A Well-Rounded, Fully Satisfying Marriage – For Life

He

1 How beautiful are your feet in sandals,
    O noble daughter!
Your rounded thighs are like jewels,
    the work of a master hand.
2 Your navel is a rounded bowl
    that never lacks mixed wine.
Your belly is a heap of wheat,
    encircled with lilies.
3 Your two breasts are like two fawns,
    twins of a gazelle.
4 Your neck is like an ivory tower.
Your eyes are pools in Heshbon,
    by the gate of Bath-rabbim.
Your nose is like a tower of Lebanon,
    which looks toward Damascus.
5 Your head crowns you like Carmel,
    and your flowing locks are like purple;
    a king is held captive in the tresses.

6 How beautiful and pleasant you are,
    O loved one, with all your delights!
7 Your stature is like a palm tree,
    and your breasts are like its clusters.
8 I say I will climb the palm tree
    and lay hold of its fruit.
Oh may your breasts be like clusters of the vine,
    and the scent of your breath like apples,
9 and your mouth like the best wine.

She

It goes down smoothly for my beloved,
    gliding over lips and teeth.

10 I am my beloved's,
    and his desire is for me.

11 Come, my beloved,
    let us go out into the fields
    and lodge in the villages;
12 let us go out early to the vineyards
    and see whether the vines have budded,
whether the grape blossoms have opened
    and the pomegranates are in bloom.
There I will give you my love.
13 The mandrakes give forth fragrance,
    and beside our doors are all choice fruits,
new as well as old,
    which I have laid up for you, O my beloved. – Song of Solomon 7:1-13 ESV

There is no reference to time in this passage but it would appear that Solomon and his bride have moved beyond the innocent days of marital bliss that surrounded their wedding night into a more substantive relationship in which their attraction for one another has deepened and matured. Their strong sexual desires have not diminished over time but have only grown stronger. They are no less verbose and over-the-top in their descriptions of one another’s bodies but there is a sense in which their words convey a more rich and satisfying love that goes well beyond mere physical attraction.

As he has done before, Solomon waxes eloquently about his wife’s physical attributes, making his way from her feet all the way to the top of her head. While his intimate description of his wife’s body can be a bit off-putting to the reader, it is balanced by his rather strange choice of imagery to convey his point. He describes her belly as “a heap of wheat, encircled with lilies” (Song of Solomon 7:2 ESV). In his eyes, her nose is like “a tower of Lebanon” (Song of Solomon 7:4 ESV). Her breasts are like the clusters of a stately palm tree (Song of Solomon 7:7 ESV).

These lovingly worded descriptions, while well-intentioned and backed by a deep affection for his wife, conjure up an image that only Salvador Dali or Picasso could put on canvas. Frankly, his choice of words paints an appalling rather than appealing image of his beloved. She comes across as some kind of Frankenstein-like monstrosity that is anything but attractive or inviting.

But we know by now that both Solomon and his bride are prone to an overuse of hyperbole and metaphors. He means well and what he says makes all the sense in the world to him. They say love is blind and this just might be an example of that truism. It’s not that Solomon’s wife was unattractive but that he was viewing her through eyes that looked far beneath the surface. He found this woman captivating – both inside and out – and all he can say is, “Oh, how beautiful you are!” (Song of Solomon 7:6 NLT). 

The imagery sugggests intimacy and love-making. He is not only admiring her inner and outer beauty, he is relishing the physical pleasure she brings him. Their relationship is a complete package that satisfies all his longings.

“Whereas the wedding night focused on the purpose of sex as the consummation of marriage, this night focuses on the purpose of sex as the nourishment of marriage… As they fell asleep the last kiss lingered in each other’s minds like the aftertaste of good wine. What an enchanting picture of the sleeping couple!” – S. Craig Glickman, A Song for Lovers

The closing verses of this chapter appear to be from the lips of Solomon’s adoring bride. She has heard his words and is responding with an invitation to join her on a day-trip to the country where they will will enjoy one another’s company. But she tops it off with a not-so-veiled promise of a night of love-making.

