Isaiah 32

Isaiah 32:1

The Beloved Seeks Cautious Rapprochement

The bride compares the groom to a gazelle and the young of a deer. Gazelles can walk over the mountains with great speed and grace (cf. 2 Samuel 2:18b; 1 Chronicles 12:8). In the case of the stag or deer, who also jump easily over obstacles, there may be added the thought of joy (cf. Isaiah 35:6). Gazelles and deer are innocent animals. They are not carnivores, they are not hunting animals. These are clean animals, which could be eaten by the Israelites (Deuteronomy 12:15; 22; Deuteronomy 14:4-5; Deuteronomy 15:22). Both animals are also known for being wary of danger and their immediate and swift flight as it presents itself.

This is how the bride sees her groom approaching. He approaches quickly and lets himself not be stopped by anything. At the same time, he remains cautious in his approach. In this way the Lord Jesus also comes to each one of His own, who turns to Him again after a period of weakening of love. He proceeds carefully to see if there is a real desire to live in fellowship with Him. He does not impose Himself and He does not force access.

We can learn from this how to approach someone whose life with the Lord has been put on hold. True love for our straying brother or sister will make us quick to help and at the same time we will do so with due caution. In these cases it is not about clear sins, but about signs that may indicate that someone no longer lives fully for the Lord. If we find that someone does not visit the meetings of the believer as often, it is good to pay attention to this and to inform why – without directly accusing anyone of being unfaithful.

That there is some reserve with the groom in his approach, we can conclude from the place where the bride is located. She says herself that the groom is “behind our wall”, the wall around her house. He has come closer and looks inside through the windows. She likes the fact that he is there, but there is still a wall between them. She calls it ‘our’ wall, but she only hid behind it and he is outside. It has more or less become her wall.

A wall is a picture of separation from the wrong in order to be dedicated to the Lord. If it is separation without the Lord, it has become isolation. We can withdraw so far into our isolation that we no longer allow the Lord to come to us. He does look inside and is standing behind the wall. He is not sitting, but is ready to take action when the bride is ready.

The Lord wants to use other believers to visit us at a time of spiritual decline. Maybe we let them into the house, but do we also let them into our life? Just when we are no longer full of the Lord and other things in our life have become important, we tend to maintain the wall around our heart. We do not want to expose ourselves or dare to be vulnerable, perhaps because we are afraid of being hurt again.

For example, we may have entrusted something to someone who we thought would keep it to himself, but he has told it all over the place. Then we don’t open our heart again, because we are afraid of another disappointment. That reaction is understandable. At the same time, it is good to be mindful of the danger of withdrawing completely into isolation. The Lord wishes to point this out with caution. He wants to have the first place in our life again and point out what prevents this.

To live in isolation is increasing in the world and among Christians. This is due to the growing individualism, through which also selfishness increases. We want to have everything for ourselves and do everything for ourselves. Computers, internet, smartphones, all these devices carry the danger that we will completely withdraw into our own world. Our children grow up with it. They only need that one device to have fun. But also older believers may have a need for all kinds of things to keep up with the times. We are increasingly being seized by these devices, which are strongly ‘I’ oriented.

People no longer know how to deal with each other. It is a recognizable scene: people sit at the table eating together, but there is no mutual communication because there is a digital connection with the outside world. Each eats for himself and in the meantime is busy with his smartphone. If there is a message, it must be responded to immediately. We must be aware of these dangers! These devices are said to promote communication. But in reality, the real communication decreases and finally disappears completely. The device says you are important. People need me, they want to let me know something; and I think it is necessary to let people know what I think of a case.

The result is that we do not have time to quietly engage with the Word of God, attend church meetings, and help brothers and sisters. We just don’t have time anymore. This risk is great because we are withdrawing from the fellowship of the saints and living in isolation. We live in such a way that the Lord cannot come to us. But He does try to come to us. He stands there, He looks through the window, that is in fact a barred window.

The bars give the impression that we are locked up in a prison. Are we locked up? We can be locked up in our own thoughts, in our life, in the plans we have and be a prisoner of them. But He looks through it. What plans do we have? What do we want? What is the purpose of our life? Is all this a prison for us? Can we think of nothing else? The Lord now stands before the window of our life and looks through the bars. He looks and He loves to come to us to give us satisfaction and true fulfillment of life.

Isaiah 32:2

Arise and Come Along

The part of Song 2:10-13 begins and ends with the same words the groom speaks to the bride. He wants her to arise in her place of isolation, a place of rest in the sense of laziness, and come to him. The bride is still inside, behind the wall, and the groom is still outside. When he begins to speak, his speaking is an answer. He “responded” to her (Song of Solomon 2:10). However, we do not read that she asked a question. This may mean that his answer is directed to the weakened feelings of her heart, which he knows.

He addresses her very personally. She knows, he says it “to me”. Now she hears not only his voice, but also what he says. There is no reproach from his mouth because she hides from him and he does not order her to show herself. The way he approaches her is full of tenderness and love. He asks her to arise.

He calls her “my darling, my beautiful one”. These are names in which he expresses the value she has for him. He wants to share the thoughts of his heart with her as his ‘darling’. That he calls her the ‘beautiful one’, indicates that he is full of admiration for her and that his heart is full of her. With these names he wants to speak to her heart and persuade her to come to him. Thus the Lord Jesus will tell the remnant of Israel how beautiful it is for Him. He calls Zion “the perfection of beauty” (Psalms 50:2; Lamentations 2:15c; Ezekiel 16:14).

In the same way, the Lord Jesus is busy with each of His own, who has lost sight of Him through circumstances. He says what value he or she has for Him (Isaiah 43:4-7). He chooses His words with care to make clear how much He cares about them. He fully means what He says. His words are not harsh, but pleasant, beneficent. They touch the heart and make it soft and willing to live with Him again.

The bride must start by rising. This is the beginning of every true conversion, whether it be the conversion of an unbeliever or the conversion of a believer. From the prodigal son in Luke 15 we also read that at some point he says he will get up and go to the father. Then we read that he gets up and goes (Luke 15:18-20).

For us it may also be the case that we have to arise from our circumstances, for example from our self-pity or from the excuses we bring forward to not completely surrender our lives to the Lord Jesus.

Isaiah 32:3

Winter Is Past, Singing Time Has Arrived

Prophetically, the bride is a picture of the faithful remnant of Israel. This remnant will pass through a time of great trial. The Lord Jesus speaks of “a great tribulation” (Matthew 24:21). At that time God will provide a refuge for that remnant (Isaiah 26:20). The period of great tribulation comes to an end after three and a half years, because the Messiah causes the tribulation to stop. Then He comes to them and says that “the winter” of the great tribulation “is past” (Song of Solomon 2:11). “The rain” time with its devastating torrential rains is also a picture of the great tribulation (Ezekiel 13:11; 13). That time “is over [and] gone”.

The groom assures the bride that the time of tormenting fear and impending suffering is really over. It has become spring. The groom then points this out to the bride (Song of Solomon 2:12). Prophetically it means that the great tribulation with the cold of winter and the torrent of trials is over and gives way to the beautiful spring of the kingdom of peace (Isaiah 35:1-2; 10). The Lord Jesus is the Man Who has been for the remnant a “shelter from the storm” (Isaiah 32:2). He will now be for them for a thousand years in the kingdom of peace the “King” who “will reign righteously” (Isaiah 32:1).

We may also experience a time in our life that the problems excess our capacities; we are under pressure and lose sight of Him. The Lord then offers us to come back into our life. When He comes into our life, He can turn winter into spring and the flood of rain into mild rain. When winter, the time of trial, is past, there is room for a new floral splendor with a multicolored beauty. Beautiful flowers will appear. After the death of winter, the new life of spring appears.

This points to the resurrection of the believer, the transition from death to a new life. The groom points this out to the bride, because it seems she has no eye for it yet. She is reminded of the fruits of the resurrection. The groom stands on resurrection ground. Death has been conquered. Do we see the signs of recovery when the Lord Jesus comes to us in our circumstances? Wherever He comes, there is restoration and blessing.

Another application can be made to the situation in which our lives have become so superficial, that there is neither smell nor taste. Nobody sees anything of the fact that we know Christ. We complain bitterly. When our eye is then again turned to Christ, He will become visible again; for He is our new life. Then our life will show the beauty of flowers. Are we in our environment the ‘flowers’, do we radiate beauty and attractiveness? Flowers give fragrance, you can smell them, you can see them and touch them. Flowers brighten up the surroundings and make them more beautiful.

Paul thanks God for leading him and his associates “always … in triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place” (2 Corinthians 2:14-15). It is God’s purpose that our life spreads the scent of Christ. He is working on this. That is why we mean so much to Him. Our life is a new land, a new creation, in which He grows and takes care of these flowers.

The new life not only has a smell, it also has a sound. We got a voice to sing. Can we sing? Or can we only complain? James says: “Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises” (James 5:13b). When the Lord Jesus has come into our life, we have every reason to sing. We can even do everything singing if we let the Word of Christ dwell richly in us: “Admonishing one another with psalms [and] hymns [and] spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God” (Colossians 3:16). Are we still singing in our hearts before God? When we are full of problems, criticism and bitterness, singing is stilled. If the Lord Jesus is central to our life, we will praise Him daily.

Prophetically, there will come a moment for the remnant of Israel when the time for complaining is over and the time for singing has come. Spring is so beautiful and pleasant because it follows a period of darkness and cold. Because of the contrast with winter, spring is warmly welcomed. The flowers on the ground and the birds in the air also testify in their own way that the whole creation has been renewed. They express a heavenly message of joy, peace and righteousness.

The “turtledove” is a picture of the faithful remnant (Psalms 74:19) which, like the turtledove, knows the time of its arrival in the kingdom of peace (Jeremiah 8:7). When the cooing of the turtledove is heard in “our land”, it means that the remnant of God’s people is back in the promised land. We as Christians must also understand the coming or presence of the right time to do something.

