We’re halfway through This Is the Old Testament, our thematic overview of the Old Testament. Each day we’ll read a thematic selection from a different book of the Bible, along with supplemental passages that show how the theme of that day’s main reading is found throughout Scripture. We’ll also read a brief summary of each book and a reflection on how the book fits into the larger story of Scripture. This week, we’ll finish our look at the books of Wisdom Literature and begin the last sections of the Old Testament, the Major and Minor Prophets.
What Is Song of Songs? Song of Songs is a collection of poetry written by King Solomon, or someone writing from his point of view, that celebrates the goodness and beauty of human love and intimacy.
How Song of Songs Fits Into the Story: Songs of Songs inspires a pursuit of the love it so beautifully describes: one of emotional intimacy and desire. The book illustrates respect, integrity, and security; devotion through bleak seasons of winter; and renewal in new seasons of spring. It reflects God’s desire to form pure and devoted love within us. It also shows there is potential bliss in married love, reflective of the greater love the Church experiences as the bride of Christ. Song of Songs helps us anticipate the fullness of our relationship with Christ when He returns for His bride.
Reflection Questions:
1. What does the delight the man and woman express for one another in Song of Songs teach you about God’s affection for His people?
2. How does today’s reading shape your understanding of the story of redemption?
Take time to reflect on your responses and share what you are learning with others in the community in the comments.
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64 thoughts on "Song of Songs"
Love never fails
Love never ends!
Gods love for us is shown through Jesus and love will never end
I have so enjoyed reading everyone’s comments! This is my first time ever reading the Bible so i had no idea wat to expect with this book. Definitely not what I expected to be reading first thing in the morning- its crazy to think tat God made us with so much passion and desire for connection and love! Like we’ve been wired to connect with him from the start!
Man knowing his woman in every detail shows the same attention to detail, getting to know us and how to love us. I think our love for God should be the same. Rejoicing in just being in his presence, in His love is that SOS reminds me of. God has redeemed us to allow us to come close to Him and have time with Him like talked about in SOS.
I see SOS as another example of God’s creativity and kindness to us by giving us such beauty in human intimacy. He created physical desire and enjoyment for us! And then He shows his desire for us to be His and gave us Jesus as the way to have relationship with Him. ❤️
I liked what was said on the podcast about Song of Songs being a romance story. It just shows that God truly loves and shows is this in thus book.
@SaraJoy Thank you! When I read what you wrote, it reminded me of a sermon I just heard a teaching by Tim Keller. This is about the Incarnation. There is so much in this sermon that is good! However around the 30 minute mark he talks about the love of God in there and uses a quote from C.S. Lewis to compare and describe His love. I get having a hard time grasping His love. Maybe this teaching will help if anyone wants to listen. Here is a link: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/timothy-keller-sermons-podcast-by-gospel-in-life/id352660924?i=1000525720587
Sarah Joy thank you so much for adding these verses! I have never read Song of Songs and now I feel like I have so much more understanding of it and a greater picture of the meaning too!! You sharing your application of it to your life helped me to grasp onto the application not just for a husband and wife but for my relationship with Jesus! That He desires me and loves me deeply and truly wants me!!
This is a man that truly desires his woman by the way he describes her in detail
Tina you gave me a good laugh (which I needed) and I have to fully agree with what you said. Love hearing from you again. Love from across the pond.
Miri Am totally and fully loved and agree with what you wrote.
Bronwen Rogers your explanation is fantastic, I loved it. I wouldn’t have thought of those verses that way. WOW. Thanks for giving me a new view on them.
Kelly liked what you commented on about how we should approach God, thanks for the insight.
Taylor your insight is so refreshing. Don’t be in too big of a hurry to get married wait for the man.
Angie your explanation and understanding of today’s reading have been a great help to me.
SarahJoy your perception and description of today’s Scripture has help me to understand it even better.
Carleigh Bright your words have helped me to understand today’s verses so much better.
Mari V. your will find Midwest weather to be so much different than the West Coast. We have a saying in the Midwest “if you don’t like the weather stick around in about 5 or 10 minutes it will change.”
Mary Desandro love what you said.
Sarah H. I went back and read your comment from Ecclesiastes and now I’m wondering to how they must’ve felt. You have a very good point.
Jennifer Anapol you are right.