Come, my love, let us go out to the fields
    and spend the night among the wildflowers.
Let us get up early and go to the vineyards
    to see if the grapevines have budded,
if the blossoms have opened,
    and if the pomegranates have bloomed.
    There I will give you my love. – Song of Solomon 7:11-12 NLT

This is quite a departure from her earlier refusal to open to him the door to her chamber because she was ready to go to bed. She is now inviting him on an unplanned excursion into the countryside that will feature an unexpected but not undesirable ending.

To a certain degree, this chapter illustrates the concept of keeping the spark alive in a marriage. Spontaneity and surprise can go a long way in maintaining the vibrancy of a relationship that has grown stale or stagnant. A healthy growing marriage requires work and a bit of ingenuity. There is no place for the status quo or business as usual. Predictability and routine have their place but can end up sucking the life out of a relationship. This woman was willing to operate outside the normal boundaries of daily life just to ensure that her husband didn’t lose interest or take her for granted. And that street goes both ways.

The apostle Paul gave couples who were members of the church in Corinth the following advice about sex in marriage:

The husband should fulfill his wife’s sexual needs, and the wife should fulfill her husband’s needs. The wife gives authority over her body to her husband, and the husband gives authority over his body to his wife. Do not deprive each other of sexual relations… – 1 Corinthians 7:3-5 NLT

Whether we want to admit it or not, sex is a significant part of the marriage relationship, and it doesn’t necessarily diminish over time. Busyness and self-centeredness can force a couple to put their sexual relationship on the back burner, where it can languish for long periods of time. This can lead to resentment, disappointment, anger, hurt, feelings of rejection, and, ultimately, the temptation to seek satisfaction outside the bounds of the marriage.

As Solomon and his wife aged and their marriage matured, they were going to remain diligent and determined to protect the physical dimension of their relationship. Over time, the call to procreate would be replaced with the invitation to appreciate the wonderful nature of human sexuality within the bonds of matrimony. It is a gift from God and is meant to be enjoyed for a lifetime.

English Standard Version (ESV) The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Permanent Text Edition® (2016). Copyright © 2001

New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Awkward Reading But An Awesome Reminder

He

1 Behold, you are beautiful, my love,
    behold, you are beautiful!
Your eyes are doves
    behind your veil.
Your hair is like a flock of goats
    leaping down the slopes of Gilead.
2 Your teeth are like a flock of shorn ewes
    that have come up from the washing,
all of which bear twins,
    and not one among them has lost its young.
3 Your lips are like a scarlet thread,
    and your mouth is lovely.
Your cheeks are like halves of a pomegranate
    behind your veil.
4 Your neck is like the tower of David,
    built in rows of stone;
on it hang a thousand shields,
    all of them shields of warriors.
5 Your two breasts are like two fawns,
    twins of a gazelle,
    that graze among the lilies.
6 Until the day breathes
    and the shadows flee,
I will go away to the mountain of myrrh
    and the hill of frankincense.
7 You are altogether beautiful, my love;
    there is no flaw in you.
8 Come with me from Lebanon, my bride;
    come with me from Lebanon.
Depart from the peak of Amana,
    from the peak of Senir and Hermon,
from the dens of lions,
    from the mountains of leopards.

9 You have captivated my heart, my sister, my bride;
    you have captivated my heart with one glance of your eyes,
    with one jewel of your necklace.
10 How beautiful is your love, my sister, my bride!
    How much better is your love than wine,
    and the fragrance of your oils than any spice!
11 Your lips drip nectar, my bride;
    honey and milk are under your tongue;
    the fragrance of your garments is like the fragrance of Lebanon.
12 A garden locked is my sister, my bride,
    a spring locked, a fountain sealed.
13 Your shoots are an orchard of pomegranates
    with all choicest fruits,
    henna with nard,
14 nard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon,
    with all trees of frankincense,
myrrh and aloes,
    with all choice spices—
15 a garden fountain, a well of living water,
    and flowing streams from Lebanon.