Isaiah 32:4

Winter Is Past, Singing Time Has Arrived

Prophetically, the bride is a picture of the faithful remnant of Israel. This remnant will pass through a time of great trial. The Lord Jesus speaks of “a great tribulation” (Matthew 24:21). At that time God will provide a refuge for that remnant (Isaiah 26:20). The period of great tribulation comes to an end after three and a half years, because the Messiah causes the tribulation to stop. Then He comes to them and says that “the winter” of the great tribulation “is past” (Song of Solomon 2:11). “The rain” time with its devastating torrential rains is also a picture of the great tribulation (Ezekiel 13:11; 13). That time “is over [and] gone”.

The groom assures the bride that the time of tormenting fear and impending suffering is really over. It has become spring. The groom then points this out to the bride (Song of Solomon 2:12). Prophetically it means that the great tribulation with the cold of winter and the torrent of trials is over and gives way to the beautiful spring of the kingdom of peace (Isaiah 35:1-2; 10). The Lord Jesus is the Man Who has been for the remnant a “shelter from the storm” (Isaiah 32:2). He will now be for them for a thousand years in the kingdom of peace the “King” who “will reign righteously” (Isaiah 32:1).

We may also experience a time in our life that the problems excess our capacities; we are under pressure and lose sight of Him. The Lord then offers us to come back into our life. When He comes into our life, He can turn winter into spring and the flood of rain into mild rain. When winter, the time of trial, is past, there is room for a new floral splendor with a multicolored beauty. Beautiful flowers will appear. After the death of winter, the new life of spring appears.

This points to the resurrection of the believer, the transition from death to a new life. The groom points this out to the bride, because it seems she has no eye for it yet. She is reminded of the fruits of the resurrection. The groom stands on resurrection ground. Death has been conquered. Do we see the signs of recovery when the Lord Jesus comes to us in our circumstances? Wherever He comes, there is restoration and blessing.

Another application can be made to the situation in which our lives have become so superficial, that there is neither smell nor taste. Nobody sees anything of the fact that we know Christ. We complain bitterly. When our eye is then again turned to Christ, He will become visible again; for He is our new life. Then our life will show the beauty of flowers. Are we in our environment the ‘flowers’, do we radiate beauty and attractiveness? Flowers give fragrance, you can smell them, you can see them and touch them. Flowers brighten up the surroundings and make them more beautiful.

Paul thanks God for leading him and his associates “always … in triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place” (2 Corinthians 2:14-15). It is God’s purpose that our life spreads the scent of Christ. He is working on this. That is why we mean so much to Him. Our life is a new land, a new creation, in which He grows and takes care of these flowers.

The new life not only has a smell, it also has a sound. We got a voice to sing. Can we sing? Or can we only complain? James says: “Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises” (James 5:13b). When the Lord Jesus has come into our life, we have every reason to sing. We can even do everything singing if we let the Word of Christ dwell richly in us: “Admonishing one another with psalms [and] hymns [and] spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God” (Colossians 3:16). Are we still singing in our hearts before God? When we are full of problems, criticism and bitterness, singing is stilled. If the Lord Jesus is central to our life, we will praise Him daily.

Prophetically, there will come a moment for the remnant of Israel when the time for complaining is over and the time for singing has come. Spring is so beautiful and pleasant because it follows a period of darkness and cold. Because of the contrast with winter, spring is warmly welcomed. The flowers on the ground and the birds in the air also testify in their own way that the whole creation has been renewed. They express a heavenly message of joy, peace and righteousness.

The “turtledove” is a picture of the faithful remnant (Psalms 74:19) which, like the turtledove, knows the time of its arrival in the kingdom of peace (Jeremiah 8:7). When the cooing of the turtledove is heard in “our land”, it means that the remnant of God’s people is back in the promised land. We as Christians must also understand the coming or presence of the right time to do something.

Isaiah 32:5

Again: Arise and Come Along!

After winter, the time of trial, come the fruits. Besides the flowers that appear on the land (Song of Solomon 2:12), we also see “the fig tree” and “the vines in blossom” (Song of Solomon 2:13). The young figs show that it is spring and that summer is on tour (Matthew 24:32). The fig tree represents righteousness. Adam and Eve, after their fall into sin, wanted to cover their nakedness before God with loin coverings of fig leaves (Genesis 3:7). However, these homemade aprons are not a covering for God.

There is no self-righteousness whatsoever that counts for God as a covering for sin. Israel has tried to establish its own righteousness before God with the result that it has not submitted itself to the righteousness of God (Romans 10:3). The only righteousness that is valid for God is the righteousness which is worked through Christ on the cross and to which man gains part through faith (Romans 10:4). On the basis of faith in that righteousness, God’s people can enjoy the blessing before God in the coming kingdom of peace.

The result is joy. We see this in the picture of the flowering vines (Judges 9:13; Psalms 104:15a). A flowering vine has the promise of an abundant harvest of grapes, that means joy. The grapes are not there yet, but the scent is already smelled. So it is with the believer who has had a time of trial. He is no longer in need, there is deliverance and that can be seen in him. Peace and rest have come in his life. It won’t be long before he expresses his joy about it in an exuberant way. He will testify of how the Lord has redeemed him from his need and what a joy fills his heart for what the Lord has done.

The author of the letter to the Hebrews links to the discipline which God inflicts on believers the production of righteousness as a good fruit: “All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness” (Hebrews 12:11). Through discipline we are “trained”, that is, we are trained in how to deal with it. By training we learn to control something. If we can thus accept discipline, if we know how to deal with it, then we will have a more intimate fellowship with God. The result will be that we enjoy more inner peace and show more justice in our lives.

The “peaceful fruit of righteousness” will soon be reality for Israel in the realm of peace, after the people have passed through the exercises of the great tribulation. God already wants to bring this fruit into our life through His education (John 15:2; 8). The vine and fig tree together symbolize the time of the kingdom of peace, of which we in the reign of Solomon – the prince of peace and a picture of the Lord Jesus – have a foreshadowing (1 Kings 4:25).

After the description of spring with its wonderful evidence of new, fresh life in Song of Solomon 2:11-13, the groom invites his bride to come to him again with the same words as in Song of Solomon 2:10. He would like her to enjoy that spring. She can forget winter by accepting his invitation. After what he has shown her of spring, it can no longer be difficult for her to give up her backslidden existence and share her life with him.

The Lord Jesus presents to us the attraction of living with Him, so that we no longer let ourselves be controlled by circumstances that depress. He is committed to ensuring that it is not the ‘wintery conditions’ in which we sometimes find ourselves that determine the temperature of our spiritual life, but the mild temperature of ‘spring life’. To this end, He points out to us the features of the new life, which He possesses and also wants to work in us.

Isaiah 32:6

Seeing the Form and Hearing the Voice

The groom uses different pictures each time to reach the bride and induce her to come to him. He now calls her “my dove” (Song of Solomon 2:14). The dove is an animal known for its loyalty and attachment to its partner. The groom appeals to the bride in her loyalty and attachment to him. The remembrance of this may prompt her to leave her isolation and come to him.

He also mentions the place where she is differently than in Song of Solomon 2:9. It is “in the clefts of the rock, in the secret place of the steep pathway”. The place where she has withdrawn is a place where she wants to hide from the enemy. The groom tells her that she can emerge, because the enemy has disappeared just as winter has passed. She has hidden herself from the enemy, but at the same time from him.

In the same way, we too may have withdrawn into isolation for fear or other reasons. As a result we have also withdrawn from His presence. We are then not perfect in love, that is to say that the awareness of His love for us does not live for us. Perfect love drives out fear (1 John 4:18). He wants us to turn our eye back to His love, so that we seek our protection from Him and not from anyone or anything else.

He wants to see the bride and hear her voice. Thus the Lord also wants us to come out of our hiding place and let Him hear our voice in praise and prayer. This is a wonderful invitation to go to Him boldly with all that is in our heart. He wants to see us as we are for Him and He wants us to know that and say that to Him. This can be a very short prayer or a very short thanksgiving as long as it is the sincere expression of the love of our heart.

We can make another application. The Lord wants to see the “form” of each of us personally, “your form”, and not that of someone else. He wants to hear the “voice” of each of us personally, “your voice”, and not the voice of someone else. When we speak to Him in prayer, we should not suddenly start talking in a completely different tone, as I have heard someone do. The words we use must also be our own. Not parroting others or trying to be completely differently, because we want to be ‘original’. The Lord then sees another form.

Every believer who lives with the Lord has learned a lot from others, but he is not a copy of those other believers. It is not about trying to say it in a way that no one – we ourselves or anyone else – has ever said it before. It is about saying it in a way that the Lord has never heard of us before. We use the same words as before or words that someone else has used, but it comes from our heart in a more profound way.

The Lord does not only say that He wants to see our form and hear our voice. He says also why this is so: “Your voice is sweet, and your form is lovely.” This shows His desire for fellowship with us. We hear this desire in His voice. When we hear Him speak like this, can our heart then remain cold? When He speaks in this way to us to persuade us to come to Him, can we keep Him at a distance? He speaks so graciously to us to let us know how precious we are to Him and that He is so eager to hear from us how precious He is to us. Shall we let Him talk and ignore His loving attempts to conquer our heart? Shall we forget Him and continue our own life? What a disappointment and sorrow that would be for Him!

Isaiah 32:7

Catch the Little Foxes

The groom tells the bride to catch “the foxes” and especially “the little foxes” (Song of Solomon 2:15). She has to catch those little foxes “for us”, with which the groom indicates that she has to defuse them in view of their relationship. The foxes, also the small ones, destroy the vineyards, especially at a time when “our vineyards” are in blossom. He uses the word “our” again, with which he emphasizes their relationship, here in connection with the joy it gives to belong together.

In the spiritual application we see in the blossoming vineyards the early fruits of joy through new spiritual life, which the believer has in his relationship with the Lord Jesus. When these fruits are spoiled by little foxes, joy in the Lord disappears and spiritual growth stops. Our joy and growth are nipped in the bud. The little foxes represent things in our lives that deprive us of the joy in the Lord. These are often small sins, which are justified by the reasoning that there is nothing wrong with them.

