“Love is strong as death. Its jealousy is cruel like Sheol.” Solomon’s Song of Songs 8:6

Love is a good and holy feeling that produces actions and words consistent with that feeling.

What would a do who loved her man?

In a situation that enflamed her love, what would she do?

The point is to get us to have a right idea of love by giving us a description of what the bride to be did when separated from the one her heart loved.

What does it feel like to be separated from the one you love? Cruel is the word Solomon chose to describe it. The feeling is cruel. Severely cruel like the way it would feel to be in a fire forever separated from God who is love and grace. Therefore the holy jealousy that springs from love in a time of separation from the one you love is a cruel feeling.

A common way to express this cruel feeling is to say, “I miss them.” Jealousy is cruel like hell fire when separated from the one you love.

When in the life and time of the 3rd Messiah of Israel and his bride did she have this cruel feeling? Right after they were engaged. She just got engaged to the man of her dreams and the nights spent away from him become unbearable. Cruel and severe. This cruel feeling is a fruit of a true and holy emotion called jealousy.

This cruel feeling helps the bride to hold him tighter. To increase he estimation of him and she values him more. Treasures him more. Holds him tighter til the cruel feeling of being separated from the one she loves turns into a happy peaceful sense of being loved returns due to her lover being near.

How could this cruel feeling be intensified in a true love relationship? and what would the benefits be?

The frequency, duration of the separation test can effect the cruelty of the situation.

Both the frequency and duration of the separation is what lead to the intense cruel feeling the bride to be had after the engagement and before the wedding.

Here the account of a night when the bride couldn’t handle the cruel feeling anymore and what she did about it. I take Song 3:1-3 to be a literal historical account of Solomon’s finance some 2,900 years ago and Song 3:4 to be metaphoric as to how she felt. She held him tight til she felt loved and safe and happy like a baby in the arms of a mother the days she was born.

Song of Solomon 3:1-4 

Learning to hold and not let go.

3 “On my bed night after night I sought him
Whom my soul loves;
I sought him but did not find him.
² ‘I must arise now and go about the city;
In the streets and in the squares
I must seek him whom my soul loves.’
I sought him but did not find him.
³ “The watchmen who make the rounds in the city found me,
And I said, ‘Have you seen him whom my soul loves?’
⁴ “Scarcely had I left them
When I found him whom my soul loves;
I held on to him and would not let him go
Until I had brought him to my mother’s house,
And into the room of her who conceived me.” …….. For loves “Jealousy is cruel as Sheol.” 8:6

Hate the feeling in and of itself but thank the Lord you feel pain and it is cruel when you separated from your beloved/Beloved because it is a sign that you love him/Him.

Imagine living night after night away from the one you love. How would it feel?

Yes, sometimes time away is good to clear your head or something. But Im talking about night after night being engaged, away from the man of your dreams and not married yet.

Some of you are married and the one you love loves you and yet there is something missing. Someone missing. JESUS! We were designed and made to be in a love relationship with Jesus and when you are apart from him then the feeling is cruel. Non believers feel this separation from Jesus and cruel feeling of being one with Satan wether they know it or not.