Featured Song of Solomon

I've preached from Song of Solomon but it's been a long time. Some use it as an allegory of Christ and the church with its emphasis on the bride and bride groom. Others see Solomon as trying to seduce the girl in the story away from the love of the shepherd.

I think that wide variety of interpretations give rise to it not being preached very much.

 

In the beginning of the movie, "Moll Flanders" a bishop is at a foundlings home & asks her to provide scripture...with that she starts resiting S of Solomon ...bishop gets flustered:laugh:...."that will be enough my child"....:laugh:

 

A degree of wisdom and maturity is prerequisite, no doubt.

 

That's probably why i only preached 1 sermon from it in 30 years... :tongue3:

 

As an aside, I always found it interesting that a good friend of mine - who happens to be a member of a conservative Jewish congregation - told me they don't have the same reservations about this Book.

Regards, hope all is well with you and yours,
BiR

 

I've heard one about a year ago by David Platt. It was very good as I recall.

IIRC he doesn't buy into the theory of the book being an allegory of Christ and the Church or God and Israel... he interpret it 'literally.'

Edit: Found it on Radical.net http://www.radical.net/media/series/view/381/chapter-19-sex-in-salvation-history?filter=book&book=56

Gotta admit I laughed at this:

 

Isn't that the sermon series that put Driscoll on Johnny Mac's bad side?

 

Sure. Just abandon what sages have said about it for millennia and defer to a hedonistic approach.

Like I said, a degree of wisdom and maturity is prerequisite in approaching this book.

 

Maybe it's my age, but is anyone else uncomfortable with a pastor talking about his sex life with his wife in a message? It sounds almost like the guy who prayed before the NASCAR race and mentioned "his smoking hot wife".

Maybe both Platt and Nascar guys' wives were ok with what was said, but mine would have pulled out my tongue.

 

Depends on whether his wife is looking young and hot, or if she is fat or old. Couldn't look at (or imagine a woman) with an unsightly mole or wart or whatever and honestly say, "there is no spot in thee."

I mean, since we're taking the Song literally. It just doesn't apply to old or ugly women.

 

Right... to try and understand the book as it presents itself is a new hedonistic approach huh?

You can't honestly be saying that the allegorical views are the only way the book can be understood?

The NASCAR guy's 'prayer' was from a stupid movie I recommend that everyone avoid like the plague.

I think it probably wasn't the smartest thing to say, but wouldn't go so far as saying he is discussing his sex life. It was a joke without specifics... probably not the best joke to make but it's not like he was sharing details.

Just going over the book would make most people uncomfortable. Aaron is right in that regard, it takes a mature audience.

 

Heard from and Preached from Too!

I have heard this book on Mothers day! It is a beautiful book on love and relationships, especially a metaphorical one between Christ and the church or a husband and his wife. It is proclaimed to be sort of erotic, but, I have found it a beatutiful book of words about love from meeting to marriage! IMHO of course!

It is my opinion, that with the leading of the Holy Spirit, a preacher could develop a sermon from several verses. The one I love to use this: "How lovely are your cheeks; your earrings set them afire! How lovely is your neck, enhanced by a string of jewels. We will make for you earrings of gold and beads of silver - AND How beautiful you are, my darling, how beautiful!"

I would like to think that it is more than acceptable for a couple to express their feelings for one another, and these verses show the kind of praise a man should feel for his wife, the mother of their children!

 

It's called Song of Solomon/Song of Songs... Songs never include hyperbole or figures of speech eh?

And you couldn't really say that to your spouse? Really? My wife may not be literally :smilewinkgrin: flawless in body, or personality but I am able to quote 4:7 to her with a totally clear conscience because to me she is "all fair."

 

I've heard a couple of sermons on this, and I was blessed to preach on it. Personally, I believe it's a story betwixt Christ and the church.

Song of Solomon 3

1 By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loveth: I sought him, but I found him not.

2 I will rise now, and go about the city in the streets, and in the broad ways I will seek him whom my soul loveth: I sought him, but I found him not.

3 The watchmen that go about the city found me: to whom I said, Saw ye him whom my soul loveth?

4 It was but a little that I passed from them, but I found him whom my soul loveth: I held him, and would not let him go, until I had brought him into my mother's house, and into the chamber of her that conceived me.


That four verse passage was what I preached on. But in reality, He found me in the waste howling wilderness, in a desert land. It was He who actually found me.


But Song of Solomon is a very good book.

 

Why are you crying to us about it? Go look for yourself.....sheesh!!! :laugh:

 

Here's another beautiful passage:

Song of Solomon 5

1 I am come into my garden, my sister, my spouse: I have gathered my myrrh with my spice; I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey; I have drunk my wine with my milk: eat, O friends; drink, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved.

2 I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night.

3 I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?

4 My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him.

5 I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers with sweet smelling myrrh, upon the handles of the lock.


This was a symbol of what I went through. When He really got through to me, I wanted Him more than I did my next breath. My "insides" yearned and ached for Him. It was like the myrrh that smelled so good. It was dripping off.