The Lord Jesus calls Herod “that fox” because of his cunning to thwart God’s work that the Lord is doing (Luke 13:31-32). False prophets are also called foxes (Ezekiel 13:4). These foxes are big enemies that we have to eliminate, so that they cannot exert their pernicious influence. In the case of the fox Herod we can think of the pressure exerted on us not to devote ourselves to God’s work. In the case of the great foxes we can think of false prophets and of charismatic errors in which, for example, it is told that you do not have to be ill and that your faith is not right if you are or remain ill. If we know God’s Word, we will easily recognize these ‘great foxes’ and defuse them.

However, there are also the little foxes. These are not gross sins, but sometimes feelings of dissatisfaction that cannot be mentioned and that negatively affect our lives as Christians. These are the small irritations in the interrelationships. Our brother or sister says or does something we do not like so much. We react agitated and thereby make the atmosphere even more unpleasant. Irritations create an extremely unpleasant and eventually explosive atmosphere, which puts an end to all the joy that characterizes a good relationship.

The fathers in the families are told not to exasperate their children “so that they will not lose heart” (Colossians 3:21). This includes minor harassment, which makes a child despondent and thoroughly disrupts the relationship if not stopped. This also applies to relations in the church and in society. All these irritations have a direct effect on the relationship with the Lord Jesus, because it is disturbed by that. It is therefore important that minor irritations are immediately judged before they become a major quarrel. As Solomon says in the book of Proverbs: “The beginning of strife is [like] letting out water, so abandon the quarrel before it breaks out” (Proverbs 17:14).

The little foxes who disrupt the joy of fellowship with the Lord can also be little time robbers. How much time is lost doing useless things? They need not be bad things, but things to which we devote a great deal of attention, forgetting time. In our hobby or sport or other forms of pastime, which in themselves can be quite relaxing, we can go overboard and forget about time. The Lord Jesus seeks fellowship with us. Also our hobby or whatever it is, we may do in fellowship with Him. If we thank Him for what He gives us in this, we will catch the “little fox” that wants to prevent us from living in fellowship with Him.

What a loss it would be if the little foxes would prevent grapes from growing on the vines that blossom. Spiritually applied it means that the Lord is deprived of the joy of fellowship with His own. We are certainly also losers, but He suffers the most loss. For He has done everything possible to make fellowship with Him possible. It is our responsibility to eliminate everything that makes it impossible for Him to enjoy that fellowship with us.

In Song of Solomon 2:16-17 we hear the bride’s reaction to all the groom’s efforts to persuade her to come to him. He pointed out to her that she must catch the little foxes so that she can no longer be stopped from being with him. A first effect of the expressions of his desire for her is that she becomes aware again that her beloved is hers and that she is his (Song of Solomon 2:16). There is an inseparable bond between them. Love is the strongest bond that connects people.

It is remarkable, however, that she says these words to others and not to him. The answer she gives is also not the one the groom is waiting for. Her thoughts revolve around herself. Her love is still self-centered. The point is that he is hers, “mine”. What matters to her is what it brings her, not yet what she means to him. She still has to grow in her love and she does. We will see that later (Song of Solomon 6:3; Song of Solomon 7:10).

She relates his love to his person as the shepherd who pastures his flock (cf. Ezekiel 34:11-15; Isaiah 40:11). The words ‘his flock’ are not in the original text and are therefore placed in square brackets. All emphasis therefore falls on his shepherd’s task, the fact that he pastures. He is not so much operating among the sheep, but “among the lilies”, under which that special lily is located, his bride (Song of Solomon 2:2). The bride knows she is one of his lilies. She emphasizes that. It is not about him, but about herself. She knows she belongs to the right company, but does not yet go out to him.

We see in Song of Solomon 2:17 that the bride wants to wait a while. She wants to wait “until the cool of the day when the shadows flee away”. This indicates that she is not yet fully convinced that winter is passed and spring has come. She still is in the dark of the night. When the day comes and the refreshing wind makes life pleasant, then she wants to come to him. If the shadows flee away first and she has a clear view of reality, then she will give herself to him. “Until” this moment comes, she prefers to stay in her cozy environment.

Similarly, in our life there may be circumstances in which we want to see improvement before we entrust ourselves entirely to the Lord and go to Him. We experience the cold of the trial of faith too much to accept that it is really over. There is a wait-and-see attitude. We want to see if the Lord really has brought a change in our circumstances. This shows that we have not yet learned that as soon as the Lord comes to us and we entrust ourselves to Him, this will bring about a tremendous change. As soon as we surrender to Him, the day has come in our life and we see everything clear again.

The bride tells the groom to leave. She still calls him “my beloved”, but he needs to be kept at a distance until she feels able to join him. Until then, he can move freely “like a gazelle or a young stag”. So she described him when he came to her in Song of Solomon 2:9.

Because she is not ready to accept his loving invitation he can go as he came and return to the “mountains of Bether”. These are the “cleaved mountains” – the meaning of the name “Bether” –, mountains in which a path has been made. She allows him a way without obstacles. But he is not interested in her wish that he will have an easy way, he wants a highway in her heart. He wants access to her heart, but she turns him down. The following chapter shows the reason for this.

The spiritual lesson is obvious. We may not say clearly to the Lord that He must leave, but we can behave in such a way that our attitude gives that message. He seeks fellowship with us, but we turn Him down because we have no time. Not now. It takes us too much effort to catch the little foxes. Then He does not impose Himself, but continues His way.

Isaiah 32:8

Catch the Little Foxes

The groom tells the bride to catch “the foxes” and especially “the little foxes” (Song of Solomon 2:15). She has to catch those little foxes “for us”, with which the groom indicates that she has to defuse them in view of their relationship. The foxes, also the small ones, destroy the vineyards, especially at a time when “our vineyards” are in blossom. He uses the word “our” again, with which he emphasizes their relationship, here in connection with the joy it gives to belong together.

In the spiritual application we see in the blossoming vineyards the early fruits of joy through new spiritual life, which the believer has in his relationship with the Lord Jesus. When these fruits are spoiled by little foxes, joy in the Lord disappears and spiritual growth stops. Our joy and growth are nipped in the bud. The little foxes represent things in our lives that deprive us of the joy in the Lord. These are often small sins, which are justified by the reasoning that there is nothing wrong with them.

The Lord Jesus calls Herod “that fox” because of his cunning to thwart God’s work that the Lord is doing (Luke 13:31-32). False prophets are also called foxes (Ezekiel 13:4). These foxes are big enemies that we have to eliminate, so that they cannot exert their pernicious influence. In the case of the fox Herod we can think of the pressure exerted on us not to devote ourselves to God’s work. In the case of the great foxes we can think of false prophets and of charismatic errors in which, for example, it is told that you do not have to be ill and that your faith is not right if you are or remain ill. If we know God’s Word, we will easily recognize these ‘great foxes’ and defuse them.

However, there are also the little foxes. These are not gross sins, but sometimes feelings of dissatisfaction that cannot be mentioned and that negatively affect our lives as Christians. These are the small irritations in the interrelationships. Our brother or sister says or does something we do not like so much. We react agitated and thereby make the atmosphere even more unpleasant. Irritations create an extremely unpleasant and eventually explosive atmosphere, which puts an end to all the joy that characterizes a good relationship.

The fathers in the families are told not to exasperate their children “so that they will not lose heart” (Colossians 3:21). This includes minor harassment, which makes a child despondent and thoroughly disrupts the relationship if not stopped. This also applies to relations in the church and in society. All these irritations have a direct effect on the relationship with the Lord Jesus, because it is disturbed by that. It is therefore important that minor irritations are immediately judged before they become a major quarrel. As Solomon says in the book of Proverbs: “The beginning of strife is [like] letting out water, so abandon the quarrel before it breaks out” (Proverbs 17:14).

The little foxes who disrupt the joy of fellowship with the Lord can also be little time robbers. How much time is lost doing useless things? They need not be bad things, but things to which we devote a great deal of attention, forgetting time. In our hobby or sport or other forms of pastime, which in themselves can be quite relaxing, we can go overboard and forget about time. The Lord Jesus seeks fellowship with us. Also our hobby or whatever it is, we may do in fellowship with Him. If we thank Him for what He gives us in this, we will catch the “little fox” that wants to prevent us from living in fellowship with Him.

What a loss it would be if the little foxes would prevent grapes from growing on the vines that blossom. Spiritually applied it means that the Lord is deprived of the joy of fellowship with His own. We are certainly also losers, but He suffers the most loss. For He has done everything possible to make fellowship with Him possible. It is our responsibility to eliminate everything that makes it impossible for Him to enjoy that fellowship with us.

In Song of Solomon 2:16-17 we hear the bride’s reaction to all the groom’s efforts to persuade her to come to him. He pointed out to her that she must catch the little foxes so that she can no longer be stopped from being with him. A first effect of the expressions of his desire for her is that she becomes aware again that her beloved is hers and that she is his (Song of Solomon 2:16). There is an inseparable bond between them. Love is the strongest bond that connects people.

It is remarkable, however, that she says these words to others and not to him. The answer she gives is also not the one the groom is waiting for. Her thoughts revolve around herself. Her love is still self-centered. The point is that he is hers, “mine”. What matters to her is what it brings her, not yet what she means to him. She still has to grow in her love and she does. We will see that later (Song of Solomon 6:3; Song of Solomon 7:10).

She relates his love to his person as the shepherd who pastures his flock (cf. Ezekiel 34:11-15; Isaiah 40:11). The words ‘his flock’ are not in the original text and are therefore placed in square brackets. All emphasis therefore falls on his shepherd’s task, the fact that he pastures. He is not so much operating among the sheep, but “among the lilies”, under which that special lily is located, his bride (Song of Solomon 2:2). The bride knows she is one of his lilies. She emphasizes that. It is not about him, but about herself. She knows she belongs to the right company, but does not yet go out to him.

