Redeemed Sexuality

image: mafleen~ Selected Texts from the Song of Solomon~

“Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and

female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? What therefore God has joined together, let

not man separate”

~ Jesus of Nazareth in the Gospel of Matthew 19:4-5

Did you just say, “God glorifying sex?” Isn’t God against sex?

We view sex wrongly when we deify it, demean it, or despise it.

The Song of Solomon

Redeemed Sexuality

image: mafleen~ Selected Texts from the Song of Solomon~

We view sex rightly when we honour sexual love as

an act of covenant renewal.

The God-ordained context for covenantal sexual love

3:6-11

1

6 What is that coming up from the wilder-

Song of Solomon 3:6-11

ness like columns of smoke, perfumed with myrrh and frankincense, with all the fragrant powders of a merchant?

7 Behold it is the litter of Solomon!

Song of Solomon 3:6-11

Around it are sixty mighty men, some of the mighty men of Israel,

8 all of them wearing swords and experts in war,

each with his sword at his thigh, against terror by night.

9 King Solomon made himself a carriage,

Song of Solomon 3:6-11

from the wood of Lebanon. 10 He made its posts of silver,

its back of gold, its seat of purple; Its interior was inlaid with love by the

daughters of Jerusalem.

11 Go out, O daughters of Zion,

Song of Solomon 3:6-11

and look upon King Solomon, with the crown with which his mother

crowned him on the day of his wedding, on the day of the gladness

of his heart.

“…the Lord was witness between you and the wife of your youth…she is your

companion and your wife by covenant. Did not he make

them one…? ~ Malachi 2:14-15

The erotic beauty of covenantal sexual love

4:1-15

2

1 Behold, you are beautiful, my love,

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

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

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

that have come up from their washing,all of which bear twins, and not one ofthem has lost its young.

3 Your lips are like a scarlet thread,

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

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,

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

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,

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

twins of a gazelle, that graze among the lilies.

“…rejoice in the wife of your youth, a lovely deer, a

graceful doe. Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight: be intoxicated

always in her love.” ~ King Solomon in Proverbs 5:19

6 Until the day breathes and

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

the shadows flee, I will go away to the mountain of myrrh

and to the hill of frankincense.

7 You are altogether beautiful, my love;there is no flaw in you.

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

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.

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

9 You have captivated my heart, my sister,you have captivated my heart with

one glance of your eyes, with one jewel of your necklace.

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

10 How beautiful is your love, my sister, my bride!

How much better is your love thanwine, and the fragrance of your oilsthan any spice!

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

11 Your lips drip nectar, my bride; honey and milk are under your tongue;

the fragrance of your garments is likethe fragrance of Lebanon.

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

12 A garden locked is my sister, my bride; a spring locked, a fountain sealed.

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

13 Your shoots are an orchard of pome granates with all choicest fruit,

henna with nard, 14 nard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon,

with all frankincense, myrrh and aloes,with all choicest spices —

Song of Solomon 4:1-15

15 a garden fountain, a well of living water,and flowing streams from Lebanon.

The one flesh union of covenantal sexual love

4:16 - 5:1

3

16 Awake, O north wind,

Song of Solomon 4:16

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.

1 I came to my garden, my sister, my bride,

Song of Solomon 5:1

I gathered my myrrh with my spice, I ate my honeycomb with my honey,I drank my wine with my milk.

“I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for me.”

~ Song of Solomon 7:10

The intoxicating blessing of covenantal sexual love

5:1

4

1 Eat, friends, drink,

Song of Solomon 5:1

and be drunk with love!

“Catch the foxes for us, the little foxes that spoil the vineyards, for our

vineyards are in blossom.”

~ Song of Solomon 72:15

God designed the mysterious beauty of sexual love

to seal and renew the covenant of marriage.

Praise God for thedesigned beautyof sexual love.

“Pleasures are shafts of glory as it strikes our

sensibility….I have tried…to make every

pleasure into a channel of adoration.”

~ CS Lewis Oxford Professor

Frame the gift of sexual lovewithin the covenant of marriage.

“I adjure you, O daughters of

Jerusalem, that you not stir up or awaken love until

it pleases.” ~ Song of Solomon 8:4

Realize that sexual love points beyond itself to a greater union.

“‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and

mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall

become one flesh.’

This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the

church.”~ The Apostle Paul in

Ephesians 5:31-32

“Sex is for fully committed relationships because it is a foretaste of the joy that

comes from being in complete union with God through Christ. The most rapturous love between a

man and a woman on earth is only a hint of what

that is like.”

image credit: mafleen https://www.flickr.com/photos/mafleen/8472558582/https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

flickr images courtesy of:

image credit: MorrowLess https://www.flickr.com/photos/morrowless/3003380784/ https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/

other images used for educational purposes:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharaoh%27s_daughter_(wife_of_Solomon)

image credit: Varinhttps://www.flickr.com/photos/varintsai/5013895763/https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Originally published in the Wittenburg Door, referenced in http://silouanthompson.net/2012/03/song-of-solomon/

Image Credit: Justin Lee. Used by permission from Kevin Schwittai & McKenzie Hahn.