WWUTT 1774 Like a Lily Among Thorns (Song of Songs 2:1-7)

The desire a man has for a woman he wants to marry is very good, and the desire a woman has for a man she wants to marry, as long as these desires are in submission to the Lord when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we feature New Testament Study, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday.

Now here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky.

The Rose of Sharon and the Lily Among the Thorns

We come back to our study of the Song of Songs, up to Chapter 2 this week, if you want to open up your Bible and join with me there. I've got a really short read at the start of this. This might be the shortest read that I've done at the beginning of any one of these Bible lessons on the podcast.

It's just two verses. It's her voice in verse 1, and then he responds in verse 2. So here we go. In verse 1 she says, I am the rose of Sharon, the lily of the valleys. And then he responds, like a lily among thorns, so is my darling among the daughters.

Now I said last week that I wasn't going to explain verse 1 until this week. And you've probably heard this before. You've probably heard like a reference to the rose of Sharon. It's maybe been in a song or a poem.

I am the lily of the valleys. And you probably thought this was something incredibly beautiful or deeply romantic. It's actually not. I'm going to burst your bubble on that. But let me go back so we get all of her comment in context.

So starting in verse 16, this was where she was speaking at the end of Chapter 1. She says, behold, you are handsome, my beloved, indeed so pleasant. And she's calling back to him the way that he had spoken to her.

Behold you are beautiful, my darling. Behold you are beautiful. And so she says something similar to him. You're handsome to me. You are lovely to me as well. Now this doesn't necessarily mean they are two just beautiful looking people, even though the romance that we're reading about in Song of Songs is very much idealized.

But this isn't necessarily to think of them as being just the most beautiful man and woman.

In the world.

He's more beautiful to her than any man. She's more beautiful to him than any woman. And they also love how complimentary they are together. And they look lovely together. We've seen that just over the course of Chapter 1 thus far.

So she calls back, behold, you are handsome, my beloved. Indeed, our couch is luxuriant. The beams of our houses are cedars, our rafters cypresses. And then continuing, she continues on the start of Chapter 2, I am the rose of Sharon, the lily of the valleys.

She's talking about him in verse 16. She talks about us together, what it's like with us together. That's the last line of verse 16 and then verse 17. And then she talks about herself in Chapter 2, verse 1, as the rose of Sharon in the lily of the valleys.

My friends, she's saying about herself that she's very plain and ordinary. Yeah, this is not that deeply poetic, ah, lily of the valleys, rose of Sharon. And I've heard people do that. You know, you could probably think of songs or hymns where lily of the valleys is used to describe Jesus as being the most beautiful of all.

That's not what this is referencing. She doesn't think of herself that way. Remember earlier in Chapter 1, she says, I'm not beautiful. And he says to her, no, you're lovely. And then you're beautiful, my darling.

Behold, you are beautiful. This is how he sees her. That's not the way she sees herself. So she's not going to refer to herself as being the greatest flower that you can possibly find. The rose of Sharon was not a great flower.

It was in Philistia. Where's Philistia? That's where the Philistines are. You don't want to be there. You don't want to be with the Philistines. You want to be in Judah or with Israel, as we've had some other references to that in Chapter 1.

When she says, I'm the lily of the valleys, the most beautiful flowers don't grow down in the shade of the valleys. They grow up on the hillsides. That's where the loveliest flowers are. So these are just plain, ordinary flowers down in the valleys or being the rose of Sharon, which is not something that an Israelite is going to go do.

They're not going to go to Philistia and pluck that rose. And yet, how does he respond? You got to know that about Chapter 2, Verse 1, because it makes his response all the more awesome. How does he reply in Verse 2?

Like a lily among thorns, so is my darling among the daughters. She plays herself down. I am the rose of Sharon, like I'm a flower in Philistia. You don't want to go to Philistia to pick that flower. How does he say it?