We see in Song of Solomon 2:17 that the bride wants to wait a while. She wants to wait “until the cool of the day when the shadows flee away”. This indicates that she is not yet fully convinced that winter is passed and spring has come. She still is in the dark of the night. When the day comes and the refreshing wind makes life pleasant, then she wants to come to him. If the shadows flee away first and she has a clear view of reality, then she will give herself to him. “Until” this moment comes, she prefers to stay in her cozy environment.

Similarly, in our life there may be circumstances in which we want to see improvement before we entrust ourselves entirely to the Lord and go to Him. We experience the cold of the trial of faith too much to accept that it is really over. There is a wait-and-see attitude. We want to see if the Lord really has brought a change in our circumstances. This shows that we have not yet learned that as soon as the Lord comes to us and we entrust ourselves to Him, this will bring about a tremendous change. As soon as we surrender to Him, the day has come in our life and we see everything clear again.

The bride tells the groom to leave. She still calls him “my beloved”, but he needs to be kept at a distance until she feels able to join him. Until then, he can move freely “like a gazelle or a young stag”. So she described him when he came to her in Song of Solomon 2:9.

Because she is not ready to accept his loving invitation he can go as he came and return to the “mountains of Bether”. These are the “cleaved mountains” – the meaning of the name “Bether” –, mountains in which a path has been made. She allows him a way without obstacles. But he is not interested in her wish that he will have an easy way, he wants a highway in her heart. He wants access to her heart, but she turns him down. The following chapter shows the reason for this.

The spiritual lesson is obvious. We may not say clearly to the Lord that He must leave, but we can behave in such a way that our attitude gives that message. He seeks fellowship with us, but we turn Him down because we have no time. Not now. It takes us too much effort to catch the little foxes. Then He does not impose Himself, but continues His way.

Isaiah 32:9

Catch the Little Foxes

The groom tells the bride to catch “the foxes” and especially “the little foxes” (Song of Solomon 2:15). She has to catch those little foxes “for us”, with which the groom indicates that she has to defuse them in view of their relationship. The foxes, also the small ones, destroy the vineyards, especially at a time when “our vineyards” are in blossom. He uses the word “our” again, with which he emphasizes their relationship, here in connection with the joy it gives to belong together.

In the spiritual application we see in the blossoming vineyards the early fruits of joy through new spiritual life, which the believer has in his relationship with the Lord Jesus. When these fruits are spoiled by little foxes, joy in the Lord disappears and spiritual growth stops. Our joy and growth are nipped in the bud. The little foxes represent things in our lives that deprive us of the joy in the Lord. These are often small sins, which are justified by the reasoning that there is nothing wrong with them.

The Lord Jesus calls Herod “that fox” because of his cunning to thwart God’s work that the Lord is doing (Luke 13:31-32). False prophets are also called foxes (Ezekiel 13:4). These foxes are big enemies that we have to eliminate, so that they cannot exert their pernicious influence. In the case of the fox Herod we can think of the pressure exerted on us not to devote ourselves to God’s work. In the case of the great foxes we can think of false prophets and of charismatic errors in which, for example, it is told that you do not have to be ill and that your faith is not right if you are or remain ill. If we know God’s Word, we will easily recognize these ‘great foxes’ and defuse them.

However, there are also the little foxes. These are not gross sins, but sometimes feelings of dissatisfaction that cannot be mentioned and that negatively affect our lives as Christians. These are the small irritations in the interrelationships. Our brother or sister says or does something we do not like so much. We react agitated and thereby make the atmosphere even more unpleasant. Irritations create an extremely unpleasant and eventually explosive atmosphere, which puts an end to all the joy that characterizes a good relationship.

The fathers in the families are told not to exasperate their children “so that they will not lose heart” (Colossians 3:21). This includes minor harassment, which makes a child despondent and thoroughly disrupts the relationship if not stopped. This also applies to relations in the church and in society. All these irritations have a direct effect on the relationship with the Lord Jesus, because it is disturbed by that. It is therefore important that minor irritations are immediately judged before they become a major quarrel. As Solomon says in the book of Proverbs: “The beginning of strife is [like] letting out water, so abandon the quarrel before it breaks out” (Proverbs 17:14).

The little foxes who disrupt the joy of fellowship with the Lord can also be little time robbers. How much time is lost doing useless things? They need not be bad things, but things to which we devote a great deal of attention, forgetting time. In our hobby or sport or other forms of pastime, which in themselves can be quite relaxing, we can go overboard and forget about time. The Lord Jesus seeks fellowship with us. Also our hobby or whatever it is, we may do in fellowship with Him. If we thank Him for what He gives us in this, we will catch the “little fox” that wants to prevent us from living in fellowship with Him.

What a loss it would be if the little foxes would prevent grapes from growing on the vines that blossom. Spiritually applied it means that the Lord is deprived of the joy of fellowship with His own. We are certainly also losers, but He suffers the most loss. For He has done everything possible to make fellowship with Him possible. It is our responsibility to eliminate everything that makes it impossible for Him to enjoy that fellowship with us.

In Song of Solomon 2:16-17 we hear the bride’s reaction to all the groom’s efforts to persuade her to come to him. He pointed out to her that she must catch the little foxes so that she can no longer be stopped from being with him. A first effect of the expressions of his desire for her is that she becomes aware again that her beloved is hers and that she is his (Song of Solomon 2:16). There is an inseparable bond between them. Love is the strongest bond that connects people.

It is remarkable, however, that she says these words to others and not to him. The answer she gives is also not the one the groom is waiting for. Her thoughts revolve around herself. Her love is still self-centered. The point is that he is hers, “mine”. What matters to her is what it brings her, not yet what she means to him. She still has to grow in her love and she does. We will see that later (Song of Solomon 6:3; Song of Solomon 7:10).

She relates his love to his person as the shepherd who pastures his flock (cf. Ezekiel 34:11-15; Isaiah 40:11). The words ‘his flock’ are not in the original text and are therefore placed in square brackets. All emphasis therefore falls on his shepherd’s task, the fact that he pastures. He is not so much operating among the sheep, but “among the lilies”, under which that special lily is located, his bride (Song of Solomon 2:2). The bride knows she is one of his lilies. She emphasizes that. It is not about him, but about herself. She knows she belongs to the right company, but does not yet go out to him.

We see in Song of Solomon 2:17 that the bride wants to wait a while. She wants to wait “until the cool of the day when the shadows flee away”. This indicates that she is not yet fully convinced that winter is passed and spring has come. She still is in the dark of the night. When the day comes and the refreshing wind makes life pleasant, then she wants to come to him. If the shadows flee away first and she has a clear view of reality, then she will give herself to him. “Until” this moment comes, she prefers to stay in her cozy environment.

Similarly, in our life there may be circumstances in which we want to see improvement before we entrust ourselves entirely to the Lord and go to Him. We experience the cold of the trial of faith too much to accept that it is really over. There is a wait-and-see attitude. We want to see if the Lord really has brought a change in our circumstances. This shows that we have not yet learned that as soon as the Lord comes to us and we entrust ourselves to Him, this will bring about a tremendous change. As soon as we surrender to Him, the day has come in our life and we see everything clear again.

The bride tells the groom to leave. She still calls him “my beloved”, but he needs to be kept at a distance until she feels able to join him. Until then, he can move freely “like a gazelle or a young stag”. So she described him when he came to her in Song of Solomon 2:9.

Because she is not ready to accept his loving invitation he can go as he came and return to the “mountains of Bether”. These are the “cleaved mountains” – the meaning of the name “Bether” –, mountains in which a path has been made. She allows him a way without obstacles. But he is not interested in her wish that he will have an easy way, he wants a highway in her heart. He wants access to her heart, but she turns him down. The following chapter shows the reason for this.

The spiritual lesson is obvious. We may not say clearly to the Lord that He must leave, but we can behave in such a way that our attitude gives that message. He seeks fellowship with us, but we turn Him down because we have no time. Not now. It takes us too much effort to catch the little foxes. Then He does not impose Himself, but continues His way.

Isaiah 32:11

Sought but Not Found

We have seen that this book is primarily about the relationship between a man and a woman and that we can learn lessons from this for our own relationship in marriage and also about the relationship between a believer and the Lord Jesus. In both relationships it is about a connection that is characterized by love. The meaning is that we learn to know a love that is not bought or enforced, but the love of Someone, Who Himself is love. For God is love.

We are only able to love if we have received this love (1 John 4:19). If there is no relationship with God and with the Lord Jesus, it is impossible to love. In this love story we find clues to our personal relationship with the Lord Jesus and the disturbing elements that prevent us from enjoying His love.

In the history of love we have ended up in a situation that in the relationship between the bride and the groom has come a distance. It is not the groom’s fault, but the bride’s fault. Her love is no longer so fervent. Maybe Song of Solomon 3:1 gives a clue why. The bride has withdrawn and sought her rest. She lies on her bed, on her own bed, “my bed”, which speaks of complacency.

The life of a believer can sometimes produce disappointments. There may be problems for which a solution has been sought but has not been found. Disappointed in the Lord, then one withdraws, just as the bride has also withdrawn. Although there may even be a certain indifference, it does not leave the Lord Jesus indifferent. He wants to fill our lives with His presence and give rest.

The groom’s attempts to reawaken the bride’s love do not seem to have been in vain, although she sent him away in the previous verse (Song of Solomon 2:17). In the night she feels the lack of him. She starts looking for him. To get back into someone’s life, the Lord Jesus uses situations in which someone is alone.

I once spoke to a group of young people about the gospel. Their reactions are different than when you speak to someone alone. They acknowledge that when they lie alone on their bed in the evening, they no longer have such a big mouth. You think about your life. It can be the beginning of a search for the meaning of life. God can speak to people “while they slumber in their beds” (Job 33:14-15).

