Application Song 1:2-4

Solomon’s Song of Song 1:2-4

2″May he kiss me with the kisses of his mouth!
For your love is better than wine.
³ “Your oils have a pleasing fragrance,
Your name is like purified oil;
Therefore the maidens love you.
⁴ “Draw me after you and let us run together!
The king has brought me into his chambers.”

First I will give some general observations.  Give application of the husband, suitor, wife, bride to be and the Bride of Christ.

Fist some observations

1.  The bride is speaking expressing her desire to experience God’s love through Solomon over and over again in marriage because his love is more delightful than wine and his character is holy and pure. v2-3
2. The reason the maidens, virgins or unmarried women loved Solomon was because it pleased them to hear his name.
3. The bride wanted Solomon to “draw” her to himself quickly, soon and fast.  “Let us run together”
4. She desired and the “king” brought her “into his chambers.”  The idea is that Solomon brought her into a personal close intimate relationship.

Far more could be said about these verses my intent in this series is to give lots of application.  I have gone in detail on these verses in the lessons.

Application for the Husband

1. 

   Be saved, be a true Christian. Its impossible to love your wife by the power of the Holy Spirit as God wants you to without being saved.  You must possess love, the “Flame of the LORD” Song 8:6  so that the love of Christ can be on display in your marriage.  The kind of love shared in the Song is a holy sweet love.  It is a love that comes from the Holy Spirit within believers.  True love can only happen between believers.

2. Your wife desires the most delightful experiences of God’s love through you over and over again.  Love, love, love.   It’s what she has tasted from God and desires more of it.  However you show your love to your wife, it needs to be better and more delightful than any other earthly experience.  “Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church.” Ephesians 5:25-33 Nourish, cherish and present her holy and blameless.  You wife, if she is godly, delights in recieving immediate forgiveness more than the delight she would get from wine.  She delights in the love of a godly man more than anything else.  She delights in your listening and understanding more than the delight she would get from wine.  For her to experience God’s love though you is her greatest delight and it should be your greatest delight to love her as Christ loves the Church.  Holy thoughts and feelings must be mutual for practical oneness in marriage.
3. What are some ways that you have loved your wife in the past
   1. In conversation
   2. In keeping your promises
   3. Providing for her physical and spiritual needs
   4. When were the times that she was most delighted in your love for her?
   5. Praying with and for her daily.
4. Carefully read 1 Cor. 13:4,  How can you be patient, kind, humble and not arrogant like Christ and love your wife as Christ loved the Church?  .“Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, ⁵ does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, ⁶ does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; ⁷ bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. ⁸ Love never fails.  1 Peter 3:7  “You husbands in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she is a woman; and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered.”
5. What are some ways that you have failed to keep on loving your wife?  She desired multiple shows of affection.  She didn’t want the love to stop.  “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth.  Yes this is physical affection.  She desires multiple kisses, but the idea is that of affection or love.  Love expresses itself many ways.  The one she chose here is that of a kiss on the lips from the king!  Where have you failed in loving your wife as Christ loves the Church, at these times your wife isn’t getting what her heart desires most and worst of all you have disobeyed God in these areas.  Your conscience will bear witness where you have failed.
6. Confess to God where you have failed and then see Christ bearing your sin on the cross and repent.  Ps. 51  Confess and repent of all sin, now!  One step at a time, you can do it.
7. Confess to your wife where you have failed.  Something like, “Honey, Im sorry, I really am sorry I didn’t listen to you, I was selfish.  Please forgive me and don’t be angry with me, Im sorry and there is no excuse for what I did,  I will do better next time.”  Confess sincerely, quickly and soon. Confess everything that comes to mind.  Be a man, don’t make any excuses!!  Don’t confess and then make excuses, own your faults, you did it but you love both God and your wife and don’t want to offend her again.  Grieve and mourn your sin, ask her forgiveness, which means your asking her to not be angry with you.
8. Resolve right now to get better and better at making your love to your wife the most delightful experience!  What can you do right now?  What is the first thing you can do?  Do it!!  Don’t wast any time.  Show your love today, now if possible.
9. Study how Solomon used his unmeasured wisdom and skill to love his wife.  Look to Godly mature men at your church or in your family and follow their example.  Your looking for good Biblical examples not worldly examples of love.  Join with another couple in learning how to love each other better and keep each other accountable.
10. Think of how Jesus loves you and love your wife the same way.  Christ is patient, forgiving, faithful to His promises etc.  Christ is a wise King, good shepherd, perfect leader, friend.  Fulfill your role as a husband and Christ will say “Well done good and faithful servant.”
11. Character is number one!!  Think of everything that is good about your wife.  Make a list of everything that is good.  Think of them now!!  “He who finds a wife finds a good thing”  Though your mind might be way to often on all the bad she does, take a moment to think that your wife is a “good thing”.  She is not all bad.  Im sure you can remember why you liked her in the first place.  Surely there were things about her character that you loved so much.  Thank God for her!!  You don’t deserve her.  You can’t complain because you deserve worse Lam 3:39, God is being Merciful!!

