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Scripture Reading: S.S. 6:4-13
In this message we will consider further the matter of being called more strongly to live within the veil through the cross after resurrection.
Song of Songs 6:4-13 speaks of a life within the veil. The intrinsic significance of this section is that a loving pursuer of Christ needs to experience His ascension by living in the heavenly Holy of Holies within the veil through the cross after she has experienced His resurrection.
Verses 4 through 10 are the Beloved’s praise.
“You are as beautiful, my love, as Tirzah, / As lovely as Jerusalem” (v. 4a). Her Beloved, treasuring her as His love, praises her that she is beautiful as the heavenly sanctuary (Tirzah — 1 Kings 14:17) and lovely as the heavenly Jerusalem (Gal. 4:26; Heb. 12:22), indicating that she lives in the Holy of Holies within the veil, experiencing the ascension of Christ through the cross after her experience of His resurrection.
In the heavens there is the sanctuary of God, which is divided into two sections. The first section is called the Holy Place, and the second is called the Holy of Holies. In between, there is a partition, a separation, a veil. Hebrews 10:20 tells us that the veil in the sanctuary signifies the flesh. In the heavenly sanctuary there is the flesh; this is according to God’s economy.
One basic principle in God’s economy is that God is not a God of time and space. With Him there is no time element, for He is a God of eternity. We care for location, thinking that there is no flesh in the heavens, but God cares for the fact. Seemingly we are in the heavens, but we still have the flesh, and we will continue to have it until God accomplishes and consummates His economy absolutely.
In our spiritual experiences we were attracted by the Lord’s love and drawn by the Lord Himself in His sweetness. We followed Him by taking the footsteps of the saints in the church through the centuries. Then we entered the fellowship with Him in our spirit. In this fellowship we were instructed concerning how to enter into the church life, and in the church life we are being transformed. We have beauty through this transformation, and we also have rest, covering, and satisfaction. All these spiritual significances match Solomon’s writing.
The next stage is that of living in the heavenlies as God’s new creation in resurrection. After experiencing this stage we need to go on to experience the rending of the veil. The veil in the temple was split by Christ’s death (Matt. 27:51). However, the veil of the flesh has not been taken away. Rather, the veil still remains for God to use in perfecting His seeking saints. For example, Paul was surely a matured brother, having passed through the age of living in the heavens as the new creation of God in resurrection. But according to 2 Corinthians 12 God allowed a “thorn in the flesh” to be given him (v. 7). Here we see that even such a mature and spiritual person could still be troubled by the flesh. This indicates that no matter how much of God’s element we may have in our regenerated spirit, or how much we have been sanctified, renewed, transformed, and conformed to the image of the firstborn Son of God, as long as we are living on earth, we still have the flesh.
Whereas the regeneration of our spirit was instantaneous, the transformation of our soul is progressive. The redemption of our body is also progressive. Paul said that our inner man is being renewed but that our outer man, our body, is decaying day by day. This is God’s arrangement according to His economy. God has no plan for us to reach such a high standard of spirituality that the flesh is no longer present. God’s economy is to keep us living in ascension as a new creation in resurrection, no matter how spiritual we may be. We might think that in resurrection there should no longer be the flesh, but God still needs it in order to work something in us.
Because the flesh is still with us, we need to deal with the flesh every day by watching and praying. If we do not watch, the flesh will act. In our prayer we need to be watchful, praying in the spirit.
In Song of Songs 6:4 Jerusalem is a sign of royalty. The more heavenly we are, the more royal we become. To be royal is to reign like a king. Romans 5 says that those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life (v. 17). Nevertheless, even though we may be royal and live in ascension as God’s new creation in resurrection, there is still a veil in the heavenly sanctuary. This indicates that no matter how spiritual we may be, we are still in the flesh, which is the veil. Therefore, we need to learn to pass through the veil by the dealing of the cross every day. Then we will live within the veil, in the Holy of Holies, which is just God Himself. This is the highest stage in the experience of the lover of Christ as presented in Song of Songs. When we reach such a stage, we will have nothing to do but to wait and hope for rapture.
The lover of Christ is also “terrible as an army with banners” lifted up as a sign of victory (v. 4b)
This praise of her Beloved indicates that her becoming the heavenly sanctuary and the heavenly Jerusalem is due to her victory over the enemies. Only by being an overcomer, one who overcomes the enemies, can we live within the veil.
Previously the lover was likened to a mare, a horse among Pharaoh’s chariots, a rose in Sharon, a lily in the valleys and among thorns, a dove, a pillar of smoke, a bed, a palanquin, a garden, and a fountain with a spring, but now she is likened to the heavenly dwelling of God and the heavenly Jerusalem, indicating her maturity in life for God’s building.