Then the bride comes to the decision to get up (Song of Solomon 3:2). That is where every true conversion begins. We see this with the youngest son in the parable that the Lord Jesus tells us. When he is with the swine, he comes to himself and says: “I will get up and go to my father.” Then he gets up and comes to his father (Luke 15:18; 20).

In the same way, as believers, we sometimes have to make a decision to deal vigorously with something in our lives that has distanced us from the Lord. So here the bride stands up and moves around in the city, through the streets and over the squares, in search of the one she loves dearly. But she doesn’t find him in the city either.

She has searched and not found him. It is said here twice: at the end of Song 3:1, when she searched for him on her bed, and at the end of Song 3:2, after she searched for him in the city. Did not the Lord Jesus say: “Seek, and you will find” and “he who seeks find” (Matthew 7:7-8)? Indeed, but He adds that there must be knocking and then it will be opened. In doing so, he points out that we have to seek with perseverance. We should not give up if we do not find Him directly.

It is good that we seek a restoration of the relationship with the Lord Jesus when we miss the relationship with Him. However, our search will be in vain if we search in the wrong places. We won’t find Him if we take our ease. Nor do we find Him in the world, of which the city is a picture. The city speaks of a society of people. Cities are formed to establish a society without God. Cain is the first city builder (Genesis 4:17b). When there has come a distance between us and the Lord Jesus, when there is dissatisfaction, we no longer have a good view of His whereabouts.

There is a certain Demas in the Bible. At first he is a dedicated believer. Paul mentions him as one of his fellow workers (Colossians 4:14; Philemon 1:24). Then there seems to have come a moment when a separation has arisen between Demas and the Lord Jesus. His love for the Lord is cooled. Demas leaves Paul’s company and leaves for the city. Paul must write with sorrow about him: “Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica” (2 Timothy 4:10a).

It does not say that Demas is no longer a Christian and that he has openly said goodbye to the Lord. Perhaps he has chosen an honorable profession, but it has seized him completely. He travelled to Thessalonika. There is a sound church. However, that is not his interest. There he seeks the world and not the brothers and sisters.

The world is particularly attractive to young believers. John warns them especially when he says: “Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). The world does not only consist of all sorts of forms of debauchery, of lusts and desires. It is the world as it has become by the fall into sin of Adam, where people that live without taking God into account tell us what to do. This also includes the hardworking people who make careers or discoveries that improve the quality of life. They are highly regarded. But if God has no place in it, it is ‘the world’.

Isaiah 32:12

Sought but Not Found

We have seen that this book is primarily about the relationship between a man and a woman and that we can learn lessons from this for our own relationship in marriage and also about the relationship between a believer and the Lord Jesus. In both relationships it is about a connection that is characterized by love. The meaning is that we learn to know a love that is not bought or enforced, but the love of Someone, Who Himself is love. For God is love.

We are only able to love if we have received this love (1 John 4:19). If there is no relationship with God and with the Lord Jesus, it is impossible to love. In this love story we find clues to our personal relationship with the Lord Jesus and the disturbing elements that prevent us from enjoying His love.

In the history of love we have ended up in a situation that in the relationship between the bride and the groom has come a distance. It is not the groom’s fault, but the bride’s fault. Her love is no longer so fervent. Maybe Song of Solomon 3:1 gives a clue why. The bride has withdrawn and sought her rest. She lies on her bed, on her own bed, “my bed”, which speaks of complacency.

The life of a believer can sometimes produce disappointments. There may be problems for which a solution has been sought but has not been found. Disappointed in the Lord, then one withdraws, just as the bride has also withdrawn. Although there may even be a certain indifference, it does not leave the Lord Jesus indifferent. He wants to fill our lives with His presence and give rest.

The groom’s attempts to reawaken the bride’s love do not seem to have been in vain, although she sent him away in the previous verse (Song of Solomon 2:17). In the night she feels the lack of him. She starts looking for him. To get back into someone’s life, the Lord Jesus uses situations in which someone is alone.

I once spoke to a group of young people about the gospel. Their reactions are different than when you speak to someone alone. They acknowledge that when they lie alone on their bed in the evening, they no longer have such a big mouth. You think about your life. It can be the beginning of a search for the meaning of life. God can speak to people “while they slumber in their beds” (Job 33:14-15).

Then the bride comes to the decision to get up (Song of Solomon 3:2). That is where every true conversion begins. We see this with the youngest son in the parable that the Lord Jesus tells us. When he is with the swine, he comes to himself and says: “I will get up and go to my father.” Then he gets up and comes to his father (Luke 15:18; 20).

In the same way, as believers, we sometimes have to make a decision to deal vigorously with something in our lives that has distanced us from the Lord. So here the bride stands up and moves around in the city, through the streets and over the squares, in search of the one she loves dearly. But she doesn’t find him in the city either.

She has searched and not found him. It is said here twice: at the end of Song 3:1, when she searched for him on her bed, and at the end of Song 3:2, after she searched for him in the city. Did not the Lord Jesus say: “Seek, and you will find” and “he who seeks find” (Matthew 7:7-8)? Indeed, but He adds that there must be knocking and then it will be opened. In doing so, he points out that we have to seek with perseverance. We should not give up if we do not find Him directly.

It is good that we seek a restoration of the relationship with the Lord Jesus when we miss the relationship with Him. However, our search will be in vain if we search in the wrong places. We won’t find Him if we take our ease. Nor do we find Him in the world, of which the city is a picture. The city speaks of a society of people. Cities are formed to establish a society without God. Cain is the first city builder (Genesis 4:17b). When there has come a distance between us and the Lord Jesus, when there is dissatisfaction, we no longer have a good view of His whereabouts.

There is a certain Demas in the Bible. At first he is a dedicated believer. Paul mentions him as one of his fellow workers (Colossians 4:14; Philemon 1:24). Then there seems to have come a moment when a separation has arisen between Demas and the Lord Jesus. His love for the Lord is cooled. Demas leaves Paul’s company and leaves for the city. Paul must write with sorrow about him: “Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica” (2 Timothy 4:10a).

It does not say that Demas is no longer a Christian and that he has openly said goodbye to the Lord. Perhaps he has chosen an honorable profession, but it has seized him completely. He travelled to Thessalonika. There is a sound church. However, that is not his interest. There he seeks the world and not the brothers and sisters.

The world is particularly attractive to young believers. John warns them especially when he says: “Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). The world does not only consist of all sorts of forms of debauchery, of lusts and desires. It is the world as it has become by the fall into sin of Adam, where people that live without taking God into account tell us what to do. This also includes the hardworking people who make careers or discoveries that improve the quality of life. They are highly regarded. But if God has no place in it, it is ‘the world’.

Isaiah 32:13

Sought and Found

It is night when the bride leaves her bed and enters the city (Song of Solomon 3:1-2), looking for the groom. She doesn’t find the groom, but others, the watchmen of the city, find her (Song of Solomon 3:3). She addresses them without any introduction. She doesn’t mention a name, but asks the watchmen of the city if they ‘have seen him whom her soul loves’.

After the bride has searched her groom in the wrong way and in the wrong place, she is now also looking for him with the wrong people. How can people who guard the city and have no connection with the groom answer her question? How can those who do not know him tell her where he is? We do not read that the watchmen answer.

We can apply this to believers with mental problems who go to unbelieving counsellors – psychologists and psychiatrists – and ask them for a solution. But how can they offer a solution? After all, these people have no living relationship with the Lord Jesus. They do not believe in Him. If that relationship is not there, the whole quest is in vain. And the emptiness grows.

The watchmen can also represent religious leaders, people who, in the eyes of people and also in their own eyes, have knowledge of the matter. They are the so-called caretakers of ‘their’ church, but they cannot help either. The general lesson we can learn here is: “Do not trust in princes, in mortal man, in whom there is no salvation” (Psalms 146:3).

In Mark 5, we read about “a woman who had had a hemorrhage for twelve years, and had endured much at the hands of many physicians, and had spent all that she had and was not helped at all, but rather had grown worse” (Mark 5:25-26). The many doctors she has visited in the hope of healing have only increased her suffering, while she has invested her entire property to pay for that help. Instead of recovery there has been worsening. Finally, she goes to the Lord Jesus. She says: “If I just touch His garments, I will get well” (Mark 5:28). This means that it comes down to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, Who is able to fill the void in our heart.

It seems that the bride in Song of Solomon 3:4 has come out of town and there she finds her beloved. He can be found outside the city, in the field where he pastures the flock between the lilies, as she said before (Song of Solomon 2:16). She forgot that, so she searched in the wrong places and with the wrong people. Now that she is free from the wrong, she runs into his arms. She has found him.

So the Lord Jesus is not to be found in all kinds of man-made systems or with prominent spiritual leaders, but in the place of rejection. We can think of the cross of Calvary, which stood “outside the gate” of Jerusalem (Hebrews 13:12-13). There the Lord is pleased to be found. Whosoever is not prepared to find and follow Him there, at the place of rejection, will never find Him.

Efforts must be made to find Him there. But if one searches with longing and perseverance, trusting that He will let Himself be found, then He will let Himself be found. He has promised: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened” (Matthew 7:7-8; Jeremiah 29:12-13; Isaiah 45:19).

The bride went out and left the city and all people behind. We can see this as escaping the hectic of life in the city with all its noise, being absorbed in all kinds of activities, without a moment of rest. The necessary and desired rest is found outside the city in the presence of the Lord. We all need those times of rest with the Lord.

Many are lived by social media and do not have one moment of rest because they think they should always be available. There should be an immediate response when a message comes in. Social media determine life. Imagine that I would miss something, I have to be constantly informed. In this way, rest is increasingly taken away from us.

Do we still have time to be alone with the Word of God and with the Lord Jesus? Only then will we find Him, not in the city, but outside the city. Then we get the strength to go back into the city to be a witness.

When she has found him, she holds on to him (Matthew 28:9; Proverbs 3:18). She doesn’t want to lose him again. She is very careful about that now. Together with him she goes to her mother’s house. She goes back, so to speak, to the beginning of her existence, where her life began and she had her upbringing. If we have departed from the Lord, we must go back to the beginning of our life with Him. We must remember our first encounters with Him, our first love for Him (Revelation 2:4-5).