Oh, you're a lily among thorns. That's awesome. That is that is the perfect response from a loving man. Hey, if you're going to be a flower in Philistia, then that would make you a flower among thorns because they're godless, but you're beautiful.

And so he even gives it application like a lily among thorns. So is my darling among the daughters. He doesn't want any of the other women. He just wants her. He doesn't have an eye for anyone else. But this woman, she is the most beautiful, most precious flower to him.

He takes her ordinary statement. I'm the lily of the valleys and turns it into the highest compliment like a lily among thorns. So is my darling among the daughters. Now, I want to make a I want to come back to that reference to the lily of the valleys.

I made a passing reference to the hymn. I don't know if you've ever sung this hymn before, if you've heard it before. Let me read to you the first line and then you'll hear how it doesn't really work now that you have this understanding of song of songs to one.

Here's the first verse of the song. I've found a friend in Jesus. He's everything to me. He's the fairest of 10 ,000 to my soul. The lily of the valley in him alone. I see all I need to cleanse and make me fully whole.

So now you see how that doesn't work because you would be calling Jesus ordinary there. It's a person who just doesn't understand what this reference is supposed to mean. The height of this reference is not the fact that she says of herself that I'm the rose of Sharon or the lily of the valleys.

It's the way he responds to her. You're like a lily among thorns. So is my darling among the daughters. Now, when it comes to making spiritual application of song of songs, we have to be very careful because this is a romance between a man and a woman and they consummate this relationship with one another.

Once they're married, there's a consummation of it that comes a little bit later on. So we need to be careful. If we make spiritual application here, we need to be careful not to be crude with it. It needs to be done in the right way.

So you're understanding exactly what the reference is. And then you're making proper application. It doesn't work. It's not proper application to take a reference the woman makes and make that about Christ or any reference to the woman and make that about Jesus.

The woman would not be representing Jesus here. If we're going to understand it that way, if we're going to draw that into the picture of marriage is the picture of the way that Christ loves his church, then the woman can't be the picture of Christ.

It's the man who's the picture of Christ. So her reference to the lily of the valleys can't be a reference to Jesus, since she's talking about herself. It would have to be the way the church talks about itself.

And then Christ responds to the church being like a lily among thorns. Now, we are not beautiful flowers in and of ourselves. As I talked about this last week, it is God who makes us righteous. It is he who makes us good.

He is the one who has cleansed us from all of our unrighteousness and clothed us in the righteousness of Christ. And so now in that condition, now we're beautiful in the eyes of God before we are filthy and stained with sin.

And as it says in Habakkuk 113, God's eyes are so holy, he can't even stand to look at sin. But it's after he purifies us and makes us beautiful in Christ, because we're given Christ's righteousness by his mercy and grace.

Now we're beautiful and lovely to him. So a reference to being a lily among thorns, that would be the way that God would speak favorably toward us. Now we've been made something beautiful. And all the rest in the world who are not seeking after God, who are rebelling against him and going into sin, they're thorns.

And we're like a lily growing among thorns. Remember the reference to in Philippians 2, that we're to shine as lights in the universe in the midst of a crooked and depraved generation. So that's all dark and black, right?

It's just full of sin and depravity. And yet we're shining as light, shining as stars in the midst of that. Just like you look up in the night sky and it's just full of blackness, but you have those wonderful speckles of light all the way through there.

That's how we are to be in this world. And so may we be lovely in the midst of thorns. The loveliness that we have is not some inherent beauty that we possess, but it is the righteousness of Christ that has been given to us by faith.

And so we continue to walk in holiness and uprightness, even in the midst of this present age. So when the world looks at us, they see something lovely, or at least we don't look like the thorns that they are or are living among.

Now, it may not be when they look at us, they think of us as lovely. It might make them angry and they want to destroy that, which is good and pure, because that's what Satan wants to do. And those who are in the world are followers of Satan.

Those who are in Christ are followers of Christ Jesus. He is the one who is going to sustain us. He will keep us beautiful until that day when we join him in glory. He's the one who made us lovely and he keeps us lovely.

