Mike Bickle emphasizes the transformative power of understanding our identity as God's beloved in his sermon on the Song of Solomon. He highlights that this book reveals God's heart and emotions towards His people, encouraging believers to embrace their belovedness to overcome shame and brokenness in a wounded generation. Bickle asserts that the revelation of being God's beloved is essential for the church to walk in victory and fulfill its destiny, as it empowers believers to face temptations and persecution. He calls for a deeper exploration of this truth, which is foundational to our relationship with God and our understanding of His love.

Course on the Song of Solomon is gonna be different than the times I've taught it before. On the website, we have two different series, but they're both a systematic presentation right through the book. In 2007, I have a 24 sessions where we work through it systematically, verse by verse. Then 2014, we do the same thing, but we do it in half the time. I make it abbreviated, it's only 12 sessions, but it's the same systematic presentation. This course is gonna be thematic, it's gonna be themes. We're gonna go throughout the book and capture different themes, biblical themes about God's heart and how God feels about his people. Now, why would we study a book like Song of Solomon and teach a course on this? Well, one reason is that the very first line of the song, it's called the Song of All Songs or the Song of Solomon, the ultimate love song in the Bible. And when the Holy Spirit titles a song, the Song of All Songs, you wanna pay attention to it. I think that this song, this eight chapter love song, the Holy Spirit is using it now in the nations. Many different people are teaching it. They're teaching in different ways, which is many different ways to approach a love song. It's in poetic language, but it's the biblical truth of God's heart. I believe that the greatest love songs in Jesus's heart for his church are yet to be released through the body of Christ. I wanna say that again. I believe the greatest love songs in his heart have not been given yet. And this eight chapter love song, each line is a theme. Each line has many implications and the Holy Spirit will inspire many songs out of each one of the nearly every line from this, again, statement of God's heart. It's a poetic statement of the biblical truth of God's heart. Now, the end time church must be equipped with the revelation of God's love and beauty. That's a standard idea, but it's an often neglected subject. Everybody believes in God's love and God's beauty, but it's not enough to have it kind of as a passing idea. We have to go deep in these ideas. We wanna see what he sees. We wanna feel what he feels about us because I believe that this is key. It's essential in equipping the bride, the body of Christ to walk in victory and the most emotionally wounded generation in history and the most sexually broken generation in history. The Lord's raising up the body of Christ in her bridal identity, the spirit and the bride, the church and the revelation of the bridegroom king, the church and her bridal identity. It's in that generation. There's only one generation in history of which the Holy Spirit emphasizes Jesus as the bridegroom king. Many generations, he's emphasized the king, but only one generation does the church worldwide, the whole body of Christ, see themselves in their bridal identity and because God strategically is using that revelation and the most emotionally broken and sexually broken and emotionally wounded generation in history. And I believe we're in the early days of that generation and the only healing reality will be the Holy Spirit revealing God's heart. Well, Song of Solomon 1 verse 15, we're gonna focus on the subject of being God's beloved. That's one of the primary sounds and themes throughout the whole book, our belovedness. The fact that he is our beloved and we are his beloved. I like how the New English Translation says it in chapter 1 verse 15. This would be the bridegroom king speaking. Again, this is one of the great songs of his heart. Many, many songs will come out of this truth. In these days ahead of us, he breaks forth one of the most transforming declarations in the whole word of God. Imagine the one who's fully God, who's fully man, the bridegroom king, how beautiful you are. My beloved, how beautiful you are. This truth will explode out of his heart. It will cleanse the body of Christ. It will satisfy them. It will invigorate them. It will give them hope. Again, in a time of unprecedented wounding and sexual brokenness, the Lord says, I have a superior message. I have a more powerful truth. You are beautiful and you are my beloved. That is the truth. And the Holy Spirit's gonna use that truth, many implications to it. As that love song breaks out of the bridegroom king's heart, as it's captured by the people of God, as the Holy Spirit imparts it, they sing this in many, many different ways. Well, this isn't just a poetic truth in the Song of Solomons. It's also a truth that's pronounced strong, emphasized in the New Testament. Paul says to all the saints in Rome, every believer, and they prophesize, he declares over them, you are beloved of God. The implications of this are vast. I believe the church is yet to