THE FIRST PART: A BIRD’S EYE VIEW OF THE OLD TESTAMENT
The Books of Poetry
Message Nine—Song of Songs (1)
Scripture Reading: S. S. 1:2-4, 12-14; 2:14-15; 4:7-8, 12-15; 6:4, 10, 13
I. The Bible is a romance, in the most pure and the most holy sense, of a universal couple—God in Christ as the Bridegroom and God’s redeemed people as the bride—John 3:29; Matt. 25:6; Rev. 19:7; 21:2; 22:17:
A. The Bible is the entire revelation of this divine romance, and Song of Songs is an abridged form of this romance.
B. The subject of Song of Songs is the history of love in an excellent marriage, revealing the progressive experience of an individual believer’s loving fellowship with Christ—S. S. 1:2.
C. Song of Songs is a marvelous and vivid portrait, in poetic form, of the bridal love between Christ as the Bridegroom and His lovers as His bride.
D. We need to learn the language of the divine romance—1:12-14; 5:10-16.
II. In Song of Songs the lover of Christ overcomes in stages—S. S. 1:2—6:13:
A. In the first stage of this book, she overcomes the attraction of the world by being captivated by Christ—1:2-4a.
B. In the second stage the lover of Christ overcomes the self, which secluded her from the presence of Christ, by becoming one with the cross of Christ—2:8—3:5.
C. In the third stage the lover of Christ overcomes the old creation (the physical things) by living in the ascension of Christ in resurrection after her self has been dealt with by the cross—3:6—5:1.
D. In the fourth stage the lover of Christ overcomes the flesh, the natural man, the old man, by living within the veil; this requires a deeper experience of the cross—5:2—6:13.
III. God created us for the accomplishment of His eternal economy in His own image with the intention that we could become Him in life and nature but not in the Godhead; for this purpose He created us with a spirit to receive Him, a seeking heart for Himself so that He could be our satisfaction—S. S. 1:2-4:
A. An overcomer should be attracted by Christ and even captivated by Him to give up the world to follow Him—Matt. 4:18-22; 16:24.
B. The yearning to be kissed by Christ is a response to His cheering love and to His charming name—S. S. 1:2.
C. We need to love the Lord in a personal and affectionate way.
IV. “The king has brought me into his chambers—We will be glad and rejoice in you; We will extol your love more than wine”—S. S. 1:4b:
A. Our regenerated spirit as Christ’s dwelling place, which is mingled with and indwelt by Christ as the life-dispensing Spirit, becomes His inner chambers, His practical Holy of Holies, for our participation in and enjoyment of Him as the consummated Triune God—John 3:6; 1Cor. 6:17; 2 Tim. 4:22; Heb. 4:16; 10:19.
B. The fellowship of Christ and His lover in her mingled spirit—S. S. 1:4b-5:
1. In the joy of Christ’s lover with her companions, in their extolling of His unrivaled love.
2. The lover of Christ is enlightened to see that she is a sinner in Adam, but she has been justified in Christ.
C. Christ led us into our spirit and in our spirit, in fellowship with Him, He directed us to the church life—S. S. 1:6b-8:
1. The seeker realized that she was separated from Christ’s flock by the denominational people and that she needed Christ’s feeding and rest with satisfaction—S. S. 1:6b-7; John 10:16; Acts 20:28; 1 Pet. 5:2.
2. She was instructed by Christ to leave the place where she was kept away from the church and go forth on the footsteps of the flock—S. S. 1:8.
V. In the church life the transforming of Christ’s lover is carried out by the transforming Spirit as the consummation of the processed Triune God with the coordination of the lover’s companions, the gifted members in the Body of Christ who do the work of perfecting the saints—1:9, 10, 15; 2:1-2; Eph. 4:11-12:
A. The seeker’s transformation in Song of Songs is carried out by the transforming Spirit; the strings of jewels are a sign of the transforming Spirit—2 Cor. 3:18:
1. The seeker in Song of Songs was likened by the Lord to a horse in Egypt, signifying the world; she is full of natural strength with a strong character, worldly, satanic, and for the world’s purpose.
2. The seeker being transformed into a lily signifies that she is now living a life trusting in God, not in her natural strength; she is also looking unto God with a single eye (eyes of doves), implying that she must also be a dove looking to God by focusing her eyes on one single goal—1:15b.
B. The perfected ones help the seeker to know God in His nature and to experience Christ in His death, resurrection, and ascension.
C. We need to impress them that in the proper church life we pay our attention fully to the Triune God: God the Father as the divine nature and life, God the Son as the divine element, and God the Spirit as the transforming One in His divine essence; this is to minister the Triune God to them.
VI. The lover’s gain and enjoyment of Christ, and Christ’s gain and enjoyment of His lover result in the mutual satisfaction and rest of Christ and His lover in the churches—1:12—2:7:
A. The lover gained Christ as a bundle of myrrh, signifying Christ’s sweet death for her, and as a cluster of henna flowers, signifying Christ in His resurrection in the churches built upon the fountain of His redemption—S.S. 1:13, 14, 16; 2:3, 5; 2 Cor. 12:9.
B. He enjoys the fragrance of His companion in love spreading forth as spikenard; He also enjoys His lover as His wife in His embracing and as a lily expressing Him in the filthy and unbelieving world—1:12b; 2:2.
C. The initial result of the mutual gain and enjoyment of Christ and His lover is a feast, and the consummate result is the banqueting in the banqueting house, the church life—1:12; 2:4.
D. The church life is a mingling of divinity with humanity; as the Spirit glorifies the Son with the Father, the Triune God is wrought into and mingled with the believers.
VII. Christ calls for His lover to be in oneness with the cross; only the cross of Christ can deliver her from the situation caused by introspection—2:9; Heb. 12:2:
A. Christ wants to see His lover’s lovely countenance and hear her sweet voice in her oneness, union, with the cross, signified here by the clefts of the rock and the covert of the precipice—2:14; Luke 9:23.
B. Christ wants His seeker to remain in the cross, in a crucified condition, continually—Gal. 2:20a; 1 Cor. 15:31; 2 Cor. 4:10-11.
VIII. In order to empower and encourage His lover to rise up and come away from her low situation in her introspection of the self, Christ empowers her by showing her the power of His resurrection (vv. 8-9a), and He encourages her by the flourishing riches of His resurrection—2:8-13:
A. Christ encourages His seeker by the flourishing riches of His resurrection—2:11-13:
1. The dormant days (winter) are past and the trials (rain) are over and gone.
2. The life in all appearances is blossoming; the time of praising—singing—has come; the fruit tree has ripened in its fruits, and the vines are in blossom, giving forth their fragrance; this is a portrait of the riches of Christ’s resurrection.
B. Christ, the embodiment of the Triune God, is resurrection before His death; John 11:25 indicates that the entirety of the Triune God is resurrection in the universe—John 11:25; 1 Cor. 15:45b:
1. The resurrected Christ became the life-giving Spirit as the reality of His resurrection; this life-giving Spirit indwells our spirit—Rom. 8:11; Eph. 2:22.
2. In order to experience the life-giving Spirit as the reality of resurrection in our spirit, we have to discern our spirit from our soul—Heb. 4:12.
3. It is in such a mingled spirit that we participate in and experience the resurrection of Christ, the reality of which is the all-inclusive, life-giving, compound Spirit, the consummation of the processed and consummated Triune God—1 Cor. 15:45b; Rom. 8:11.
Ⅸ. Christ’s espousal was linked to God in His moving for the accomplishment of His economy and united with Christ—S. S. 3:6-11:
A. The lover of Christ becomes a new creation by her complete union with Christ; as such a person, she is worthy of God’s economy and is qualified to move with God, in union with Christ for the accomplishing of His economy—cf. 2 Cor. 2:14; 5:17:
1. The lover of Christ, as an overcoming representative of God’s elect, comes from Egypt, the world (wilderness), like persons in the unshakable power of the Spirit (pillars of smoke)—Exo. 14:19; Rev. 3:12.
2. Perfumed with the sweet death and fragrant resurrection of Christ (myrrh and frankincense) and with all the fragrant riches of Christ as a merchant.
3. Although we, the believers in Christ, are on earth, when we are in our spirit, we are joined to the ascended Christ in the heavens; to live in ascension requires that we live, act, move, and do everything in our spirit—Heb. 10:19; Rom. 8:4.
B. The lover of Christ united with Christ in His three prominent attainments—S. S. 3:7-11; Rev. 19:7:
1. His marvelous victory over all the enemies of God in the church age, signified by a bed in the night with sixty mighty men during the war; she is the bed and Christ is the sleeper in the bed; this implies the union, the oneness, of the lover with Christ.
2. His glorious triumph in His kingdom, signified by the palanquin in the day in the triumphant glory.
3. In His espousal and marriage life; His espousal began from the time of incarnation, when incarnation as His mother crowned Him with His humanity, and goes through the church age in which all His believers are espoused to Him as virgins; Christ’s espousal and marriage life cover the church age, the kingdom age, and the eternal age—2 Cor. 11:2.