Suitors

Single men out there, this is for you.  Are you looking for a wife?  She only wants to be loved and you can do this by being like Christ and having a good name.  The first 3 chapters of the Song is courtship but the ideas in the first 3 chapters can apply to marriage as well.  This application is for the Suitor or godly man dating or wanting to pursue a godly woman.   In the Song they are not married til the end of Chapter 3 and the honeymoon is chapter 4.

1.  Be a suitor of a good Christian character.  For the suitor, the godly single woman is looking for a man of character.  Be a man of a good character.   Not perfect but headed that direction.  Basically, the woman you marry will be trusting you with her spiritual and physical life.  Your character is number 1.
2. Does hearing your name bring a smile to the one you are pursuing?  She should primarily be drawn to you because of your character.  In life have you been faithful, are you continuing in any sin then repent and look to the cross for forgiveness.  You name, Is it pleasing to her like perfume poured out.  A good name should be pleasing for her.  Your looking to have a name that when she hears is, she gets pleasure just from the mention of your name.  What kind of reputation do you have.  Or is it your money or looks mainly                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  that draw her to you?
3. Do not be continuing in the same habitual pattern of sin, this will ensure that your name is good.  Imaging knowing someone who is continuing in sin.  You would hear of that person and it would not be pleasing to hear their name.
4. Do you have a character that would attract holy women?  All the maidens loved Solomon, because of his wisdom and love that gave him such a great name.
5. No dating unless you desire to be married to someone someday.  People with the gift of singleness should not be dating.  Not that you have to marry the one you date but if you think you have the gift of singleness then you ought not to be dating. Iron can sharpen iron in conversation but dating should only between two people of the opposite sex and only.  In my opinion there tends to be a few stages before marriage.   1st one is getting to know the other person.  At church, work, outings and various group settings.  Then, Second, there is dating.  A more intimate getting to know them.  Testimonies are shared, more detail is learned about each others likes and dislikes etc.  Third which can be included in the second phase so to speak is courtship.  Then it is generally known that the only reason the man is pursing the woman is that he desires to marry her and feelings are mutual, but now formalities need to be worked out.  Talk to parents, the proposal and engagement ring etc.  Culture may determine much of these things.  Then comes planning the wedding and date.  Then the wedding and many customary things.  Then they consulate the marriage.  The two are one.
6. Men, we are idiots.  Really, I mean it.  We are stupid.  Born stupid and strangers in this world. We need God to not hide His will for us in courtship. Psalm 119:19.  God gave us the Song of Songs to help us be skilled in holy Biblical courtship.  Use the first 3 chapters to guide you in courtship.  Read 20 principles of courtship to help guide you.

Wife

This is the desire of her heart.  This could be your prayer to God.  Your asking God to show His love to you through your husband over and over again because knowing the character of your husband gives you pleasure and delight like smelling pleasing perfume.

God wants your husband to love you as Christ loves the Church.  It is God’s will.  Now for you to desire God’s will is a good thing.  God desires for you to experience His love through your spouse and you desire it as well.

So ask for God to show His Love to you through your husband who is the authority in the marriage, represented by Solomon being king.  King in Song 1:4 is to give the idea of authority.  The husband makes the final decisions guided by Scripture, the wife obeys out of love,  the husband is a type of king in the marriage, a wise good and loving king.  Your husband is a type of king.  Think of him as the one God wants you to listen to and obey.  Wives submit to your husbands Eph. 5:23.  Not that he is your king and you are the slave by force, but you should gloriously illustrate our delightful submission to Christ in marriage by your delightful submission to your husband who is submitting to God. Thus the wife obeys God in the marriage when she listens to her husband.  She sins when she doesn’t listen.  Wife, you must confess you sin to God and if you have not listened to your husband you must confess to him as well.  No matter how hard it is you must confess.  A godly man would love to hear your voice for it is most sweet when you confess.  Confession of sin is a great show of love to God for God wants you to confess.  But also you husband see’s your love for him and is humbled by it.  Confess, look to the cross, see his love there, experience his love in forgiveness as you see Christ bearing your sins, know that you old self of disobeying your husband or usurping his authority are over, he is your wise king now and God gives you all the power of the Holy Spirit to enable you to show your love to your husband.

So the bride desire to experience God’s love through Solomon, who she is happy to make king over her life because his holy character.  As she expresses her desires you, express your own in a similar way…

Oh God, “Let him/my husband kiss me with the kisses of his mouth—
    for Your love is more delightful than wine.”

Then you think of the character of your husband/Husband and the pleasantness of smelling perfume and draw a comparison between the two and speaking now to your husband you say
^{3 “}Pleasing is the fragrance of your perfumes;
    your name is like perfume poured out.”
    No wonder the young women love you!

Now having his pleasing character in mind you desire a closer more intimate relationship with your king/husband that you say,
      ^{4 “}Draw me after you —let us hurry!”

Then you king/husband/ takes you into his chambers for he also desires a closer more intimate relationship with you.  Expressing your satisfaction and delight and lost in his love you say.
    “The king has bought me into his chambers.”

Which could be your own for application, just think of you and your husband whom you desire affection from and though not perfect, you delight in what is morally excellent about him and his good name is like perfume poured out, you desire to have him as king over your life and to be drawn into a closer more intimate relationship with him because he has a good name and his love is more delightful than any else under the sun.

