Summary of sermon by Erlo Stegen, 01 Mar 2015
Song of Songs 5:1, “I am come into my garden, my sister, my spouse …”
Spiritually my heart and your heart is the garden of the Lord Jesus Christ. He bought that heart, with His own precious Blood. Your life is His garden. We conquer through the Blood of the Lamb (Rev 12:11). With His precious Blood He has redeemed us; not with silver or gold.
In a garden you find beautiful flowers, with wonderful fragrance. This garden isn’t just open to anybody. This garden is protected so that no wild animals can enter and damange it.
The lives we live should be far more beautiful than human made gardens. Of all different communities and gatherings, nothing is as beautiful as the garden made by Jesus. And so we should reflect that beauty – His beauty in His garden.
If we look at the first church and see how beautiful it was, and then we compare ourselves, where do we stand? It is said that that congregation was completely one in heart and mind (Acts 4:32). Can you exceed such beauty? Not one said anything was his own, but they shared everything. However sometimes satan puts his dirty foot into what is lovely.
A long time ago we read in the Bible of a wicked king Ahab and his wicked wife Jezebel. One day when Ahab was on his way he saw a beautiful garden which belonged to Naboth (1Kings 21). He asked Naboth for his garden so that he might plant vegetables there. Naboth replied that he couldn’t sell his inheritance. Ahab was deeply disappointed. He went home and lay sulking on his bed. His wife asked him what the matter was, and he told her. Jezebel said that he needn’t worry. She will see to the matter. (Wives can lead their husbands into great wickedness or to great good.) So she arranged false witnesses to get Naboth accused of blaspheming God and the king, and he was stoned to death. And Ahab got the garden that he desired. In the same way satan wants to spoil the garden of our Lord Jesus Christ. But God sent His prophet Elijah to Ahab to declare the judgement of God upon him and his wife and his household for what he had done. Remember nothing we say or do or think remains hidden. God will reveal it. Jesus said in Luke 12:3, “what you have whispered will be shouted from the housetops”.
May your garden remain beautiful and bring joy to our Redeemer who died for us. Let no thorns of stubbornness, hatred, slandering etc. be found in your garden. Let’s not take it lightly for God has said in His word that the one who says he loves God but hates his brother is a liar (1John 4:20). If satan comes into your garden he will damage and destroy its beauty.
Let Jesus find you today not in criticism and bitterness but in His beauty. Jesus praises the seven churches in Revelations, but then also corrects them for the things that are not beautiful, and He urges them to repent of that. So too He speaks to us today. Let not satan come and rob and spoil things, but rather that the church of Christ, His garden, may glisten with His glory and beauty. His garden is unsurpassed by any other garden. He died for us.