He is the one who has planted this garden and is maintaining it. And so we continue to hold fast to Christ, follow him, walking in holiness and uprightness, and he will deliver us from the perils and the temptations of this world.

He preserves us. Now, that's just a little application right here. We've got about 10 more minutes yet to go. We're only about halfway through the lesson today. So let me continue on to verse three. This is now her response, and it's going to go through verse six.

And then he replies at verse seven. So let me start here in verse three. She says, like an apple tree among the trees of the forest. So is my beloved among the sons. In his shade, I had great desire and sat down.

And his fruit was sweet to my taste. He has brought me to his house of banqueting and his banner over me is love. Sustain me with raisin cakes. Refresh me with apples because I am lovesick. Let his left hand be under my head and his right hand embrace me.

And then his response in verse seven. I call you to solemnly swear, O daughters of Jerusalem, by the gazelles or by the hinds of the field, that you do not arouse or awaken my love until she pleases. Now, then let me come back to verse three.

This, of course, is in response to what he just said. So he said, like a lily among the thorns. So is my darling among the maidens. She replies like an apple tree among the trees of the forest. So is my beloved among the sons.

Trees of the forest are not generally fruit trees. Fruit trees grow smaller and the trees of the forest are taller. And so because of all that shade, you don't get fruit trees growing in the middle of a forest.

You have a grove of fruit trees. So this is complimentary on her part as well to say that my beloved is like an apple tree growing in the midst of the forest. So is my beloved among the sons. She prefers the apple tree.

And this is something that even provides sustenance to her. It feeds her where the other trees would not. So she says again, like an apple tree among the trees of the forest. So is my beloved among the sons.

In his shade, I had great desire and sat down and his fruit was sweet to my taste. Now, she's kind of daydreaming here because remember what we had in chapter one was her desire to want to go be with him.

And he told her, I'll be along shortly. Here's where you can go and expect to find me there. So it's not that she's gone and now she's there and she's waiting, but she's kind of daydreaming about being with him again.

And she says in his shade, I had great desire and sat down. So wanting to be in his presence, wanting to have her soul filled with him or fed by him, by our wonderful conversation, or even by his leading her in the word, in the scriptures.

Because remember that a husband as the head of his wife, according to what we have in Ephesians five, a husband as the head of his wife is to cleanse her by the washing of water with the word, the way that Jesus does with the church.

So a man is to lead his wife the same way. He's going to be not just the provider of food and shelter and things like that, but he's going to be her spiritual provider. Also, here's the picture of this woman sitting with her man is what she's daydreaming about and being fed by him, not just with food that sustains her body, but with food even that feeds her soul.

His fruit was sweet to my taste, she says. Verse four, he has brought me to his house of banqueting and his banner over me is love. Again, this is a shepherd and a shepherdess. This is not a woman who is pining for King Solomon.

You got to go back to my introduction and listen to all of that. He is not King Solomon in this story. This is a shepherd and a shepherdess, but to her being in his presence and being fed by him is like being at the king's table of banquet and his banner over me.

You got all these banners that hang in the banqueting hall. You know that you're in the presence of the king. You are under the banner of his kingdom, his sign, his insignia, all these things that would be on these banners.

Well, the banner that's over her is love. She knows she is loved by him. She is guarded and protected and richly provided for in his great palace because he loves me. Sustain me with raisin cake, she says.

That's a royal dessert. Refresh me with apples because I am lovesick. Now, what happens next here? She makes this statement. I am lovesick. She's just swooning over him, just aching within her to be with her man.

And so says in verse six, let his left hand be under my head and his right hand embrace.

Me.

She is imagining being touched and held by him. Again, they're not together. He's not really there, but she's thinking about it. She's laying under this tree. She wants to feel his hand under her head, like supporting her head as she's laying down to elevate her head for what purpose?

