Mike Bickle explores the themes of the Bride's value and her partnership with the King in the Song of Solomon, emphasizing the importance of seeing the worth in others as God sees them. He highlights the Bride's journey from understanding her own value to recognizing the value of others, even those who may be immature or difficult. Bickle illustrates how serving others can lead to persecution, but ultimately, the Bride is vindicated by both the community and the King. The sermon encourages believers to engage in ministry with a heart of love and commitment, regardless of recognition or response, and to find joy in serving the Lord amidst challenges.

Solomon chapter 6, and for those that are new with us today, the Song of Solomon is an eight-chapter love song, and it can be interpreted in two different ways. Both of them are biblical. The first way, it's a natural love song extolling the beauty of married love. It's a romantic poem between King Solomon and his bride. It was meant to be a poem about the beauty of married love, but it can also be interpreted through New Testament principles as King Jesus loving his bride. And the language of this love song, this eight-chapter love song, is the agricultural language of that day. So we interpret some of the symbols spiritually by understanding their plain meaning in the agricultural sense of that day, and we take places in the Bible where those symbols are used and defined in a clear way. So we take the biblical use of those terms, and we take the plain sense of how they were used in an agricultural society, and that's how we give an estimation as to what the details mean spiritually. And as long as they honor New Testament principles, we're on safe ground, even if we understand one of the features differently, as long as it honors and magnifies principles taught in the New Testament, that we would love and obey Jesus and honor Him accordingly, then we're on safe ground reading this book. Well, let's look at paragraph one, an overview of the passage tonight that we're looking at. Now, we just finished in the last session with chapter six, verse four to ten, and it's one of the most remarkable passages in this love song describing the value of the bride to the king. He magnified how valuable and beautiful she was to him in the spirit. That's chapter six, verse four to ten. That's our last session. But the bride now has learned to see the value that others have to the king, because she has seen the value she has to the king, and she goes, well, if he sees me this way, that's how he sees others. Therefore, that's how I should see others. So when we understand the way the Lord looks at us, there's a very practical application. That's how he looks at other believers, even believers that bother you and trouble you, even immature believers that are acting in their pride and living in compromise. The Lord still loves them in a way that's beyond anything we can understand. So the bride has learned to see the value that others have to the king as well. It's a first great moment when we understand our value to him, but it only takes a while before we figure out that's how he sees the other believers that are different than us, and even the believers that are troubling us. The Lord loves them. She saw that they were also his garden. She's not the only one that is his garden. They are as well, and they are his inheritance. Therefore, she's committed to serving them, even the immature ones. And then in the place of serving, we'll find out in chapter 6, verse 12, she was overcome with love for them. That in the midst of touching them and walking in the Spirit, those that she would not naturally have loved, she's overcome with love for. Paragraph B. I'm continuing just the overview of this passage because many of the verses we won't stop to consider because of the session being short. So I give you the overview and then give you the notes. After a season of partnering with the king in serving others, because in verse 11 and 12, chapter 6, she's serving others. Well, what happens is she finds she's persecuted. There are those that among the people of God that don't appreciate what she's doing. They don't appreciate the way she lives before God. So they sarcastically put her down. But then right after that, the bride is vindicated by the daughters of Jerusalem. And then right after that, she's vindicated by the king. So she serves. This is the pattern of Scripture. Then she's resisted or persecuted. Then the Lord has those that vindicate and honor her and stand with her among the body. And then the Lord Himself vindicates and honors and stands with those that are seeking to obey Him, even though they might not be doing everything in full maturity. Paragraph C, we can't repeat the basics enough, but this is what this passage is actually about, the basics, that the primary calling for every ministry, every