Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and then Song of Solomon. And I want you to go to chapter number six, if you would please, chapter number six. Now, I'm trying to move along just a little bit in our studies on Sunday nights, this overview of the various books of the Bible. I did purposefully, as of right now, skip over Psalms and Proverbs. Now, I will come back to those later, but I think a lot of us are fairly familiar with those books. I mean, could we use a little bit more in-depth understanding? Of course. And we'll get back to those, but we're a little bit behind on our Bible reading schedule as far as where Most of you are on on the Bible reading schedule and where I am as far as the overview. So trying to get caught up a little bit. So tonight we're going to cover this book of Song of Solomon. I want you to look here one verse I'm going to go ahead and give to you. And then I'm going to talk more about this at the end as I apply the scripture and share this. But notice what he says here in Song of Solomon, chapter six, verse number three, I And my beloved and my beloved is mine. Now, maybe you've been to a wedding and you have seen this verse has been utilized. It's a very well used verse for weddings, for maybe a Valentine's theme, something of that nature. But what a beautiful picture here, not only of the love of two individuals that are spoken of in this particular book, But I want you to think about the relationship you have with Jesus Christ. Can you truly say tonight, I am my beloved's, my beloved is mine, or is your relationship estranged? Is it according to the Lord Jesus, would he say, you know, I know so-and-so and I know so-and-so, but I'm not sure I really know you. We have not spent a lot of time together. Oh, how important it is for you as believers to be able to say, I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine. Let's pray together. We'll get in our study. Father, thank you for this time. Open up the Word of God. Do us in a very special way. Help us to be attentive with our minds, our hearts, every part of our being. To be just focused on that which you have for us in Jesus precious name, amen. Now, I'll get to this a little bit later, but really, this book is written by, I believe, Solomon, and we'll give some explanations. It is one of the many songs that were written by him. Now, if you look at 1 Kings chapter 4 and verse number 32, the Bible says that Solomon wrote over a thousand different songs. Now, imagine that. David had a lot of songs that he wrote, probably about half of the Psalms that he wrote were songs. But again, that's not all of them. And Solomon wrote a lot of Proverbs, a lot of different songs, but not all of those are included. But I want you to notice back at chapter one, verse number one. In fact, there's not many chapters. So we're able to flip through here. Notice here what Solomon says about this particular what we call a book. He says the song of song. And what does he mean by that? If you were to take all of Solomon's songs that he had written, this one right here was the best. This was the song of songs, and it was the very best song that he put together. Now, what is all this about this book, this song? Well, you could probably summarize it in this way. It is a love story. There's great detail about a love relationship. In fact, it's a book that could be utilized. I'm doing some premarital counseling right now, but it is a book that you could walk through and do some premarital counseling. You could utilize it for counseling for those who have been married for a little while, but it's a love story between two people. Who are they? The groom, who I believe to be Solomon, and the bride, who is identified in chapter 6 as someone known as the Shulamite woman. And that's the title that is used for her. Now you say, who is the Shulamite woman? Where is she from? Is there a town, a city by the name of Shulam? Archaeologists and various smart people that have done study on this really don't know of a particular city that has been referenced that way, but it's possible that either it was some place that was in the land of Palestine, somewhere near Jerusalem, or it was a place possibly in Lebanon, because on a few occasions, Lebanon is mentioned on a regular basis. Now, let's grab this for just a moment and compare the writings in the Song of Solomon with Solomon's other writings. I believe that Solomon wrote this particular book that we're studying tonight when he was a young man. Now, last week we discussed Ecclesiastes. Solomon wrote that, I believe, when he was an old man. But in his middle years, I believe he wrote the book of Proverbs. So in these three spans of his life is when Solomon wrote these three books that we have made study of. Now, something unusual, very interesting here about the book Song of Solomon, it doesn't really make any strong theological statements, if you will. It doesn't even seem to have a divine stamp upon it. In fact, there are many from years ago rabbis that were in the