focus in a consistent way on the implications of this truth. I believe those days are on us and yet unfolding, where the church is gonna be intentionally going deep on this subject. It's an Old Testament, it's a New Testament truth. Look what Romans 9, verse 25 says. Paul's quoting the prophet Hosea in Romans 9. I will call them my people. Even before they were my people, I'm gonna call them ahead of time my people, because I'm gonna prophetically lead them into the truth by declaring it over them before they even understand it. But it doesn't stop there. They're more than my people. They're more than servants in my kingdom. I will call them her beloved. When she was not beloved, I will call her the beloved of my heart. This is one of the most intimate and cherished truths, and the Holy Spirit's calling his people beloved even now. Many aren't equipped to hear that. I don't mean to hear the sound of it in the physical way. It's not penetrating their heart, but I tell you, the day is now and it's unfolding. Well, this truth is gonna go deeper and deeper. One of the ultimate confessions of the bride in the Song of Solomon in this great eight-chapter love song. Chapter seven, verse 10, I love this. She declares, I am my beloved's. I belong to him, and the nature of the relationship is rooted in mutually being one another's beloved. I'm not just a servant. I am his beloved and he is mine. That's the nature of the relationship that God has in the new covenant with his people. And then she breaks out, declares one of the great implications of understanding, the nature of the relationship rooted in the truth of being one another's beloved. She says, his desire is for me. I understand why I'm his beloved. His desire is for me. This is where we discover our identity in its fullness in this confession. We discover our destiny. Beloved, our destiny is not only to be citizens in the kingdom in heaven. We're much more than citizens. We're much more than citizens. This is where our greatness lies. This is where our security lies. This is where our satisfaction lies. And again, it's not enough to kind of be casually familiar with a few terms and a few ideas. These ideas, the Lord wants them to get into the language of our heart, into our dialogue with the Lord. These aren't just truth that we hear here and there, but he wants us to talk to us this way and has to talk to him in this kind of language. Paragraph B, I'll just give you a simple working definition. Being beloved by God or God's beloved. This is not comprehensive. This is a simple working definition. The Lord is relating to his people with affectionate delight. What a transforming truth. I remember when it first dawned on me. I have so much to learn and so much ground to gain in this, but I have eternity to gain it. But I wanna go deep now in this age. When I began, I remember when it first dawned on me, I was in my 20s, that God didn't just forgive me, he actually delighted in me and it was startling. Like, wait, what if I believe that and that's not really true? What a terrible mistake. But then I went the other way. What if I don't believe it and it is true? What a tragedy for my life. And I remember when from the Bible, this truth began to touch my heart, that even in my weakness, God actually delighted in the relationship with me, with affection, with a smile on his face, even in my weakness, not only when I was mature, but in the journey. And a phrase I've said so many times over the years that when this began to touch me, then I would run to him instead of from him when I discovered my sin and failure and weakness, because the only place of safety was the one who delighted in the relationship. Well, it's not only that he delights in the relationship with affection, he enjoys our value. We are valuable to him. He enjoys the beauty that we possess, that of course imparted from him, his own beauty, the very beauty that God possesses, he imparts, but he enjoys the beauty that he sees in us now. And these are themes we'll develop through the song. Again, we'll take different passages and different themes through this course. Our belovedness. This is the dominant message of this love song. It'll change your life. Most people catch this slowly. I caught it slowly, but it builds over the months and years. It will change you. You'll read the Bible with a new pair of lenses, a new pair of glasses, so to speak, and you'll see the implications of being his beloved, the belovedness that you possess in the relationship. You'll see it from Genesis to Revelation. But many people, ardent students of the Bible, they love God for years with sincerity. They know the Bible, but this has never, it's never touched them in any kind of consistent way because it's a new paradigm. It's a new perspective. Over the years, I've taught the Song of Solomon for almost 30 years. And I remember the multitudes of testimonies that I've received. I'm not talking about how I taught it. That's not my point, because you can teach it under this poetic love song in many different ways. But it's always the same. I've heard it. I've heard it over and over and over for almost 30 years. All types of people. They said, I can hardly believe it that he delights in me, that he's beautiful, that I possess his beauty, that we enjoy the relationship, that