In this sermon, Pastor Chuck Smith continues his study through the Song of Solomon, focusing on chapter 4, verse 8. He invites the bride to come with him from Lebanon, expressing his deep love for her. The sermon emphasizes the beauty and power of love, comparing it to the counterculture of the 1960s and the popular song "All You Need is Love." Pastor Chuck Smith shares the message of Jesus' love and how it can change lives, offering his book "Love, The More Excellent Way" as a resource for further understanding.

Oh, let the Son of God enfold you With His Spirit and His love Let Him fill your heart and satisfy your soul Oh, let Him have the things that mold you And His Spirit like a dove Will descend upon your life And make you whole And now, with today's message, here's Pastor Chuck. Come with me from Lebanon, my bride, with me from Lebanon. Look from the top of Ammanah, from the top of Shinar and Hermon, from the lion's den and from the mountains of the leopards, that northern area of Lebanon, Mount Hermon and all. In those days, there were lions and leopards in that area, recorded in the scriptures. But then he goes on to say, You have ravished my heart, my sister. And here the idea of sister is that of infinitely delicate, intimating the very whiteness of purity in the midst of the love that is there. You have ravished my heart, my sister, my bride. Thou hast ravished my heart with one of your eyes and with one chain of your neck. How fair is your love, my sister, my bride! How much better is thy love than wine and the smell of your ointments or perfumes than all spices. Thy lips, O my bride, drop as the honeycomb. Honey and milk are under thy tongue, and the smell of thy garments is like the smell of Lebanon. A garden enclosed is my sister, my bride, a spring that is shut up, a fountain that is sealed. Thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates with pleasant fruits, camphor, spikenard. The spikenard and the saffron, the calamus, the cinnamon, and all of the trees of frankincense, myrrh and aloes with the chief spices, a fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, the streams from Lebanon. And so he becomes very profuse and lavish as he waxes really eloquent in his description of his bride, of her beauty, of his being totally ravished by her, his love overwhelming him, overcoming him. She responds. He says, you're like a garden, all of the pleasant spices and all, you know, you're just so beautiful. And she responds, awake, O north wind, come thou south. Blow upon my garden that the spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved come into his garden and let him eat his pleasant fruits. And so taking it over into the spiritual realm, the church is the bride of Christ, inviting really the wind to come and take the beauty of Christ that is in the church and waft across it so that it might spread out, that the influence of the church might spread throughout the world. And then that the Lord himself may come into the garden to partake of the fruit. Now, there is that segment of Christianity and the church that places a tremendous emphasis upon works, what you are doing for the Lord. And they get the people deeply involved in a lot of works. And there is an intimation that your works do express the degree of righteousness. And righteousness is more or less measured by works. So by the amount of time you pray, by the amount of time you read the word, by the amount of witnessing that you do, by the amount of money you give, amount of time that you spend in the church doing work around the church and so forth, that this sort of is an indicator of your righteousness. And thus there are many people who are seeking a righteous standing before God by works. And they seek to point to God their works for him. Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? And have we not cast out devils? And have we not healed the sick? And did we not do this and that and the other? We remember when Jesus was writing to the church of Ephesus. He mentioned and emphasized the fact that it was a working church. I know thy labor and thy works. And he speaks about how they did all of these things and were doing the right things. They had a lot of works. But they were lacking in one essential element. Nevertheless, I have this against you. You have left your first love. Now, the Lord is not interested in works that we do to try to have a righteous standing before God. That was the flaw and the failure of the Pharisees in that they were seeking a righteousness as the result of their works of the law. They were seeking a righteous standing before God by their works of the law. And the church has embraced that idea in many quarters, that they will give you sort of an assignment. This is what you should do as a Christian. And these are the works and these are the things that make you righteous. And these are the things that will cause God to accept you. And thus, there are many people who are involved in a lot of works, but they don't have what the Lord is really looking for, love. And Jesus said, you have all the works. I know these things, but I have this against you. You've left your first love. And therefore, He calls upon them to repent. Remember that first love. You see, it is usually the first love that is the thing that prompts and sparks the works. Which, when they come as the result of love, we don't really consider them as works. We just consider them as a joy. It's just the joy of the Lord and knowing Him and His love for me, knowing how great His love is for me. I respond to that, and there's nothing that is too much for me to do for Him, because I love Him so much. And that's what He wants. He wants those things that spring out of my life spontaneously as a result of the love. And that happens many times. A person begins with this spontaneous response to the discovery of salvation and eternal life through Jesus Christ, and they're responding, and they're just, you know, they can't get enough. They can't get to church often enough, and