Thank you very much. What a lovely hymn. The Lamb is all the glory of Emmanuel's land. Well, that's quite an experience tonight. I've forgotten all about that brother asked me to sing the solo part in that choir number. And it was after I'd eaten a big supper that he called me. He said he coming over at, you know, quarter to seven. This is twenty-five to seven. And it's one of those, you know, preach, pray or die at any moment. and I'd rather die. But then when I get up here, I'm trying to look at the notes and hold that mic and turn the page, and it's gotten where it was after a while. I was trying to remember what I had seen at the practice, and then I came in at the wrong time, but I brought them with me. It can't beat them, join them. So I appreciate them all going with my time there, and that one part of that solo, but we got through it, right? Great song. How great does that work? Nearly murdered it. But anyway, it's fine. I did, I mean. I'm told by the choir. It was great. And I'm delighted to be here. And I love to sing. I love to harmonize with people. And I used to sing in a quartet. And it's great. Great to sing, right? We should feel like singing. Don't be so miserable. We ought to feel like singing. It's a delight. And, by the way, I ate too much now. I was at first supper tonight. And, you know, the two kinds of eaters. Some people eat to their full and others eat to their tired. I think I ate until I was tired tonight. Big dessert, whipped cream, you know, all that stuff. It's not good for you when you're going to sing. And also when you're going to preach. And so it's got nothing to do with the message. But I was thinking about what happens to you when you eat too much and you preach. I thought of Bill Belch. Bill had a sister. You remember Bill Belch? He ran Joy Bible Camp. and Bill had a sister, I think it was Bertha, was it Bertha Belch? And she was a missionary in Africa. And in the Avenue Road Church in Toronto, he used to put announcements for the Wednesday night meetings and missionaries come in and so forth to give a report of their work. And on the bulletin board in the Avenue Road Church one night, it said, come and hear Bertha Belch all the way from Africa. That's a long distance. Come on, I'll tell you. I thought it was Bill Belch and I was thinking about tonight. But anyway, it was a great supper, believe me, and I enjoyed it. But it's a delight to know the Lord, isn't it? To know Christ as your Savior and to live in the enjoyment of it. To me, that's the thing. It's not just saying, well, I'm a Christian, I'm going to heaven and I think I'll make it. No, I think we should. As life goes on and the older you get, the more you should know the Lord intimately. and be loving Him fervently and serving Him. Even though you may not be as physically as alert as you were before, the fact is you can still enjoy your salvation. Therefore, with joy, right, we shall draw out of the wells of salvation, with joy, not misery. I hate to be in this whole situation where people sit there and they're totally miserable. And yet they're going to heaven, right? Going to heaven. And your sins are all forgiven. And then sit there. Absolutely miserable. Well, tonight we're in Song of Solomon. We're going into chapter two. This morning we talked about that company of horses in Pharaoh's chariots. And it was a compliment after we get through all of that. Now in chapter two, verse one, it says, I am the rose of Sharon and the lily of the valleys. I'm not going to deal with that chorus tonight. And by the way, Those Irish songs, beautiful tunes, a lot of them have been put to Christian words. We sung last night when Irish eyes are smiling, he finally was a burden. There's another hymn to the tune of Mother Macri. There's another one to the Rose of Tralee. And it's, he was lovely and fair, like the fair Rose of Sharon. but it was not his beauty alone that won me. Ah, no, twas his hands and his side deeply wounded, that made me love Jesus, for Jesus loved me. Isn't that nice? Nice tune. And those are good words. And Jesus Christ is the fairest and so on. But here in the second verse, You have a very interesting expression. It says, As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters. And I was thinking today about this whole business of a lily among thorns. By the way, every day we live in this world, the thorns are all around us. The evidence of the thorns are all around where the church is situated in this world. Is that true? We live in the middle of thorns. Now thorns, as you know in the Word of God, represent the curse of sin. Way back in the book of Genesis, when man had sinned through disobedience in the Garden of Eden, and God said, Curse it be the ground for thy sake and so on. And it says, Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth. They're the mark of the curse. But thank God Jesus has made a curse for us, wasn't he? And he wore a crown of thorns. I always remember a message. on the crown of thorns given not by Harold Paisley but by his brother Ian, Ian Paisley. And he preached