The bride returns with her groom not only to her mother’s house, but to the room of her, “who conceived” her. That is all the way back to the beginning, to the moment of the birth of the new life. It is as Israel must always do, after the people have been delivered from Egypt. Each year they have to celebrate the Passover as a reminder of the deliverance from Egypt.

So we can do this every Sunday, when we proclaim the Lord’s death, remembering what He has done for us. But we must also think about it every day, not forgetting that we are redeemed and how it happened, and thank the Lord for redeeming us from our sins and eternal judgment.

Are we (still) grateful? Do we remember when and where our first real meeting with the Lord Jesus took place? Do we remember the joy and peace it has given us that the heavy burden of our sins has been taken away from us and that we have been born again and become children of God? When something drastic happens in the world, people are sometimes asked later where they were or what they were doing at that moment. They often remember that too. The turning from idols to God is the most profound event in the life of a person which he consciously experiences. Then the Lord Jesus with His love and authority enters his life and changes it completely. It gets a totally different perspective.

In Song of Solomon 3:5 she addresses the same persons with the same words as in Song of Songs 2 (Song of Solomon 2:7). It therefore sounds like a refrain. Yet it is not the same. Here, in Song of Songs 3, she speaks these words after the lost connection with the groom has been restored. So there is restoration of fellowship. Now that she has found him again and brought him into the room of her mother’s house, she hangs the sign DO NOT DISTURB on the door, as it were. She let it be known that she does not want to let in any elements that could disturb her regained fellowship with him again.

Fellowship with the Lord Jesus is not a matter of speed. It takes time, even when the relationship is restored, to grow in it. Growing in faith should not be stimulated artificially. Thus, the use of loud, psychedelic music in a service works that the Beloved disappears. This is also the case with soft music that responds to the emotions. Fellowship with the Lord Jesus requires rest and peace, not incitement. The Spirit of God is present and works in “a gentle blowing”, not in “a great and strong wind”, “an earthquake” or “a fire” (1 Kings 19:11-13). Love needs time to grow, even when cooled love is awakened again.

Isaiah 32:14

Sought and Found

It is night when the bride leaves her bed and enters the city (Song of Solomon 3:1-2), looking for the groom. She doesn’t find the groom, but others, the watchmen of the city, find her (Song of Solomon 3:3). She addresses them without any introduction. She doesn’t mention a name, but asks the watchmen of the city if they ‘have seen him whom her soul loves’.

After the bride has searched her groom in the wrong way and in the wrong place, she is now also looking for him with the wrong people. How can people who guard the city and have no connection with the groom answer her question? How can those who do not know him tell her where he is? We do not read that the watchmen answer.

We can apply this to believers with mental problems who go to unbelieving counsellors – psychologists and psychiatrists – and ask them for a solution. But how can they offer a solution? After all, these people have no living relationship with the Lord Jesus. They do not believe in Him. If that relationship is not there, the whole quest is in vain. And the emptiness grows.

The watchmen can also represent religious leaders, people who, in the eyes of people and also in their own eyes, have knowledge of the matter. They are the so-called caretakers of ‘their’ church, but they cannot help either. The general lesson we can learn here is: “Do not trust in princes, in mortal man, in whom there is no salvation” (Psalms 146:3).

In Mark 5, we read about “a woman who had had a hemorrhage for twelve years, and had endured much at the hands of many physicians, and had spent all that she had and was not helped at all, but rather had grown worse” (Mark 5:25-26). The many doctors she has visited in the hope of healing have only increased her suffering, while she has invested her entire property to pay for that help. Instead of recovery there has been worsening. Finally, she goes to the Lord Jesus. She says: “If I just touch His garments, I will get well” (Mark 5:28). This means that it comes down to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, Who is able to fill the void in our heart.

It seems that the bride in Song of Solomon 3:4 has come out of town and there she finds her beloved. He can be found outside the city, in the field where he pastures the flock between the lilies, as she said before (Song of Solomon 2:16). She forgot that, so she searched in the wrong places and with the wrong people. Now that she is free from the wrong, she runs into his arms. She has found him.

So the Lord Jesus is not to be found in all kinds of man-made systems or with prominent spiritual leaders, but in the place of rejection. We can think of the cross of Calvary, which stood “outside the gate” of Jerusalem (Hebrews 13:12-13). There the Lord is pleased to be found. Whosoever is not prepared to find and follow Him there, at the place of rejection, will never find Him.

Efforts must be made to find Him there. But if one searches with longing and perseverance, trusting that He will let Himself be found, then He will let Himself be found. He has promised: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened” (Matthew 7:7-8; Jeremiah 29:12-13; Isaiah 45:19).

The bride went out and left the city and all people behind. We can see this as escaping the hectic of life in the city with all its noise, being absorbed in all kinds of activities, without a moment of rest. The necessary and desired rest is found outside the city in the presence of the Lord. We all need those times of rest with the Lord.

Many are lived by social media and do not have one moment of rest because they think they should always be available. There should be an immediate response when a message comes in. Social media determine life. Imagine that I would miss something, I have to be constantly informed. In this way, rest is increasingly taken away from us.

Do we still have time to be alone with the Word of God and with the Lord Jesus? Only then will we find Him, not in the city, but outside the city. Then we get the strength to go back into the city to be a witness.

When she has found him, she holds on to him (Matthew 28:9; Proverbs 3:18). She doesn’t want to lose him again. She is very careful about that now. Together with him she goes to her mother’s house. She goes back, so to speak, to the beginning of her existence, where her life began and she had her upbringing. If we have departed from the Lord, we must go back to the beginning of our life with Him. We must remember our first encounters with Him, our first love for Him (Revelation 2:4-5).

The bride returns with her groom not only to her mother’s house, but to the room of her, “who conceived” her. That is all the way back to the beginning, to the moment of the birth of the new life. It is as Israel must always do, after the people have been delivered from Egypt. Each year they have to celebrate the Passover as a reminder of the deliverance from Egypt.

So we can do this every Sunday, when we proclaim the Lord’s death, remembering what He has done for us. But we must also think about it every day, not forgetting that we are redeemed and how it happened, and thank the Lord for redeeming us from our sins and eternal judgment.

Are we (still) grateful? Do we remember when and where our first real meeting with the Lord Jesus took place? Do we remember the joy and peace it has given us that the heavy burden of our sins has been taken away from us and that we have been born again and become children of God? When something drastic happens in the world, people are sometimes asked later where they were or what they were doing at that moment. They often remember that too. The turning from idols to God is the most profound event in the life of a person which he consciously experiences. Then the Lord Jesus with His love and authority enters his life and changes it completely. It gets a totally different perspective.

In Song of Solomon 3:5 she addresses the same persons with the same words as in Song of Songs 2 (Song of Solomon 2:7). It therefore sounds like a refrain. Yet it is not the same. Here, in Song of Songs 3, she speaks these words after the lost connection with the groom has been restored. So there is restoration of fellowship. Now that she has found him again and brought him into the room of her mother’s house, she hangs the sign DO NOT DISTURB on the door, as it were. She let it be known that she does not want to let in any elements that could disturb her regained fellowship with him again.

Fellowship with the Lord Jesus is not a matter of speed. It takes time, even when the relationship is restored, to grow in it. Growing in faith should not be stimulated artificially. Thus, the use of loud, psychedelic music in a service works that the Beloved disappears. This is also the case with soft music that responds to the emotions. Fellowship with the Lord Jesus requires rest and peace, not incitement. The Spirit of God is present and works in “a gentle blowing”, not in “a great and strong wind”, “an earthquake” or “a fire” (1 Kings 19:11-13). Love needs time to grow, even when cooled love is awakened again.

Isaiah 32:15

Sought and Found

It is night when the bride leaves her bed and enters the city (Song of Solomon 3:1-2), looking for the groom. She doesn’t find the groom, but others, the watchmen of the city, find her (Song of Solomon 3:3). She addresses them without any introduction. She doesn’t mention a name, but asks the watchmen of the city if they ‘have seen him whom her soul loves’.

After the bride has searched her groom in the wrong way and in the wrong place, she is now also looking for him with the wrong people. How can people who guard the city and have no connection with the groom answer her question? How can those who do not know him tell her where he is? We do not read that the watchmen answer.

We can apply this to believers with mental problems who go to unbelieving counsellors – psychologists and psychiatrists – and ask them for a solution. But how can they offer a solution? After all, these people have no living relationship with the Lord Jesus. They do not believe in Him. If that relationship is not there, the whole quest is in vain. And the emptiness grows.

The watchmen can also represent religious leaders, people who, in the eyes of people and also in their own eyes, have knowledge of the matter. They are the so-called caretakers of ‘their’ church, but they cannot help either. The general lesson we can learn here is: “Do not trust in princes, in mortal man, in whom there is no salvation” (Psalms 146:3).

In Mark 5, we read about “a woman who had had a hemorrhage for twelve years, and had endured much at the hands of many physicians, and had spent all that she had and was not helped at all, but rather had grown worse” (Mark 5:25-26). The many doctors she has visited in the hope of healing have only increased her suffering, while she has invested her entire property to pay for that help. Instead of recovery there has been worsening. Finally, she goes to the Lord Jesus. She says: “If I just touch His garments, I will get well” (Mark 5:28). This means that it comes down to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, Who is able to fill the void in our heart.

It seems that the bride in Song of Solomon 3:4 has come out of town and there she finds her beloved. He can be found outside the city, in the field where he pastures the flock between the lilies, as she said before (Song of Solomon 2:16). She forgot that, so she searched in the wrong places and with the wrong people. Now that she is free from the wrong, she runs into his arms. She has found him.

So the Lord Jesus is not to be found in all kinds of man-made systems or with prominent spiritual leaders, but in the place of rejection. We can think of the cross of Calvary, which stood “outside the gate” of Jerusalem (Hebrews 13:12-13). There the Lord is pleased to be found. Whosoever is not prepared to find and follow Him there, at the place of rejection, will never find Him.

