Listen to sermons at FreeGraceRadio.com

 

 

 

Sermon #2152 — Miscellaneous Sermons

 

      Title:                                 “Perfect Love”

 

      Text:                                  Song of Solomon 8:7

      Subject:               Christ’s Unquenchable Love

      Introduction:

 

We read in 1 John 4:18 — “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear” (1 John 4:18). That perfect love that casts out fear is not our love for one another or our love for God, but God’s love for his elect. Perfect love is God’s love. It is…

·      Everlasting Love (Jeremiah 31:3).

·      Free, Unconditional Love (Hosea 14:4).

·      Electing Love (Romans 9:13-18).

·      Predestinating Love (Ephesians 1:3-6).

·      Redeeming Love (John 3:16; Romans 5:6-8; 1 John 3:16; 4:9-10).

·      Immutable Love (Malachi 3:6).

·      Indestructible, Unquenchable Love (Song of Solomon 8:7).

 

Proposition: If ever you come to know the Lord Jesus Christ, as are given the sweet assurance of God’s perfect love for you in his darling Son the knowledge of that love will cast out fear from your soul.

 

(1 John 4:18) “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.”

 

No Fear in Love

 

I do not suggest that God’s saints in this world live without fear; but I am saying that we should. And I am saying that as God the Holy Ghost assures us of the perfect love of God for us he makes us fearless. — “Perfect love casteth out all fear!” — “He that feareth is not made perfect in love.” That is to say, He who fears does not have the love of God made perfect in him. — “Perfect love casteth out all fear!

·      Fear of Judgment, Wrath, Punishment

·      Fear of Providential Matters

·      Fear of Men

·      Fear of Death

·      Fear of Eternity

 

I stand before you as a monument to the perfect love love of God my Savior, and that is what I want to preach to you. — “Perfect Love”. That perfect love is described for us in the 8th chapter of the Song of Solomon.

 

(Song of Songs 8:5-7) “Who is this that cometh up from the wilderness, leaning upon her beloved? I raised thee up under the apple tree: there thy mother brought thee forth: there she brought thee forth that bare thee. (6) Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as the grave: the coals thereof are coals of fire, which hath a most vehement flame. (7) Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned.

 

What a description this is of the love of Christ, the “love that passeth knowledge.It is Christ who speaks in verse 5, “I raised thee up under the apple tree.” And it is Christ who says, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love, and with loving-kindness have I drawn thee.” It is God our Savior who declares, “I drew them with cords of love, and with the bands of a man.He found me in a desert land, and in a waste howling wilderness. — “Christ loved the church, and gave himself for it.”

 

The Lord Jesus here declares his love to his church, and she replies, “Set me as a seal,” not only on thy heart, but also on thine arm — the place of your love and the place of your strength — the place of the most tender emotion and deepest passion, and the place of power, safety, and work.

 

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? His love is invincible and irresistible as death. It is a jealous love, as unyielding and unalterable as the grave. It is comparable to fire, — coals of fire, — the very flame of Jehovah.

 

Divisions: Here, then, is the love of Christ! Its breadth, length, height, and depth, are absolutely immeasurable. But our text singles out two specific things about our Savior’s love I want us to meditate upon tonight.

 

1.    It is unquenchable.

2.    And it is unpurchaseable.

 

Unquenchable Love

 

The Love of Christ is unquenchable love. No other love is really unquenchable; but our Savior’s love is. His love is eternal and everlasting, immutable and unalterable. The love of Christ is infinitely beyond that of a father or a mother, or a brother or a sister, or a husband or a wife. The love of Christ is the one and only love that passeth knowledge; the one love that nothing in heaven, or earth, or hell is able to extinguish or cool; the one love whose dimensions are beyond all measure.

 

(Ephesians 3:14-19) For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, (15) Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, (16) That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; (17) That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, (18) May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; (19) And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.

 

Our Redeemer’s love is here compared to fire that cannot be quenched. As such it is affirmed that “waters,” “many waters” cannot quench it. Christ’s love for us is a thing of life which the floods cannot drown (Psalm 69:15, 93:3).

 

(Psalms 69:15) “Let not the waterflood overflow me, neither let the deep swallow me up, and let not the pit shut her mouth upon me.”

 

(Psalms 93:3) “The floods have lifted up, O LORD, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods lift up their waves.”

 

The water floods of our sin and fall in our father Adam did not quench the flame of Jehovah’s eternal love for my soul. — God’s eternal love could not be and was not altered by that which took place in time. Though we were born “children of wrath even as others” and were justly condemned in our own guilty consciences, God’s love for his elect was unaffected by our fall in Adam.

 

The waters of shame and suffering sought to quench and drown it. — They would have hindered its outflowing, and come (like Peter) between the Savior and the cross, but his love refused to be quenched on its way to Calvary. Herein was love! It leaped over all the barriers in its way. It refused to be extinguished or drowned. Its fire would not be quenched. Its life could not be drowned. — See his love in Gethsemane!

