A Word in Season: Altogether Lovely (Song of Solomon 5:16)

Someone asks you, what is Jesus Christ to you? How do you think of him?

How do you esteem him? Now, how would you answer such a question? What phrases will you reach for?

What words will you conjure? What language can you employ properly to communicate your affection for, esteem of, and delight in your

Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, who loved you and gave himself for you?

Many have reached for the language of the Song of Solomon, chapter five and verse 16, where he is described as altogether lovely.

Now, many might have a challenge at this point, asking whether or not this is the right kind of language to use, or can it be taken from the song and applied to Jesus Christ?

Sadly, we live in a day and age, most of us, where the language of affection is often vulgarized and sexualized, where every expression of love has to have something physical in it.

Now, the way that the apostle Paul, for example, speaks in Ephesians five about a husband's affection for his wife and the wife's delight in her husband is then transferred properly to Christ and his church, which is the main thing that Paul is talking about, so that these lesser relationships, this lesser affection is simply a reflection of the greater and truer delight that the church has in Christ and the love that Christ has for his church.

And with that in mind, there's no difficulty for us then in understanding that in the Song of Solomon, there is a proper representation of the love between a man and a woman in its proper and pure sense, but also this sweet and symbolic reference to Christ Jesus and his church.

And so, without wanting to stretch it or strain it over much, it's not wrong for us to say of Jesus Christ, using this language, he is altogether lovely, and for everyone who knows him to mean it from the very depths of our souls.

In Song chapter five, the language is so rich.

There's this sort of outpouring, if you will, of the affection that the spouse has for her beloved.

And she's got this great catalog, this long list of things in which she delights.

My beloved is white and ruddy, chief among 10 ,000. There's this esteem of him.

He is beautiful in all things. He is head and shoulders above everybody else.

If you had 10 ,000 take the field, then there is one who to her is more and above and greater than all the rest.

And she talks about his head like gold and his locks wavy, black as a raven. She talks about his cheeks and his lips, his hands, his body, his legs.

It's this image of strength and glory and majesty and beauty in the truest sense.

And then his mouth is most sweet. It is the words that he says, which are most precious to her.

And is that not like our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ, that of all his perfections, that which most often brings us comfort and delight and assurance and pleasure are the things that he has spoken to us in his word, the kindness in giving his spirit to us so that we may go on hearing his voice.

And with this great catalog before us, with the perfections of Christ before us, we say he is altogether lovely.

There is nothing in him which is in any way marred, nothing which in any way dents his beauty, nothing which diminishes or undermines his glory.

His kingly majesty, his wisdom, his grace, his goodness, all his excellences together render him most delightful and most precious in our eyes.

And we must not be ashamed of expressing that kind of affection to our great

God and savior, Jesus Christ. We must not allow the thinking of the world.

We must not allow the carnality too often that clings to our own minds to deprive us of that language of rich and sweet and true and sure affection for the

Lord Jesus. Move from the depths of our souls with love for him who loved us and gave himself for us.

So that if somebody says, what is Christ to you? How do you esteem him? You say, he is altogether lovely in himself and to me.