She

16 Awake, O north wind,
    and come, O south wind!
Blow upon my garden,
    let its spices flow.

Let my beloved come to his garden,
    and eat its choicest fruits. – Song of Solomon 4:1-16 ESV

This chapter is filled with so much semantical hyperbole it’s almost difficult to read. Solomon’s attempt to describe his bride’s beauty is so over the top that it borders on the ridiculous and comes across as almost comical. His description of her eyes being like two doves behind a veil is quite a poetic and alluring visual that achieves its objective, but when ventures into characterizing the stunning beauty of her teeth he seems to go a bit too far.

“Your teeth are like a flock of shorn ewes
    that have come up from the washing,
all of which bear twins,
    and not one among them has lost its young.” – Song of Solomon 4:2 ESV 

His point is well made if not a tad bit overdone. It’s clear that he admires the vivid whiteness and flawless quality of her teeth but his attempt to describe them seems a little overzealous and unnecessary. But then again, it is poetry and these words are written by a man who is completely smitten by the love of his life. As he gazes at her in all her bridal splendor, he isn’t necessarily thinking rationally. It isn’t that his words have left him but that they are coming out in a jumbled cacophony of love-infused rhetoric.

Some scholars believe the context of the poem has moved from the day of the marriage ceremony to the evening in which the marriage would be consummated. This might explain some of Solomon’s over-the-top descriptive flourishes. If this is indeed his wedding night, his verbosity is nothing more than a case of nerves; he is overcome by the intensity and intimacy of the moment. We’ll graciously cut him some slack for his gratuitous use of over-embellished similes and metaphors. He can’t help himself.

It’s obvious to all that Solomon is enthralled by his bride’s stunning beauty. On this momentous night, he can see no wrong in her. Everything about her is beyond perfect - from head to toe. Her dark flowing hair reminds him of a flock of goats slowly descending a hillside in an undulating pattern. At this point in the evening, everything is operating in slow motion for Solomon. His mind is fully engaged in the moment.

The Scriptures declare Solomon to be the wisest man who ever lived.

God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding beyond measure, and breadth of mind like the sand on the seashore, so that Solomon's wisdom surpassed the wisdom of all the people of the east and all the wisdom of Egypt. For he was wiser than all other men… – 1 Kings 4:29-31 ESV

We also know that Solomon was a prolific writer, having authored 3,000 proverbs and 1005 songs (1 King 4:32). But when it came time to record his first impressions of his bride on their wedding night, it was as if Solomon’s writing skills abandoned him. He is stringing words together in a stream of consciousness that flows from his heart but seems to fail to engage with his mind. Whether his bride would have found any of these descriptions to be flattering is difficult to say. But Solomon means each and every one of them.

And as he works his way down from her eyes to her hair, then from her mouth to her neck, things begin to heat up. By the time he reaches her breasts, Solomon’s intensity level has reached a fever pitch. It’s almost as if his physical passions have taken over and his mental faculties have completely disengaged. His descriptions reach the point of no return as he desperately tries to communicate what he is seeing and how it is impacting him. For the reader, this is painfully awkward territory. One almost wants to scream, “Put your pen down, Solomon!”

But the writer in Solomon can’t stop himself from trying to convey his thoughts at that intimate and intensely satisfying moment.

“Your two breasts are like two fawns,
    twins of a gazelle,
    that graze among the lilies.” – Song of Solomon 4:5 ESV

One can only hope that Solomon wrote all this after the fact. Surely these were not the words he spoke to his bride on their wedding night. It becomes almost comical to think about Solomon waxing grandiloquent as he gazed at the naked body of his bride. While intended to be flattering, his words paint a rather bizarre image that is difficult to reconcile with the intimate nature of the moment. Once again, the reader is left to hurry past the sheer awkwardness of Solomon’s passion-induced prose disguised as poetry and, thankfully, he provides a much-needed respite.

In the following verses, Solomon calls his bride to leave behind her past and join him in their new life together.