really, really, this changes everything. I guess I say, you're getting it. It changes everything. I've received that testimony, and so will you as you teach these truths. And many of you are already teaching them one-on-one. You're still teaching them. Others of you are teaching them through social media. You'll get the same response. All kinds of people. You know, we expect the ladies to like it, but I tell you, many strong men, they like it. You know why? Because the human spirit was created to be loved. I don't care how big their muscles are and how many Rambo movies they've watched. They love to be loved. Don't care how, who they are. And they love loving. They may have woundings and shyness and hesitations, but in their core, they love to be loved, and they love loving every man, every woman, every child, old and young. It's the very core of the human heart. That's why it can't go wrong, going deep in these truths. Paragraph C, I remember 1988, I was 33 years old. It's a day that changed my life. When the Lord spoke audibly. I won't tell the story. I've told it many times in the other series. You can, if you wanna hear longer, the long version, you can hear the different teachings on the internet that I've given on this, but he spoke audibly. He said, in essence, Song of Solomon 8.6, he's gonna put a seal of love, which is a progressive seal, by the way. It's not a one-time deal. It's a revelation and an impartation of his love progressively touching. He said, I'm gonna do this worldwide in this generation. I'm gonna do it worldwide. The Lord's gonna raise up teachers all over the body of Christ. They're gonna teach the truths. The biblical truths that are set forth in this poetic love song. Because in the poetic nature of this, there's a unique dimension of God's heart and emotion that comes out in it. God's raising up hundreds of thousands, millions of teachers. They'll teach through song, through drama, through media, through blogs, through social media. They'll teach many, many different ways. God is raising up teachers that will capture the unique dynamics of this song, the belovedness that just saturates and oozes through every line of the song nearly. How beloved he is to us and how beloved we are to him. Roman numeral two. Well, this is really a couple of quick qualifiers. I've put these in far more detail in the 2007 series that I went 24 sessions systematically through the song. But there's two different basic interpretations that are common. The natural interpretation where King Solomon, it depicts the love that King Solomon had with his bride. It sets forth the principles that honor the beauty of married love. It's a wonderful book about marriage. That's what it's meant to be. But paragraph B, it's not only a natural story teaching about love in the context of marriage. There's a spiritual interpretation of King Jesus and his bride, the body of Christ. We understand that. Most of the commentaries throughout church history have focused on Jesus, the bridegroom, relating to his bride. There are more commentaries on Song of Solomon than almost any other book in the Bible. I was surprised to discover that years ago. There's hundreds of different commentaries on this book. There's other books like the book of Psalms and John that has a large number, but Song of Solomon is near the top of the list. That surprises me in church history. I thought, really? So I begin to see the different times. I've got about 150 commentaries myself on this book. I just begin to collect them and people begin to give them to me for free, pretty cool. So it's not a new idea. It's new that the Holy Spirit is emphasizing this in a global way, that's new. But the truth itself has been proclaimed all through church history. One thing I just like to say it every time that I know 99% of you don't need to hear this. But there's always that one guy or one gal or whoever that we must refuse all sensual overtones. This isn't about Jesus being someone's boyfriend and they go on date nights with Jesus. It's not about kissing Jesus. I mean, I know you know that, but I just need to say that every time. Some people ask the question, again, I go into more detail in the other times I taught this class is Jesus really in the Song of Solomon? Is he really in this book? Well, Jesus said the Holy Spirit came to glorify him. And the Bible says that every book of the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit. It's inconceivable to me the Holy Spirit would write a book of the Bible, by the way, which will last forever, that wasn't ultimately and directly about Jesus when fully understood. Luke 24, Jesus said to the disciples on the road of Emmaus, he said he took all the scriptures and talked about himself from all the scriptures. I wonder what he said about himself when he got to Song of Solomon. I wonder if he smiled, says you have no idea who I am, but you will one day. Top of page two. Well, I want to kind of tip you off what to pay attention to when you're reading through the Song of Solomon, this eight chapter love song. Five things to pay attention to. Paragraph A, the reason I want to point this out because in this book, the Holy Spirit is emphasizing the emotional dimension of God's personality. He's giving the why behind the what. The what, he's a creator. He