with praying that. These are healthy things to pray if these things are flowing between us and Jesus. It's healthy for us to say, remember me, Lord. Show me that you love me. Show me a sign for good. Remember me with the love that you have for all your people. I feel alone. I feel that I can't hear you. I feel that I don't understand what is going on. Lord, show me that Christ loves me. that I am upon his heart and that I matter to his heart. But then she also mentions the arm. And yes, it's right to be in the heart of the affections. I think, just very quickly, that the arm brings out something of that when action is taken, the arm is the place where strength is. And your hand and your arm are something you look at frequently as well. That if this man's a king, if he's a soldier, if he's a workman of any kind or does any work, that if something is written on the arm, it will be frequently seen by you. We still write things on our hand to remind us of certain things. Well, she's saying, engrave me, set me as a seal upon your arm. Act for me because you love me. If you love me, Lord, act for me. I don't deserve for you to act for me. The only deserving act that you would give me is to state what I am, to weigh my sin, to find me wanting, and to show me that I should inherit hell. That's the only deserving act that we should ever get. But Christ has told us to be confident in his love. that he's done this for us, and to be confident in his love. She has become confident. She said in the previous chapter, in chapter seven, sorry, what do you see in the Shulamite? What do you see in me? I am dark, she says in another chapter, I am dark, I desert you, I don't respond when I should. And she closes chapter six, what do you even see in me? she's still feeling that works, exchange. She doesn't expect the beloved to come back and show her his grace again because she says, well, what do you see in me? Because if I could see something in me that would make you love me or make you act on my behalf, and I can come to you with that, it's been a faithful year. 2019 was a faithful year. And I fell here and I fell there, but I'm more faithful than others. Lord, act for me. She says, but all that's in me is a dance of two camps. The last verse of chapter six. That's all I am. A mess. Divided. At war with myself. Two armies, two camps. What do you see in me? A dance of the two camps, the armies. the spirit and the flesh, the new renewed nature in Christ and the old man and the carcass of the dead old man that's still there. And she knows that this is in her. Solomon wrote this. He's writing about himself. He's writing about himself as a bride here. Solomon wrote this. What do you see in shalomite? Two camps inside me. Sin and grace. And he knows he doesn't deserve God's nearness. But that's the point, isn't it? We never get anywhere. Christ has to reassure us again when we're there. Because when we're finding ways to get rid of the sins so we deserve a hearing, we've missed the point. because it's all of grace. The two camps will always be there. Let us annihilate as many soldiers in the bad army as possible in us. Let us do that and fight it. But the point is, Christ wants us to be confident in his love as he's displayed it in his grace. Why is she married to him? Because I have loved you. We love him because he first loved us. He knows we are sinners. He's not still figuring that out. Well, she must be confident and say, Lord, upon your heart and upon your arm, act for me in your providence, act for me in your work, act for me in your wisdom, defend me, provide for me, whatever the need is, seal me upon your heart and upon your arm as Aaron had them over his heart and on the shoulders where the government and the action is. Aron would go in, his affections are for the people who need their sins forgiven outside the tent, and he goes in, and he loves them, he's their priest, he loves them, but everything he's doing, the incense and so on, he's using his arms for these things, and he's doing it for them, for the 12 tribes. He's doing it for them, as their representative. We can ask Christ to do the same thing. Does Christ not do that? Isaiah says, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands, the Messiah says. It's very vivid in the Hebrew, I've cut you into my hands. I've engraved you, chiseled you, I've cut you into my hands. like you chisel into stone. I have engraved you, Judah, on my hands, the Messiah says. Has he not done that? When Christ acts from heaven, it's not without you in mind at all. We read it this morning. All things work together for the good of those who love him. Yeah, but he loved them first. It all works together because he's governing it in an inscrutable wisdom. But he's doing it and you're in mind. You're not left as a victim to the passing waves as they go by, as though you're just being tossed about randomly by what's going on in this world. Christ is in control of it, and that engraving on his hand shows us that when he is carrying out his work as the Lord of glory, his heart is filled with love. individuals who are the elect, and when he acts, when Christ stretches out his hands to act, the names of his people, figuratively, they're not actually there, but this is the whole point of the prophecy, When he acts, when Christ stretches out his hand to judge, when Christ stretches out his hand to help, or to touch a church, or to intervene in a situation, the names of his people are on the very hand that he's acting with. Do you understand the point? How can he forget them? That's the point of that passage in Isaiah. A mother, a nursing mother, may forget her nursing child. but I will not forget you, says the Lord. I have engraved you on the palms of my hands. He says that it's more possible for a new nursing mother to forget her newborn, that that's more likely, he says. A sinful woman will do that. I will never do it. God says, and Christ has set me as a seal upon your heart and upon your arm. Affections and action. Then that's the bride's request. Lastly, we have the beloved's love that is the source of all of this. Why? For love is as strong as death, Jealousy as severe as shale, its flashes are flashes of fire, the flame of the Lord. This is very vivid, intense Hebrew poetry. We wouldn't really write this way today at all. It wouldn't be common to say love is as strong as death. We would find something maybe more positive to