This is a reminder that God created desire and passion. Those emotions aren’t bad, if shown in the right contexts. I want to cultivate those emotions more in my marriage. I know that when life gets busy, we can become complacent.
So true. Complacency can be dangerous.
I have been absent lately from the comments but have enjoyed reading everyone’s thought. I love this group so much and I’m praying for everyone.
Bronwen sorry that autocorrect struck again
Today’s reading reminded me of the Jesus Culture song You Won’t Relent. It’s been running through my head since I read verse 6. I had to go look it up because I can rarely remember song names &/or artists.
Tina, thank you so much for the laugh. At 67 I have to reach back a long way to remember how everything used to work. So many beautiful comments today. Sarah Joy, Carleigh Bright, Angie, Kelly, and Bronson Rogers in particular our words spoke to my heart. Thank you for sharing. Rhonda J I do follow SRT on both Facebook & Instagram but I rarely see any comments. If you see someone comment with a purple teddy bear as their profile picture that’s me.
Song of Songs to me is like many romance short stories. Some of them very steamy. I would have to say Solomon or whoever wrote them has a way with words. I’m not the romance story type though so I guess that’s why I’m not so excited about them. I need to look at them in a different frame of mind. Help I need to understand them better.
Sisters be blessed.
Song of Songs is like a steamy novel! These verses stood out to me. 7:10 I am my love’s, and his desire is for me. To think we are someone’s only desire is beautiful. And flipping that to know that we are God’s desire. 8:6 Set me as a seal on your heart, as a seal on your arm. For love is as strong as death. We can become complacent in marriage. Life gets busy and we don’t spend the needed time with our spouse. This is a reminder to remember to put the important things first, those we love.
What are you waiting for by Dannah Gresh is an excellent book on tough issues that are hard to talk about and bring to the light. I took my daughter many yrs ago to one of her events for Moms and Girls and it was outstanding! I recommend this book to single women and young girls heading to college for truths on romance, sex and God’s desire on how it is supposed to be.
Prayers to Traci and Tanner, ERB, Foster Mama, Victoria E and all on SRT. So grateful to be studying and praying with all of you this past 15 months. I prayed for yrs for God to help me stay away / limit social media and I found you! God Bless You and so glad Tina is back and also especially praying for Churchmouse every day. ❤️
I so love Sarah Joys thoughts, if you haven’t read them please do. Thank you Sarah Joy for sharing. ❤️
I became a Christian when I was 24 and had not been too interested in men and had never had a boyfriend before. Then I started hanging around couples that had wonderful relationships and the flame was lit within me. When I became engaged at 29 (still my only boyfriend) this book of the Bible came alive to me. My fiancé left for Alaska for 3 months before our wedding but we planned things before he left and over our once a week calls. We saw our marriage in the light of Christ’s love for his church and some of the proclamations we said to each other at our wedding came from SOS. Also, there is an album by John Michael Talbot called For the Bride that contains lyrics from this book. Several of the songs were sung at our wedding. Every time I read SOS I am taken back to that wonderful time of my life and that blissful state of budding love!
Today’s readings made me think about how passion and spiritually are not odds with each other. God celebrates love, intensity, and beauty. While this will look differently for all of us at different stages in our lives, I think God invites us to delight in these things, too.
Tina, as Mari I am because my thoughts are as yours. At 65 my are more like a weeping cherry tree. But you nailed it girl. I have always said God has a sense of humor. God’s blessing to all my SRT sister’s. ❤️
For me, this reading illustrates just how perverted the world has made the beauty of (physical) love to be and how far the world has fallen from God’s ideal of love. I feel sad today, because I have never loved or been loved like the love described in the reading. I think our very fallen and human experiences of “love” can get in the way of even imagining a love like the one we read about in Song of Songs. I know by faith God loves me and delights in me, but it is something I can’t begin to imagine or feel. If that makes sense?
@Shianne Hayden I just responded to your reply on the Proverbs reading. I don’t have specific resources that use science as an argument for God but I will look for some. For me the best argument has been contained in the Word and reading it start to finish myself has really spoken to me. Nature and science point to a Master Engineer , the more I learn about my field (oncology and neurology) the more I am convinced of this.
I love this and truly needed to hear this. Thank you Lord for your love! Amen!!!!
@MAURA…Thanks for: “If we have put God above all else on His throne, that which we have made so important becomes so small in the light of His glory.”
And for Isaiah 46:3b-4 WOW!