 

The waters of death sought to quench it. — The waves and billows of death went over the great Lover of my soul. The grave sought to cool and quench his love; but his love for my soul proved itself stronger than death. Neither death nor the grave could alter or weaken his love for me. It came out of both death and the grave as strong as before. Love defied death, and overcame it. — See his love at Calvary (2 Corinthians 5:21)!

 

The waters of our unworthiness could not quench nor drown the love of Christ for our souls. — Love is usually attracted to that which is loveable. When something ugly, unlovely, unattractive comes, love (as it is called) withdraws from its object. Not so here. All our unfitness and unloveableness could not quench nor drown the love of Christ. It clings to the unlovely, and refuses to be torn away.

 

Though we went astray from the womb speaking lies and lived all the days of our rebellion with our fists in God’s face, hating God, his love for his chosen stood firm, all the days of our rebellion. The waters of our long rejection sought to quench it. Though the gospel showed us that personal unworthiness could not arrest the love of Christ, we continued to reject him and his love. We continued to hate him and despise his love. Yet, his love for us rose above our enmity to him, rose above our unbelief, and survived our hardness. In spite of everything we are and have done, his love was unquenched.

 

Though he has saved us by his matchless grace, the filthy water floods of our daily inconsistency, unbelief, and sin seek to quench it his love; but, blessed be his name, without success! Even after experiencing his adorable grace, we are constantly spurning his unspurnable love!. What inconsistencies, coldness, lukewarmness, unbelief, worldliness, hardness, and utter ungodliness daily flows against the Savior’s love, like a mighty flood to quench its fire and drown its life! Yet it survives all; it remains unquenched, unquenchable and unchanged!

 

All these indescribable evils in us are like “waters,” “many waters,” like “floods,” torrents of sin, waves and billows of evil, — all constantly laboring to quench and drown the love of Christ! They would annihilate any other love, any love less than his. But our Savior’s love is unchangeable and everlasting.

 

Our text tells us something else about the love of God our Savior.

 

Unpurchaseable Love

 

The love of Christ is unpurchaseable love. — If a man should give all the substance of his house for love, it would be utterly contemned.” — All that a man has is nothing, less than nothing, before God and his great love. The love of Christ is not merchandise. It is not a marketable commodity. It has nothing to do with gold and silver. The whole of a man’s substance is unavailing and useless to win or attract the love of Christ.

 

Nothing we offer God could ever persuade him to love us. — Love cannot be bought by gifts. Certainly, the love of God cannot be purchased by our paltry gifts. Christ’s favor cannot be purchased by money. He loves without gifts, and before all gifts. He loves freely!

 

We can no more offer payment to our God for having loved than we could offer payment to purchase his love. — Gold has nothing to do with love, neither before nor after! Pay a man for loving! How revolting the thought! Pay Christ for loving! What a wickedness and what an impossibility in the thought! Love is altogether free.

 

We can never do anything or offer anything as a bribe to keep the love of Christ, and nothing can ever buy off his love, or cause him to cease loving us. — Should the whole universe be offered to Christ on condition of his ceasing to love us, it would be utterly despised. Satan tried it. Did he not (Matthew 4)? Who or what shall separate us from the love of Christ? All earth and heaven together would be ineffectual to cool or quench this mighty love. He cannot but love us, whatever may be the gifts offered to stay his love.

 

The love of Christ truly passeth knowledge. It is, like himself, infinite.

  • It emerges out of every storm or flood.
  • It survives all unworthiness, and unbelief, and rejection.
  • It is this that fills the soul; that liberates us from bondage; that gladdens our hearts in the most sorrowful hour.

Love is the true sunshine of life; and with this love Christ is to fill, not heaven only, but also earth, when he comes again in his glory.

 

How does a sinner obtain this great love, this unquenchable love, this perfect love which casts out fear?

 

(Romans 5:1-11) “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: 2 By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 And not only [so], but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; 4 And patience, experience; and experience, hope: 5 And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.”

 

“6 ¶ For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. 8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. 10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. 11 And not only [so], but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement.”

 

 (2 Corinthians 5:14-15) “For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: And [that] he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again.”

 

(1 John 4:19) “We love him, because he first loved us.”

 

Perfect love casteth out all fear!” — Read the 8th chapter of Romans and see what that means.

 

(Romans 8:1) “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. (2) For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. (3) For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: (4) That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.”

 

(Romans 8:28) “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. (29) For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. (30) Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified. (31) 1 What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? (32) — 2 He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? (33) 3 Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. (34) 4 Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. (35) 5 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? (36) As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. (37) Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. (38) For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, (39) Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

 

(1 John 4:18) “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.”

 

(Jude 1:20-21) “But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.”

 

Amen.

 


 

 

 

Don Fortner

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pastor Fortner’s

 

Audio Sermons

Video Sermons

Books

Event Calendar