28th March 2026

28th March 2026


Pray (ACts) 


Read (Song of Solomon 3v1-5) 


Message (Scott Woodburn) 


The Shulammite watched as her beloved turned away from the hareem's walls - today would not be the day that they would be together. Later that night she went to bed and fell into a dream. What did she dream about? Her Shepherd who was still beyond her reach.


As she slept she began to search out her beloved (3v1). He was nowhere to be found and so in her dream state she began to search the streets and the squares of the city (3v2). The watchmen found her and she sought their help to find her true love but they had not seen him (3v3). Just as she began to believe that he would never be found, she turned to see her beloved. Her passionate response echoed her passionate language - she held him and would not let him go until she took him to meet her mother (3v4).


Is this the end of the story? The happy ending? No. The Shulammite was dreaming. Her beloved remained outside the hareem and she remained far from his love. No wonder then did she wake and immediately adjure the daughters of Jerusalem not to stir up or awaken love until it pleases (3v5).


There's something very cruel about a dream that convinces us of one thing only for us to wake and discover the true reality. Maybe you've experienced that yourself? You dream of having a conversation with your mum who has been dead for many years or you dream that your illness has been cured only to remember when waking that it isn't true. I wonder if the Shulammite wept when she woke? Her heart longed for her Shepherd but the only place she could find him was in her dreams.


Brothers and sisters, life is often heartbreaking and we often see it in our relationships. How many of you can testify to broken marriages, broken homes and broken hearts? The Scriptures say that "weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning." (Psalm 30v5). Joy? Where? In Christ. We await His return and whilst currently He remains outside the wall, a day is dawning when He will come in power. Wait for Him child of God for He will bring with Him a kingdom in which righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3v13) where there will no no more death, mourning, crying or pain (Revelation 21v4).


The Shulammite could not yet find her beloved but we know where Jesus is. "Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured. For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come." (Hebrews 13v13-14).


Pray (acTS)


Sing


WSC


Q27 Wherein did Christ’s humiliation consist? Christ’s humiliation consisted in his being born, and that in a low condition, made under the law, undergoing the miseries of this life, the wrath of God, and the cursed death of the cross; in being buried, and continuing under the power of death for a time.