How I wish I knew love ans sex this way. I haven’t had the chance to experience what love really looks like or feels like between man and woman. And I don’t enjoy sex :( I wish I did. I’ve been celebrate for 3 years or more and I have no desire anymore at all …. but I wish I did. It was hard for me to read this today…. usually I love reading it and it ggives me hope… but today it felt like a reminder of something I’ll likely not experience in this lifetime and it sorta bummed me out. But, then I remembered it’s supposed to mirror God’s love for me and so I sorta switched my focus a little. But I do so wish I could experience an earthly human love and emotional intimacy like the one described in this book
Thank you Jesus for seeing me as more desirable than I am. Give me a heart that chases You as fervently.
SRT sisters, quick request to keep praying…. tomorrow is the meeting that might be the “clincher” in this saga re: adoptive parents. Pray God’s will for the kids /family and everyone’s peace please!!
@BRONWEN ROGERS, that really resonated for me. Thanks
@TINA, Nice to see you on again. Sending you love back.
Rhonda J! I loved that moment in the chosen and it reminded me exactly of what you’re speak. I always feel so much closer to Jesus when I watch that show.
Hi All Y’all. I never have rushed to read Song of Songs, I so loved reading your comments Carleigh Bright and Sarah Joy. And I appreciate that there are messages of God’s love for us in this book. I wanted to post the NIV version of Isaiah 62:5 this morning as it made it more clear to me. “As a young man marries a young woman, so will your Builder marry you, as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you.” Here is the true love we have, He rejoices over us, our whole being not just the creation of our body but every thing else He has woven into our creation and we are His delight. So much that He gave it all for us His very self as a sacrifice, that redemptive love so much better than any romantic love, so life changing is the love of our Jesus.
ERB, Good morning sweet Lady, ha ha I read your messages and felt your rush. And I wonder if all of us who dwell here feel the pull to stay when work or other things call us out. So glad you had time to comment. Isaiah 46 is so good too. As I have been contemplating the Fear of the Lord and the idols that keep coming up in Isaiah, it hit me that If we have put God above all else on His throne, that which we have made so important becomes so small in the light of His glory. And He is the only One we will see worthy of our worship in creation, even the things we create we will give glory to Him. He is so worthy. I loved Isaiah 46:3b-4 I have upheld you since you were conceived, and have carried you since birth. Even to your old age and gray hairs I am He, I am He who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.” I know this is for the house of Jacob in the beginning of verse 3, but this morning I read it for me and it is lovely. And I loved the end of the chapter, where I see Jesus, Isaiah 46:11-13. So so good! Hugs to you ERB, His strength and peace this day. Thank you Sisters for time in the Word, for your insightful beautiful comments that bless my days. Love to all!
We made it! My daughter and I are in Oklahoma City. Enjoying my quiet time out by the pool but it’s noisy because of the freeway. Humid and windy today but loving it. I’ll be visiting the Oklahoma City memorial here shortly. And how ironic of today’s devotional as I am here for my nephews wedding! I think I will send him the He Reads Truth version.
I always feel like I am barging in on somebody’s love life when I read song of Solomon!
@Charlie! So good! Love all the comments! I love to come back at night and finish reading all of them!
@lydiav- Yes, I understand! I have learned to have mostly God-loving pages on there to support rather than mindless scrolling! I just know we love to dive deeper into our friendships and stories as women, and I’m surprised that there is such a small following for SRT on fb and IG where it would be such a good place to be able to comment and respond directly to each other! Also….Did any of you watch The Chosen last night?! I cried as Mary came to Jesus, after falling in to sin after she had been once forgiving and following with Jesus! Wow, would I show us what God’s love and what forgivness looks like. He loves us, He has already seen our sin, but that is why Jesus was sent, to save us! I think we feel so guilty that our lives will be instantly changed after being reborn, but it is a diligent, coming to Jesus every. single. day. and asking for Him to be with us and to help us navigate through this life, and draw us close to him! I had a repeated sin, well, many, that the evil one kept leading me to. But God, he drew me in his arms and forgave me. Watch the show, it is amazing!
❤️
Love & appreciate your comments, Tina. And it’s so good to see you back with us!
Song of Songs: SEX WITHIN MARRIAGE IS GOOD! Enjoy it! God created us to delight in each other!
