Song Of Solomon 3:1-5 - Homiletics

The dream of the bride.

I. THE ABSENCE OF THE BELOVED .

1 . The bride ' s distress. In the last chapter the bride related to her female friends some of the incidents of her early love; here she seems to be relating a dream of those same well remembered days. The whole narrative, like that of So Song of Solomon 5:2-8 , has a dream-like character. The circumstances are not such as would be likely to occur in real life; but the longing, the wandering, the search, represent in a vivid truthful way the images of dreams. She was lying asleep on her bed; her thoughts were full of the absent bridegroom. "I sought him," she says," but I found him not." We notice the dream-like repetition, the dwelling upon phrases. Four times in these five verses we have the fond description of the bridegroom, which occurred for the first time in So Song of Solomon 1:7 , "him whom my soul loveth." Twice we have the utterance of unsatisfied longing, "I sought him, but I found him not." She was sleeping, but (as in So Song of Solomon 5:2 , "I sleep, but my heart waketh") her thoughts were busy and active. Her whole heart was given to her beloved. Those oft-repeated words, "him whom my soul loveth," imply a very deep affection, a great love. The believer remembers God in the watches of the night. The psalmist says, "In the night his song shall be with me, and my prayer unto the God of my life;" and again, "I call to remembrance my song in the night: I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search" ( Psalms 42:8 ; Psalms 77:6 ). If our heart is given to the heavenly Bridegroom, we shall think of him as we lie on our beds; our first waking thoughts will be of him. Alas! our love for Christ is not like the bride's love in the Song of Songs. How few of us can in truth speak of the Saviour as "him whom my soul loveth"! The bride dwelt upon those words as the simple truth, the sincere expression of her feelings. We dwell upon them, too; but, alas! with a sense of much coldness and ingratitude, a remembrance of much insincerity and unreality.

"God only knows the love of God;

Oh that it now were shed abroad

In this poor stony heart!

For love I sigh, for love I pine;

This only portion, Lord, be mine,

Be mine this better part."

The Christian dwells on the words, longing for grace to make them his own, the utterance of his inmost heart. Here is the spiritual value of the Song of Songs. We see what a great love is; how it absorbs the heart and fills the soul. Such should be our love to Christ; such should be our "songs in the night" ( Job 35:10 ). The bride sought her beloved in the visions of the night. We seem sometimes in our dreams to be going on long trackless journeys, wandering ever in search of something we know not what. So the bride could not find him whom her soul loved. Such are sometimes the experiences of the Christian soul. So Job once complained, "Oh that I knew where I might find him! that I might come even unto his seat!… Behold, I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him" ( Job 23:3 , Job 23:8 ). The Lord has said, "Seek, and ye shall find;" "Every one that seeketh findeth." But he has also said, "Strive to enter in at the strait gate; for many, I say unto you, shall seek to enter in, and shall not be able." Those who seek shall surely find at last; but the seeking must be diligent seeking, patient, persevering; there must be striving too, struggling to Overcome obstacles, wrestling against the spiritual enemies who would bar our way. It is not enough to seek by night on our beds; there must be effort, sustained effort, not mere dreamy aspirations; and that not only by night, not only in the hour of darkness: "in the day of my trouble I sought the Lord" ( Psalms 77:2 ). We must seek the Lord always; in the hour of health and strength, in the days of our youth; giving him our best, doing all things to his glory. Such seeking will surely find him.

2 . The search. "I will rise now," she says. The Hebrew tense is cohortative. She is addressing herself, arousing herself. Dreaming as she is, she feels that this is not the way to seek; she must leave her bed, she must rise. Perhaps she remembered the bridegroom's words spoken in the freshness of their first love: "Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away." She seems to rise; in her dreams she goes about the city in the streets, seeking him whom her soul loved. We must arise and seek the Lord; we must not lie still in careless slumber; we must seek him wherever his providence has set us, whether in the quiet country or in the bustling, crowded city. We may find him in any place, provided it be one where a Christian may safely tread; in any employment, provided it be lawful and innocent; in the city, in the streets, and in the broadways.

"There are in this loud stunning tide

Of human care and crime,

With whom the melodies abide

Of the everlasting chime;

Who carry music in their heart

Through dusky lane and wrangling mart,

Plying their daily task with busier feet,

Because their secret souls a holy strain repeat."

Still the bride found not the beloved; she repeats her first lament like a plaintive refrain: "I sought him, but I found him not." The soul does not always find the Lord at once when it first feels its need of the Saviour. We try one plan after another; we make effort after effort; but for a time all our efforts are vain. We know that he may be found, that others have found him and have felt the blessedness of his love. But the search seems long fruitless. God would have our search to be sincere, thoughtful, earnest. Therefore he tries our faith. He proves us, as once he proved Abraham; as the Lord Jesus tried the faith of the Syro-Phoenician woman. Again and again she sought his help, but for some time there was no response; silence at first, then what seemed to be a stern refusal. Still she persevered, she urged her prayer; her case was like that of the bride—she sought him, but she found him not. We must follow her example, remembering the Lord's teaching, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint. We must imitate the bride in her dream, and seek on, though for a long season our search may seem unsuccessful—though we find him not.