For the building of the Body of Christ, we need the maturity of life. Ephesians 4:12-16, which speaks of the building up of the Body, tells us that we need growth to reach maturity so that the Body of Christ can be built up. To build up the church in a general way requires only the capacity to manage, arrange, and take care of things. This is not something organic but something organized according to human management. However, the building up of the Body has nothing to do with our ability to organize, manage, and arrange things. The Body of Christ is an organism, not an organization. The building up of this organism depends on growth and the maturity in life. The building of the Body is organic.
To build up the Body organically, we need to mature. This is the reason that we are now stressing the building up of the Body much more than the building up of the church. First Timothy is a book on the church as the house of God (3:15). There is nothing in this book on the building of the Body of Christ. First Timothy 3 speaks of the arrangement of elders and deacons in their service, but Ephesians does not speak of elders and deacons. Instead, it speaks of members growing. First, we need to grow, and then we can perfect others. This perfecting is according to 2 Corinthians 13, in which Christ is living and growing in us (v. 5) and we are enjoying the Triune God in the Father’s love, the Son’s grace, and the Spirit’s fellowship (v. 14). This is the building up of the Body, not the building up of the church as a kind of organization. This building, for which we need the maturity in life, is unique. It is the organic Body of Christ, which will consummate the organic New Jerusalem in the new heaven and new earth.
“Turn your eyes away from me, / For they overcome me” (S.S. 6:5a). This is the Lord’s word of seeming rejection (cf. Mark 7:25-27; John 11:5-7; Exo. 32:10; Gen. 32:26), but actually it is the word inviting her expression of her overcoming love to Him. Such a rejection is actually a kind of welcoming. When the Lord says, “Turn your eyes away from Me,” He is really saying that we should put our eyes on Him all the time. When we love someone, we want that person to look at us all the time. The Beloved’s words are words that invite the lover’s expression of her overcoming love to Him.
“Your hair is like a flock of goats / That repose on Mount Gilead” (S.S. 6:5b). The meaning here is the same as that in 4:1b.
“Your teeth are like a flock of ewes / That have come up from the washing, / All of which have borne twins, / And none of them is bereaved of her young” (6:6). The meaning here is the same as that in 4:2.
“Your cheeks are like a piece of pomegranate / Behind your veil” (6:7). The meaning here is the same as that in 4:3b.
“There are sixty queens and eighty concubines / And virgins without number. / My dove, my perfect one, is but one; / She is the only one of her mother; / She is the choice one of her who bore her. / The daughters saw her, and they called her blessed; / The queens and the concubines, / They also praised her” (6:8-9). Here we see that her Beloved (Solomon, typifying Christ in a positive sense) is loved by many different believers, some as queens, some as concubines, and some as virgins (all in the positive sense in poetry), but her Beloved, considering her as His love and perfect one, praises her as the only one lover of Him, the only and choice one regenerated by grace.
“Who is this woman who looks forth like the dawn, / As beautiful as the moon, / As clear as the sun” (v. 10a). Her Beloved praises her as the dawn, being beautiful as the moon and clear as the sun, bringing and shining the light on others.
In verse 10b the Beloved again says that she is as terrible as an army with banners. The meaning here is the same as that in verse 4b.
“I went down to the orchard of nuts / To see the freshness of the valley, / To see whether the vine had budded, / Whether the pomegranates were in bloom” (v. 11). Here we see the lover’s work. She works on herself as a garden which is growing as the valley growing the fresh green things, as the vine budding, and as the pomegranates blossoming. She works on herself as a particular garden to grow nuts, to grow strong, hard food. She considers herself not only a garden of soft things but an orchard growing particular nuts for Christ.
Verses 12 and 13 describe the lover’s progress and victory.
“Before I was aware, / My soul set me among the chariots of my noble people” (v. 12). She is not aware that she is progressing swiftly as the noble people’s chariots going forth.
“Return, return, O Shulammite; / Return, return, that we may gaze at you. / Why should you gaze at the Shulammite, / As upon the dance of two camps?” (v. 13). Those who are attracted by her ask her to come back that they may look at her as at two camps of an army celebrating their victory by dancing (cf. Gen. 32:2).
In Song of Songs 6:13 the lover’s name Shulammite, which is the feminine form of Solomon, is first used, indicating that at this point she has become Solomon’s duplication, counterpart, the same as Solomon in life, nature, and image, as Eve to Adam (Gen. 2:20-23), signifying that the lover of Christ becomes the same as Him in life, nature, and image to match Him (2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 8:29) for their marriage.