There is such a shame culture for so many young women (and men, too) who are raised in Christian homes. In fact, we skipped this book in church. It was never talked about, always passed over. Can you imagine? No one even wanted to admit that this incredible gift God gave us is right here, in the Bible.
Song of Songs rips off the mystery and says: Hey spouses! It’s OK to give and take pleasure in each other, to appreciate sexual beauty, to be satisfied and to satisfy.
Amen Charlie! My husband and I were just talking about how sad it is that the Puritan mindset has infiltrated so many churches. When we were first married I struggled to get over the shame I had instilled in me and couldn’t enjoy sex very much. Thankfully we have worked through this (and are continuing to do so) and I love that God included this book in His Holy Word!
1. The delight between the man and the woman in the passages we read about in Songs of Songs teaches us how intimately God loves us; unconditionally seeing us as beautiful. I appreciate how when describing the woman Solomon describes her character in her beauty, God sees our character as part of our beauty as well.
2. One verse that stood out to me in the Song of Songs reading that helps point to the story of redemption comes in Song of Songs 8:7; “Many waters cannot quench love, Nor can floods drown it. If a man would give for love, All the wealth of his house, It would be utterly despised.”….This verse really drives home the story of redemption for me because it is telling us that we cannot purchase love, it has been given to us as a gift. Jesus Christ dying on the cross for us was a gift, no amount of good works could purchase our salvation. Praise Jesus!
@ANGIE yes and amen
I have other parts of Song of Songs I prefer over these chapters. Some of my favorite verses are:
“He has taken me to the banquet hall,
And His banner over me is love.” 2.4
“Arise, my darling,
my beautiful one, and come with me.
See! The winter is past;
the rains are over and gone.” 2.10-11
“My Lover is mine and I am His.” 2.16
As a lifelong romantic the less steamy parts of this book appealed to my heart as a lovely story line. Their interaction reads a bit like the Christian novels I have read.
However, when I read it as God pursuing ME then my heart really beats hard. I wrestle constantly with the idea that I must earn the love of my Savior. “Just wait, Jesus, while I get cleaned up, get my act together and do stuff to show you I’m worthy.”
But He says “Fear not, I have redeemed you;
I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you…
You are precious and honored in my sight,
and because I LOVE YOU.” Isaiah 43.1b-2a, 4a
“My Lover is mine and I am His.” SOS 2.10
We don’t have to earn what is freely given! My God “delights over me with singing!” (Zephaniah 3.17) God, remind me today to rest in your love, your love for your Bride the Church. You paid the bride price, you stand at the altar watching us walk towards eternity with adoration in your eyes. We are your image bearers, your ultimate creation and your beloved. Amen.
Amen!
Amen Sarah Joy! Thank you for putting those verses together.
❤️❤️❤️
The man sounds like he is hungry, ready to feast, not on food but his wife. She reminds him of the delicious and beautiful things in his life. He is hungry for her.
Our lives are full of hard work and responsibilities. In the Song of Songs, God reminds us that he created us with passion and that in the boundaries of a sealed relationship (marriage) that passion is enticing, beautiful, and right.
We have been sealed in Christ Jesus. Our God finds us beautiful. He sees in us good. We are His…and I think equally as the bride we should feel passionate about our God. Whether apricots or donuts, fawns or puppies, those things our senses find beauty in, should remind us of our God, His love and provision and, we should be passionate in our anticipation of time spent with Him. The closer we draw to Him, laying all else down except our passion for Him, the hungrier we get too.
Hello again MAURA, I was unexpectedly able to carve out a few minutes of time…
Isaiah 46… this chapter is shorter than the last few chapters we’ve read, but it’s so good!! I felt like I could hear God speaking and calling us up to a higher place of existence. No more depending on ourselves or on idols in our lives. I love this!! With God’s grace we can fix our eyes only on Him… and we can see His glory and His faithfulness working right before our very eyes!!! How incredibly BLESSED are we?!
Hope all you wonderful ladies have an awesome day!! Xoxo
Oops I hit reply to early. But seriously, y’all, it gave me a much deeper appreciation for a book that used to make me a little squirmy. If any of you are married, I do recommend the book. It’s called Passion Pursuit by Linda Dillow and it really changed how I see and value my husband. Blessings to you all!
Allie thanks for the recommendation, I will check out this book!