they can't get enough of the Word. And they're just so excited and so enthralled with the things of the Spirit. But as time goes on, these things that were once such a joy and the fruit of their relationship become sort of a work kind of a thing. And it's, oh, it's Thursday night. I've got to go to church tonight, you know, Thursday night. And it's not a spontaneous, joyous kind of a thing. They're still doing it, but the love isn't there. And Jesus wants the love. He said, you've left that first love. And He was calling the church back to the love that initially sparked the works. Now, the moment it turns to the realm of works, it then turns to the realm of the flesh. For all work is wrought in the flesh. When you get into the realm of the Spirit, it is fruit. It is the natural result of relationship. The apple doesn't work at getting ripe, becoming luscious. All it does is just hang in there. Attached to the tree, it develops. And it is the natural result of the relationship attached to the tree. The natural result is the ripening and the becoming luscious. And you don't see the apples on there just working and struggling to get red and to get ripe and to get edible. It's just natural result of relationship. Jesus said, I am the vine, you're the branches, every branch in me that bringeth forth fruit. The fruit comes as a result of abiding in the vine. Cut off from the vine, you can't do anything. You can't bear fruit. You're worthless. And therefore, abide in Christ. And as you abide in Him, fruit will be the natural result of this relationship of abiding in Christ. And that's what He's looking for. This fruit that develops out of the natural relationship with Him. Now we read, the fruit of the Spirit is love. But it starts out, but the fruit of the Spirit is love. But is a disassociative conjunction. I remember that from high school. That's a long time ago. But it is a conjunction that ties together two contrasting kind of thoughts. So when you get to the word but, the disassociative conjunction, it means that you have two contrasting thoughts that are being tied together with this little conjunction. The contrast, but the fruit of the Spirit is love. So the contrast that this word but is tying together is, but the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these. And it tells us the works of the flesh. Then in contrast to that, but the fruit of the Spirit is love. Now whenever you think of works, you usually think of a manufacturing plant. And all of the workers on the assembly line doing their job. And unfortunately, many churches have become like manufacturing plants where they get everybody on the assembly line, and this is what you do, and if you don't, then the committee member will call you to find out where you were and why you didn't, and did you follow up, and you know, you got this assembly line process. And the church is working, functioning, according to this organizational chart that we've set up. But in contrast to that, the fruit of the Spirit is love, which is manifested in joy and peace and long-suffering and patience and gentleness and goodness and meekness and temperance. Now, when the Lord comes to His church, He doesn't want to come to a factory to observe the assembly line, to see that the works are all, you know. He wants to come to His garden and enjoy the fruit. And He said where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst. He wants to come into the garden to enjoy the fruit of the garden. And He's not interested in the works. He's interested in that love that flows forth. And so we hear the bride responding to this analogy that the groom makes that she's like a garden, a pleasant garden of spices and all. And she said come, thou North wind, blow south. Blow across the garden that you might carry the fragrance out and away. And then the invitation to the bridegroom, let my beloved come into His garden and partake of the pleasant fruits. Lord, come. Partake of the fruit, my love for you. And pouring out your love to Him in this beautiful, intimate fellowship and relationship. That's what Jesus is looking for. He's not coming to see how many people you witnessed to this last week, how many chapters you read of the Bible, how many scriptures you memorized. He's just looking for love. Your heart open to Him in love. He comes into His garden to enjoy its delights. And so the bridegroom responds. I am come into my garden, my sister, my bride. I have gathered my myrrh with the spice. I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey. I have drunk my wine with my milk. Eat, oh friends, drink. Yes, drink abundantly, oh beloved. I have come. And here is that beautiful joy of just the consciousness of the presence of Jesus pouring out our hearts to Him and just receiving and experiencing the touch of His love upon our lives and that deep, beautiful communion as our love flows out to Him. Now, the bride speaks again about an experience. It's like a dream, and yet it seems to be more real than just a dream. She said, I sleep, but my heart's awake. And it is the voice of my beloved that knocks, saying, open to me my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled, for my head is filled with dew and my locks with the drops of the night. So as she is there at night to sleep in her bed, she hears this voice. She's sleeping and yet her heart is awake, and she hears this voice calling for her to open. I think that there are times when the Lord calls us into fellowship, and I think that many times He's just longing for that close intimacy. Spend some time with me. How many times the Lord is just calling out for us to just spend some time with me. And I wonder how many times we just sort of pass it off, well, Lord, I'm so busy, I'm doing this, you know, I've got to get down here and I've got to do that, and Lord, you've got me so busy, and the Lord's saying, hey, just spend some time with me. You remember the story of Mary and Martha as Jesus came to visit these sisters. And Martha was out busy in the kitchen