individual believer, is to work together with other believers to build the church and engage in the Great Commission and make disciples. So whatever a specific assignment God gives you in context to this, everybody is to build a church, engage in the Great Commission, and make disciples. And you may do that in the context of building a prayer room and doing outreach, but you're still building the church and you're making disciples, engaging in the Great Commission. Paragraph 2, let's look at now, she begins, we start in chapter 6, verse 11. She says, after, remember, chapter 6, the verses before, the Lord has just, the King has just revealed how He feels so deeply about her and the destiny and dignity she has in His kingdom. And she's deeply encouraged and moved and excited. So the first thing she does with that encouragement is she launches out again in agricultural language to go serve others in the garden of the Lord, because the garden is the local church. The garden is the body of Christ even worldwide. She goes, I went down to the garden of nuts, this is the walnut grove, to see the growth that's growing in the valley. And she went down to see whether the vine had budded or the pomegranates had bloomed. So she went down to the valley in the midst of the garden, and she wanted to see these budding vines. Now remember, these vines, this garden is spiritually speaks of the Lord, where the garden of the Lord, the body of Christ is. And we're a part, He's the vine, we're part of the branches. But it's these budding vines, these, they haven't borne fruit yet, but she went down to get involved with them to see how they're doing. And in the midst of it, she involves herself deeply with them. Paragraph B, these vines are budding, their own, the fruitfulness is just beginning. Now paragraph A, let's go back to that, the bride committed herself to minister to those that were less spiritually mature than she was. Now that sounds noble, less spiritually mature than she, but here's what that means in real life. They're not always very responsive. She gives them the same lesson over and over, but they're not as mature, sir, so they don't respond as quickly or as deeply. They're not as grateful as she is. They're not as humble as she is. They aren't as balanced as she is. In other words, they could really trouble her if she did not have God's perspective of them. Now everybody wants to be involved in ministry. Everybody does, that I know. The problem is when we actually get involved in ministry, because the people, they're not as grateful, they're not so humble, they're not as responsive, and it's like, what is this about? And the Lord says, that's the budding vines that I want you to be involved with. Well Lord, they're not responsive, they're not grateful, they're not humble. I mean, they're actually criticizing me after I serve them. He says, yeah, remember the verses before, verse 4 to 10, how I see you and how you move me. Lay hold of that, and you will stay steady in your patience with these young tender vines. Paragraph B. She valued, in the middle paragraph B, the budding virtues in others. She saw the beginning of their commitment, and the reason she valued their budding virtues, because you will remember, back in chapter 4, the Lord once valued her budding virtues, and she remembered it. How the Lord was kind to her when her commitment was just beginning to emerge. The Lord said, your commitment is real, and it touches me. Well now it's in a different situation, and now she is having to see the value of just the budding commitment of those that she's serving. Her enthusiasm for others flowed from knowing His enthusiasm for her when she was immature, back in chapter 4. That's one thing that helps me, is that when I'm with those that are not responding, and they're not being humble, and they're being selfish, and proud, and troublesome, the Lord says, well and so were you, and I was enthusiastic about you. Oh yeah, so be enthusiastic about them. Don't push them away. Paragraph D. The garden and the vine, it speaks of God's people in the New Testament language. Paul said, we are God's fellow workers, you are God's garden, you are God's field. Some translations say God's garden. Paragraph E. Now the bride's heart was genuinely to serve these young vines, these young budding plants. Now her heart to genuinely serve them speaks of more than serving to find a place to be recognized, and to feel good about ourselves. And what I mean by that, I've seen a lot of folks over the years, they want to serve, but they want to serve basically to get recognized. And if those young budding vines don't recognize them, and others don't either, then they're disinterested, and they feel burned out, and they feel disappointed, because they're more in it to establish a place for themselves in ministry, than they are to actually minister to the