created heavens and the earth. Book of Genesis tells us what he did. What, he accomplished redemption on the cross, the book of Romans and all through the New Testament. We find out what he did and the cross and what's accomplished. But Song of Solomon is focused on the why behind the what and both of them are very important. I want to know the what. I marvel at his power. I marvel at his justice and what the cross accomplished. But when we see the why behind the what, it touches us in a different way. Paragraph B, right through the book, we see God's emotions. We see God's emotions. You know, there was a time, it was in my late 20s. I made an intentional decision to become a student of God's emotions. I remember I made it, it was a moment where it crystallized in my mind. It was in context to teaching the life of David. I wasn't a Song of Solomon guy at all at that time. I don't really start the Song of Solomon until that encounter with the Lord. I was 33 years old, but in my 20s, I was a life of David, kind of real zealot. And David was a student of God's emotions. And I remember I said, Lord, I want to be a student of your emotions. Like David, it was intentional. It wasn't a casual thing. I love Alan Hood's testimony. When he was just a young man, about 22 years old, long time ago, he came and spent a year. He lived in Florida. He came and spent a year in the church where I was pastoring here in Kansas City. I didn't even hardly know him. And I made a statement. I said, be intentional about being a student of God's emotion. Go through the whole Bible and mark every verse that gives insight into God's emotions in a direct way. And he did it. And I've heard him give the testimony and many times over the years, how that study changed his life, set him on a whole different trajectory. Well, the Song of Solomon is a book, again, that takes in poetic language and the language of song and in a unique way, brings forth God's emotions, his desires, his delight, his enjoyment, these themes that are often neglected in the body of Christ. But they're critical. They're essential to equipping a generation to overcome shame and darkness and sexual brokenness and emotional pain, offense, the subject of God's heart that God desires, he delights, he feels, he loves. He has affection and he wants us to see it and to receive it and to be moved by it. I wanna encourage you, whatever season of life you're in, to make an intentional decision, to become a student of God's emotions. Well, obviously, most of you are because you're here tonight. You're saying, well, what do you think we're doing? I honor you for that. I encourage you to stay with it all your life. In the resurrection, we're going to understand God's emotions more, but I don't wanna wait till then. I wanna go deep now. Paragraph C, the second theme of the Song of Solomon, it's God's beauty. One of the great prophecies for the generation the Lord returns. Your eyes will see the king and his beauty, not just his power, his power too, not just his wisdom. Yes, I love God's wisdom and power. You'll see his beauty. You'll have a new look at old truths and you'll see beauty from A to Z being manifest in God's love and his power and his wisdom. This is one of the great promises, Isaiah 33, 17. You wanna be intentional about seeing the beauty of God. That was the verse that, I mean, the theme that God gave us here for the establishing of IHOP 17 years ago was Psalm 27, 4. This one thing, we gaze on his beauty. That's central to our mandate to keep a 24-7 sanctuary of prayer and worship was people interacting with his beauty. One of the reasons that's so key because through the incredible development of media and media is gonna continue to become more dynamic, to be used for good or evil, but more and more dynamic. But through this tremendous revolution of media, so much quality of technology and art and all those things that you're aware of, there's a counterfeit fascination going on in the earth. And the only thing that will be strong enough to overpower that counterfeit fascination is the genuine beauty that only God possesses. And it's the very beauty that he imparts. And that's paragraph D. That's one of the other themes is how the bridegroom king repeatedly through this love psalm says, it's not only that I'm beautiful, my beloved, so are you. The beauty that I possess, I impart. In other words, when I look at you, it's what the Lord is saying, I'm not repulsed. When I look at you, I'm not put off. When I look at you, I'm not hesitant. When I look at you, I feel delight. I see value. I like what I see because even though many of our virtues are only budding, they're only beginning, he sees it clearly and it's beautiful to him and he knows where it's going. And when we understand that he's not just forgiving us, but he actually sees beauty in his people. He delights, he likes, he enjoys, he values what's going on. That's a whole different way for a relationship to develop. Isaiah 61, the famous verse that Jesus quoted, the spirit of the Lord is upon me to proclaim the good news. He's anointed me. It goes on in verse three, to give beauty. Part of my mission under the anointing is to impart beauty where there was the brokenness of ashes because ashes speaks of the burning passions, but burning the wrong way and only