days of Jesus and later and in other periods of history who have really viewed the book of Song of Solomon with some skepticism as as if does this really belong in the Bible? Is it something that is a part of the canon of Scripture? But I'm here to say, in case you have any doubts at all, yes, it has been included. It is to be included. And it is God's inspired word. I believe we ought to settle that tonight. So let's look at this unique book of the Song of Solomon and grab some of its richness for us as believers. Let me talk about the attributes of the book already alluded to the author. So I want to talk first about that. I believe the author must be Solomon. Now he's named as such. Chapter 1, verse 1, the Song of Songs, which is Solomon's. Verse 5, it mentions his name. Chapter 3, verse 7. Chapter 3, verse 9, and a few other places. Again, he is named. If you look at chapter 3, verses 6 through 11, it talks about a man with some unbelievable wealth. a man who had possessed some rare goods. Now, I don't know anybody other than Solomon in the Bible. Now, maybe there could have been others. But Solomon was a man who was very wealthy. God gave him not only wisdom, but provided him with a great amount of wealth and also things that were brought into the palace of unusual and pricely items. There also seems to mention here of this groom, this author of a royal harem. Now, in chapter 6, verse number 3, or chapter 6, verse number 8, it alludes to that, talks about how many wives and various things that he had. But I want you to know, again, nobody else that we know about that, like Solomon, In fact, the Bible talks about 700 wives here, 300 concubines. So, again, I really believe looking through these chapters, eight chapters, Solomon's the author. Let's look at the outline for just a moment. I have two simple points. We'll throw these up. First of all, chapters 1 through 4 is the establishment of the love relationship. And then in chapters 5 through 8 is the expansion of that love relationship. Now, truthfully, I'm going to be very frank with you. It is very hard to actually outline the book of Song of Solomon. I probably looked at a number of different commentaries, looked at a lot of different sources, and every one of them had a different outline for the book of Song of Solomon. And I thought, OK, Lord. I read through this book several times as I try to do. I read through it and try to get a sense of it. But to me, this was probably the easiest way to look at it. You look at the first four chapters. The bride longs for the bridegroom. They meet. They give praise to one another. Their love begins to blossom. They use various figures and descriptions to share about their love for one another. And then in chapters 5 through 8, the second part, the lover has gone away, but he comes back and he expresses the groom, expresses his love and his longing here for the bride and the bride for the groom. And that marriage is consummated. And the happiness of that couple is celebrated, and these are seen in these two chapters. So that's the extent of what we'll give of the outline here. But now let's move along to the analysis of the book, the analysis of the book. There's a few things that I'd like to give to you here that I think are very important to understand. Number one, if you're going to read this, you need to understand, number one, Solomon's unique relationship that is here. Now, we read this and we might say, I'm not sure Solomon wrote this. How in the world can you have a guy talk about such a unique, wonderful, glorious relationship with one person when he's got back home 700 wives and 300 concubines? What's wrong with this guy? Well, first of all, let's understand again, he wrote this as a young man. I believe this was possibly, and I cannot be certain on this, but I believe it was written even before he became king. Now what happened? Why all those concubines? Why all those wives and various things? Well, a lot of those were arranged relationships. They were, they were, well, OK, we're going to we're going to have peace and and we're going to set up a contract with this particular nation. All right, we'll give our daughter here to be your wife and and so on and so forth. Well, before all of those things ever came about, this one relationship with this Shulamite woman was one that he pursued for himself. He had a genuine love. All these others may have been arranged relationships and people brought into his life, but this one out of all of them is the one he truly desires. In fact, he loves her because she's not like all of the other cultured princesses. She's not, you know, all decked out like they would be in their palace and various things. Here's a woman who is described as a simple vineyard servant. In fact, the Bible describes her in chapter 1, verse 6. It says a couple of times, her skin is dark. It doesn't mean that she's a black woman, but it references here the fact that she is dark because of the sun. She's working outside and he loves her. In fact, in chapter 4, notice