young budding vines. Now I've stumbled in that, I get that. I've had to repent of that a number of times over the years. But if we're looking for ministries, a place for recognition, I want to promise you something. Because we all have that by nature, you will get burnt out, disappointed, and you'll be tempted with bitterness. But if we switch over, and we see those young budding vines as the Lord's inheritance, and how He feels about them, then regardless whether we're recognized, whether doors open, whether we're honored, whether any money comes our way, any recognition comes our way, we can stay faithful, because we're actually serving them for the Lord. Now everybody says that, but when the doors don't open, and the recognition doesn't come, all kinds of negative attitudes begin to emerge. That's the alarm system of the Lord saying, alarm, alarm, you're serving for the wrong reasons, you're serving for the wrong reasons. Well they're not responding right. He goes, well neither did you when you were starting out, and I stayed with you, so stay with them. Top of page 2. Well in the midst of serving, she's overcome with love. The bride, paragraph A, she was overcome with love for God's people, for the King's people. She says in verse 12, she's down there in the valley, in the garden, serving the budding vines, and she goes, before I was even aware, I'm in the midst of the hot Sun, pulling weeds, immature people, not much seemingly happening, I can't measure the growth very clearly, doesn't seem like I'm gaining any ground. Suddenly, before I was even aware, my soul had made me as the chariots of my noble people. So while, paragraph A, while in the valley, she's working with the budding vineyard, her soul became like the chariots of nobility. This is depicting her zeal for the people she's serving. Paragraph B, her chariot, her soul moved quickly towards them like a chariot. She goes, I was a little tentative at first, I went down to check them out, but I found that as I was serving, and with my eyes on the Lord, and my eyes not on them so much, but on the Lord, and seeing how the Lord felt about them, and felt about me serving them, I felt my soul move towards them in a powerful way. She goes, my soul was like a chariot of the noble ones. Now the best chariots in the ancient world belonged to the nobility, to the royal family. They were the chariots that were fast and powerful. In other words, I'm powerfully, my heart is moving towards them, when I only went down to see them, and to be involved a little bit, but it grabbed hold of my heart. She found strong desires to serve God's people. Instead of being put off by their immaturity at the end of paragraph B, instead of being put off by their pride, their lack of discernment, their lack of commitment, their lack of gratitude, their lack of humility, she felt compassion for them. Again, the most natural response in ministry that I've witnessed over 40 years, is people minister, typically, five or ten years, and many of them end up burnt out and bitter. They're angry. They're disappointed. They go, that's how the body of Christ treats me. And the reason that they're burnt out, they were doing it for all the wrong reasons. That's why the payback didn't equal what they expected. That's where the burnout and the bitterness comes. But I've found that when I have that response, and I've had that response sometimes, I shift my soul, the alignment of my soul, and I go, I'm going to do it for the right reasons. And when that happens, my soul then moves towards the people, and even the place of service, where I'm not maybe appreciated or even understood. My soul moves towards them like a noble, the chariot of a nobleman, the fastest, most efficient, powerful chariots of that day. Something happens in my heart if I'm doing it with the Lord and unto the Lord. When I get disconnected from Him, the work of ministry, whether it's full-time or whether it's part-time, whatever way that you do ministry, ministry is burdensome if you're not connected with the right paradigm, the right perspective. Paragraph D. Well, the bigger truth here is that Jesus loves the whole church. What I mean by the whole church, He wants every man to be presented to Him in Christ. He wants even the churches down the road that aren't like you, that disagree with you. He wants even the believers that don't like you. He wants us to love them. See, it's real easy to love the denomination or the stream in the body of Christ that we're like, that we're part of. It's easy to love the people that value what we value in our ministry. But the Lord says, wait, I want you to love the whole church because I do. But Lord, look at the way they do things. He says, yeah, but look at my blood has been shed for them. They're part of my family forever. And this affects the way that we view all of those little ones or the big ones, whatever, in