Efforts must be made to find Him there. But if one searches with longing and perseverance, trusting that He will let Himself be found, then He will let Himself be found. He has promised: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened” (Matthew 7:7-8; Jeremiah 29:12-13; Isaiah 45:19).

The bride went out and left the city and all people behind. We can see this as escaping the hectic of life in the city with all its noise, being absorbed in all kinds of activities, without a moment of rest. The necessary and desired rest is found outside the city in the presence of the Lord. We all need those times of rest with the Lord.

Many are lived by social media and do not have one moment of rest because they think they should always be available. There should be an immediate response when a message comes in. Social media determine life. Imagine that I would miss something, I have to be constantly informed. In this way, rest is increasingly taken away from us.

Do we still have time to be alone with the Word of God and with the Lord Jesus? Only then will we find Him, not in the city, but outside the city. Then we get the strength to go back into the city to be a witness.

When she has found him, she holds on to him (Matthew 28:9; Proverbs 3:18). She doesn’t want to lose him again. She is very careful about that now. Together with him she goes to her mother’s house. She goes back, so to speak, to the beginning of her existence, where her life began and she had her upbringing. If we have departed from the Lord, we must go back to the beginning of our life with Him. We must remember our first encounters with Him, our first love for Him (Revelation 2:4-5).

The bride returns with her groom not only to her mother’s house, but to the room of her, “who conceived” her. That is all the way back to the beginning, to the moment of the birth of the new life. It is as Israel must always do, after the people have been delivered from Egypt. Each year they have to celebrate the Passover as a reminder of the deliverance from Egypt.

So we can do this every Sunday, when we proclaim the Lord’s death, remembering what He has done for us. But we must also think about it every day, not forgetting that we are redeemed and how it happened, and thank the Lord for redeeming us from our sins and eternal judgment.

Are we (still) grateful? Do we remember when and where our first real meeting with the Lord Jesus took place? Do we remember the joy and peace it has given us that the heavy burden of our sins has been taken away from us and that we have been born again and become children of God? When something drastic happens in the world, people are sometimes asked later where they were or what they were doing at that moment. They often remember that too. The turning from idols to God is the most profound event in the life of a person which he consciously experiences. Then the Lord Jesus with His love and authority enters his life and changes it completely. It gets a totally different perspective.

In Song of Solomon 3:5 she addresses the same persons with the same words as in Song of Songs 2 (Song of Solomon 2:7). It therefore sounds like a refrain. Yet it is not the same. Here, in Song of Songs 3, she speaks these words after the lost connection with the groom has been restored. So there is restoration of fellowship. Now that she has found him again and brought him into the room of her mother’s house, she hangs the sign DO NOT DISTURB on the door, as it were. She let it be known that she does not want to let in any elements that could disturb her regained fellowship with him again.

Fellowship with the Lord Jesus is not a matter of speed. It takes time, even when the relationship is restored, to grow in it. Growing in faith should not be stimulated artificially. Thus, the use of loud, psychedelic music in a service works that the Beloved disappears. This is also the case with soft music that responds to the emotions. Fellowship with the Lord Jesus requires rest and peace, not incitement. The Spirit of God is present and works in “a gentle blowing”, not in “a great and strong wind”, “an earthquake” or “a fire” (1 Kings 19:11-13). Love needs time to grow, even when cooled love is awakened again.

Isaiah 32:16

Who Is Coming Up From the Wilderness?

The answer to the question “who is this coming up from the wilderness” is simple. “This” is none other than the bride. Yet the question suggests that she is not immediately recognized. That has to do with her stay in the wilderness. The wilderness has changed her. She has become, as it were, a different person. In the spiritual application, the wilderness represents the world seen as the area God uses to test our faith. Through faith tests God wants to change us and make us more and more conform to the image of His Son.

In the prophetic application we can think here of the faithful remnant that is kept by God in the wilderness in the time of the great tribulation (Revelation 12:13-17; cf. Hosea 2:14-23). This time will bring about a change in the remnant that will make it a people with whom the Lord Jesus can dwell.

The believers individually and God’s people as a whole are compared here to “columns of smoke”. We see the ‘columns of smoke’ in Israel rising from the altar of burnt offering to God, as a soothing aroma to Him. Believers who have been tried by God and to whom He has been able to do His work are also pleasing to Him. In their lives He recognizes what is always perfectly present in the Lord Jesus: His own image.

Further we see that the bride is “perfumed with myrrh and frankincense”. That reminds us of the journey of the people of God through the wilderness, where the people are led by the cloud of God’s glory. This cloud has covered them and also the tabernacle. God wants to make His glory visible through all exercises through which a believer passes. That is what our stay in the wilderness is for.

The “myrrh and incense” by which she is perfumed, means that she comes in the fragrance of Christ (cf. 2 Corinthians 2:15-16). ‘Myrrh’ symbolizes the suffering of the Lord Jesus, while ‘incense’ symbolizes His glories. Everything that is pleasing to God, He has found in His Son. He wants to work the same in His own, so that through their lives He is increasingly reminded of that of his Son. In the trials of our faith we experience the suffering of Christ, while we may also look forward to the glory that awaits us.

To the myrrh and incense are added “all scented powders of the merchant”, a mixture of scents by which the bride is also surrounded. It represents the many excellencies that are present in the Lord Jesus and have been expressed. Every word and every act is of great beauty and excellence. At the same time they flow together into a beautiful whole. Everything is in harmony with each other. There is no odor that dominates and destroys the other odors.

Paul presents these ‘scented powders’ to the believers in Colossae so that they will spread them around them. These fragrances are the features of Christ, which we as believers can exhibit and thus let others smell. He writes to them: “So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you. Beyond all these things [put on] love, which is the perfect bond of unity” (Colossians 3:12-14). These are some of the many excellencies of the new life that we as believers possess. That new life is Christ Himself. Often the exercises in the wilderness are needed to let others smell the excellent scent of Him.

The ‘scented powders’ are available from “the merchant”. This means that they are not available for free, but must be ‘bought’. A price has to be paid for it. That price is the giving up one’s own self and to put obedience and devotion in its place.

Certainly, every believer possesses these ‘scented powders’ through the new life. But putting them into practice is something else. They must, as Paul says, to be put on. That means we have to be busy with it by reading and studying the Word of God. Then we see how they were expressed in the life of the Lord Jesus. The result is that they are also noticed in our life.

Isaiah 32:17

The Couch and the Mighty Man of Solomon

In Song of Solomon 3:7 is the answer to the question who she is who comes from the wilderness (Song of Solomon 3:6). The answer is not ‘the bride’, but “the [traveling] couch of Solomon”. Here we see the rest of Solomon. This is a very different rest from the one in Song of Solomon 3:1. There it is laziness. Here it is the rest or peace of Solomon, who became part of the bride. Solomon is the king of peace. This scene shows that the bride has found peace in the groom.

Thus, as new testament believers, our conscience may come to rest in the presence of God on the basis of the work of the true Prince of Peace, the Lord Jesus. Through faith in Him we have peace with God (Romans 5:1). In that rest we may know that in the Beloved we are pleasing to God (Ephesians 1:6). A similar picture like the bride in Solomon’s couch can be seen in the two tablets of stone in the ark (Deuteronomy 10:1-5). This second pair of tablets also represents the believers, and the ark represents Christ.

The couch of Solomon in which he transports his bride, represents the rest of his victory. In that rest, the bride is united with him. He carries her on in that rest. He also ensures that this rest is protected for her sake. It is not just sixty soldiers, but “sixty mighty men” who have been carefully chosen from the “the mighty men of Israel”. It is a corps of excellent men. They have proven that they can wage war. With David there are thirty mighty men (2 Samuel 23:8-23), but Solomon has sixty.

Christ, the true Solomon, knows all the dangers through which His bride, His own, must pass. He leads her on in that rest. We have found rest for our hearts and conscience by going to Him with our sins (Matthew 11:28). He also wants to lead us through life in that rest, on our journey to Him. For this He tells us to take His yoke upon us. Then we find rest for our souls in our daily activities (Matthew 11:29).

The rest acquired and obtained by Christ is attacked by the powers of darkness and must be defended (cf. Isaiah 27:3). He places the responsibility for the defense in the hands of His own, providing them with the right weapons to effectively eliminate the enemy. We see this in the picture of the sixty mighty men.

The sixty mighty men all know how to handle the sword and have it within reach (Song of Solomon 3:8). In these mighty men we can see a picture of believers who, in the practice of life, protect and preserve the truths of faith. Every believer is called upon to be such a mighty man. It is our responsibility to protect what God has given us in His Word. We are all being called upon to “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints” (Jude 1:3).

For this every believer gets “the whole armor of God” at his disposal, which he must “put on” and “take up” (Ephesians 6:11-18). This also includes “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17b; Hebrews 4:12). With this, for example, a false teaching about the rest offered by the Lord Jesus can be dispelled – such as that that rest can be kept by keeping the law. It is about knowing God’s Word, by which we become adept at using it as a weapon of defense.

The sword is used here to defend us with it “against the terrors of the nights”. The night is dangerous. It represents the spiritual darkness in which we live. But “the night is almost gone, and the day is near” (Romans 13:12). The day begins when the Lord Jesus returns to earth. At the same time, we also see that darkness is increasing. There is increasing deception and satan is doing his utmost to keep us from following the Lord.

Only by holding on to the Word of God, holding that sword firmly in the hand or within reach at the hip, will we keep our spiritual rest and peace. The Lord Jesus gives the example when satan tempts Him in the wilderness (Matthew 4:1-11). He then uses the Word of God as a weapon and defeats satan, so that he finally drips off. If we deviate from the Word, we lose our peace. Therefore it is important that we read and study God’s Word.

