She is a Locked Garden
12 You are a garden locked up, my sister, my bride;”
Solomon says to Naahmah on their wedding night.
She is a virgin. Untouched. And locked up.
Notice that he says that she is like a garden. Not that a certain body part is a garden. Rather he says, “You are a locked garden…” Solomon’s song of songs 4:12.
A locked garden is a most intimate and glorious statement about his bride on their wedding night!!
What do we think of about a garden? And more importantly, let’s see how Solomon goes on to describe her getting a bit more detailed information comparing her to a garden, a spring of living water, and then details as to what he drank, gathered, smelled, ate, saw, heard and tasted.
Notice the specifics about her that go along with the garden analogy.
12“ You are a garden locked up, my sister, my bride;
you are a spring enclosed, a sealed fountain.
13 Your plants are an orchard of pomegranates
with choice fruits,
with henna and nard,
14 nard and saffron,
calamus and cinnamon,
with every kind of incense tree,
with myrrh and aloes
and all the finest spices.
15 You are[b] a garden fountain,
a well of flowing water
streaming down from Lebanon.”
He says this to her right before they consummate the marriage which is a super key part of them moving forward to becomming more one. Physically showing someone that you delight in their physical pleasure and happiness in one of the most intimate of ways is crucial to the strength of their bond. The depth of sincere intimate love will strengthen a bond where trust was established by a proven Christian character being manifested before engagement. Consistently and truly, loving your spouse will cast out and fear of harm or separation.
First, he compares her to a locked garden, then a spring and also a fountain. It is the garden I will focus on in this post
Love is a mighty and holy flame and this is probably the most heated and intimate part of the whole love poem. This night brought the couple so much closer to each other. This night strengthened the bond between them. This is one of the key moments in their union of hearts that eventually let to their being totally functionally one.
“Her plants… These are things about her that are 1 many 2 sweet and delightful 3 the best for they are “choice”
1 Many. Many because her plants are an orchard of pomegrantates. An orchard. That alot. Multiple pomegrantates. More than enough. Many and more than enough.
2 Sweet and delightful. Pomegranates. We eat them and they are sweet and delightful for we get a pleasant feeling eating them. These intimate sweet and delightful things about her, she has not shared with any other. These are and were reserved for her husband. These sweet and delightful orchard of pomegranates have been locked up til now. One of these delights is the things she says, “Your lips drop sweetness as the honeycomb, my bride;
milk and honey are under your tongue.” 4:11
3 Wow! Not only are there many sweet and delightful things about her but also these multiple delights are the choicest ones! Her many sweet and delightful fruits are the choicest ones. The best. Can’t get any better. “With choice fruits.”
Then we get a little more specific about her plants.
She has
“henna”
“spikenard”
“spikenard and saffron”
“Culmus”
“Cinnamon”
We have many, various, combinations and multiple use. These things are what makes her garden abundant, delightful and choice.
Many. She had many choice fruits and now she has many other kinds of plants.
Various. She has variety. She has more than enough variety to not be saying and doing the same thing over and over again.
Application
Wives, have you been letting your husband experience the variety of delights that you have for him? Variety will draw the two of you closer, whereas boredom could most dreadfully lead someone to finding variety somewhere else. How could you vary the way you show love to your husband the next time?
The command in 5:1 is for both of you to” drink your fill of love.” 5:1 Part of being satisfied in loving someone is by you varying how it is done. Your job is to let your spouse drink their fill of love. Their fill in being loved and their fill of showing love. You are a garden of variety, therefore don’t let it go to waste.
Husbands, what could you do different that would please your wife? What could you do different that would please her more and more?
Many.
Do you have many delights for your spouse or are you limiting yourself? Wouldn’t it be a great act of love to have many different ways of expressing it?
Fyi as a nonbeliever I learned many things in my sexual and sinful life before Christ. But now you benefit. So, your holy edification. For those men who have an intense desire to please you spouse then don’t forget she has 6 pleasure zones. God has gifted her with 6 intimate places that are for her good and pleasure. Love intensely desires the good and happiness of the beloved more than oneself. This holy flame is from God and is sweet.
Imagine the garden has “Botanic garden” in a glass house. The house has an overhang like a hood. The 6 physical pleasure zones. 1 Under the hood 2 One inch in 3. Two to 3 inches in on the top roof 4 All the way in above the cervix 5 All the way to the cervix 6 All the way to the cervix on the bottom (sorry, most men will not be big enough to reach the last three.). Just trying to spell some thing out so that the simple gain knowledge then motivated by love will use the information wisely in a way that would be priceless and draw the two closer.
The Christian is and isn’t a hedonist. Pleasure seeker. We are commanded to find delight. We are commanded to do good and giving someone physical pleasure in the context of marriage is one of the best ways to show love. Pleasure outside of God’s will is sin but in the marriage bed you can drink your fill of love. Song 5:1 This fill of love can be ways your spouse makes you physically feel better. Yes. But we can also drink our fill of love by communication that may be for someone’s emotional good. Mental Good or Spiritual Good as well. My point is that we can seek to have physical pleasure greater and greater and greater as possible to no limit provided, we are within God’s Biblical guideline of love and not selfish lust.
