Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 605
Delivered on Sunday Morning, December 18, 1864, by C, H. Spurgeon, at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington
“Come, my Beloved, let us go forth to the field. Let us lodge in the villages. Let us get up early to the vineyards. Let us see if the vine has budded, whether the grape blossoms are open and the pomegranates are in bloom. There will I give You my love. The mandrakes give off a fragrance, and at our gates are pleasant fruits, all manner new and old, which I have laid up for You, O my Beloved.” Song of Solomon 7:11-13.
THE daughters of Jerusalem had been praising the Church as the fairest among women. They spoke of her with admiring appreciation, extolling her from head to foot. She wisely perceived that it was not easy to bear praise, and therefore she turned aside from the virgins to her Lord, making her boast not of her own loveliness, but of her being affianced to her beloved—“I am my Beloved’s and His desire is toward me.”
Solomon has said, in his Book of Proverbs, “As the fining pot for silver and the furnace for gold so is a man to his praise,” meaning to teach us that praise is a serious ordeal. Very many men can bear censure and abuse, for their spirit rises so superior to it all that they are even profited thereby. But to be flattered, or even duly honored, is not so easy a thing to endure. The sun’s warm beams made the traveler unbind his coat when the wind made him wrap it the more closely about him—the warmth of praise may make us relax our integrity—unless we are very watchful.
How many have been foolish enough, when standing upon a pinnacle, to look down and admire their own elevation and then their brain has reeled and they have fallen to their own shameful ruin? If we must at any time listen to the praises of our virtues. If we have served God so that the Church recognizes and rewards our usefulness, it is well for us to listen just as long as we are obliged to do, but no longer. And then let us turn aside at once to something more practical and more healthful to our own spirits.
The spouse seems abruptly to break off from listening to the song of the virgins and turns to her own husband-Lord, communion with whom is ever blessed and ever profitable. She says to Him, “Come, my Beloved, let us go forth into the field.” To lodge in communion with Christ is a certain cure for every ill. Whether it is the bitterness of woe, or the overindulgence of earthly delight, close fellowship with the Lord Jesus will take the gall from the one and the satiety from the other. Live near to Jesus, Christian, and it is matter of secondary importance whether you live on the mountain of honor or in the valley of humiliation.
Live near to Jesus and the glowing coals of the furnace cannot consume you, nor the chill blasts of wintry affliction destroy you. Living near to Jesus you are covered with the wings of God and underneath you are the everlasting arms. If you read the three verses before us with attention, you will see that the Church all through anxiously desires fellowship with her Lord. It is, “Come with me,” “let us.” She will do nothing except as she is near to her beloved and in the enjoyment of His company.
I think she desires three things in her words. First, she desires to practice self-examination—she would go and see whether the vine flourishes and whether the tender grape blossoms appear. But it is self-examination with Him. She desires next to go into active service—it is to this end that she would lodge in the villages and go among the tender plants, that she may labor there, but it is with Him—“Let us go!” “Come with me!” In the third place, she has a store of fruits laid up for Him. Some things done and some things doing—things old and new—but they are all for Him and she will not mention them except for Him, much less bring them out for them to be enjoyed by a rival. “They are laid up for You, O my Beloved.”
Let us try to make a personal matter of the text, this morning, and may God hear the desire of our hearts that we may have true fellowship with His own dear Son.
I. First, then, IS THE MATTER OF SELF-EXAMINATION. This is a most desirable and important business, but every Believer should desire to have communion with Christ while he is attending to it. Self-examination is of the utmost importance. No trader who would wish to succeed would neglect to keep his books. No farmer who wishes to prosper would be careless as to the state of his fields. No flock-master who would see his herds abundantly increase would leave his servants to care for them and fail to tend them with a watchful eye. If you would have your business prosper, see to it carefully yourself.
In soul-business it is of no use taking anything for granted where there are so many temptations to self-deception in our own hearts—where so many around us are deceived and are willing to help us to be deceived, too. And where Satan sedulously and craftily seeks to cry to us, “Peace, peace,” where there is no peace—it is of the first and last importance that we should search ourselves whether we are in the faith and whether, being in the faith, our graces are growing, our faith increasing, and our love deepening.