on the crown of thorns a tremendous message. He talked about the mockery of the crown of thorns. And he talked about the misery of the crown of thorns. And he talked about the mystery of the crown of thorns. And he talked about the meaning of the crown of thorns. He was through the whole series of things describing all of the misery and the mockery of it all, and yet the great mystery because Christ was made a curse for us. And we're redeemed from the curse. But we live in the world and all around us, you can see the grave situation of the thorns of iniquity and sin all around us. We live in a dirty world, folks. We live in a filthy world. We live in a world which is filled with corruption, showing the evidence of the curse of sin all around us. And yet in the middle of it all, God has put a lily. Right in the middle of it all. And I was thinking about those lilies. You know, turn over to the Gospel according to Luke. Let me talk to you a moment or two about the glory of the lily. And in Luke, you remember, Luke chapter twelve. Where, by the way, you have the story of the rich fool. When Jesus brings to our attention the fact that a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things that he possesses. Verse fifteen. He says, Take heed and beware of covetousness. For a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things that he possesses. You know, sometimes even we can be carried away with this. We get the idea, well, things are life. Well, they're not. life. See, people make millions of dollars and have everything that this world has to offer and die and go to hell. And Jesus said, what shall it profit a man if he gained the whole world and lose his own soul? And people get the idea, that's life. You've heard the story of the rich Texan who owned oil wells. And he said, when I die, I want to have a rich funeral. I want you to put my best suit on me. I want you to put my gold rings in my fingers. I want to have my gold Cadillac. I'll sit in the driver's seat. And you bury me in my Cadillac. And at the graveyard, when they were letting the Cadillac with the taxon sitting with all of his finery on him, going down into the grave, sitting there dead, two black fellows standing watching this, looking at that catalach, I had gold catalach going down into the grave, and one of them said to the other, Man, that's living. No, I wasn't living, I was dying. I was dead. He couldn't enjoy his riches. They were burying them. And Jesus said, You see, this is what it's all about. Life is not things. And by the way, as Christians, we don't need to be too concerned about things, do we? when we've got the Savior and in this particular parable of course he tells the story of the the rich man and in verse sixteen he speak a parable unto them saying the ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully and he thought within himself what saying what shall I do because I have no room where to bestow my fields is more than enough and then it says this I said this will I do I'll pull down my barns and build greater And there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods, and I will say, and by the way, notice all the eyes, and I will say, I will say, I will say, he thought within himself, totally self-centered. And he said, I will say to my soul, soul thou as much goods laid up for many years, take thy knees, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee. Then who shall those things be which thou hast provided? And then Jesus added this, So is he that mayeth up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. Now after telling that parable, he turned and spoke to his disciples. Next verse. It says, And he said unto his disciples, Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, neither for the body, what ye shall put on. What he's saying is, Don't be anxious, don't be worrying about that kind of thing. It's amazing. the amount of worrying that Christians do. Is that right? And yet we say, our Heavenly Father watches over me. And we sit moaning about the fact of whether we're going to make it or not. And it says here, look in verse twenty-four, consider the ravens. Now ravens were dirty birds, unclean birds, ravens. It says, for they neither sow nor eat, which neither have store hush nor barn, and God feedeth them. He sure does. I mean, I live in an area where there's a lot of porcupines and stuff that come out of the woods and driven down the highway. You know, you run over a porcupine, flatten it right on the highway, splattered all over the place. And you look in your mirror and you see these dirty birds. They come flying out. Everything's clear. Get on the napkin. knife and fork. There they are. Getting dinner. All provided. You help the Lord to provide it for them too. Run over a thing. And God provides for raven. They're unclean birds. These are unclean birds. They can't sow. They can't reap. They don't have any barns. And God feeds them. By the way, we are better than birds. Are we? We're better than birds. Now, I know we live in a society where people always