Combinations.
How well do you know your spouse that you know the various combinations of showing them love that they enjoy the most?
“Loves jealousy is as intense as the fire of hell.” Song 8:6 Meaning the spouse is jealous for the good and happiness of their beloved. This love feeling comes with a desire to do good to your spouse and a burning desire to make them happy. The sensual parts of the Love Song should promote feeling of love and not lust. Reading this Holy Scripture should stir up holy feeling of love and not selfish lust. The Scriptures shouldn’t promote selfish lust in the mind that is pure but rather God’s word will enflame love in the heart of His Bride. Love to God is the flame that God keeps burning in our hearts. And when we love God we will have a desire to please our spouse more than ourselves. That unselfish desire that is intense is what love is. Or rather is loves jealousy. The holy jealous feeling for the good and happiness of your spouse is what comes with a feeling of true and holy love.
When you have sexual desire is your mind more on yourself and pleasing yourself or do you also have the good and happiness of your spouse in your heart? Sensual desire by itself is a feeling. Love unites and selfishness separates. This love poem is about how two lovers get so close that nothing could ever separate them. Are you thinking of yourself and how you could get pleasure more than the good and happiness of your spouse? Philippians 2ff.
Spikenard. This is mentioned in combination with Saffron. Okay so is this her speaking (spikenard) and her touching him (saffron) at the same time. Is this and application of the meaning behind “Spikenard and Saffron?” Her husband gathered from her something that smelled wonderful and all-encompassing Song 4:16. Maybe he even smelled real Spikenard, which is very possible. And he tasted. Saffron. Value. Something precious and valuable. Love is given freely and when received feels priceless like some rare spices. Solomon heard sweet things from his spouse and felt like he was receiving from her something that had greater value than saffron and rubies. for “if someone were to give everything he owned for a woman to love him, the offer would be utterly scorned.” Song 8:7 Love is unexchangeable, unconditional and priceless.
We could say that out of her love to him in her heart she both said and did sweet and priceless things that were a delight to both his physical sense and hearing. Now, this doesn’t mean that she was limited to only pleasing two of his senses.
Multiple use.
Multiple use has to do with the “Spikenard” This fragrance was used by itself in the text. And also used with “Saffron”. Read it again and see Spinkenard being mentioned in two different situations. One alone “Spinkenard” and another time in combination with saffron. “Spikenard and saffron.” This means that one of her plants in her garden that is delightful and precious to him is used by itself and also in combination with a spice “Saffron”
Is there something your beloved loves that you say or do? Could they do that in combination with something else? Wouldn’t this spice up the situation and draw the two of you closer? The love song is about two people becomming one. And if we see something beautiful and loving that they did that helped unite them faster, then wouldn’t it be good to imitate their expressions of love to each other. Here, she has one thing that pleases him by itself and another use for the Spikenard is to say or do it with Saffron (which is a different sense). We have 5 senses.
What combo’s could you do to please your spouse?
What combo’s do they like? Sight, sound, smell, touch and taste. Change of sight with different music. A certain phrase, or sound with a certain precious look. A valuable look with a sweet sound. Etc
What to do with guilt.
Okay, so maybe you feel guilty for not showing love to you spouse as you ought.
Maybe, God has convicted you that you have been selfish in your lovemaking and now you feel guilty.
This guilt is a good thing. You have a conscience. What you did was evil but now you feel guilty. Maybe you failed over and over again! This is bad and evil and you deserve punishment from God, even if your married. Even when married you could be selfish in the bedroom where showing love matters most. Feel the guilt and now know that you deserve punishment from God for disobeying Him and not showing love to your spouse. Tell Him your selfishness.
This is confessing your sin to God. Telling Him what sin you did. Telling Him you know you deserve a hotter hell for disobeying. Tell Him you feel guilty. If your sorrowful then tell Him you are sorry. If you aren’t sorrowful then ask God to make you regret what you did because it displeases Him. Now, Trust that the punishment you deserve for being selfish over and over again was paid for by Jesus over 2,000 years ago. You sin today and deserve a punishment in hell after you die, yet Jesus showing love took the sins of His Bride upon Himself on the cross. He bore the wrath of God that should have gone her way for her being sinful and selfish. This process of feeling guilty and running the gospel through your mind will help deal with guilt. Many of you should feel guilty for not showing love in the bedroom. It’s what you do with that guilt. You should take your feelings to Jesus. Tell them to him, confess your sinful thoughts, words and actions and believe Jesus paid the punishment for them. Guilt will ruin sweet sincere lovemaking. So tell God how your feeling, confess you sins and then don’t do them again. Read your Bible and obey.
Trust that you don’t get to heaven for doing good either. Trust that God will credit your record with the good things Jesus did. His good record of good deeds gets put on our record and we get rewarded heaven because when we die God will treat us as if we lived the life of Jesus Christ. Then repent. Love your spouse. Next time you make love to your spouse. Make love. Don’t fulfill lust. Think of them first. Manifest love in your marriage bed.
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