II. THE ULTIMATE SUCCESS OF THE BRIDE 'S SEARCH .

1 . She meets the watchmen. The watchmen found her (as again in So Job 5:7 ). Sheasks them the question which was so near her heart, "Saw ye him whom my soul loveth?" They were going about the city; they might be able to guide her to the object of her search. But they were like the watchman of Psalms 127:1-5 , waking but in vain for the bride's purpose, unable to help her. It is not always that Christian friends, or the ministers of God's holy Word and sacraments, who "watch for our souls" ( Hebrews 13:17 ), can help us in our search for Christ. We ask them, we seek their help; it is right to do so; sometimes they can help us. But each soul must find Christ for itself. "Work out your own salvation," St. Paul said to the Philippians; and that, "not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence" ( Philippians 2:12 ).

2 . She finds the bridegroom. The watchmen could give her no good tidings; but she did not faint; she did not return home or throw herself down in despair; she continued her search alone. She would search on till she found the beloved of her soul. And her search was rewarded at last. "It was but a little that I passed from them, but I found him whom my soul loveth." God is not far from us even in the hour of deepest gloom, when we seem to strain our eyes through the darkness, and can see no light. If we seek him earnestly we shall surely find him at the last; for he, we know, is seeking us. The Lord Jesus Christ came to seek and to save that which was lost. He seeketh the lost sheep until he find it. He giveth his life for the sheep. Then we may be quite sure that he who loved us with such a love, a love stronger than death, will not suffer any penitent soul that seeketh him in faith, in sorrow for the past, in earnest painful longings for forgiveness, to lose its way, to wander on without finding, to inquire everywhere without result, "Saw ye him whom my soul loveth?" He will surely manifest himself according to his blessed promise, as he did to the two disciples who on the first Easter Day were mourning for their lost Master, and would not be comforted by the words of the women who "had seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive." He will come in his gracious love, and then our heart will burn within us as he manifests himself, and our eyes shall be opened, and we shall know him; and that knowledge is eternal life ( John 17:3 ).

3 . She brings him to her home. The long wanderings of the dream were over. She had found him whose love filled her waking thoughts, of whom her dreams were full when she slept. She would not let him go. The anguish of that long, almost despairing search should not be in vain. She held him fast, and brought him to her own home, into its inmost chambers. The soul that once has found Christ clings to him with the strong embrace of faith. He may "make as though he would go further" ( Luke 24:28 ), to try our faith, that we may feel our need of him. But as the two disciples then "constrained him, saying, Abide with us, for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent," so the soul holds him and will not let him go. The soul, weak as Jacob was weak, struggles with the strength that the sense of weakness gives. "I will not let thee go, except thou bless me."

"Yield to me now, for I am weak,

But confident in self-despair:

Speak to my heart, in blessings speak;

Be conquered by my instant prayer:

Speak! or thou never hence shalt move,

And tell me if thy name is Love.

My prayer hath power with God: the grace

Unspeakable I now receive;

Through faith I see thee face to face,

I see thee face to face, and live!

In vain I have not wept and strove:

Thy nature and thy name is Love."

This noble hymn of Charles Wesley's expresses the feelings of a soul that has found Christ. We must not let him go, not for any perplexities, not for any temptations. St. Paul tells us that no difficulties can draw us back from him if we really give him our heart. "I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" ( Romans 8:38 , Romans 8:39 ). Then we must cling very closely to him, not letting go any one desire to serve him better and to love him more. We must stimulate every such desire into activity by actual self-denying effort. We must try with all our heart to realize his presence always, at all times and in all places, in our business, our amusements, our intercourse with friends and relations, as well as in the hour of private prayer or public worship. We must try with conscious effort to please him always; seeking, indeed, to serve him much, like Martha, but still more to please him perfectly, like Mary. And we must bring him into our home, into the very inmost chambers of our heart, opening them all to him, dedicating them all, every purpose of ours, every hope, every aspiration, to him, beseeching him to accept our imperfect offering, to make our hearts his temple, to fulfil in us his blessed promise, "If any man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode [our dwelling, our abiding place] with him" ( John 14:23 ). And now we have again the adjuration of So Philippians 2:7 . The bride has related her dream to the daughters of Jerusalem. The subject of that dream was love—pure and innocent love; its sorrows and its joys; separation and blessed reunion. It is a sacred thing. The daughters of Jerusalem were to listen in silent sympathy; they were not to praise or to blame; they were not to endeavour to stimulate or increase the love of bride or bridegroom; they were to leave it to its free spontaneous growth in the heart. Human love is a holy thing. The love that is between Christ and his Church, the love that is between the Lord of our redemption and every elect soul, is holier yet by far. It is not to be much talked of; it is to be treasured in the heart; it is the inmost spring of that life which is hidden with Christ in God. It must not be stirred by irreverent talk or disclosure; it must rest unseen "till it please"—till the fit time shall come for speaking of its blessedness.