here this praise that he gives above all others. Look at chapter 4, verse number 10. What he says about this bride. How fair is thy love, my sister, my spouse! How much better is thy love than wine, and the smell of thine ointments than all spices!" So again, you say, well, is there something to really understand about this unique relationship? I'm not sure I get it all together, but I really believe this was one that he pursued himself, and it was the beginning of his love life. Notice now number two, another analysis of the book. How do we interpret the book? How do we interpret the book? Well, it's important every time you come to a book to learn how to interpret a book, a passage of scripture, whatever it may be. There are three ways to look at the Song of Solomon. I don't have these on the screen tonight, but I'm going to give them to you very quickly. First of all, we look at it from a very natural standpoint. We look at it, secondly, from an allegorical standpoint, or we look at it from a standpoint of a type. Now, when I say a natural standpoint, there are people who interpret the Song of Solomon as a natural setting. All right, this is just a love song. It's just, you know, it's not about anybody in particular. There's just this beautiful love between these two people, and it's a song that just kind of makes us feel good. That's one interpretation. Another interpretation is the allegorical. Now, sadly, there are people who take parts of Scripture and say that it is allegorical. My friend, I want to tell you, there's only a couple places and the Bible says that these are allegorical. But it's important for you to take the Bible for what it is. It is literally to be taken. But some interpret the book of Song of Solomon as an allegorical book. Well, there's no literal figures there. The accounts not real stuff like that. I want to tell you, I believe that the last is the one of types. This view balances out the other two. And what it does is it lets us know the account is real. The people in it are real. But it also draws out from there an ability to apply to our life today. So therefore, we look at this love relationship. This is a real account of a real love relationship. But there's something I can apply to me as a New Testament Christian. The Jew who read this could say, you know what? Just like Solomon and the bride, the Shulamite woman, had that beautiful love relationship, so God has a love for us as the Jewish people. You and I as the New Testament Christians can say, just like Solomon had that beautiful love relationship with that Shulamite woman, so it is God has a unique, beautiful relationship with us as His body. So what a beautiful way of looking at it. So interpreting the book, I just want to give that to you. Number three. And I want you to look at chapter four. I want you to under we've got to understand the metaphors. Sometimes you read through the book of Song of Solomon, you go, what's he talking about here? Let me give you a couple examples. Look at chapter four, verse number one. Now, here's Solomon. Catch this now speaking to the bride. Behold, thou art fair, my love. Behold, thou art fair. Thou hast dove's eyes within thy locks. Now we're good so far, right? Now look at this. Thy hair is as a flock of goats that appear from Mount Gilead. Look at verse number four. He's good. I mean, this guy's rolling with compliments. He says, thy neck is like the Tower of David, builded for an armory, whereupon there hang a thousand bucklers, all shields of mighty men. Let me just stop for just a moment. I could read other portions of Scripture. Let me say this. If I went home tonight and I said to my wife, honey, your hair is like a flock of goats. That neck of yours, it's like an armory. I mean, it's a huge tower. How many of you, how many of you would realize it'd be a cold night in my bed? OK, we don't talk like that, but understand in Solomon's day, they use symbolic language and certain metaphors that they all understood. You and I might describe somebody beautiful and we might use an analogy that we all get. Because it's part of our colloquialism. We use it today. But you understand here the people that lived in this day who saw the hillsides and they saw the goats running down the hills as just all coming down to them. That was a beautiful sight. And to see all of those coats coming down the hill, they use that as a description. Now, I don't get it, but they use it as a description for the long flowing hair of their bride or their wife or their lover in their life. The tower here, that neck here that talks about the Tower of David built for an armory. If you were walking up to a city that had a wall built around it, and there was a majestic tower that was set up on that wall, you would begin to think of that city as a very stable city, and there was a sense of grandeur about that city. And so, as you read through the book, and we can't go through all of them, but understand that it may not be the language you and I use, but it was the metaphors, the