“Come with me from Lebanon, my bride,
    come with me from Lebanon.
Come down from Mount Amana,
    from the peaks of Senir and Hermon,
where the lions have their dens
    and leopards live among the hills.” – Song of Solomon 4:8 NLT

Their wedding night is just the beginning of a grand new adventure in which they will forge a new path as husband and wife. Solomon is clearly excited about the prospect of walking through life with his new bride and her physical beauty certainly makes the prospect of a long and happy marriage that much more attractive. He uses a series of phrases to convey her hold over him.

“You have captured my heart…” – vs 9 (NLT)

“You hold it hostage with one glance of your eyes…” – vs 9 (NLT)

“Your love delights me…” – vs 10 (NLT)

“Your love is better than wine…” – vs 10 (NLT)

“Your lips are as sweet as nectar…” – vs 11 (NLT)

“You are my private garden, my treasure…” – vs 12 (NLT)

This man is in love and, as before, he cannot stop himself from expressing that love with a steady flow of rhetorical flourishes that seem excessively overwrought. It’s not that he’s trying too hard but that his love has literally left him without the proper words to express what he is thinking and feeling. This author par excellence has become like a giddy schoolboy trying to pen a love letter to his first junior-high crush. 

And the entire chapter ends with his bride inviting Solomon to stop talking and consummate their marital relationship. It was time to put down the pen and experience life together, with all its God-ordained passions, pleasures, and joys. This was to be a moment neither one of them would soon forget and it perfectly reflects the beauty of the intimate relationship that God had in mind when He created man and woman and placed them in the bounds of the marital union He had designed for them.

This passage, while somewhat difficult to read because of its awkward intimacy, is designed to paint a glowing image of God’s gracious plan for sexuality and marital intimacy. The author of Hebrews provides a stern warning to preserve the sanctity of marriage at all costs.

Give honor to marriage, and remain faithful to one another in marriage. God will surely judge people who are immoral and those who commit adultery. – Hebrews 13:4 NLT

The wedding night of Solomon and his bride was meant to seal the covenant they had made to one another in their wedding ceremony. They were now committed to one another for life – in the eyes of God. And as Jesus so poignantly put it, “They are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate” (Matthew 19:6 ESV).

English Standard Version (ESV) The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Permanent Text Edition® (2016). Copyright © 2001

New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Well Worth the Wait

She

1 On my bed by night
I sought him whom my soul loves;
    I sought him, but found him not.
2 I will rise now and go about the city,
    in the streets and in the squares;
I will seek him whom my soul loves.
    I sought him, but found him not.
3 The watchmen found me
    as they went about in the city.
“Have you seen him whom my soul loves?”
4 Scarcely had I passed them
    when I found him whom my soul loves.
I held him, and would not let him go
    until I had brought him into my mother’s house,
    and into the chamber of her who conceived me.
5 I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
    by the gazelles or the does of the field,
that you not stir up or awaken love
    until it pleases.” – Song of Solomon 3:1-5 ESV

As stated earlier, the language of this poem sometimes makes it difficult to discern a timeline or logical sequential order in the dialogue. The opening verses of chapter three have the maiden disclosing the content of a recent dream that had turned into a nightmare. Even in her subconscious state, she can’t get the image of her lover out of her mind. But in her dream, she found herself searching everywhere for the love of her life but to no avail. She even imagined getting out of bed and wandering the streets of the city in the middle of the night. One can almost see this young maiden, still dressed in her nightgown, oil lamp in hand, searching through the darkened alleyways of her hometown in a desperate attempt to locate the one whom her soul loves.

In her dream, she had waited with eager anticipation, hoping that her lover would show up but the hours passed and he remained a no-show. It was his failure to appear that prompted her desperate nocturnal search-and-rescue mission. She looked high and low but to no avail; he was nowhere to be found. At one point, she imagined herself coming across the nightwatchmen as they made their rounds. These men, surprised to find a young maiden out by herself in the middle of the night, must have questioned her sanity and intentions, but she is more interested in whether they solve the riddle of her missing lover.