the valley, in the garden, in the vineyard of the Lord. Well, she gets two responses after she's serving with this heart that's moved like a chariot, deeply moved for the people she's serving. And beloved, that's a gift when that happens. That's not always the case. As a matter of fact, I have found many times it's not the case. I mean, people start off well, but the five and ten year mark, their soul isn't moving towards the people they're serving. Again, they feel a little burnt out. They feel misunderstood. They feel a little worn out. And negative things begin to happen on the inside of them. So what happens is that chapter Roman numeral four, there's two responses that come from the church or from the king's people. Verse one, she's been serving now, partnering with the Lord. I mean, verse 13, the first group says, return, return, O Shulamite. Return. We want to look upon you. We want more. We want to receive more from you. That's powerful. Some fully embrace her. Some of the king's people fully embrace her, but the others respond with sarcasm. The end of the verse. Then another company, and I assume the other company is the watchmen from the chapter before chapter five, they respond sarcastically. What would you see in the Shulamite, they tell these daughters of Jerusalem. Why do you even pay attention to her? She's not a big deal. Matter of fact, we wounded her and took her ministry away back in chapter five, verse seven. Why are you even paying attention to her, daughters of Jerusalem? What's the big deal about her? I find that almost, I mean, so often when people are dedicated to the Lord, there's two responses. There are people, those in the body of Christ, that don't like their dedication, and others that do like their dedication, and there's usually a good number on each side of the response. The spiritual application, or at least one spiritual application to this principle, is the bride's lifestyle of dedication is embraced by part of the church, while another part persecutes her. That happened in Jesus' day. It wasn't, we think of the scribes and Pharisees as legalistic, but at their heart, at their core, they were compromisers was the real deal. Jesus said, you love money, and you love praise. That's your problem. It wasn't just they loved the law, and they were legalistic. They were legalistic, but their bigger problem is they loved money, and they loved praise. They loved ease. They loved honor, and that's why they didn't like Jesus' message. They didn't like His dedication. They didn't like His message about dedication. Paragraph B, so the first group says, return, O Shulamite, that we may look upon you. Paragraph B, the first response was one of respect and admiration towards her, to receive from her more. They wanted her to return from the valley, and the garden, and the vineyard where she was laboring. They said, hey, come back home. Get back home from your ministry trip. Come and minister to us. We receive from you. We want to, we like it when you're here. But paragraph C, again, I'm just repeating it, the other group, they said, what do you even see in the Shulamite? It's sarcastic. It's a, the second response was sarcasm, or sarcastic, presumably from the jealous watchman who had struck her and took her ministry away. And in essence, they censored her, and they put her on probation. They didn't like her. The Lord liked her, but some of the elders didn't like her. Top of page 3, then at the end of chapter 6, verse 13, just to end the phrase, one cap says, return, Shulamite. We want to look at you. We will receive from you. The other cap says, what's the big deal about her? And then this little phrase, it's the dance of two camps. That's the description of what's going on. There's this dance of two camps going on. This can speak of the conflict between the daughters of Jerusalem and the watchmen, related to how they viewed the bride. Now again, this is a poem. It's the daughters of Jerusalem and the watchmen. They're part of the people of God. And so the bride just figuratively speaks of those that are pressing in hard after God. The whole body of Christ in the age to come, everybody's the bride. So this is only a love story. It's a love song depicting different figures, meaning I've had people read this love song and they go, well, they're like the daughters of Jerusalem. Well, they're clearly the watchmen, and I'm the bride. I go, no, don't even do all that. Don't figure out who's who. The idea, the bride depicts the one who is receiving from the Lord his heart and wanting to be radically committed. And our goal is to see everyone that way, but between now and the Lord's return, there will be always different responses, even radically different responses to the grace of God, even within the camp of the Lord. Two camps, extreme polarized view, and many, many different responses in between the