say, well, now, you know, they try to make it almost equal with animals, right? I mean, I have a real hang-up today with the way they treat this animal rights group. You know what I mean? Animals, you shouldn't use the skin of animals. Now, listen. Animals are not on the same level as human beings. Never have been, never will be. Man is not on the same platform as animals. It was amazing how they say, well, how intelligent animals are. And you go to SeaWorld. Ever been to SeaWorld? See Shammu? And I was at SeaWorld. The first time we were at SeaWorld. And Shammu goes around that tank there and so on. Pop in the air and so on. And they throw a few fish in the way it goes. Isn't that amazing? They all applauded. And then what they did one time for Shammu, they got a girl to stand up on this platform here. And Shammu was going ripping around the tank. and came right to where that girl was standing, come up out of the water and kiss her on the cheek. I said to a fellow afterwards, I said, how long did it take you to teach that whale, that killer whale, to kiss a girl on the cheek? Said six months. I want you to know it didn't take me six months to learn that. It didn't take me six minutes to learn that. Are you either? We're not as stupid as that. See, what do they get? And there's an amazing, intelligent dog. Roll over. Point. Isn't that a marvelous dog? What intelligent? We're not like animals. And what God is saying, listen, the other Lord is saying is if God is able to feed animals that have no storehouse, no barn, they can't sow a reap. Can't he feed you? You better believe it, he can. Now then he talks about, that's the diamond he talks about the lilies. Look at verse twenty-seven. It says, Consider the lilies, how they grow. They toil not, they spin not. In other words, what they have is not of works, right? It isn't by their own works, by their own efforts. Lilies do not become what they are by their efforts, right? And it says here, They toil not, they spin out. Yet I say unto you, now this is a tremendous phrase. It says that Solomon, in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of these. Isn't that amazing? The richest, wisest king in all the Old Testament, Solomon, and the splendor of Solomon, you remember the Queen of Sheba, came and she saw where the servants sat in all the wonderful settings of his table, all the riches he had, and she said, The half has not been told me. And yet the Bible says, that the glory that God has put upon the lily is greater than the glory of Solomon. And by the way, let me tell you something else, that the glory which God has put upon the church, right, that lives in the midst of the curse of this world is far greater than all the glory of any earthly king. That's why it's a wonderful thing to be a Christian. It's a glorious thing to be a Christian. You see, the glory of a lily in the midst of the thorns. How glorious it is to be a Christian. Let's turn to Second Corinthians for a moment. In Second Corinthians chapter four. Now, you've read, I'm sure, Second Corinthians chapter three, where the Apostle Paul talks about the difference between the ministration of death and the ministration of life. The ministration of condemnation and the ministration of righteousness. The difference between the law and grace and the glory which was associated with the law and the glory which is found in Christ. And what he does is he says, listen, the glory that we have as the church of Jesus Christ in Christ is so glorious that the glory that Moses had in his face was no glory at all in comparison. Amazing, isn't it? And you keep in mind that when Moses, you remember, was up on that mountain receiving the law, and his face shone like the face of an angel, and when he came down there and he veiled his face so they could not look to the end of that which was to be abolished. That that glory is nothing compared to the glory we have in Christ. What a wonderful thing. The glory of the relief. And when you come to the end of that chapter, Second Corinthians, three, eighteen, it says, But we all, with open face, beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of God. Now, let's go into chapter four. Wherefore, seeing we have this what? Receive this ministry. The ministry of the glory. This ministry. As we have received mercy, we faint not. But we have renounced the hidden things dishonesty, not walking in craftiness or handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves through every man's conscience in the sight of God. Verse three. But if our gospel be hid, it is said to them that are what? Lost. You see, those that are lost do not see the glory of the gospel. because the devil has blinded their minds. And in verse four of second Corinthians chapter four it says that in the lost in whom the God of this world, that's the devil, have blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of what kind of gospel said together? The glorious gospel of Christ should shine unto them. The glorious gospel of Christ should shine unto them. For we preach not ourselves but Christ Jesus the Lord. and ourselves, your servants, for Jesus' sake. And then you have that lovely verse which actually takes us back to Genesis chapter one, where God commanded the light to shine out of darkness. It says in verse six that God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness in the beginning, hath shined in our hearts. Listen to it. To give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of whom? Jesus Christ. And it says, but we have this treasure. We have the treasure of the glory, right, in earthen vessels. It does not make you stand up tall to me like a Christian. And the glory of it that I have, by God's word, been brought face to face with the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, and I have this treasure inside me. By the way, folks, That world out there that's full of the thorns and the curse and the sin needs to see the glory of it through us. Is that right? Through these earthen vessels. And by the way, we don't like it when God touches the earthen vessel, begins to break the earthen vessel, and begins to deal with the earthen vessel. And when the rest of this chapter, the apostle Paul talks about being troubled on every side, yet not in despair and so on, and being persecuted. and being cast down and being perplexed and always bearing about in his body the dying of the Lord Jesus that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. What verses? That the glory might be saved. Folks, it's glorious to be a Christian, isn't it? It's glorious. And it's not of works. Lest any man should go. Just as the lilies, they toil not, they spin not, and yet God has arrayed them with their glory. And God has placed upon us and in us the glory which is found in his Son, the glory of being what, a lily? Greater than all the glory of the richest, most glorious king that ever lived. That's why it's wonderful to be a Christian. That's why it's wonderful to be his bride and to be the church of Jesus Christ in the midst of the thorns. Let me go on to something else. Go back to Song of Solomon with me. And I want to talk about the garden of the lilies. You find the glory of it over there in that particular chapter. But in chapter five, pardon me, chapter six of the Song of Solomon and verse two. Song of Solomon, chapter six, verse two. My beloved. Don't you like that phrase? My beloved. That's personal. My beloved. It says, My beloved has gone down into his what? Into his what? His garden. You see, when we talk about the church and we talk about believers and we talk about this whole business of having his glory, listen. What a wonderful picture here to say. We're his garden, right? Garden. I wonder what he sees when he comes down into his garden. I wonder what he smells, right, when he comes down into his garden. Ascending from the lives of his people in worship and adoration, coming up. What a wonderful thing. We are like a garden of lilies. And it says here, that he's gone down into his garden, to the beds of spices, to feed in his garden, and to gather lilies, to gather them. I know that you have that often enough, haven't you, that where two or three are what? Gathered together in my name, there in my image. He loves to gather us, doesn't he? Right? Gathered. That's the word you know all about. Gathering what? Lilies, saints of God in whom the glory dwells, and they're together as we worship, as we honor him, as we sing praises to him. The fragrance of the lilies ascends to his blessed nostrils. What a wonderful thing. There's a glory about the lilies. We're like a garden of lilies. You know, there's a little phrase used over in Ephesians chapter three. Where the Apostle Paul, in praying for the Ephesian Christians, says this. I'll give you this prayer. In verse fourteen of Ephesians chapter three, he says, For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. That he would grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with might by his spirit in the inner man. that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge that you might be filled with all the fullness of God. What a prayer. And in the middle of all of that, he says that ye being rooted, you see that word? Rooted and grounded in what? Love. I've been saved for about forty-nine years. And I've been a lot of gatherings of those spiritual lilies. I've been a lot of gatherings of God's people. And I've discovered this, that wherever in His garden the lilies are rooted and grounded in love, There's quite an atmosphere, isn't there? There's quite a fragrance that ascends from assembly there then. There's something about that that is fragrant like spices, gives off a sweet smell. You ever go into a meeting and there was a rotten atmosphere? I've been in them. Haven't you been in them? Sure. But you've been in others where you know, one of the things I discovered, now I have never been to this place before, okay? I have never been part of the pond before. Never been here. And I sense this, all right? That where people are here and some in the manner and some in your apartments and so forth, that you