“How is your beloved better than others?” – Song of Solomon 5:9 (NIV)
None Like Christ
Your answer is at hand: My Beloved bore my sins, opened in His heart a fountain in which I am washed whiter than snow. My Beloved sustains my burdens, counsels my perplexities, heals my wounds, dries my tears, supplies my needs, bears my infirmities, upholds my steps, and cheers my path-way to the tomb. My Beloved will be with me in the valley of the shadow of death and with His presence I shall fear no evil. My Beloved has gone to prepare a place for me in the many-mansioned house of my Father, and will come again to receive me to Himself – that where He is, I may be also. My Beloved will walk with me in the gold-paved streets of the New Jerusalem, will lead me to fountains of living waters, and will wipe away every tear from my eyes.
This is my Beloved, and this is my Friend!
Therefore stand firm. Yet have we need of constant vigilance, lest we should not always and in everything give Christ the pre-eminence.
Should you discover any encroachment of your worldly calling upon the claims Christ has to your time and service – any rival affections to the claims He has on your whole heart, any secret demur to the claims He has to your unreserved obedience; should you, in a word, detect the undue ascendency or influence of any one being or object whose presence and power tends to shade the beauty, lesson the attractions, weaken the supremacy, or share the throne of Christ in your soul – that being and that object must be relinquished at once and forever!
– Octavius Winslow [1866]