compare it to. Especially jealousy is as severe as the grave. But this is the way a Hebrew man would think. What it's bringing out for us is the quality of God's love. She can have that love too. Her own love can be strong and she wants him therefore to express his. She feels a love for him. She's jealous if he's ignoring her or she feels ignored. She wants that contact with him, but it's especially true from his side, and she's calling forth for his expressions of love based on what that love is like, what she knows it to be like. And Christ's love is as strong as death, according to Solomon here, and his jealousy as severe as the grave, and its flames are intense flames, the flame of the Lord. This is just bringing before us the strength of Christ's love, its intensity, and its indestructibility as well in verse seven, that many waters cannot quench love. Its strength, its intensity, its incorruptibility. Its strength, that it's as strong as death. And the idea of the poetry here is basically this, that when death takes hold of someone, that's it. It doesn't change. When someone dies and death comes for them and they go into the realm of death, there's no discussion. It holds them in place and it is strong. It is a strong master. And Solomon, in the depth of his inspiration, He says God's love is like that. Even human love can be like that. Human love is as strong as death when someone's so jealous that they actually go out and kill someone, kill their wife that's left them and gone off with another man and so on. I mean we see that even in the fallen aspect of this how intense a thing maybe not love there, but passion, possessiveness, which has its rightful place in love if it's kept in check and so on. Love isn't a calm thing all the time. Love does contain passion. And as we'll see in a second, a kind of jealousy too. But love is strong as death. He's saying, well, Christ's love is like that. It's got the strength of God's covenant. It's got the strength of Christ's heart. In Christ's case, it is as strong as death, that Christ was willing to die in a very deep and horrific and spiritually unimaginable way for the sake of the love that he has for a fallen sinner who's elect in God's sight. It's as strong as death. And it is a jealous love. It's intense. This here is not the kind of jealousy we think of, which is, we use the word jealousy today basically as synonymous with just envy. That we're jealous if someone has something that we want and we can't have it. That's not the original biblical jealousy. The original biblical jealousy is that if you're married or in God's case if you have a people that you've called to yourself that you have a rightful claim to their love, affection and obedience and so on, and if they behave, if they break that covenant and behave sinfully and so on, that produces a zeal, it produces a jealousy for the fact that you possess this, this is rightfully yours and you intensely love it. And the thing itself has no right to go off and to give itself to another and commit adultery and so on. That's why Israel was always called an adulterer, because of this jealousy. And God himself says, I am a jealous God. He says, my name is jealous. And it's never meant in a negative way. This word jealousy is not always translated jealous, like I've quoted to you there, but it is often translated as the old word zeal. that there were people in the camp of Israel I can't remember the name of the man who went out and because of his zeal He took out the enemies of God and so on. He was commended for his zeal. That's that word here. It's also used of Christ in Psalm 69 where Christ famously says in prophecy there in the Psalm, zeal for your house has consumed me. And that was then brought up in the early gospel narratives when Christ cleansed the temple. That was because of his zeal or his jealousy. He went in there, he saw what they were doing, and his spirit was aroused, it was animated with a holy jealousy. That this place is for this, and look at what they're doing with it. A den of thieves, corrupt, using the place of worship, the holy courts of God, and using it for these things. and John remembered when he saw Christ behave that way, it says, John remembered the psalm that it says, zeal for thine house has consumed me. This love is as strong as death and went to death. This love is a zealous love. Don't forget it. This is the foundation of a large percentage of the problems plaguing modern evangelicalism. this, that it's a zealous love. It isn't a pathetic human love that changes its mind or gives up or just gives up what belongs to him. Unmoved, lukewarm, untouched by the quality of the other. Christ is very gracious and merciful to sinners in the Gospels and his people when they fall. There is a graciousness and a mercy, but never misinterpret that as though he's indifferent to the things we do and the things our churches do. Never misinterpret it as an indifference or a kind of casual. Christ is not casual. His love is zealous. He told Laodicea, you're too casual. You think it's no big deal, you are lukewarm, and he says, I'm going to vomit you out. It is a zealous love, a gloriously beautiful and merciful and gracious and attractive love, but we are making a huge mistake today about God because we don't think he's zealous for his own glory and holiness. Huge mistake. His zeal is as severe as Sheol. Sheol is a deep, powerful place. It is a place that takes people and they never come out of it when they go there in judgment and so on. Solomon could not put it more strongly. He says then, it's flashes or flashes of fire, the flame of the Lord, the idea that God's love is a fire like his own nature, that it's strong as death, as jealousy, as zealous, it's a deep, possessive love, and it's like a flame. These are just poetic figures, it's not actually a flame, but the next time you see a fire, think about this. The next time you see a fireplace, you see the way flames behave, the heat, how if you put your hand in it and so on. Well, God's love is like this. It burns, it consumes, it's warm, it's beautiful, it's mysterious, like God's own glory when he appears as a burning fire. His very being in its purity, in its sanctifying power, in the heat and the intensity of the being of God. That the nations will melt like wax before the fire of his presence. This love is a burning love. So this strength of the love, its intensity, describes