“The Honeymoon’s Over” – FBC Morning Light (5/29/2024)

The World’s “Show All, Tell All” Culture

Well a good Wednesday morning. Today you're finishing up in your Bible reading the Song of Solomon, but I'm gonna take a couple more days and talk about this book. Today I want to zero in on one aspect that we find in chapter 4, in the relationship between the husband and the wife that runs counter to our culture.

You know, the world says, show all tell all. You know, I don't have to belabor the point that there's not much left to the imagination when it comes to the human body being shown in public ways. Don't have to don't have to belabor that point.

The world, you know, just seems to relish in that showing of everything, and the telling of everything. You've got these crazy reality shows where, you know, well, I just don't I don't watch them, so I don't know a whole lot about them other than what's reported to me.

But, you know, these, you know, Bachelor, Bachelorette shows where, you know, they're just following people around and they're telling everything, you know, and it's... Yeah, okay. So the world says show all tell all, but the wisdom literature that is the Song of Songs says to the husband and wife, show him, says to the wife, show him, and says to the husband, tell her.

Modesty, Trust, and Honesty in Marriage

What do I mean? Well, what you see in chapter 4 verses 1 to 7 is that the bride, who has saved herself for marriage, is revealing herself to her husband. She's not got a lot on, and that's, I mean, that's the marriage relationship, understand that.

She's just wearing a veil, and what you see is a veil in verse 1 and 3, you see a necklace, and you see her long dark hair, okay? And that poetic imagery, it's not graphic, it's not erotic in any, you know, negative way, but that graphic imagery is really kind of reflective of the lack of shame in the Garden of Eden, right?

Before sin entered the world and defiled everything, messed everything up, you know, Adam and Eve, they didn't wear clothes, there was no sense of shame, and here the bride stands before her husband in a way that is, as Doug O'Donnell expresses it, a symbolic demonstration of perfect honesty, perfect trust, perfect giving, and commitment.

This is something that a bride does for her husband. So the world says, show everybody. The scriptures and wisdom literature says, show your husband. And in response, husbands, or counseled in the wisdom literature, tell your wife how beautiful she is.

Listen to how he speaks of her in chapter 4 and verse 1. He says, Behold, you are fair, my love. Behold, you are fair. It's like he's saying, wow, you're beautiful. You're beautiful. See how he's praising her flawless beauty?

You say, well, I mean, what bride is flawless in her beauty? Well, to the husband, she is. He's not zeroing in on what might be considered by some to be a flaw. No, he looks at her and says, like in verse 7, he's basically saying, you're beautiful everywhere.

He says, you are all fair, my love, and there is no spot in you. Look at how he praises her. Look at how he praises her. He assesses her to be a 10. A 10. And he doesn't see any flaws as flaws. He sees them as marks of beauty, if you will.

And what he also does in these verses, chapter 4, 1 to 7, is he itemizes her beautiful features. And there are seven of them that he mentions. Her eyes, her hair, her teeth, her lips and mouth, her temples and cheeks, her temples or her cheeks, I should say, her neck, and her breasts.

He says, you're just beautiful everywhere. And in the end, what happens in verse 6? He breaks out in song. He says, Until the day breaks and the shadows flee away, I will go my way to the mountain of Myrrh and to the hill of frankincense.

This is a song. He's breaking out in song because of her beauty. Now, what I want us to see here is that, and I mentioned this yesterday, this is a song about human love in the context of marriage set in the Bible.

Christ and the Church in Song of Songs

It's in the Bible. So we should understand that there are going to be some other implications or applications from what we read in the Song of Solomon that you find elsewhere in Scripture. So, for example, you can see a parallel between what's going on here with Christ and his Church.

Christ sees us as we are. So Hebrews 4 .13 says,. There is no creature hidden from his sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of him to whom we must give account. He sees us as we are. But how does he see us?

He sees us in light of the end result. Ephesians chapter 5 verses 25 through 27 talk about this picture of marriage being the picture of Christ's relationship to his Church, whom he will present to himself a glorious Church, a glorious Bride, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing.

He sees us as beautiful. And what happens as a result? What does he do? What does God do, seeing the beautiful Bride of Christ? Sings over us. Zechariah 3 verse 17 says,. The Lord your God is in your midst, the Mighty One.

He will save. He will rejoice over you with gladness. He will quiet you with his love. He will rejoice over you with singing. Just as the groom in Song of Solomon praises the beauty of his Bride and rejoices over her with singing, so too does our gracious God and our glorious Savior, our Bridegroom, rejoice over his Bride, the Church, and break out in song over her beauty.

Wow. Wow, what a stupendous thought, is it not? In spite of the fact that we know or think we're so ugly, he sees us as so beautiful. Let's thank him for that. So our Father and our God, we do thank you for this insight into the relationship between Christ and the Church that we can see in a healthy marriage.

Bless these thoughts to our hearts, we pray, we ask it in Jesus' name, Amen. All right, listen, have a good rest of your Wednesday. May the Lord bless you in it.