polarized ones. And the real reason this matters isn't so that people get a persecution complex. That's not the point. The point is, when there is resistance, don't be troubled. Don't be offended. Don't be discouraged. Don't quit. Being resisted is part of the divine pattern of growing in love. That's the reason I'm pointing it out. Not pointing it out to say, if you've got somebody that thinks you're off, you're amazing. You must be so remarkable because someone doesn't like you. Everybody has somebody who doesn't like them, so don't get complex about it. But don't give up either. It's how it really is. Paragraph 8, the dance between the two camps speaks of the interaction of the two companies in the polarized extreme sense. Those radically committed and those just doing the least they have to respond to God to just be still be in the family of God. And there's a lot of conflict between those that are doing the least amount of response as possible and those that are seeking to give the greatest response to God possible. There's often collision between them. And again, there's many, many different measures of response. And there isn't any one group that's one or the other. It's just, again, a poem. It's depicting the conflict that happens. Matthew chapter 10, Jesus said, don't think I came to bring peace. I didn't come to bring peace. I came to bring a sword. Well, He did come to bring peace. The angels cried out at His birth, you know, peace and goodwill to men because of Him. He did come to bring peace. He's the Prince of Peace. What He was saying is, I'm not only bringing peace, there will be conflict before there's perfect unity. There will be perfect unity before it's over. I believe the Lord is coming back for a church that will be unified across the world, where the whole body of Christ is honoring and valuing the other parts of the body of Christ that aren't just like them. But He says, in the process of the unfolding of my kingdom, there will be conflicts. There will be many, many tensions, so don't lose heart and give up and just give in to despair. Often, wholeheartedness is at the core of many divisions. The quest for wholeheartedness or the quest for not wholeheartedness. I mean, there's a lot of doctrines out there around the grace of God validating compromise and fighting about it. And there's others that are validating wholeheartedness, and some of them approach it the wrong way, some of them approach it the right way, some of them half and half. There's all these kinds of different approaches, and there's conflict in the midst of it. And the Lord says, don't grow weary, stay steady, keep your eyes on Me. Romans 5, chapter 7. So now, in the midst of the conflict, the question in the air is, who is the Shulamite that we should pay attention to? Who is she? So in chapter 7, verse 1 to 5, sincere believers, the daughters of Jerusalem, they're sincere, but they're still immature. And again, the story language, the picture language of this love song, they're the immature ones. They vindicate her. Verse 1 to 5, they talk about how glorious she is. They said, you want to know the answer to what about the Shulamite? Let me tell you, she's beautiful. And it goes and gives 10 different features about her. Paragraph B, the daughters highlighted 10 characteristics of the bride. Now again, they're using agricultural terms and using her physical features, because it's originally a love song between a man and a woman, a husband and a wife. That's what I'm talking about. But the spiritual application, we take the agricultural terms in their plain meaning. We take the symbolic, what the Bible says, when some of these terms have symbolism that's in the Bible. And we make sense of it. And I'm not going to go through these 10 characteristics. You can, I have a bit more on the additional notes on the website, if you care about that. But the first, the one verse I do want to read is verse 5. It says, your head crowns you like Mount Carmel. The hair of your head is like purple. It's not a Bible verse about purple hair. That's not what this is about. A king is held captive by your tresses or by your hair. This is the daughters of Jerusalem saying, the king is held captive by who you are. We are for you, and we want to receive from you, and we vindicate, and we endorse, and stand with you. And we know the king is held captive by your love for him. No matter what the others are saying, the Lord loves you. That's what they're saying to her. Top of page 4. Look, looking at the verse we just read, I want to look at it again. I really like that of the 10 characteristics, this is the one I like the most. The other ones are valuable. Again, they're spiritual features, reading it through the spiritual interpretation that have New Testament values in them. But the head speaks of the thought life. The head that's got hair, it says the hair of your