Wednesday, May 8
Read Song of Solomon 4:8-5:1.
Song of Solomon 4:16 and 5:1 form the very center of this book and describe, as it were, its climax as the marriage between Solomon and the Shulamite is consummated.
In the Song of Solomon, we find some of Scripture’s most compelling evidence for God’s plan that people remain sexually chaste until marriage. One of the most powerful is a reference to the Shulamite’s childhood, when her brothers wondered whether she would be a “wall” or a “door” (Song of Solomon 8:8, 9). In other words, will she remain chaste until marriage (a wall), or be promiscuous (a door). As an adult woman, she affirms that she has maintained her chastity and comes pure to her husband: “I am a wall” (Song of Solomon 8:10). In fact, he confirms that she is still a virgin up to their wedding night by saying that she is “a garden inclosed … a spring shut up, a fountain sealed” (Song of Solomon 4:12). From her own experience, she can counsel her friends to take the steps of love and marriage very carefully. Three times in the Song of Solomon the Shulamite addresses a group of women referred to as the “daughters of Jerusalem” to counsel them not to arouse the intense passion of love until the appropriate time (Song of Solomon 2:7, 3:5, 8:4), that is, until they find themselves safely within the intimate covenant of marriage, as is she.
For the second time in the poem the beloved invites his bride to come away with him (Song of Solomon 2:10, 4:8). Before the wedding she could not accept his invitation, but now it is she who invites him to her garden (Song of Solomon 4:16), and he gladly accepts (Song of Solomon 5:1). He is not just attracted to her beauty; she has stolen his heart (Song of Solomon 4:9), he is intoxicated with her love (Song of Solomon 4:10), and he is exuberant that she is his and nobody else’s now, and forever: “My bride, my very own, you are a garden, a fountain closed off to all others” (Song of Solomon 4:12, CEV). In his union to this perfect woman he finds himself as reaching the Promised Land: “Your lips are a honeycomb; milk and honey flow from your tongue” (Song of Solomon 4:11, CEV).
What good news is there for individuals who regret their wrong choices in the expression of their sexuality? 1 John 1:9; compare Psalms 103:12, Isaiah 55:7, John 8:11.
