THE christian's RELIANCE ON CHRIST.
Cant. viii. 5. Who is this that cometh up from the tvilderness, leaning on her Beloved?
THERE is an intimate and mysterious union be- tween Christ and his Church. It is often compared, in Scripture, to a marriage union : and in the book before us, the Song of Solomon, there is a figurative representation of the intercourse which subsists be- tween Christ and his Church under this relation. A third description of persons, called " the daughters of Jerusalem," are occasionally introduced, to diversify the dialogue, and to enliven it by bearing their part in it. The words of the text seem to be uttered by t/iem. The Church had, in the four preceding verses, expressed her desire after more familiar and abiding fellowship with her divine Husband : and the by- standers, admiring and felicitating her state, exclaim "Who is this?" &c.
I will endeavour briefly,
I. To throw light upon the words thus addressed to the Church —
There does not, indeed, appear any considerable difficulty in them ; especially if we bear in mind the passage of the Israelites through the wilderness to the land of Canaan. This world may fitly be repre- sented as " a wilderness" —
[That through which the Israelites passed is called "a waste howling wilderness^;" "a land of deserts and of pits, a land of drought and of the shadow of death ^;" a land " wherein were fiery serpents and scorpions ; and drought, where there was no water''." And such, indeed, is this vain world to the weary pilgrim. It affords nothing for the comfort and refreshment of a heavy-laden soul ; but furnishes obstruc- tions without number, snares at every step, and enemies filled
with the most envenomed hostility ]
Through this the Christian is passing, in his way to heaven —
» Deut. xxxii. 10. '• Jcr. ii. G. <= Deut. viii. 15.
854.1 THE christian's RELIANCE ON CHRIST. 451
[He has, of necessity, his duties to perform, hke other men. But " though in the world, he is not of the world''." He regards not this world as his rest ; but merely as a country through which he must go, towards " that better country which he is seeking after." He accounts himself a " pilgrim and a stranger upon earth*' ;" and advances on his journey with all practicable expedition, " not setting his affections on any thing by the wayV' but looking forward to the termination of his labours in a better world ]
111 all his way, " he leans upon his beloved" Saviour
for support —
[He feels his insufficiency for the work he has to perform : but " he knows in whom he has believed, that he is able to sustain him, and to keep that which he has committed to him^." No sick or enfeebled traveller places a more entire dependence on one who has undertaken to bear him onward, than the Christian does on Christ, who has engaged to perform this office, saying, " Even to your old age I am He ; and even to hoar hairs will I carry you : I have made, and I will bear ; even I will carry, and will deliver you**." He would account it a most heinous offence if for a moment he should " trust to an arm of flesh';" and with a holy indignation at the thought of placing any confidence in the creature, he says, " Ashur shall not save us ; we will not ride upon horses ; neither will we say any more to the work of our hands. Ye are our gods : for in thee the fatherless findeth mercy *"." In a word, the whole habit of the Christian's mind, throughout this dreary wilderness, is that which the holy Psalmist addressed to his Lord and Saviour: " Hold thou up my goings in thy paths, that my footsteps slip not:" " hold thou me up, and I shall be safe'."]
But my object is, to mark the spirit of my text, and, II. To point out more particularly the force of the interrogation —