June 4—Morning Devotion
“Awake, O north wind, and come, thou south; blow upon my garden.”—Song of Solomon 4:16
Are these the words of my Lord? Yes, surely, they can be no other; for none but Jesus can send the Holy Ghost to his church and people. And besides, none can call the church “my garden,” but he that is the rightful owner of it. Surely, Lord, it is thine, both by thy Father’s gift, and by thy choice, and by thy purchase, and by the conquests of thy grace, and by the voluntary surrender of thy people, when thou hast made them willing in the day of thy power. And dost thou call then, both the north wind and the south, thou dearest Lord, to blow upon my soul? Dost thou command all suited influences of thy grace to visit me, that one may search, and another warm my affections, and call thine own gifts and graces forth in exercise, upon thy glorious Person, and thy glorious work? Oh come then, thou Holy Spirit, with all thy sweet and precious offices. Come, Lord, to convince and comfort me, to humble and direct me, to chill my affections to the world, and to warm them towards the Lord Jesus. Come, thou holy, gracious, almighty, quickener, reviver, restorer, and glorifier of my God and Saviour! Oh if thou wilt make my soul like the chariots of Amminadib, and cause those graces thou hast planted there to go forth in a way of love, and desire, and faith, and expectation, and hope upon the Person and glory of him whom my soul loveth, then shall I cry out with the church, and say, “Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat of his pleasant fruits.”
Robert Hawker (1753-1827) was an Anglican (High-Calvinist) preacher who served as Vicar of Charles Church, Plymouth. John Hazelton wrote of him:
“The prominent features…in Robert Hawker's testimony…was the Person of Christ….Dr. Hawker delighted to speak of his Lord as "My most glorious Christ.” What anxious heart but finds at times in the perusal of the doctor's writings a measure of relief, a softening, and a mellowing? an almost imperceptible yet secret and constraining power in leading out of self and off from the misery and bondage of the flesh into a contemplation of the Person and preciousness of Christ as "the chiefest among ten thousand and the altogether lovely." Christ and Him crucified was emphatically the burden of his song and the keynote of his ministry. He preached his last sermon in Charles Church on March 18th, 1827, and on April 6th he died, after being six years curate and forty-three years vicar of the parish. On the last day of his life he repeated a part of Ephesians 1, from the 6th to the 12th verses, and as he proceeded he enlarged on the verses, but dwelt more fully on these words: "To the praise of His glory Who first trusted in Christ." He paused and asked, "Who first trusted in Christ?" And then made this answer: "It was God the Father Who first trusted in Christ."
Robert Hawker on the Biblical Covenants (Complete)
Robert Hawker's Poor Man's Morning Portions