ashes are left. He goes, I'll give beauty. I'll take the ashes of your broken life. I'll give you beauty. We'll develop that throughout this book, but that theme is all the way through the book. That's a very important theme. Moses said in Psalm 90, the beauty of the Lord be upon us. Paragraph E, it's not only that he's beautiful and he imparts it and he loves us. He awakens us to love. I believe that the truths, the biblical truths about God's heart, about his desire that are set forth poetically in this love song, but it's all the way established Genesis to Revelation. They will awaken love. There's nothing that will make you love God more than seeing the way he loves you. I wrote a book called Passion for Jesus years ago and people have asked me, how do you get passion for Jesus? I go, I can tell you, it's really easy. Be a student of his passion for you. When you are intentionally a student of his passion for you, his emotions, it will awaken. You can't see that truth without it moving you. It will move you progressively. Sometimes we go three steps forward, two steps back, but we keep moving forward over the months and years. There are setbacks, but we overcome them and we keep moving forward. This is a song about love. This is the bridegroom king, the king's song about love in the Bible. It's an eternal song. This book, the Song of Solomon will last for billions of years. There won't be natural marriage in heaven, but this song will still be sang. Again, I don't wanna wait till the resurrection. I wanna see it now. I wanna feel it now. Paragraph F, it's about partnership. You'll see through the book, particularly the final four chapters. Well, no, you see it all the way through, but more in the last half. Love longs for partnership. He's not only a king who wants workers. He's a bridegroom king, he wants partnership. Love always wants partnership. He doesn't want us to work for him. He wants us to work with him. The key to not being burnt out in ministry is working with him, not for him. When you work for him, you can work detached. You can work separated from dialogue and from encountering his heart. When you work with him, you're dialoguing with him. You're feeling his heart. You're sharing your heart and you get built up, even though you might get weary in your physical strength, your heart is being energized. But when your body gets weary through the labors of ministry, but you're not dialoguing, you're not interacting with the heart, that's called burnout. Because we were made for love. I love what Jesus says in John 17, 24. Right before he goes to the cross, he goes, Father, Father, I desire that they be with me where I am. He wants us with him where he is forever. We find this theme all the way through the Song of Solomon. Then in Revelation 20, verse four, he says it again in verse six, Revelation 20, verse four, and again in verse six, it says, they'll rain with him over the earth. Not just rain, rain with him. Revelation 20, verse four, says it again in verse six. It's the with him. That he really desired. We see these five themes, not only these five themes, but these five themes over and over in the book. All of these themes are biblical from Genesis to Revelation, but nowhere are they so compacted in one short part of Scripture, eight short chapters, just kind of like this fire hose of God's emotion and delight and beauty in the way that he sees us, all compacted in a song. And again, I believe nearly every line of the song can become 1,000 songs the Holy Spirit gives as a theme from a line in that book. Paragraph H, one of the best summaries of the Song of Solomon is given by Paul the Apostle, in my opinion, in Ephesians 3.18. One of the very best summaries of this book. He says, verse 17, that you may be able to comprehend. That's it, comprehend, understand, experience, the width, length, depth, and height. To, verse 19, experience the love that passes human knowledge, meaning the love is bigger than our ability to grasp it without the Holy Spirit's help. And we can't grasp it, we'll never exhaust it, ever. A million years from now, we will still be receiving more and fresh insights. I love to call it the ocean of God's love. It passes human knowledge. You can't get it without the Holy Spirit helping you. And there will never be enough years to exhaust it, even in eternity. Paragraph I, the Holy Spirit gives us the ability to comprehend this. Beloved, this is the journey. This is the journey you're on, this is the journey I'm in. I'm not just on a journey to work. In the kingdom, I love working because I'm working with him. Now, I'm working for what he desires. I'm working to see people liberated and brought into that glorious two-way relationship with him. But the Holy Spirit wants more than workers. He wants us to comprehend something. The width and length and depth and height of love, of affection. You can put the word affection there. He wants us to comprehend his delight. The value he sees in us. Our destiny, he wants us to go on this journey with him. Beloved, when we see ourself like he sees us, even a little bit, we don't look at our lives only through the lens of our brokenness. We see our brokenness, we're honest about it, our sin and our brokenness, but that's not the dominating narrative of how we see ourself before God. We