head is like purple. Your head crowns you like Mount Carmel. That speaks of a thought life that's filled with royal thoughts, being crowned like Mount Carmel. High and lofty thoughts, royal thoughts. You can put either one of those you wanted there. High and lofty, heavenly thoughts, like Mount Carmel. Paragraph M says that the king is held captive. The king speaks of the heart of God being held captive by the bride's dedication. I mean, what a statement. I mean, there's a number of these kinds of statements in this love song. The king is held captive by your thought life and by your dedication. The king is moved by the way you think and he's moved by the choices you make. Now we look at our thought life and we look at our choices and we go, oh my. And the Lord knows that we're still in our weakness in the days of our flesh. But your thoughts aren't just bad thoughts. Yes, you have bad thoughts. I have bad thoughts. Whether they're proud or angry or all kinds of negative thoughts you can have. Bitterness. I think anger is probably the most prevailing bad thought. Some think, well, I think it's probably immorality. I think anger is probably the most prevailing negative thought in the human race. Anger that touches on bitterness or the beginning of bitterness. Those kinds of things. But the Lord doesn't only see the negative. He sees that even in the midst of your struggle you're saying, but I love you and I want to obey you. And I'm reading the word and I'm trying to find strength and how to lay hold of it by the Holy Spirit that I can obey you. And the Lord says, that moves me. That moves me. I mean, here you are on a Friday night. You could be anywhere in the world. You're in a Bible study, in a Bible school class on a Friday night. Do you know how much of the earth is not in a Bible school class on a Friday night? And not only that, we take a ten-minute break and have session two. Well, just a little prelam. Session one we're talking about the Shulamite. In session two we're going to talk about the Harlot Babylon. So we got a real contrast here tonight. Actually that is Revelation 17 and 18 it is. Just happens to be. But here's the point. The very fact you're in this room, I don't mean it's this room, you're in a Bible study on a Friday night. I mean, a lot of you from Korea, you flew a long way, East Coast, West Coast, or from Korea or those from Brazil, hundreds of you, you paid a lot of money to come sit in a prayer room to hear Bible teachings. So yeah, I got bad thoughts too. And the Lord says, yeah, but you got good thoughts. Look at the decision, look at the thought process you went through to do that. And again, it's not about being here. You could be said that about a million places you could be in the body of Christ. The Lord's moved by that. That isn't inconsequential to him. That's not nothing to him. He is held captive by the dedication of his people, even in our weakness. It moves him. Now, of course, here in chapter seven, in the sense of this love song, this spiritual love song between Jesus and the bride. Chapter seven, she is at a significant maturity right now. Because each chapter, the maturity is growing if you follow the storyline of the eight chapters. I call it the progression of holy passion. She's getting more mature chapter by chapter as she responds to more and more truth. His love is so powerful it binds him to weak people who love him. I mean, his love is so glorious that he takes my weak devotion and it moves him. That's how powerful he is. It's his glory to be captivated by his people. That's not God's weakness. That's not diminishing his glory that he's held captive in that love language. Again, I'm using a poetic language. It's not a diminishing of God's glory. It is his glory that he would be so loving he would let people like us capture his heart. That is his glory. The glory of God is not about how powerful he is or how smart he is. That is his glory, undoubtedly. But the greater glory of God is that one so powerful and one so smart is moved so deeply by us. That is his glory. That's remarkable. What kind of God is he? That the language of Scripture, he could be held captive by the dedication of his people. Well, Roman numeral 6, now we move on to the next. It's not only the daughters of Jerusalem are vindicating the bride because the watchmen are saying, why are you even paying attention? And the daughters of Jerusalem, chapter 1 verses 1 to 5, they spoke up. Now the king is speaking up. You say, well, how do you know? Well, I got a bit of this explained on the notes, how the change of the voice in the person, first person to third person. You can follow the storyline if you pay attention to the details. I got a bit of that on the notes on the website that I don't have in these notes. So now the king speaks up and he's going to release a great measure of grace. He's not only moved by her