soul continually.

Voice after voice; correction

after correction, all speaking the same thing"Open unto me."

But behold a still more wondrous display of the tenderness and long-suffering of Christ. He had "knocked," but still no opening of soul.

Rebukes and chastisements he might, indeed, have poured out in tenfold measure, but he will plead with the voice of love.

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He thus addresses his sleeping slothful desciple, 'Open to me, my love, my dove, my undefiled." How full of grace and tenderness are these expressions!

Not one word of reproach or complaint escapes His lips.

Though acting towards him in the most ungracious manner-He still addresses His Church most tenderly and in the most patient manner.

Extravagant as expressions like this may seem to be, to unregenerate and unenlightened readers, they are in strict accordance with the very language employed in the New Testament, and ofttimes by our Lord himself. Thus, compare with this very passage Mark iii. 35.

Those who by faith are espoused to Christ, are most dear to Him. He keepeth their feet,' so that they do not utterly turn out of the way.

1. Prov. ii. 8.

Being clothed with His righteousness, which is as fine linen, pure and white, they are, in His eyes, "undefiled."

Being filled with His Spirit, they are pure, gentle, and loving as the "dove."

Now why, does Christ thus address His Church, by all these loving and endearing titles?

Look to this for a moment. It brings out the consolations of the Gospel, and sets forth the security of the "covenant of grace," which is "ordered in all things, and sure."

Here is a gracious soul asleep. Here is a child of God, a true disciple, slumbering.

The Lord does not judge as you and myself may judge each other. He sees the end from the beginning. He sees true faith, even though small as a grain of mustard seed, and he nourisheth it and cherisheth it. He neither despises the day of small things, nor forsakes utterly such as for a time walk in darkness, and even inconsistency. Thus, though" asleep," still he owns it as His Church, His "own," which He had purchased with His own blood.

Though slumbering and slothful and regardless of her high and holy calling, still He calls her "His love, His dove, His undefiled."

His feelings were not altered. His faithfulness,

1. II. Sam. ii.-iii. 5.

and love, and promise, were all engaged on behalf of His Church, which shows the speaker here to be "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. 991

Observe, too, His touching remonstrance, "for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night." Allusion, here, is made to Christ's sufferings for His Church.

There is evidently an agreement between those sufferings of Christ, which He endured by night and by day, when he trod the valleys and mountains of Israel, and those here.

Christ reminds His slothful disciples of this. He remonstrates with them by reminding them of the deep sufferings which, for them, he undergoes— "My head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night."

"Did I not come down from heaven? Did I not endure the curse, despising the shame? Was I not a wanderer by day and by night, with no place wherein to lay my head? Did I not endure the hidings of God's face? Did not the "bloody sweat" fill my locks? Wherefore then am I shut out from thy heart?—I who ought to be so welcome! How unkind-how ungrateful! how forgetful!" Open to me, my love, my dove, my undefiled."

Reader, it may be you have long ago believed

I. Heb. xiii. 8.

unto salvation; you have passed from death unto life; the Lord has given you to know something of the blessed peace of believing, and you have tasted the Lord is gracious. What then is the health of your soul at this moment?

Is it well with thee? How beats the pulse of your spiritual affections for Jesus? What know you of the joy of His salvation? As your affections for Jesus are, so your zeal, holiness, purity, and real life.

Say, are you like the Church; only in a poor, half-awake, slothful condition-one eye open and the other shut; one half of your heart with Him and the other half caring for the ease and luxury which the bed of sloth invites to?

Be warned! Depend on this if you are not deceived; if you are not a mere painted hypocrite; if in other words, Christ has really set His love on you and sealed you as His own, you are calling for strokes and rebukes and chastisements "that will lay you even with dust," in thus permitting sleep and sloth to creep over your souls.

Be roused therefore oh slumbering Church of God!

Awake! and stand up upon your

Look diligently to your ways!

feet!

"Behold the Bridegroom cometh," go ye forth to

meet Him!

3.

4.

5.

I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?

My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him.

I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers with sweet smelling

myrrh, upon the handles of the lock.

6. I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake : I sought him, but I could not find him; I called

him, but he gave me no answer.

Three points here deserve attention.

(I.) The

vain excuses—(II.) the gracious security-(III.) the solemn chastisement of a slothful Believer.

We have seen how Christ dealt with the lukewarm, sleepy souls. We noticed His faithfulness, His long-suffering, and His tenderness, while enduring so long and so patiently the coldness and ingratitude of one for whom He had done and suffered such great and bitter things.

It seems that all His "knockings," and most tender calls and earnest pleadings, were unavailing! The sloth-loving, self-pleasing soul opens not to her Beloved. She presumes even to offer most unworthy and frivolous excuses.- "I have put," &c. How