see ourself through his lens. And it doesn't stop there. We see other people through his lens. Through this lens, I remember I was just overcome one night, years ago, with Psalm 419, it says he's ravished for his beloved. And I go, oh Lord, you're ravished for me. Oh my goodness. And then I'd say like, if I was you, I wouldn't be that ravished about me. Then I thought, well, he knows everything. So he knows more than I know about me. So, okay, ravished, I mean, affection, delight. I remember I was caught up in that. And that particular time I had a particular man who was really attacking me with all kinds of lies and publishing them, I mean, they're horrible lies. And for a, I just paused and it entered my mind. I am ravished for him too. I went, well, Lord, I mean, I want him saved. I really do. But ravished, it's so wrong what he's doing. The Lord says, my heart is so much bigger than his weakness and brokenness. I remember, it was so clear to me. I paused, really glad he's saved, but not that glad that God delighted in him. I thought, come on, Lord, let's be straightforward about this. And this idea that my heart is bigger than his brokenness, but that's good for you. Because I never change and that's how I look at you. My heart is bigger than your brokenness. I went, oh, that's a good deal. Like I said, that's how you are, okay, I can go there. It changed the way I looked at that man. What he did, I still didn't appreciate, but I had a different feeling entirely. I said, I would say these words, I would whisper them. I saw him many times with my eyes and I'd pray for him and say, Lord, you're ravished for him. You delighted him, I go, okay, okay. I can feel that a little bit, this is easier. Lord could say, my yoke is easy. If you do it my way, my yoke is easy. Doesn't mean there's not a lot of hard work, but it means if you relate to me and work with me my way through my lens, through my paradise, I mean paradigm, the yoke is easy. Doesn't mean the work is easy, the yoke is easy because your heart is enlarged and it's invigorated in the journey. Top of page three. Well, I want to get to this idea. We're going to again, develop it through this course, the belovedness. Well, the anchor to this truth is found in Jesus. I want you to note two things. I note something here and then we'll look at it for a moment that on two occasions, God, the father, so to speak, bent over the balcony of heaven, looked down to his son and audibly out loud, like thunder, you are my beloved son. He did it twice. That's remarkable. The first time was right before Jesus went into the temptation and the temptation, the wilderness for 40 days, Satan literally appears. I've seen a demon a time or two. I don't like it. I don't like the feeling. I don't like the look of it. I know I got authority. I don't even like anything about it. Satan appeared to him with all of his power. Jesus is weakened in his human, his humanities, fully God. But as a man, he's living as the Holy Spirit gives him human strength. His strength as a man is drawn by the Holy Spirit, just like you, just like me. He wasn't living out of the resource of his deity, though he never ever lost it. He was living like a man who lives by faith and in relationship to the father, to the spirit. And he's weak. His body is weighed down 40 days of water. Satan comes in all of his splendor and fierceness to him because Jesus is in the position as the second Adam that Adam was in the garden of Eden. And Jesus gives three temptations in the wilderness, the same three temptations that Adam got in the garden of Eden, the same three. I'm not gonna go to it right now. Adam yielded, and therefore the whole human race went in a different direction. Jesus has to, as a man, stand in the same place that Adam stood, but it's not a garden of paradise where he's fully refreshed. It's a wilderness, 100 degrees, whatever, parched, no food, the fierceness of Satan. Jesus had to say yes to the father in the same three temptations that Adam yielded to. The father knew what Jesus was facing. And beforehand, he says, Jesus, my beloved, my beloved, and the very statement of Jesus's belovedness. I don't know how it all works because he's fully God, but he's fully man too. But I know that the truth of being God's beloved was a source of warfare in one of the greatest moments of temptation in his life. Well, then three plus years later, right before the cross, the Mount of Transfiguration, Moses and Elijah appear, and God speaks audibly again. It says they appeared to speak to Jesus, Matthew 17, about his coming death. I mean, could you imagine Moses and Elijah showing up from history? Hi, Jesus, like Peter, James, and John are going, what on earth is going on? And they came to talk to Jesus about his death. For the second time, the Lord speaks out like thunder. Jesus, you're my beloved. That truth empowered him in the wilderness, and it empowered him on the cross. And we look at that as a, I don't, more than a model. I don't know what the word is, but we look at that, how the Father and the Son related, and in the two most intense hours of temptation, of course, the cross being far more than the other, but the other being the second most powerful time of temptation, and he was energized, empowered by the truth of you are my beloved. Beloved, the