I too felt uncomfortable reading the Song of Songs passages but also honestly jealous because I want someone to love and desire me like that. BUT GOD… He already does! He loves me and desires my heart and soul so much He was willing to sacrifice His Son so I could be with Him forever. It brought tears to my eyes to know that I’m already loved, I’m already chosen, I’m already wanted not just for a lifetime but for eternity. I hope and pray I will get to experience a Christ-centered marriage on this earth, but can rest in the truth that the God of the universe loves me more than I could ever imagine or fathom. In that I rejoice!
This past fall I went through a Bible study at my church entirely on Song of Songs! Oh my word
I love this!! Today’s passage reminds me of the song that goes: How deep the Father’s love for us, how vast beyond all measure…
MAURA, just wanted to let you know that I will be reading and posting a little bit later than usual today… xoxo
*redeemed for His glory
1. The beautiful expressions of love and desire in Song Of Songs reminds me that God’s design for a husband and wife was that they would be naked and unashamed. No shame that brings doubt of the other’s motives and no manipulation that brings fear.
This is how God wants us to approach Him no doubts, mistrust, fear, or shame.
2.God wants all aspects of our lives tedeemed for His glory-even our sex lives.
These passages have never hit me like the did today. God loves us no matter the shape our bodies are in. He looks at us lovingly no matter what we think of ourselves. No matter what we have done. He loves us enough to give his wealth for love, that wealth being Jesus Christ. Yet he is scorned for doing it. What a wonderful way to start the day. God loves me and sees me. Me, a lowly sinner that doesn’t deserve it, is loved by the most high God. You all are loved the same way. My dear sisters, accept the love, forgetting how you see yourself, accept God’s love as he sees you! What a glorious way to see yourself. God’s love is beyond our comprehension but these passages give a glimpse of that love. The key verse tied it up nicely. God gave his wealth, Jesus Christ, for love of us. For love of me! Thank you Lord!
LYDIAV – same here! I groaned when I saw the heading for today, having conveniently let it slip my mind that it was the next book in the Bible. I felt a little squirmy reading it, as in hurry up and be done because it reads like a private declaration not meant to be shared.
TINA – thank you for a laugh this morning – I’m a little older than you ;) – in the midst of the uncomfortableness of these passages.
And thank you for pointing us to the depth and strength of God’s everlasting, sacrificial Love for us – Jesus!
Oh Tina you brought a smile to my face at 70 having had a double mastectomy a number of years ago I have no breasts, but I do have a husband God introduced me to over 50 years ago that loves me no matter what. Thank you Tina for writing what was in my thoughts!
@TINA what a fabulous summary! I’ve laughed and felt inspired by your words! Whilst I continue to hope I might have love like that in a marriage this side of heaven, every day I see a little bit more that I am part of the Bride of Christ in the church. Loved to the ends of the earth by the God who created it! Such beautiful grace!
This is a bit of saucy reading at 5.30am! I’m not sure what you think, but I think the two in Song of Songs, need a room!
I hope they are married too!
Seriously though, the admiration for each other, the anticipation, the comparison to the best in those days.., I am not sure I ‘read’ love in those words in Song of Songs, but for sure something was going on!
Song of Songs, certainly in the passages we read today, he describes his perfect woman, and she, her perfect man..
But God..
To Him,these things aren’t important (thank goodness, as at 62, I would not describe my bosoms as a mound of grapes), what is important to Him, is the heart, our souls, the hidden organ, the out of the way, can’t see, yet important part of us. God, looks to the inside. All described in the passages fade, but the heart, the soul, the innermost part of us, that holds our love of God, is what He looks at and for.
Thinking out aloud, thankful that we are made in His image, which means that as we are, absolutely as we are, He, God, sees beauty, He sees perfection! He sees us! My heart sings a chorus of Hallelujahs for that!
Our hearts, His love, together, for sure, is the essence of 1 Corinthians. God’s love, our guide to loving in this world, whether romantic love or one another, imperative we are guided by it.
Gods love is pure, perfect and for ALL, in giving His Son to be crucified for our sins, His death and His resurrection, Gods Redeeming love, gives us hope for a future in Eternity.
I’ve mumbled. Forgive me..
Happy Thursday my dears.. wrapped, as always in love and hugs across the pond. ❤
Amen
Cracking up Tina! I couldn’t help and I’m still laughing.
Looking forward to reading everyone’s thoughts and insights on Song of Songs, it’s one of my least favourite bible books!
@Rhonda: Facebook is such a black hole for me, I try to evade it :(