but he's going to cause a greater measure of grace. Now the grace is free and we receive the fullness of grace available the day we're born again, but we experience it in our mind and emotions at greater measures as we mature in the Lord. We don't earn the grace that we experience a greater measure of, but our mind and emotions are touched by the grace of God more and more as we mature. That's what I mean by a greater measure. The king, as you'll read, we're not going to spend time on this, but the king gives her a threefold commissioning to her ministry. He commissions her to nurture others. He commissions her to release the presence of the Spirit, again using the symbolic language of this love poem, and he commissions her to maintain her intimacy with him. And again we're going to move on, but I just wanted to highlight that. The king speaks up in the storyline of this poem, top of page five. Then we go on to the final part of this section, chapter 7 verse 9 to chapter 8 verse 4. The bride describes now four aspects in this passage of walking out mature partnership with the king. You can read that more clearly just when you have more time, but there's four descriptions of what mature partnership looks like. But in the very first verse of this next section is chapter 7 verse 9, but it's in the middle of verse 9. It says this strange statement. Now the bride is speaking. Now she's speaking. The king was speaking before, but now she's speaking. At first the daughters of Jerusalem, verse 1 to 5. Then the king, verse 6 to verse 9. Then the second half of verse 9. Now the bride speaks and gives her response to these affirmations and these validations of her sincerity in her walk with the Lord. She says the wine goes down smoothly for my beloved, moving gently the lips of sleepers. I am my beloved, his desire is for me. This is the bride clearly speaking here. When she says the wine goes down smoothly, the bride is expressing her enthusiasm to obey the king. The idea is that in the poetic language of love I have written in here, is that this refers to her in a instantaneous agreement with his leadership. And the wine and the vine often in the picture language would speak of Old and New Testament speaks of the ministry of the Holy Spirit. The vine and the wine and those terms associated with that speak of the Holy Spirit's ministry. What she's saying here is I'm not wrestling with him. I'm not choking on the Holy Spirit's leadership. I'm not, you know, it's not difficult. It's not, it's not a bad tasting medicine that I have to take because I mean after all is God, so I better obey because I'm gonna get in trouble if I don't. She goes, no, the wine goes down smoothly. I quickly receive the Holy Spirit's leadership. I love the Holy Spirit's leadership. I don't grieve him. I don't quench him. I don't push him away. I don't choke and cough over the medicine I'm taking because it's not. It's the good leadership of God is what is being said here in the poetic language of this love song and she says, I am my beloved. I belong to my beloved and he belongs, his desire is for me. Paragraph C, when she says the wine goes down smoothly for my beloved, she says, paragraph C, she's indicating she obeys the Holy Spirit because the King is her beloved. She obeys out of love. I find that sometimes this isn't the verse I use all the time but I've used it over the years. When obedience is difficult, when the Holy Spirit is challenging me to something and I'm resisting in my flesh, sometimes I'll stop and I'll confess, Lord, the wine goes down smoothly because you're the one I love. I love you. Yes, I will do what you say and it's mostly about humbling myself and mostly about serving in hard ways. That's more or giving in ways I don't want to. That's mostly where it really presses in in a personal way. I go, I don't want to do it. I don't want to be nice. I don't want to humble myself. I don't want to admit my error. I don't want to pour myself out and I pause, not always, by any means. The wine goes down smoothly for my beloved. That's my confession. That's who I am. That's what I will do. I love this verse because I am my beloved's. I belong to him and he is mine. Paragraph G. Her obedience is empowered by seeing herself as belonging to and desired by the king. This has got to be one of the most dynamic statements in the Bible from a, reading it from a redemptive perspective. I am my beloved's. I belong to him. His desire is for me. That the God of Genesis 1, you belong to him and he wants you. He goes, yeah, I take you. I own you. I'm you. You, you are mine. You're my inheritance and my desire is towards you, says the Lord. This is one of the most prominent themes. In the Song of Solomon, she goes in paragraph I, I am my beloved's. This is a powerful insight. When somebody sees they actually belong to him. Now everybody knows the term, but there's