for us God's love. I'm bringing things to a close here. Describes for us God's love, that this love is the eternal love of God that is now expressed through Christ to weak sinners like you and me. but it's the covenant, marital, eternal love of a burning, blazing God that produced the universe, an everlasting God, an infinite God that he says to his people in the Old Testament, I have loved you with an everlasting love. What do we take from such intensity and zeal? You know, one of the applications is when he's zealous, we ought to be zealous and so on. But the immensity of this love, what do we take from it? Well, it is divine because he is divine. So when we speak of Christ's love and so on, we're not talking horizontally here at all. We can't compare it to our earthly relationships. This is when a divine being that is triune, decides to love you. That's in a category of its own. And it makes the love everlasting and eternal, which is worth your meditation when you go home tonight. Eternal. Just think about that. That this flash of fire, this intense, vehement love This love that overcomes death is as strong as death, that overcomes the grave and is as strong as the grave, a jealous love. That this love for you in Christ, that it began before anything else existed. So one way to see that is, As glorious as the physical creation is, and I've preached on that before, and I enjoy the physical creation too, especially the sky at night is glorious. But if you go out tonight or this week and you look up and you see the stars and the moon, or you see the expanse just going out into this vast, unknowable distance, when you look up, You're not looking at eternity, you're looking at something that's made. Those stars are made. That deep blackness is made. And you know it's old when you look at it. It's been there for a very long time. Now as a Christian, You can take the verses about Christ's love and really set your mind to understand them. And when you look at that, you can say with clarity that before that was even there, Christ loved me. Before that was stretched out, thousands of years ago, before it was even there, I was known in the electing love of the Trinity. I was known. The father and the son didn't buy up a workforce and then figure out the names later. The father and the son decided whom they would elect and whom they would create. That's you. Isn't that marvelous? You can look up and say before, the whole world can see this. Scientists study it. Stephen Hawking thinks he understands it. But before it was there, I was loved and known in the council of eternity. My name was already on the table. I was already engraved upon his heart. Well, it's divine. and it's eternal, this love. And that means, and this is my last comment, that means in its strength, in its intensity, in its eternality, it can't be destroyed. Many waters cannot quench love, nor can the floods drown it. The man would give for love all the wealth of the South, and it would be utterly despised. The idea there is of a burning flame and that the water's coming over, it can't put it out. And that's a wonderful thought. Certainly of our own love that Christ promises that once we love him, we will never stop loving him. That there is the perseverance of the saints. But of Christ's own immense love for his people as a bridegroom that flows from him towards his church right now. That all the waters that come in, anything that comes into your life, all the commotion and so on, as it crashes upon you, like it does water upon the rocks when it comes into shore. The point here is that these waters cannot put out this love. Nothing can break the fact that he has this love for the elect believer. It is absolutely secure. It never fluctuates or diminishes. Christ's love does not go down and then up and so on. It is constant. They say in science that the speed of light is a constant. Well, it can only be a constant if what Christ has is constant. Christ's love is a constant. Every time you do something to light, it will behave the same. It will always go at the same speed and so on. Christ's love is like that. It is a divine constant. It doesn't change. Our love ebbs and flows. It weakens. It gets tired. It can lie languishing on the floor. It can become very confused. It can end up at its wits end. A Christian can be very unhappy. But God's love, Christ's love, is it like that? Is God's marital commitment and covenant something that's going to be shaken? Do you think God gives up his wife? We even know men that would never do that. Do you think God will give up his bride and allow his bride to be taken away by strangers and so on and to be destroyed? Is his love inconstant? Is Christ saving, dying, sacrificing love? His divine, exalted love? The love of the divine husband? Can it ever be quenched or broken? Look at him with Peter, look at him with Paul, look at him throughout the New Testament with his people. Do you see him breaking his love bonds with his church? Do you see Paul get worse and worse or better and better? Do you see Peter kept to the end or did Christ abandon Peter for all his faults and so on? No, Christ's love is intense and constant and it cannot be interfered with and broken. What shall separate us from the love of Christ? The Apostle says, shall nakedness, famine, sword, peril? I am persuaded that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ. Neither things present, things that are to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any created thing, including Satan. He's a created thing. Nothing in all of creation can break, weaken, or sever the bond, the chain of love that Christ has for a Christian soul. Are these things not wonderful? Paul isn't speaking abstractly there. Who shall separate you tonight from that love? your own sin, your own tiredness, your own despondency, your foolishness. What will separate you from it if you're truly in him? Nothing. Because this love is strong and powerful and indestructible. What a love this is. what a love this is and what a glorious thing if I or you can call this love our own and to say tonight in light of that Lord set me as a seal upon your heart and as a seal upon your arm. The bride is upheld The bride is born. The bride requests that he show and remember that love. And the bride looks at what his love is truly like. And this is the heart of the song of Solomon. Amen. May God bless our thoughts upon his word.