C. Today we should be people linked to God in His moving in union with Christ and eventually united with Christ in His victory over the enemies in His celebration in the kingdom age and in His eternal marriage life, that is, the New Jerusalem.
Ministry Excerpts:
THE HISTORY OF LOVE IN AN EXCELLENT MARRIAGE,
REVEALING THE PROGRESSIVE EXPERIENCE OF
AN INDIVIDUAL BELIEVER’S LOVING FELLOWSHIP WITH CHRIST
Song of Songs is a particular book in the holy Scriptures, which is a poem of the history of love in an excellent marriage. It is a romance of the highest standard. The entire Bible is a romance, a love story, of God “falling in love” with man. Song of Songs is a history of the wise King Solomon, the writer of this book, with the Shulammite, a girl of the countryside. In this life-study Solomon is called the beloved and the Shulammite is called the lover. (lit., “love”—1:15; 2:2; 4:1, 7; 6:4) Solomon, in the masculine gender, means “peace,” and Shulammite is Solomon in the feminine gender. One is the king in the palace at the capital in Jerusalem, and the other is a girl from the countryside.
As the record of a divine romance, the Bible first shows us that God loves His elect Israel as a Husband who loves His wife (Isa. 54:5-7; Jer. 2:2; 3:1; Ezek. 16:8; Hosea 2:19-20). Israel was a bride and God Himself was the Bridegroom. Thus, there was a bridal love between God and Israel.
Second, the Bible reveals that Christ loves His church as a Husband loves His wife (Eph. 5:25, 31-32; Rev. 19:7-9; 21:2, 9). In Revelation 19 we see that Christ will have His wedding feast with His overcomers as His bride, and His wedding day will be for a thousand years. Then in the new heaven and new earth, all of His believers as the New Jerusalem will be the wife of the Lamb. The New Jerusalem will be the corporate wife of Christ, the Lamb.
Third, According to Paul’s word in 2 Corinthians 11:2, the believers have been betrothed to Christ as pure virgins. In this sense, all the believers of Christ are female. Spiritually, we all, brothers and sisters alike, are virgins betrothed to Christ.
The sections of Song of Songs, which are according to the intrinsic and spiritual significance of this book, are as follows: drawn to pursue Christ for satisfaction (1:2—2:7); called to be delivered from the self through the oneness with the cross (2:8—3:5); called to live in ascension as the new creation in resurrection (3:6—5:1); called more strongly to live within the veil through the cross after resurrection (5:2—6:13); sharing in the work of the Lord (7:1-13); and hoping to be raptured (8:1-14). (The Life-Study of Song of Songs, msg.1)
BEING DRAWN TO PURSUE CHRIST FOR SATISFACTION
God created us for the accomplishment of His eternal economy in His own image with the intention that we could become Him in life and nature but not in the Godhead. For this purpose He created us with a spirit to receive Him. Many people do not realize that God also created us with a seeking heart for Himself so that He could be our satisfaction. Man fell away from God, and sin through Satan came in to frustrate man from receiving God for his satisfaction. Yet the desire for God, the seeking for God, still remains in man’s heart.
THE NEED FOR A PERSONAL AND AFFECTIONATE
RELATIONSHIP WITH CHRIST
Song of Songs is a book in the Bible that tells us how we can be satisfied properly with God. There is no other way except by pursuing after Christ, because Christ is the very embodiment of the Triune God. He is the reality of God. He is God in reality, God’s embodiment, coming to earth to give people the opportunity to receive Him for satisfaction. Song of Songs opens in this way: “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth!” (1:2a). This is what it means to pursue Christ. This is the most personal and affectionate thing. I want to stress these two words: personal and affectionate. The very God whom we pursue is personal and affectionate.
His love is attracting, His name is charming, and His person is captivating. He has drawn and captivated millions of His lovers to pursue after Him and is still doing the same today. Therefore, all His lovers would run after Him for their satisfaction. This is why the seeker prays, “Draw me; we will run after you”.
We all need this kind of personal, affectionate, intimate contact with the Lord every day. This has become my habit. Every morning after rising up I go to my desk and the first thing I say is, “Lord Jesus, I love You.” I am not just a poor man praying to a merciful God, but I am contacting a Savior who is personal and affectionate to me, as I am personal and affectionate to Him. (The Crystallization of Song of Songs, msg.1)
FELLOWSHIPPING IN THE INNER CHAMBERS OF CHRIST
We must go to our spirit. The inner chambers of Christ are His lovers’ regenerated spirits mingled with and indwelt by Him as the life-dispensing Spirit (Rom. 8:16; 2 Tim. 4:22; Rom. 8:11) and are the practical Holy of Holies in Christ’s lovers for their participation in and enjoyment of the pneumatic Christ as the consummated Triune God (Heb. 4:16).