Probably to kiss her, right? The other hand comes around her to hold her close to start pulling her close to him. And this might be going a little too far. This is just her imagination here. They're not really together.

But what she's thinking about is awakening things that are not ready to be awakened until their wedding night. Now, this is a man she is going to marry. He's going to marry her. Their desire for one another is healthy, but they still have to be careful not to awaken certain desires until the right time.

And you see that in his response in verse seven, he doesn't even say this to her. He speaks this to those who are the others or who might be her maidens that take care.

Of her.

The ones who had said earlier that we're going to make you look lovely for him. What does he say in verse seven? I call you to solemnly swear, oh, daughters of Jerusalem, by the gazelles or by the hinds of the field that you do not arouse or awaken my love until she pleases.

Not many translations are going to interpret verse seven as being the voice of the man. Most translations read that as the voice of the woman. The English Standard Version says that's still the woman speaking there.

But I do not think that's the case. And I checked several commentaries on this, about eight or nine commentaries. There was one in there that agreed with me. This is the man that's talking right here.

So look at it again. As you have the woman speaking in verse six and daydreaming about his touch, his hand under her head, the other pulling her close, and then he speaks up as almost to stop her from thinking about this too far, from going too far and playing out this scenario in her mind.

And then in verses eight through 17, that's the woman speaking, and she never mentions his touch again. So his speaking up there is effective to kind of cool her off, for lack of a better phrase. So again, he speaks here in verse seven to say, I call you to solemnly swear, oh, daughters of Jerusalem.

These are the maidens that we've heard from previously that respond to the woman's swooning,.

Right?

And he says to these women who keep her and tend her, care for her, he says, by the gazelles or by the hinds of the field. Now, he's calling them to swear, not an oath, but it's a solemn charge, by the gazelles or by the hinds of the field.

When a hunter goes out to hunt in the field, he doesn't run into the field yelling and screaming, right? All the gazelles will go running away. He goes in slowly, quietly. And so he's telling these maidens that you do not arouse or awaken my love.

In other words, what he's saying to them is don't encourage her in this fantasy, lest her mind go running into places where it should not go. But you do not arouse or awaken my love until she pleases, until the time is right, until it is truly pleasing to her, when it is right for our relationship, when we're married, on our wedding night.

That phrase comes up here in chapter two, verse seven. It comes up again in chapter three, verse five. In both occasions, she's dreaming. This is a daydream here in chapter two. It's a night dream in chapter three.

She's dreaming, and she's imagining his touch. So both times, when she starts thinking about him touching her, we have this phrase, I call you to solemnly swear, oh daughters of Jerusalem, by the gazelles or by the hinds of the field, that you do not arouse or awaken my love until she pleases.

Don't let her mind, don't let her fantasies go into that place where she's not meant to be until our wedding night. And the maidens are going to help to keep her desires in check. Now for these two lessons between this week and next week, we're going to make that our.

Ending mark.

So today we're ending in verse seven. Next week, I'm going to try to go all the way through chapter three, verse five, which ends the same way. Since it's the same phrase in chapter two, verse seven, and in chapter three, verse five.

So we'll end there for now and pick up our study in the song of songs next week. But let me give some application here. And then I'm going to talk about this again next week as well for yourself and for your children.

Do not awaken love until the proper time. Teach your children purity and to save sex until marriage. If you're not married, you need to do the same. Love Christ and honor God with your body. We read in Philippians chapter four, verses six through eight, be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God and the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is dignified, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable. If there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, consider these things.

Heavenly father, may we have minds that are in submission to Christ, not led astray by the temptations of this world or the temptations of our own flesh, but we submit to Christ and desire to honor you with our minds and with our bodies.

This is our spiritual act of worship in Jesus name. We pray.

Amen.

This has been when we understand the text of pastor Gabriel Hughes. For all of our podcasts, episodes, videos, books, and more visit our website at www .utt .com. If you'd like to submit a question to this broadcast or just send us a comment, email whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com and let your friends know about our ministry.

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