care for each other. Is that true? I really do. I sense that right here. I sense that even you're concerned for my daughter and so on. That's a marvelous thing. It's a great atmosphere, right? Where God's people are rooted in what? Love. That's the kind of soil that sends up a fragrance. By the way, our beloved came in tonight, didn't he? He's here. Among the lilies. The glory we have. We're like a garden rooted in. in his love. And as he has gathered us together, here's a big question. I'm not going to ask you tonight, what are you going to get out of this meeting? Because generally what happens is in conferences that when you come, you want to be fed. Is that right? You should want to be fed. God's people need to be fed. And you need to receive a deeper appreciation of him. And that's wonderful. But you see, it's wonderful when in the garden of lilies where the glory is, and our beloved comes into his garden, it says he feedeth, right, among the lilies. And many a time in a meeting I've said to myself, I wonder not just what these believers will get out of this message. And I hope you do. This week gets something out of the Word of God that will feed your soul and set you on fire as you'll be jogging before the week's over. Spiritually. And we say physically that I want to be responsible for heart attacks around here. But spiritually, that you've got a spring in your step now, and you say, man, I'm excited. And it's just been a delight to be together every day and every morning and every night, and it's thrilled us to know Christ and so forth and learn more about Him and be excited about Him. Yeah, I hope so. I hope so. I hope you get so excited that there'd be an odd praise God now and again. But the big question I'm asking is this. My beloved has come down into his garden. He has gathered his lilies, gathering lilies. What does he feed upon, right? How is he refreshed? What refreshes the Lord? We say, well, boy, he feeds us, and he's the shepherd that leads us into the green pastures and beside the still waters, and it's thrilling to get something from his hand and feed with him and feed from the Word of God. That's great. But what refreshes him? Let me tell you a little portion of Scripture here. In Genesis chapter eighteen, Abraham... It's sitting in this tent door. Now, Genesis chapter eighteen follows Genesis seventeen. You understand that? That's right. I just wanted to be sure you understood that. Because that's complicated. But it does, it follows. Now, if you're Genesis seventeen, at the end of that chapter, God asked Abraham to do a very difficult thing, didn't he? He said, I want you to circumcise every man you're asked. And we're talking now just about little boys. We're talking about grown men, right? As well as little boys. Now, I don't know about you. I would not like to have been Abraham announcing that. To walk into that house and say, by the way, God has told me to circumcise every man in the house. I'm sure someone had it for the door. Or they might have said to Abraham, you're hearing voices. It can't be the will of God. And Abraham knew that God had told him, circumcise every male in your house. Do you know what the Bible says? The very same day that God told him, Abraham, circumcised every man in his house. That's obedience, isn't it? That's obedience. And immediately following that, in the next chapter, the Lord came to be with him. In his tent door, three men came. One of them was the Lord. Two were angels that were going on to Sodom with that message of judgment. of fire and brimstone. And when the Lord came, sat under Abraham's tree. Do you know what happened? That Abraham was able to say to Sarah, Make ready quickly, three measures of meal. And the Lord sat under Abraham's tree. And the Lord was refreshed by Abraham, wasn't he? Do you know what refreshes the Lord? obedience obedience one of the sad things in ministry is this there are people who listen to the word of God and they listen to what God has said to them and they don't do it right they don't do it and you'll find it over in the gospel according to John you remember the Lord Jesus said if any man if you hear my word and you do it in other words Happiness is not knowing the Bible. I know some miserable theologians. I know people that know everything about eschatology and soteriology or any other ology even think of. They know it all. And they're the most miserable people you can meet. Happiness is this. Jesus said, if you know these things, happier you, what? Do them. Do it. Do it. That's what happiness is. doing it, obedience. And the Lord promises, He said, If anyone keep my words, it says, We will come to what? To Him. We will make our abode with Him. We will live with Him. See, it refreshes the Lord when you obey Him. And a verse we often use in preaching the gospel, find in the book of Revelation, In the letter to the church of Laodicea, verse twenty, the Lord says, Behold, I stand at the door on what? Now, if any man hear my voice, right? That's the word. And open the door, that's obedience. Listen to this