The seeker received the revelation concerning how to enter the church life. The seeker realized that she was separated from Christ’s flock by the denominational people and that she needed Christ’s feeding and rest with satisfaction (vv. 6b-7; John 10:16; Acts 20:28; 1 Pet. 5:2). Christ led us into our spirit and in our spirit, in fellowship with Him, He directed us to the church life. She was instructed by Christ to leave the place where she was kept away from the church and go forth on the footsteps of the flock (S.S. 1:8a). The flock is the church in the proper sense according to the apostles’ teaching in the New Testament. The footsteps of the flock have laid a line showing us the proper way to follow the Lord in His recovery.
The essence of the church is the organic Body of Christ which consummates the New Jerusalem. After we were saved, our concern was merely for our satisfaction, but Christ’s concern is God’s satisfaction, to have His eternal economy accomplished by having us as the members of the church, the essence of which is the organic Body of Christ, which ultimately consummates in the New Jerusalem. We have to learn to say that our concern is God’s concern for the church, for the Body of Christ, and for the New Jerusalem. (The Crystallization of Song of Songs, msg.2)
TRANSFORMED BY THE TRANSFORMING SPIRIT AND
PERFECTED BY THE PERFECTED SAINTS IN THE CHURCH LIFE
The seeker in Song of Songs was likened by the Lord to a horse in Egypt (1:9), signifying the world; she is enslaved by Satan, signified by Pharaoh’s chariots. She is a mare among Pharaoh’s chariots for his worldly purpose. She is full of natural strength with a strong character, worldly, satanic, and for the world’s purpose. But then she is transformed to be a lily (2:1b-2). How can a horse be transformed into a lily? A horse is a strong animal, but a lily is just a little flower. God wants a lily rather than a horse. God does not want our natural strength. The lily does not have strength. The seeker being transformed into a lily signifies that she is now living a life trusting in God, not in her natural strength. She is also looking unto God with a single eye (eyes of doves), implying that she must also be a dove looking to God by focusing her eyes on one single goal (1:15b).
The perfected ones also coordinate with the Spirit to beautify the seeker through the dispensing of the transforming Spirit with the divine life expressed as jewels in strings. Transformation is the working of the Triune God’s attributes into the seeking believers to become their virtues. We all need to learn how to perfect others with the attributes of the Triune God. We need to impress them that in the proper church life we pay our attention fully to the Triune God: God the Father as the divine nature and life, God the Son as the divine element, and God the Spirit as the transforming One in His divine essence. This is to minister the Triune God to them. (The Crystallization of Song of Songs, msg. 3)
SATISFIED WITH CHRIST MUTUALLY IN THE CHURCHES
The lover enjoys Christ as a bundle of myrrh between her breasts in the night. This is Christ in His death for her to embrace privately (1:13). Then she enjoys Christ as a cluster of henna flowers, which is Christ in His resurrection for her to express openly. This cluster of henna flowers is in the vineyards of En-gedi (v. 14). En-gedi means “the fountain of the lamb.” This signifies that Christ in His resurrection in the churches is built upon the fountain of His redemption. This fountain, which is through Christ’s redemption, is the Spirit. In the night we embrace Christ as a bundle of myrrh in His death. In the morning we wear Him as a cluster of henna flowers in His resurrection. This resurrection is in the church built upon the fountain of redemption. Here are the death of Christ, the resurrection of Christ, and the Spirit of Christ. This is the way that we gain Christ. Through the experience of His death and resurrection in His Spirit we gain Him.
Christ gains His lover as a companion in love (1:12), as the wife (2:6), and as a lily, signifying one who lives by His life in trusting in God (2:2). He enjoys the fragrance of His companion in love spreading forth as spikenard (1:12b). He also enjoys His lover as His wife in His embracing (2:6) and as a lily expressing Him in the filthy and unbelieving world (2:2). When we live the lily life, trusting Him and looking unto God with a single eye, the dove’s eyes, that is a joy to Christ and His boast. (The Crystallization of Song of Songs, msg. 4)
CALLED TO BE DELIVERED FROM THE SELF
THROUGH THE ONENESS WITH THE CROSS
Christ wants His seeker to remain in the cross, in a crucified condition, continually (Gal. 2:20a; 1 Cor. 15:31; 2 Cor. 4:10-11). However, to remain in the cross is a difficult matter, like entering into the clefts of the rock and the covert of the precipice high in the mountains by a rugged road. In order to empower and encourage His lover to rise up and come away from her low situation in her introspection of the self, Christ empowers her by showing her the power of His resurrection (vv. 8-9a), and He encourages her by the flourishing riches of His resurrection (vv. 11-13). It is by the power of Christ’s resurrection, not by our natural life, that we, the lovers of Christ, determine to take the cross by denying our self (Matt. 16:24). It is also by the power of Christ’s resurrection that we are enabled to be conformed to His death by being one with His cross (Phil. 3:10).