a time in a believer's life where it dawns on us, it touches us. We really do belong to him, really. And he has the wisdom and the right to assign us to humble ourself and serve and not get what we want from it, but to get what he wants from it. I don't like that Lord, always. Her focus was on him. What he desires is what she values most. When she says, I belong to him. I am my beloved's. Then her partnership, she expresses it here. Chapter 7, verse 11. She says, I'm yours Lord. I'm all the way with yours. Yes, I've been resisted. I've been written off sarcastically by others. You love me. I'm going with you. And so she really recommits herself to the service of other people. She goes, come my beloved. In other words, that's a prayer. Come Lord Jesus, come and release your presence with me. Now she says this four times. Let us go to the fields. Let us go to the villages. Let us go to the vineyards. Let us see if the vines, the young immature ones are growing and budding. Let us see if the great blossoms are opening. The pomegranates are blooming. Let's see if the young ones are responding. Let's recommit ourselves. Let's fully engage and let's spend our time and our money and our energy. Let's make disciples of the young ones. Let's pour ourselves into those that might not respond well or might not be grateful or might not be humble or might not follow through. I want to go down. She says this to the fields, to the villages, to the vineyards. But look at the very end of verse 12. This is the key phrase I'm going to end in. She goes, there in the midst of the rigors of the work I will give you my love. Paragraph D, top of page 6. We're going to comment on there I will give you my love in just a moment. One point in paragraph D she goes, let us get up early and go to the vineyards. Getting up early speaks of her faithfulness and her diligence and her assignment. She got up early before the others. You know when the assignment is a stewardship from God, you come early and you leave late. You're not looking for shortcuts. But when the work in the kingdom is just a job, you try to come late, you try to leave early, and you try to skip out on as much as you can. But not this one. She says I'll come early. I'll work longer. It's in my heart. It's a part of who I am. It's you that I'm serving, not just the people, though serving people is a valid and a good thing. Roman number 7. We'll just go just one more moment, minute here. She says, let's read it again, verse 11. Come my beloved. Let's go to the field. Let's go to the villages. Let us get up early. And here's the phrase, there I will give you my love. It's there. The Lord really touched my life once some years ago on this verse. It rocked me. I mean I didn't like it to be honest, but I was struggling because I had so much going on in ministry, the labor of it, the hours, and the return didn't seem worth the effort. And a lot of criticism from outside, from inside, and the money wasn't right, and the people were not responding, and you know I spent a lot of time praying and teaching, and I go, I don't want to keep doing this. I'd rather just be alone with you. And the Lord spoke to me so clearly. He says, there you will give me your love. That's what I want. In the midst of the rigors, I want you to love me. It's easy to love him under the apple tree, back in chapter 2, at the banqueting table, but he goes, I want you to love me in the rigors of the field, of the valley, of the vineyard, where the young ones aren't responding well, where the watchmen are striking you. That's where I want you not to give up, not to give in. That's where I want your love. Now he wants our love in the early days, but beloved, when we give him love in chapter 7, that's mature love. Paul the Apostle, it says in paragraph C, he labored more than all the others. I mean he had more rigors. He had more pressures, and it was there, in the midst of the vineyards and the labor, he loved him. Now what happens to a lot of folks, I mean it's easy. It's happened to me a few times. In the midst of the fields, and the villages, and the vineyards, that's where we can get bitter. That's where we can get disappointed. That's where we can get preoccupied with how people are treating us. The Lord says, don't be preoccupied with how they're treating you. Be preoccupied with me. I didn't say, there the people will love you. I said, there you will love me. And it's easy. If our mindset isn't right, we can drift away from our intimacy with God, because we're there to get loved by people. And the Lord put us there that we could show even a deeper love for him, by not yielding to the preoccupation and the bitterness. I'm not treated right. I don't get what I want. It's not worth it, the burnout. And the Lord says, why don't you realign yourself and love me there, and you'll find I will refresh you and renew you. Amen and amen.