You just can’t say the young women love your husband.  Solomon was single when the women adored him,  May this was a time when you had feelings for you hubby but weren’t dating yet and other girls adored your future husband.  It would be right for them to adore a man of character but you can’t say this about your husband now.  It would not be right for other women to adore your husband and desire closer intimacy with him.  He’s married now, but back then they could desire Solomon as much as the bride to be did. Song 1:4.    I desire to say so much more but will hold back.  Now onto the application of the principles of the text to the “bride to be.”

Bride to be

Single ladies out there.  This is for you.  Are you a bride to be, Lord willing.  Are you a single woman but married to Christ, then this is for you!

1. Pray for God to send you a man of good character because you have tasted God’s love in salvation through your heavenly Husband, Christ.  And now you want to experience it more in marriage to a believer.
2. Have in mind as you pray, that if you are to be married, then God will bring him around.  But for now you pray Lord willing.  Express your desire earnestly and don’t stop.  I know it sounds funny, but you must be content in Christ alone while desiring marriage.
3. You must be saved and growing.  No godly man is going to intentionally marry a non believer.  Be reading your Bible and obeying God and praying and waiting patiently.

Application for the Bride of Christ, Believers

Christ is greater than Solomon Matt. 12:42.  We argue from the lesser christ to the Greater.  However so great her desire for Solomon was, it still falls short of how great our desire for Christ ought to be.

1. “Let Christ show me His love over and over again.”  Never stop praying like the bride in the Song.  Or Moses, “Show me your glory”  or “the one thing I desire..to behold the beauty of the Lord”  Ps. 27:4.  When you stop praying its because you stopped desiring.  You stopped desiring because you got prideful.  She desired to be loved by the greatest type of Christ living because his love was more delightful than wine.  How much more so is Christ’s love to be desired by us.   We ought to want that Pearl more than she desired Solomon.   We ought to Love Christ no matter what and give up all sin in order to have that closer more intimate relationship with God in Christ.  Never stop praying for your love relationship with God.  Pray,  Let God show me His affection over and over to me in Christ.  May I understand and know Christ’s love to me over and over again.  Bigger and bigger waves of mercy and waves of Grace.  Enlarge my heart to view Christ Greater and clearer.  Shed Your love abroad in my heart as I see my many sins forgiven at the cross.
2. Pray for all the saints to experience this love.  Pray like Paul in Ephesians 3:16-21 (I modified it to apply to all believers)  I pray LORD, that according to your glorious riches that you would strengthen us with power through Your Spirit in our inner being, ¹⁷ so that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith. And I pray that we, being rooted and established in love, ¹⁸ may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, ¹⁹ and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—as we behold His Matchless Glory and Infinite Beauty at the cross, that we may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God in Christ.
3.  Get to know Christ, experiential knowledge not just intellectual knowledge so that your desire for Him grows.  “Kiss” the Son lest He be angry with you.   We are born under God’s wrath.  He is angry with sinners.  Oh, sinner accept God’s love for you at the cross.  Look to Jesus!  He is infinitely Beautiful!  Most delightful to behold!!  Take your sins to the cross and see His love for and Grace to you!!  May your desire for Christ grow oh wretched man that you are, so that you desire more and more of Him.  Those who know Christ’s Name with trust Him.   Read your Bible to get to know God in Christ.  No ones love is more desirable than the love of Christ for His Name is better than perfume poured out.  Oh, thirsty deer, panting for streams of water.  Gaze into His eyes overflowing with love, peaceful and refreshing to gaze upon.  To experience God’s love through Christ is better than any other experience.  Read John to get to know that Jesus is the Son of God, the messiah.  Desire Christ. If you think something is missing in your life it because either you aren’t saved or your a Christian continuing in sin and have forgotten how good it feels to be walking obediently as possible.  Desire Christ.  Desire more of Him.  He satisfies the greatest hunger and you need no money.  Desire Christ!!  His will only in your life.  Desire to experience a deeper more intimate relationship with God through Christ.  Desire more holiness.  Desire more love.  Desire Christ!!  He wants you to experience His love more than you do.  He is Jealous over you with a Godly Jealousy.  He will draw you nearer for he loves you Jer. 31:3 and you are one with Him in Christ.

   ^{Jer. 31:3} The Lord appeared to us in the past, saying:

   “I have loved you with an everlasting love;
       I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.

   4.  Bring all your current and past sins to the cross often in order to see God’s love and grace greater and greater.  When you sin and are convicted of it, immediately think of Jesus suffer for the sin you committed and past sins, all your sin.  Jesus loved you and proved it by paying the penalty for you sin.  He suffered the Wrath of God in your place.  Oh, to behold the Beauty of Christ at the cross!  His holiness at the cross.  His obedience and infinite love to God on display.  Jesus is altogether Beautiful, there is none like Him!!  Greater revelations of Christ is what your after.  Think of all your sin and then while asking and receiving higher and clearer thoughts of God.  Now you have higher thoughts of God by meditating on the glorious spender of His Majesty and His wondrous works in your salvation.