now. I will come in to him and will what? Stop with him. And what? He with me. That's a mutual feast, isn't it? We say, I will sup with him and he will sup with me. That's a great relationship. That's a kind of thing to enjoy your Christian life. And in the song of Solomon, it says, My beloved, he's gone down into his garden. He feeds us among the lilies. He's there to gather lilies. And he's getting something out of his garden. And the lilies are enjoying nourishment in that garden. And this whole relationship is mutual. Because I'm sure of this. That during this week, not only should we get something fragrant. And something full. And something blessed out of the Word of God. But our beloved one should get something out of it too, shouldn't he? He should get something. You see, folks, a lot of people hear a lot of sermons, and what's missing is doing what it says. In Canada, during the last, oh, I'd say the last twenty years, years ago they brought out a slogan in Canada in relation to exercise. They said, actually they put in the news one time, that a seventy-year-old sweet was fitter than a twenty-one-year-old Canadian. I don't know how true that was, but it made all the twenty-one-year-old's math. And they said, man, if that's the way it is, we need to get in shape. And they started a program in Canada called Participation. And they had a slogan, Participation. Get with the action. Don't just think about it. Do it with a friend you both can bend. Do it with your muscles you both can have. And on TV over and over again, says, don't just think about it, do it. Don't just think about it, do it. And if you see any Nike, that's that sneaker advertisement. The two words are what? Do it. Do it. Do it. I never did an exercise for years. The only exercise I used to do was to walk to the table and eat and then walk away again until the next meal. And I remember... on our campus, our principal, found a book by the Air Force, put out by the Air Force, was called Five BX. And he read the book and he came to me and he says, you know, Bob, he says, we need to get in shape. We're serving the Lord. Our body's the temple of the Holy Ghost. At that time, I was built like a cube. That means that every way you measured me has the same height. This way, this way, this way. I was forty-five pounds heavier than I am now. And he said to me, you know, give me a whole lecture. You should do this. And I said, yes, I know I should. That's right. Maybe I should. He said, read this book and do it. So I got the book, and I said in the first page of the book, please read this book carefully before starting this exercise program. I read it for five years. Now, you can't be more careful than that. I mean, I read it for five years. I could memorize it. I could tell you every exercise sooner or later jumps up and jumps on. I knew the whole book. The thing that was wrong is I never did anything. I read it. And every time he had me, he said, are you doing those actions? I said, I'm still reading the book, Ken. I'm careful. Then one day I said, God, that's it. I'm going to do it. And for twenty-two years, I've been doing it. That makes a difference, by the way. Now, I'm not recommending you run or anything else. Well, I'm saying this. reading, you don't lose weight by reading books on diet. All right? Now, I know, ladies, there's some of you on diet. I know that. Because you get this six glasses a day. You get that? Yeah. You see the laughing? They know. You read the book, Fit for Life. Yeah. Fit to be tired. Anyway. You're fit for life. But the point is, reading books and all of this, and I'm not saying you should go on a diet. I'm simply saying this. Reading what it says is not doing it. Right? Information is doing it. Participating. And what the marvelous thing is this, that tonight, whatever the Lord says to us in the Word of God, as we study it and so forth, we say, Lord, I'll do it. By the grace of God, I'll do it. I want you to know that refreshes Him. obedience refreshes my beloved now he certainly wants to refresh us and it's a marvelous thing to know him as our beloved and we're his love and he's put upon us his glory and put in us the glory of the gospel in the midst of this wicked cursed world of thorns and sin and tonight he's come down into his garden He has gathered the lilies, rooted in love. He wants to feed among the lilies. And I trust, even in this meeting tonight, we're saying to him, Lord, whatever you want, whatever it is, by your grace, I'll do it. And out of this meeting tonight, not only will we be fed, But he'll be fed. As the lily among thorns, so is my beloved, my love among the daughters. Glorious. Garden. Gathered. And he gets some good out of it too, doesn't he? Let's bow in a word of prayer. Father, we thank you tonight for your word. Praise you for your grace. Thank you, Lord, for your love expressed upon us, and you have given us just like the lily, the glory, which is far greater than the glory of any earthly king. Oh, Lord, we pray that as we listen to the word of God day by day and read it day by day,