symbolism of that day. Let me give number four, a very important analysis of this book, and let me ask it as a question. Is this book a bit too graphic for the Bible? It's a good question to ask. You know, the mention of certain female body parts in the Bible, not anything lewd. All right. But the mention of breasts, the graphic details of description in this book sometimes leave us a little puzzled. And I want to say to you that for those of you who wonder, well, you know, why does God use that type of language? I think it's important for us to take a step back for just a moment and realize something. You know, the devil has done everything in this world to dirty up what God has created. Everything that God has created, Satan is taking and twisting it. And making it into something that is dirty, something that is lewd and wrong. Is it not interesting to you, I was thinking about this again this afternoon, that at the end of chapter 2 in the book of Genesis, that it says that the man and his wife, that is Adam and Eve, were naked and not ashamed. Think about that. Naked and not ashamed. And yet, after they had sinned, And then God comes through and is looking for them. And he basically, now God was looking, but he knew where they were. And when he comes to them, he says, where have you been? And what was their answer? We've been in hiding. And why were they in hiding? They said, because we were afraid. And they said we were naked. What does sin do? Sin all of a sudden messes things up, doesn't it? You know what would be amazing here? When we get to heaven someday, the Bible says that there will be no marrying in heaven, neither giving in marriage. You realize when we get to heaven someday, we will have some of the most transparent, open relationships in heaven that we've never even been able to have on this earth. You know why? No sin. You know what sin does? Sin keeps a barrier. Sin kind of holds things back. Now, I get it. I think we ought to be clothed, OK? I get that. I understand decency and I understand all these things. But I'm here to tell you that within the marriage relationship, there are some things that God has created that Satan has taken and turned around. And we read the book of Song of Solomon and we talk about this man wooing this woman and talking about her body and the various beauty and there's things that we almost sense a little blushing over. But I'm here to tell you that in its proper, normal, godly context, it's good and wholesome. Can I give you a verse in Hebrews if you want to turn there? I invite you. It's in Hebrews chapter number 13. And I want to just read this one verse to you. Book of Hebrews, chapter 13. Listen to verse number four. The Bible says marriage is honorable in all. And notice these next words and the bed undefiled. Now think with me for just a moment. What do you mean marriage is honorable? Well, the word honorable has this idea of precious. To God, what He's established in marriage is precious. That is, the words that are spoken, the physical act between the two. Everything that God has established within the bounds of marriage is good and wholesome and honorable. In fact, it's so honorable that God the Father created it as such. Jesus performed his first miracle, where? At a wedding. And the Holy Spirit used the marriage as a picture of the relationship of Jesus Christ and the church. So do you think God thinks marriage is honorable and precious and good? Absolutely. But what's happened in our world? Well, Within the proper bounds of marriage, can I say that the physical act is beautiful, it's fulfilling, it's creative, but outside of the proper bounds of marriage, all of that is ugly, it's destructive, and it's damning. So what do you do when you're reading through your Bible? Let's say you're reading through with your children or your grandchildren, and you come to the book of Solomon and you go, I wonder if I should read this or not. You know, what if they ask me some questions? You know what I always thought of as a parent? I'd rather give it to my children and tell them than have the world define for me what marriage is all about. So don't be afraid of some of the terminology. Don't be afraid of the book and what God has given, because what God has given is clean and good in its proper context. And therefore, you be the one to set the bounds and to give the definitions and help teach your children as opposed to the world. How about the announcement of Christ in the book? Well, first of all, Solomon is a beautiful type of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the groom who wins over and marries the bride, the Shulamite woman. And I don't have to go in tonight. I think you understand the detail. Solomon becomes a picture of Christ, the bride who's married the church. That's the bride here. Analogy is seen in Ephesians chapter five, Revelation chapter 19, let us be glad and rejoice, give honor to him for the marriage of the lamb has come and his wife have made herself ready. And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white