{"id":3816,"date":"2008-12-05T23:52:51","date_gmt":"2008-12-06T04:52:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/ch-spurgeon\/song-of-solomon-54"},"modified":"2008-12-05T23:52:51","modified_gmt":"2008-12-06T04:52:51","slug":"song-of-solomon-54","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/2008\/12\/05\/song-of-solomon-54\/","title":{"rendered":"Song of Solomon 5:4"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

“My Beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my
       bowels were moved for him.” 
              — Song of Solomon 5:4 <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Knocking was not enough, for my heart was too full of sleep, too cold
and ungrateful to arise and open the door, but the touch of his
effectual grace has made my soul bestir itself. Oh, the longsuffering
of my Beloved, to tarry when he found himself shut out, and me asleep
upon the bed of sloth! Oh, the greatness of his patience, to knock and
knock again, and to add his voice to his knockings, beseeching me to
open to him! How could I have refused him! Base heart, blush and be
confounded! But what greatest kindness of all is this, that he becomes
his own porter and unbars the door himself. Thrice blessed is the hand
which condescends to lift the latch and turn the key. Now I see that
nothing but my Lord’s own power can save such a naughty mass of
wickedness as I am; ordinances fail, even the gospel has no effect upon
me, till his hand is stretched out. Now, also, I perceive that his hand
is good where all else is unsuccessful, he can open when nothing else
will. Blessed be his name, I feel his gracious presence even now. Well
may my bowels move for him, when I think of all that he has suffered
for me, and of my ungenerous return. I have allowed my affections to
wander. I have set up rivals. I have grieved him. Sweetest and dearest
of all beloveds, I have treated thee as an unfaithful wife treats her
husband. Oh, my cruel sins, my cruel self. What can I do? Tears are a
poor show of my repentance, my whole heart boils with indignation at
myself. Wretch that I am, to treat my Lord, my All in All, my exceeding
great joy, as though he were a stranger. Jesus, thou forgivest freely,
but this is not enough, prevent my unfaithfulness in the future. Kiss
away these tears, and then purge my heart and bind it with sevenfold
cords to thyself, never to wander more. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“My Beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my       bowels were moved for him.”                — Song of Solomon 5:4 Knocking was not enough, for my heart was too full of sleep, too coldand ungrateful to arise and open the door, but the touch of hiseffectual grace has made my…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"twitterCardType":"","cardImageID":0,"cardImage":"","cardTitle":"","cardDesc":"","cardImageAlt":"","cardPlayer":"","cardPlayerWidth":0,"cardPlayerHeight":0,"cardPlayerStream":"","cardPlayerCodec":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3816"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3816\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/purposedriven.ca\/wiki\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}