A Freudian psychologist would have a field day with this dream. They would probably assess that this woman has a pathological attachment to this young man that is producing an unhealthy co-dependence. She can’t live without him and she can’t get him out of her mind. Their diagnosis might include some form of obsessive-compulsive behavior.

But the truth is, she is simply deeply in love and can’t imagine life without this young man. She desperately wants to be married and can’t wait until the day when he pops the question, they set the date, and the long-awaited day arrives. In her dream, she compresses the timeline and takes matters into her own hands, by locating her long-lost lover, taking him by the hand, and leading him to the nearest bed, which just happens to be the one on which she was conceived. This young virgin shares the intimate details of her dream, as she describes taking her lover to bed. 

The bluntness of her language makes us a bit uncomfortable and could leave us with the impression that this young lady has a lust problem. But the content of her dream only illustrates the longing of her heart. Her relationship with Solomon has moved well beyond puppy love. These are not two adolescents experiencing their first high school crush; they are soul mates who have determined their lives have been inextricably linked together for life. They have been divinely destined to be “one flesh” (Mark 10:8). The graphic and somewhat lurid content of the dream does not suggest that this couple had been intimately and immorally involved with one another, but it does make it clear that consummating their relationship was on her mind. She wanted to experience everything that marriage had to offer, and her honest admission that she dreamed of sexual intimacy with her lover should not be taken as a moral indiscretion but as a barometer of the depth of her love. She was more than ready and willing to give herself to her lover but would hold those passions in check until their wedding night.

She even caps the recounting of her dream with its steamy conclusion by encouraging her fellow maidens to keep their physical desires under control and “not to awaken love until the time is right” (Song of Solomon 3:5 NLT). Her dream revealed her heart’s desire but she was not going to let her passions get the best of her. She couldn’t control her sub-conscious dreams but, in real life, she was committed to maintaining her purity and protecting the sanctity of the marriage bed. While she lived long before the Book of Hebrews was written, she would have agreed wholeheartedly with its warning.

Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. – Hebrews 13:4 ESV

One must not forget that this is a book of poetry that chronicles the love between a man and a woman. It is meant to be intimate and uncomfortably revealing. There is a certain sense in which the reader is meant to feel a bit awkward as if they are intruding on the private conversations of two lovers. But the intent of the poem is not to embarrass or produce guilt but to showcase the amazing nature of the God-ordained love between a man and a woman.

It’s interesting to note that Solomon, long after penning the content of this book, wrote another book entitled Ecclesiastes. It was written very late in his life after he had amassed great wealth, world renown, and all the comforts that can come with life. He was wise and incredibly well-off, but he lacked any sense of joy, peace, or contentment. He had spent his entire adult life searching for significance and satisfaction but could only conclude, “I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind” (Ecclesiastes 1:14 ESV). By this point in his life, he had accumulated all kinds of treasures, including 700 wives and 300 concubines, but nothing brought him satisfaction. Sex had long ago replaced love as a driving factor in his life. He sadly confessed, “whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I kept my heart from no pleasure” (Ecclesiastes 2:10 ESV).

Later in this same book, Solomon seems to reminisce about the days when he found satisfaction and significance in the arms of his young maiden. Those had been simpler days when two was more than enough.

Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed. If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble. Likewise, two people lying close together can keep each other warm. But how can one be warm alone? A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. – Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 NLT

All the treasures of the world cannot replace or replicate the God-ordained love between a man and a woman. Marriage was God’s idea from the beginning. In the garden, God declared His intentions for the indissoluble union between a man and a woman.

“Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” – Genesis 2:24 ESV

The young maiden dreamed of the day when she and Solomon could consummate their love and solidify their union. She knew she had to wait and do things according to God’s divine will but that did not remove the desire or diminish her longings for all that God had in store for them. The marriage was a gift from God and she couldn’t wait to open it.

English Standard Version (ESV) The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Permanent Text Edition® (2016). Copyright © 2001

New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.