for the fine linen is the righteousness of the saints. Beautiful picture given here, Solomon, picture of Christ. Let me get something else here. There's a picture of Christ's two comings, if you will. That's hard to really get this in the book of Song of Solomon, but there seems to be a sense that Solomon appears to the Shulamite woman, proposes to her, there's an engagement and he goes away for a little time and then he comes back and they have the official wedding. You realize that's the way the Jewish weddings were? A man would come. In fact, we often think to ourselves, oh yeah, the people in those days, you know what, they married blindly and various things. Let me just tell you something. A marriage wasn't just between two people. Families were involved. And a father of the groom would give to the father of the bride a dowry, that is a payment of something. I want you to think of the analogy of this. We'll give a payment of something and that engagement would come and that dowry would serve as a promise that the marriage would happen. That groom then would go away and would make all the preparations and then at a time that was not appointed, but at a time when the groom was ready, he would come back and he would consummate that marriage with the bride. Does that not sound like what Jesus has done? Jesus came the first time, did He not? And He came, and He died on the cross of Calvary, and when He left, He made a promise. The Father made a promise to us. He gave us a dowry, if you will, a special gift. That was the Holy Spirit. What is the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit, as Ephesians talks about, is that earnest, is that down payment. The Holy Spirit who dwells in you is a promise from God that Jesus is coming back to take you home to glory. And how long do we know Jesus is gone? We don't know how long. But there's coming a time when the groom is coming back. He's coming for you if you're a believer. And what a beautiful picture this is. And to a certain degree, you can see this. I want you to look at chapter two, verse number one. Third thing I want you to see about this. Announcement of Christ is the rose of Sharon. Notice here, verse number one of chapter two, I am the rose of Sharon and the lily of the valleys. Now, there's a couple of old hymns, how many members sing in the song that references the rose of Sharon? All right. Believe it or not, the only time this phrase was used in the Bible is right here, Song of Solomon, chapter two, verse number one. What is this? What's the reference to it? Well, Sharon could also be spelled without an H. Saren, if you will. It was actually a very fertile plain in the land of Palestine. If you go to one of the maps in your Bible, you might see right on the Mediterranean Sea a city by the name of Joppa. You're familiar with Joppa? It's used in the Bible. We read about in the New Testament. But Joppa, if you go out east about 15 to 20 miles and in an area of about 30 miles, that's the plain of Sharon. It was a very fertile plain where there were a lot of, if you walk through there and you could see from a hilltop, beautiful flowers that were there. One of the flowers was what we call here the Rose of Sharon. And not necessarily a rose like we're familiar with that we might give to our bride husbands here on Valentine's Day. But this rose was more like a rock rose or a cystus. And you can look that up online and see what that's all about. And ultimately, this rose of Sharon, when referencing the Shulamite woman, you and I can conclude that it was a complimentary term expressing her beauty. You know, this really applies to Jesus, the Rose of Sharon, which I have no problem saying this applies to Jesus. Could I ask you this? Is not Jesus beautiful? If you can't answer tonight, then I'm going to have to say that your relationship is a little shaky. But I'm here to unequivocally say that the relationship that you and I ought to have with Jesus, we ought to be able to walk away and say, wow, Jesus is beautiful. I love him more every day. He's mine, I am his and he is mine. What a beautiful thing. I want to apply the book here now, the application of the book, and I'll be done. Go to chapter five, if you would, please. I want to give something here and. We'll put this point up. First application is to answer God's call when He comes to you. You say, what does that have to do with the book of Solomon? Well, look at chapter 5, verse number 2. Here's the Shulamite woman, the bride, saying, I sleep, but my heart waketh. Now she's kind of, if you want to say this is a dream, this is something that's real, you know, it could be. But she's basically saying, it's the voice of my beloved that knock knocketh, saying, open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled, for my head is filled with dew and my locks with the drops of the night. So here he is. He comes and he wants to be with her. And he knocks on the door, and he's been out all night, and the dew of the evening has settled on his head, and