end time church is gonna be empowered to face the persecution, a type of the cross, and to face temptation, the whole harlot Babylon reality by the same truth, our belovedness to God. I mean, I don't mean we earn anything by persecution, but the end time church is going to bear the cross, not for their own salvation, but in that way of standing for truth. And we're gonna face the onslaught of temptation like no time in history. And the two times that Jesus was tempted most, the same truth was uttered over him. You are my beloved, and beloved, the Song of Solomon captures this theme and unpacks it right from the first chapter to the eighth chapter in this poetic love song. And I believe, again, the great love songs of God's heart, the bridegroom king, are gonna be released by the spirit all through the body of Christ, calling them the beloved of God to withstand the fierce temptations and the fierce persecution of the generation the Lord returns, and the church will stand unified across the nations, the spirit and the bride, the church and her bridal identity. Come, Jesus, we are yours, you are our king, you are our beloved, and we are yours. This love song is, Song of Solomon is not of secondary importance. Again, because it's poetic, because it's a song, some people go, yeah, but, I go, no, no, no, no, don't do yeah, but. It's only one generation that is the bridegroom generation where the church worldwide sees the Messiah as a bridegroom, only one generation in history, because they have to, they have to see who he is, their beloved, and who they are as his beloved to withstand the temptation and the persecution, that type of a cross that, the same way that Jesus was empowered. And again, the mystery of how a man who's fully God and fully man, how that all works, I don't even pretend to understand the depths of that. We are his beloved, look at paragraph five, I mean, Roman numeral five. The secret to who you are, the secret to your identity, to your destiny, to your greatness, the secret to your satisfaction is in the heart and in the words of the Father over you. In the words of the Son, so many believers, because we're humans, we're still wanting to get our identity and our definition of success and greatness from the mouth of another person. And I believe that there's ways where you do that through encouragement, but the primary way that we establish our identity, our sense of worth and success is from the mouth of God. And I believe that the song of Solomon, the truth of our belovedness, God's gonna wash the church with it. And that's why I wanna take these themes to this course and highlight on just themes and pull them out of the book of Revelation and see where they are from Genesis to Revelation, I mean, the book of Song of Solomon and see where they are established from Genesis to Revelation. Being God's beloved, Jesus said in paragraph eight, John 15, one of my favorite verses, Jesus said, in the same way the Father loves me, I'm telling you, that's the way I relate to you, that's how I feel about you. We will enjoy intimacy with God's heart more and more as we interact with this truth. And again, it's not just a, we agree with it, we gotta stay with it in an intentional way. It needs to get into our lips, into our prayer life, into the language of our dialogue with the Lord. Paragraph B, Paul referred to it, he called the saints the beloved of God. Paragraph C, in Ephesians, he chose us before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blame before him in love. Some translations say he chose us in love to be holy and blameless, that before the world was ever created in love, he chose us that we would be holy and like him. Look at verse six, that we would be accepted in the beloved. Go down to paragraph two. God gives himself to us in a way that he gave himself to Jesus. He frames out the whole relationship through the grid of Jesus being the beloved of God, and we're accepted in that tone and in that spirit of the relationship. The beloved of God accepts us before God, we're accepted in that place where belovedness is the primary truth and dominating theme of the relationship. We're not just accepted in the king, that I would take that, in the beloved we're accepted because the nature of the relationship is a mutual two-way belovedness. It's more than servants. Paragraph D, we looked, as I already said this, but we looked first to the father for our primary identity. We don't look to it from people. Naturally, we do look to people for it, but we wanna go on this journey where we're saying that's not enough. They're not giving me the recognition, the honor, the value that I really should have. And the Lord says, no one's gonna ever do it just right. Get it from me first. Then you'll be able to receive it or not receive it from others. Get it from me first. A believer that's confident and being God's beloved will be far more dedicated, far more consistent. Paragraph E, now this is for all of you that teach the word of God. Again, whether you're teaching one-on-one in your home to your children, whether you're teaching on the internet, through social media, condemnation, rejection, despair is overcome in the truth of being his beloved. You don't have to use that term every time, but when I meet somebody, they have condemnation