Isaiah 32:18

The Couch and the Mighty Man of Solomon

In Song of Solomon 3:7 is the answer to the question who she is who comes from the wilderness (Song of Solomon 3:6). The answer is not ‘the bride’, but “the [traveling] couch of Solomon”. Here we see the rest of Solomon. This is a very different rest from the one in Song of Solomon 3:1. There it is laziness. Here it is the rest or peace of Solomon, who became part of the bride. Solomon is the king of peace. This scene shows that the bride has found peace in the groom.

Thus, as new testament believers, our conscience may come to rest in the presence of God on the basis of the work of the true Prince of Peace, the Lord Jesus. Through faith in Him we have peace with God (Romans 5:1). In that rest we may know that in the Beloved we are pleasing to God (Ephesians 1:6). A similar picture like the bride in Solomon’s couch can be seen in the two tablets of stone in the ark (Deuteronomy 10:1-5). This second pair of tablets also represents the believers, and the ark represents Christ.

The couch of Solomon in which he transports his bride, represents the rest of his victory. In that rest, the bride is united with him. He carries her on in that rest. He also ensures that this rest is protected for her sake. It is not just sixty soldiers, but “sixty mighty men” who have been carefully chosen from the “the mighty men of Israel”. It is a corps of excellent men. They have proven that they can wage war. With David there are thirty mighty men (2 Samuel 23:8-23), but Solomon has sixty.

Christ, the true Solomon, knows all the dangers through which His bride, His own, must pass. He leads her on in that rest. We have found rest for our hearts and conscience by going to Him with our sins (Matthew 11:28). He also wants to lead us through life in that rest, on our journey to Him. For this He tells us to take His yoke upon us. Then we find rest for our souls in our daily activities (Matthew 11:29).

The rest acquired and obtained by Christ is attacked by the powers of darkness and must be defended (cf. Isaiah 27:3). He places the responsibility for the defense in the hands of His own, providing them with the right weapons to effectively eliminate the enemy. We see this in the picture of the sixty mighty men.

The sixty mighty men all know how to handle the sword and have it within reach (Song of Solomon 3:8). In these mighty men we can see a picture of believers who, in the practice of life, protect and preserve the truths of faith. Every believer is called upon to be such a mighty man. It is our responsibility to protect what God has given us in His Word. We are all being called upon to “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints” (Jude 1:3).

For this every believer gets “the whole armor of God” at his disposal, which he must “put on” and “take up” (Ephesians 6:11-18). This also includes “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17b; Hebrews 4:12). With this, for example, a false teaching about the rest offered by the Lord Jesus can be dispelled – such as that that rest can be kept by keeping the law. It is about knowing God’s Word, by which we become adept at using it as a weapon of defense.

The sword is used here to defend us with it “against the terrors of the nights”. The night is dangerous. It represents the spiritual darkness in which we live. But “the night is almost gone, and the day is near” (Romans 13:12). The day begins when the Lord Jesus returns to earth. At the same time, we also see that darkness is increasing. There is increasing deception and satan is doing his utmost to keep us from following the Lord.

Only by holding on to the Word of God, holding that sword firmly in the hand or within reach at the hip, will we keep our spiritual rest and peace. The Lord Jesus gives the example when satan tempts Him in the wilderness (Matthew 4:1-11). He then uses the Word of God as a weapon and defeats satan, so that he finally drips off. If we deviate from the Word, we lose our peace. Therefore it is important that we read and study God’s Word.

Isaiah 32:19

Solomon’s Sedan Chair

The bride’s attention is now on the groom. He has made a sedan chair for himself (Song of Solomon 3:9), but uses it for the transportation and protection of his bride. Everything that is said about the sedan chair speaks of the person who made it. The bride in the sedan chair is constantly reminded of him during the journey through the night. It is also a demonstration against the enemy and that nothing can stop him. He is the mighty, invincible prince of peace.

The sedan chair speaks of the Lord Jesus Who is carried around by the believers and in Whom at the same time the believers know themselves safe and protected. Who He is to His own is seen in the materials. Not everything is seen by the people, because what is inside is seen only by God.

The first thing that is mentioned and seen of the sedan chair, is the durable wood of Lebanon. That wood is strong, it is durable and unbreakable. Wood grows out of the earth and it is often in Scripture a picture of the humanity of the Lord Jesus. He is “the fruit of the earth” (Isaiah 4:2; Isaiah 53:2a; cf. Luke 23:31). Thus have men seen Him, and so do the believers know Him.

The Lord Jesus knows the dangers of life on earth from His own experience, for He was as Man on earth. He is therefore perfectly capable of protecting us from the terrors of the nights (Song of Solomon 3:8). The same goes for the faithful remnant during the terrors of the great tribulation. He protects his own: “For He Himself has said, “I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you,” so that we confidently say, “The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What will man do to me?”” (Hebrews 13:5b-6). This may be the language of the believer, in whatever time he lives.

Solomon made the posts of the sedan chair of silver (Song of Solomon 3:10). Silver is a picture of the price of redemption (Exodus 30:14-15; cf. 1 Peter 1:18-19). Then we remember what the Lord Jesus did for us on the cross. That is the basis on which we are brought into this rest and through which He leads us on.

The back – or floor, as it also can be translated – is made of gold. Back or floor represents something that supports, that has carrying capacity. Gold represents the glory of God. We see this in the Lord Jesus Who carries and supports us. We see His glory in everything He does for us during our journey through the night with all its terrors. When we see Him in God’s glory, those terrors do not affect us.

The seat of the sedan chair is purple fabric. Kings go dressed in red purple. Red purple speaks of royal dignity. The faithful remnant shares in the dignity of her Bridegroom, the Messiah. When He appears in royal dignity, they appear with Him. The believers of today also have that dignity. They are now a kingdom of priests and will reign in the kingdom of peace with Christ as kings (Revelation 1:6; Revelation 5:10; Revelation 20:6).

Finally, it is mentioned that “its interior” was “lovingly fitted out by the daughters of Jerusalem”. In the interior we see the atmosphere in which the bride finds herself, by which she is surrounded. That atmosphere is love. The daughters of Jerusalem have taken care of this.

This speaks of believers who love the Lord Jesus so much, who live so much for Him, that this love surrounds their whole life. Whatever they do, they do it out of love for the Lord Jesus. When you come into contact with them, you simply cannot escape experiencing that atmosphere, you undergo it, as it were. If there is that atmosphere of love around us, it means that we show what we are in Christ. As a result, we accept, complement and help each other in this.

The daughters of Jerusalem, who also love the groom, have decorated the interior of the sedan chair with their love. That is what he really rests on. The Lord Jesus is carried around by the love of all His own. In the light of love, the other materials acquire their true meaning. God forgets nothing done out of love for Him and His own (Hebrews 6:10).

Isaiah 32:20

Solomon’s Sedan Chair

The bride’s attention is now on the groom. He has made a sedan chair for himself (Song of Solomon 3:9), but uses it for the transportation and protection of his bride. Everything that is said about the sedan chair speaks of the person who made it. The bride in the sedan chair is constantly reminded of him during the journey through the night. It is also a demonstration against the enemy and that nothing can stop him. He is the mighty, invincible prince of peace.

The sedan chair speaks of the Lord Jesus Who is carried around by the believers and in Whom at the same time the believers know themselves safe and protected. Who He is to His own is seen in the materials. Not everything is seen by the people, because what is inside is seen only by God.

The first thing that is mentioned and seen of the sedan chair, is the durable wood of Lebanon. That wood is strong, it is durable and unbreakable. Wood grows out of the earth and it is often in Scripture a picture of the humanity of the Lord Jesus. He is “the fruit of the earth” (Isaiah 4:2; Isaiah 53:2a; cf. Luke 23:31). Thus have men seen Him, and so do the believers know Him.

The Lord Jesus knows the dangers of life on earth from His own experience, for He was as Man on earth. He is therefore perfectly capable of protecting us from the terrors of the nights (Song of Solomon 3:8). The same goes for the faithful remnant during the terrors of the great tribulation. He protects his own: “For He Himself has said, “I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you,” so that we confidently say, “The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What will man do to me?”” (Hebrews 13:5b-6). This may be the language of the believer, in whatever time he lives.

Solomon made the posts of the sedan chair of silver (Song of Solomon 3:10). Silver is a picture of the price of redemption (Exodus 30:14-15; cf. 1 Peter 1:18-19). Then we remember what the Lord Jesus did for us on the cross. That is the basis on which we are brought into this rest and through which He leads us on.

The back – or floor, as it also can be translated – is made of gold. Back or floor represents something that supports, that has carrying capacity. Gold represents the glory of God. We see this in the Lord Jesus Who carries and supports us. We see His glory in everything He does for us during our journey through the night with all its terrors. When we see Him in God’s glory, those terrors do not affect us.

The seat of the sedan chair is purple fabric. Kings go dressed in red purple. Red purple speaks of royal dignity. The faithful remnant shares in the dignity of her Bridegroom, the Messiah. When He appears in royal dignity, they appear with Him. The believers of today also have that dignity. They are now a kingdom of priests and will reign in the kingdom of peace with Christ as kings (Revelation 1:6; Revelation 5:10; Revelation 20:6).

Finally, it is mentioned that “its interior” was “lovingly fitted out by the daughters of Jerusalem”. In the interior we see the atmosphere in which the bride finds herself, by which she is surrounded. That atmosphere is love. The daughters of Jerusalem have taken care of this.

This speaks of believers who love the Lord Jesus so much, who live so much for Him, that this love surrounds their whole life. Whatever they do, they do it out of love for the Lord Jesus. When you come into contact with them, you simply cannot escape experiencing that atmosphere, you undergo it, as it were. If there is that atmosphere of love around us, it means that we show what we are in Christ. As a result, we accept, complement and help each other in this.

The daughters of Jerusalem, who also love the groom, have decorated the interior of the sedan chair with their love. That is what he really rests on. The Lord Jesus is carried around by the love of all His own. In the light of love, the other materials acquire their true meaning. God forgets nothing done out of love for Him and His own (Hebrews 6:10).