his hair is a little bit wet, and he's knocking. Notice what her answer is in verse number three. I've put off my coat. How shall I put it on? I've washed my feet. How shall I defile them? Basically, she's saying, I'm already ready for bed. You come knocking on the door this late, I'm ready for bed. Notice here now, verse number four. My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door and my bowels were moved for him. So basically he knocked. And then after a while he left and all of a sudden she said, I can't believe I let him go. So verse five, I rose up to open to my beloved and my hands dropped with myrrh. My fingers with sweet smelling myrrh upon the handles of the lock. Basically, he had put some cologne on and it was on his hands and he had touched the door. And when she held the handles, she could smell him. She sees that he's not there anymore. And so the next verse, she begins running out, searching for him who came knocking and looking for her. I want to say something to you tonight. That's a great application. You know, as a Christian, from time to time, God's going to come knocking at your door. He's going to ask you to do something. He's going to call on you to be involved in a particular ministry. He's going to call upon you to minister to someone in particular. But God is going to come to your heart's door He's going to knock. And sometimes may not be anything sinful, but we're just like, I'm too busy. I can't. I really am not ready for this. And so we let it go and all of a sudden that calling begins to wane and fade away. I don't know how to say this tonight. But when God calls you, answer. Don't wait. There's some people in here tonight that God may be calling into full time ministry. You say, I can't do that. That's not for me. Answer God's call. Some people tonight, God is calling you to make a decision for Him. Don't wait. Follow that reading. Number two, I've alluded this to already, but marriage is honorable. Marriage is honorable. Now, yes, it's honorable in the fact that is precious and God said, but I want to share not so much the terminology that was used and all of these things about the physical act. But I want to say that in a day when marriage is being. Misdefined. Abused. Misaligned. It's important that we as God's people hold it up high. Marriage is good. There may be some single people tonight who maybe you've been in a bad relationship and you go, oh yeah, all men are bad or all ladies are bad. And look, that may be your take for just a little while, but God has said that marriage is honorable and it's good. If you're married tonight, let your love be like the love that is spoken of here. It's sad that there's a lot of people that have been married for a number of years and they only become just mere partners living in the same house. That's sad. My friend, you ought to be able to say as a married person, I'm more in love with my wife. I'm more in love with my husband than the day that I got married. That ought to be the case. And we only had one man say amen tonight, so. Thank you, Bob. Honestly. That's what it should be like. Number three. Could I give you this and ask this question? Are you in love with Jesus? Didn't ask you today if you go to church. Didn't ask you what service ministry you're involved in. Let's put all that aside for right now. Forget what leadership role you have. Forget whether you sing in the choir. Forget whether you teach Sunday school. Forget if you hold an office in the church. Forget how often you come and you're faithful to God's love. Let's put all of that aside right now and come to this. Are you in love with Jesus? Can I say that if you're in love with Jesus, any things that you have going on in your life that you find may be problematic, it's going to help solve some of those things. Maybe you're having a hard time being faithful to God's house, fall in love with Jesus, and you'll find church attendance will be no problem. You know, it's pretty amazing when I got saved, before I got saved, I spent four years at a Christian high school and I hated every bit of it until I got right with God. You know what happened after I got saved? I loved it. I was like, what rules? Didn't bother me. Went four more years to a Christian university and had rules there, and I was good with it. You know why? I was in love with Jesus. And Jesus changed my perspective and helped me in a way that I didn't know. I want to encourage you to tonight at the invitation to tell Jesus, Jesus, I love you. When's the last time you said that to Jesus? Some of you have a hard time saying it to your spouse. Tonight, you ought to do this. Say to your spouse, I love you. But more importantly than your spouse, you ought to say to Jesus, Jesus, I love you. I love you more than anything. I love you more than possessions. I love you more than the relationships in this world. I love you, Jesus. I'd like to ask you to bow your heads, please, and close your eyes. This love story is a wonderful, wonderful story. Great truths that are given to us.