and compromise. They're caught in bondage. It's not the only truth, but I know that's the dominant truth that's gonna liberate them when it's all said and done. It's not the only thing, but I know that's the dominant truth as a Bible teacher and a shepherd. And when you get that clear in your heart, the condemnation, the despair, the shame, the addiction, that is overcome by the truth of his beloved. It's the many facets of that diamond. The truth of his beloved being his beloved has many facets. It's a diamond with many facets. The most effective way to empower them, to liberate them is to lead them to that truth, that vast diamond of being his beloved, of which the Song of Solomon for eight chapters is all about. It's the way to your liberty and mine. It's the way to your greatness. It's the way to your satisfaction. It's the way to your freedom, but it's also the way to the people you minister to. And when you have that clear, then you don't ever wanna graduate from this truth. Paragraph F, just the last minute or two here. The primary battleground in the spirit is Satan's accusations against our identity. He's gonna accuse us to get us to yield to the temptations of this generation, and he's gonna accuse us to try to get us to back away in fear from standing and bearing persecution. He wants to bring temptation, and he wants us to cower before persecution by weakening us with accusation. He tells us we're not God's beloved. He tells us we've gone too far. He tells us it's too late, but the truths of this song will say exactly opposite. It's like a weapon in God's hand, I mean, in the hands of God's people, by the spirit to break Satan's lies. Paragraph G, look what John wrote about himself five times. Five times, I mean, there's nothing in the Bible where a guy talks about himself five times in the same way he describes himself as the beloved. But the term John uses is the one God loves, but it's the same truth as the beloved. Paragraph H, David did it. Look at Psalm 60. You're beloved. After David struggled in sin and compromise and ziklag, the day he got free, I mean, after 16 months of compromise, look what Psalm 18, verse 19. He says, God delivered me from my dilemma and my compromise. Why? Because you repented? Well, yeah, David did repent, but why'd God deliver you? He says, because God likes me. David, how could you say that? You've been in ziklag 16 months. You ought to say God delivered me because something, I don't know, but not because he delighted in you, and he goes, that's why he delivered me, and that's why I didn't give up, because I knew his heart and his gentleness and my weakness and my sin is what's making me great, because I didn't give up, because he was gentle with me. He didn't cast me aside. Well, the enemy comes and lies, and we feel cast aside, but we're not. David says, no, his gentleness gives me a new beginning every day so I can go on to be great, meaning I can do the will of God completely in my life. Look at paragraph I. Jeremiah, this is intense. He's speaking about Israel. When Israel is under the Babylonian discipline, the discipline of God in Babylon, that being the most severe discipline Israel's gone through in the Old Testament, but look what Jeremiah, that God says. He says, what has my beloved to do in my house? Because they were still in the temple. They were offering sacrifices to demons. He goes, they're doing these little things, but, and they're in my temple offering sacrifice to demons, but, but, but they're still my beloved. Like I look and I go, wow, what language. Lord, if that's how you feel about Israel, is that how you feel about me? Because yes, you're my beloved even when I'm disciplining you. Look at chapter 12. I have given the dearly beloved of my heart into the hands of her enemies to Babylon to discipline her, to wake her up, but she's the dearly beloved of my soul. Jeremiah 31, Jeremiah was persecuted by so many of the leaders in Israel in his day because he kept saying discipline's coming, bondage is coming, Babylon's coming. And they said, stop saying that. You're getting the whole nation afraid. He goes, they need to be afraid. They need to be afraid. And they put Jeremiah in prison a couple of times. And here's what God, here's what Jeremiah said. Verse three, the Lord appeared to me. He appeared to me. He said, Jeremiah, I know you're in prison. I know you're hurting. I know everybody's rejecting you, but I want you to know I love you. I love you, Jeremiah, with everlasting love. Keep telling them I love them, but know in your imprisonment, in your difficulty, I love you. And J, paragraph J, there's more references. Look at Romans 12, worship team, come on up. We're called beloved. When we're tempted to take our own vengeance in bitterness, the Lord says, don't, don't, I will repay because you're my beloved, you can trust me. Look at 1 Peter 2, right towards the end. When we're facing temptation of lust, it's the truth of being his beloved that empowers us. 1 Peter 4, when we're facing trials, it's the truth of being his beloved. Like Jeremiah, it sustains us. The book of Song of Solomon is this explosion of God's heart. You are my beloved. I am yours and you are mine together forever, not just in eternity. Now, you are my beloved. I am your beloved. Amen. Let's stand before the Lord.