getting the food and everything all ready, setting out the little dainties and all, and Mary was just sitting at the feet of Jesus, just looking up and adoring Him, listening to His words, just communing with Him. And Martha finally called out from the kitchen and said, Lord, would you send Mary in here? I'm doing all the work and she's just sitting out there with you. And Jesus responded to Martha, Martha, Martha, Martha, you're so busy with these nonessential things. Mary has chosen the better part and it's not going to be taken away from her. And I wonder how many times in our busyness for the Lord we've neglected the better part of just sitting at His feet, adoringly, worshiping, just in that intimacy of love that He desires. And so the bride hears the voice, the knock at the door, asking to open, let's spend some time open to me. But she responds, I have put off my coat. I've washed my feet. I washed my feet and climbed into bed. How can I get them dirty? And so she said, my Beloved put His hand by the latch of the door and my bowels were moved for Him. Now, it is the belief that the deepest emotions are not felt in the brain, but down deep, you've heard of gut-level feelings? And they say that when you experience emotions in the deepest part of your being, it's down here in your gut-level area. That there is where the deepest emotions are felt. That when you're really touched to the deepest part of your emotional being, you'll feel it down here in your stomach region. But there's this feeling down deep, deep, deep in the deepest area of the emotions of man. And all the way through the Scriptures you will read of this, the bowels of compassion, and where it speaks about emotions in the deepest level being what we would refer to today as the gut-level feelings. And so she speaks of being moved in the deepest area of the emotions for Him. And so she said, I rose up to open to my Beloved, and my hands dropped with myrrh and my fingers with the sweet-smelling myrrh upon the handles of the lock. He had taken hold of the handles of the lock, and the scent of Him, the perfume and all, was still there as she took hold of the handle. It was just like her hand was touching the myrrh that came from His hand as He had hold of the handle. And she said, I opened to my Beloved, but my Beloved had withdrawn Himself. He was gone. And my soul failed when He spoke, and I sought Him, but I could not find Him. I called Him, but He gave me no answer. Those times when the Lord has called us for this intimacy, this communion, just this close fellowship with Him, and we sort of are slow to respond. Lord, I've gone to bed. I've washed my feet. Shall I get them dirty? I mean, I don't want to move. And then your heart is so moved. You say, well, oh yes, and you come. But then it seems like you're too late. The Lord has withdrawn Himself. And oh, what a feeling of forlorn emptiness when we lose the consciousness of His presence. When we feel the sort of an absence of His nearness. And so I called Him, but He gave me no answer. The watchmen that went about the city, they smote me. They wounded me. The keepers of the walls took away my veil from me. And then turning to the young maidens, I charge you, oh daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my Beloved, tell Him that I am sick of love. Now, you would say today, I'm lovesick. I'm just lovesick. My heart is just wrenching because of the love. We'll return with more of our verse-by-verse venture through the Bible in our next broadcast, as Pastor Chuck continues his study through the Song of Solomon. And we do hope you'll make plans to join us. But right now, I'd like to remind you that if you'd like to secure a copy of today's message, simply order Song of Solomon 4.8 when visiting thewordfortoday.org. And while you're there, we encourage you to browse the many additional biblical resources by Pastor Chuck. You can also subscribe to the Word for Today podcast or sign up for our email subscription. Once again, all this can be found at thewordfortoday.org. If you wish to call, our toll-free number is 1-800-272-WORD and our office hours are Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Pacific Time. Again, that's 1-800-272-9673. For those of you preferring to write, our mailing address is The Word for Today, P.O. Box 8000, Costa Mesa, California, 92628. And now, on behalf of The Word for Today, we'd like to thank all of you who share in supporting this ministry with your prayers and financial support. And be sure to join us again next time as Pastor Chuck continues his verse-by-verse study through the Bible. That's right here on the next edition of The Word for Today. And now, once again, here's Pastor Chuck with today's closing prayer. Father, we thank you for the words of wisdom, instruction in righteousness and in truth and in equity. May we walk, Lord, in that righteousness and in that truth. May we incline our hearts to understanding, to knowledge, and to wisdom, and that we might, Lord, receive the rewards of the righteous. In Jesus' name, amen. The 1960s became one of the most colorful periods in American history. The counterculture was dropping out and turning on. The summer of love was the stage for many dramas of change and the most popular musical group in the world was singing, All You Need Is Love. But one man in Southern California was reaching out with the answer and the truth began to set people free. Author and pastor Chuck Smith began to share the love of Jesus Christ with a generation that was looking for love in all the wrong places. Now, some 40 years later, the gospel of love is still changing lives. In his book simply titled, Love, The More Excellent Way, pastor Chuck Smith expounds upon the love that can change your life now and forever. For more information on how to obtain your copy, visit a bookstore nearest you or call 1-800-272-WORD or visit us online at thewordfortoday.org. That's thewordfortoday.org. This program has been sponsored by The Word for Today in Costa Mesa, California.