The reality of resurrection is the pneumatic Christ (John 11:25), who as the consummated Spirit indwells and is mingled with our regenerated spirit (1 Cor. 6:17 and notes). It is in such a mingled spirit that we participate in and experience the resurrection of Christ, which enables us to be one with the cross to be delivered from the self and to be transformed into a new man in God’s new creation for the fulfillment of God’s economy in the building up of the organic Body of Christ. (The Holy Bible Recovery Version, S. S. 2:14, footnote 1)
CALLED TO LIVE IN ASCENSION AS THE NEW CREATION
IN RESURRECTION
In order to empower and encourage His lover to rise up and get away from her down situation in her introspection of the self, Christ empowers her by showing her the power of His resurrection by the gazelle’s leaping upon the mountains and the young hart’s skipping upon the hills (2:8-9). It is by this power of Christ’s resurrection that we, the lovers of Christ, determine to take the cross by denying our self (Matt. 16:24). Have we ever had such a determination? Often we forget what we determined to do before God. We need to be reminded. It is also by this power of Christ’s resurrection that we, the lovers of Christ, are enabled to be conformed to His death (Phil. 3:10), to be one with His cross as staying in the clefts of the rock, in the covert of the precipice.
Christ encourages His seeker by the flourishing riches of His resurrection. The dormant days (winter) are past and the trials (rain) are over and gone. The life in all appearances is blossoming. The time of praising—singing—has come. The fruit tree has ripened in its fruits, and the vines are in blossom, giving forth their fragrance. This is a portrait of the riches of Christ’s resurrection.
In order to experience the life-giving Spirit as the reality of resurrection in our spirit, we have to discern our spirit from our soul. In our soul we are the old man (Eph. 4:22), the soulish man, the natural man (1 Cor. 2:14). In our spirit we are the new man (Eph. 4:24), the spiritual man (1 Cor. 2:14-15), that lives and walks in our spirit as God’s Holiest of all, indwelt by and mingled with the life-giving Spirit, the pneumatic Christ. It is in such a mingled spirit that we participate in and experience the resurrection of Christ, the reality of which is the all-inclusive, life-giving, compound Spirit, the consummation of the processed and consummated Triune God. (The Crystallization of Song of Songs, msg. 6)
THE LOVER OF CHRIST WAS LINKED TO GOD IN HIS MOVING FOR THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF HIS ECONOMY AND UNITED WITH CHRIST
After the lover of Christ has experienced the breaking of her self, her natural man, by the cross of Christ and after she has seen the flourishing riches of Christ’s resurrection by which she was empowered and encouraged, she became a spiritual, steady person signified by the unshakable pillar of smoke, the same as God was to the children of Israel in their exodus from Egypt to the wilderness. Thus, she was linked to God in His moving for the accomplishment of His economy and united with Christ in His three prominent attainments:
1) His marvelous victory over all the enemies of God in the church age, signified by a bed in the night with sixty mighty men during the war. She is the bed and Christ is the sleeper in the bed. This implies the union, the oneness, of the lover with Christ.
2) His glorious triumph in His kingdom, signified by the palanquin in the day in the triumphant glory.
3) In His espousal and marriage life. His espousal began from the time of incarnation, when incarnation as His mother crowned Him with His humanity, and goes through the church age in which all His believers are espoused to Him as virgins (2 Cor. 11:2). Christ’s espousal and marriage life cover the church age, the kingdom age, and the eternal age. In the church age Christ has been fighting. This is the time of His espousal. In 2 Corinthians Paul was fighting, and at the same time he was betrothing the believers to Christ. He fought to gain us. Even Paul’s fighting was a part of God’s “dating.” When we preach the gospel, we go out to represent God in His “dating” of His selected sinners.
Christ’s espousal also includes His wedding in the kingdom for one thousand years (Rev. 19:7-8). Ultimately, His marriage life will be in the New Jerusalem in the new heaven and new earth for eternity (21:1—22:5). The bed in the night (signifying the church age), the palanquin in the day (signifying the kingdom age), and the marriage life in the ages all refer to the one lover of Christ—the Shulammite. Eventually, the New Jerusalem will be a corporate Shulammite, including all of God’s chosen and redeemed people. (The Crystallization of Song of Songs, msg. 7)