Christ Searching For A Bride

These seven would-be brides are seeking to lay hold of one man, whom I take to be Christ. Yet these brides are not interested in loving Him. On the contrary, they have only one thing on their minds - the removal of their reproach! "...We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name, to take away our reproach" (verse 1).

I see here those women approaching a man and saying: Let’s cut a deal. You don’t have to provide food for us. We’ll take care of our own bread. And you don’t have to provide any clothes for us. We’ll provide our own robes."

You don’t have to be very deep in theology to see the significance here. After all, "...sin is a reproach to any people" (Proverbs 14:34) - reproach of guilt! Sure, these women want to be the bride of Christ - but only on their own terms. They want an arrangement without intimacy, love or devotion.

The number seven used in regard to these brides to remind us that is perfect description of a total failure… In churches claiming to be Christian, is this concept of marriage license only, on the paper, without submission, respect, obedience…

ILL. Every year, in US they are at least 50,000 couples who are married just for the citizenship… I know a bright young man; his name is __________, who after several years of waiting his green card, with no possibility to run his own business without legal papers, decided to take this short cut. He found a lady somewhere in Atlanta, 20 and some years older than him, accepting to marry him for $10,000 in cash. They married, he got a marriage licence and a green card. He lived in another city, with no relationship with his “bride”. Starting a business…Big mistake. She transformed him in a milky cow. Blackmailing him… He is now deported. Every time letter from his lawyers was destroyed by that lady, because he was receiving mail at her address… An missed all the opportunities to live here free and have a wife, one for good…

Seven women in an attempt to "take hold of one man" - Christ - only to get relief from the guilt and condemnation of their sin. They don’t want intimacy with Him. They want nothing more than forgiveness - to have the reproach of sin removed. To deceive other around them about a status of high regard: I am married, I have a husband, look here, I am wearing his name…

Please understand,I believe in justification by faith. It is by faith alone in Jesus Christ that we are saved. We are justified by His finished work on the Cross. And because of this we can live without guilt, fear or condemnation. This is the great meaning of the gospel.

But if that is all you ever want of Jesus - if you don’t want to be intimate with Him, to live on Him as the bread from heaven, and to come under His fiery gaze, which searches and convicts - then being forgiven is your entire focus!

ILL. I passed a big amphitheater advertising a Christian rock concert. I stopped to watch the kids set up their equipment for the show. Unbelievably, some of them wore T-shirts with a message that included a four-letter word. It read: "Guilt!" I can’t even quote the word to you here - and these were so-called Christians. Apparently, all they wanted was to get rid of guilt! (Illustration by David Wilkerson)