Daily Devotional Friday 7th June 2024
by William Moody
Song of Solomon 6
Others
6:1 Where has your beloved gone,
O most beautiful among women?
Where has your beloved turned,
that we may seek him with you?
Together in the Garden of Love
She
2 My beloved has gone down to his garden
to the beds of spices,
to graze1 in the gardens
and to gather lilies.
3 I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine;
he grazes among the lilies.
Solomon and His Bride Delight in Each Other
He
4 You are beautiful as Tirzah, my love,
lovely as Jerusalem,
awesome as an army with banners.
5 Turn away your eyes from me,
for they overwhelm me—
Your hair is like a flock of goats
leaping down the slopes of Gilead.
6 Your teeth are like a flock of ewes
that have come up from the washing;
all of them bear twins;
not one among them has lost its young.
7 Your cheeks are like halves of a pomegranate
behind your veil.
8 There are sixty queens and eighty concubines,
and virgins without number.
9 My dove, my perfect one, is the only one,
the only one of her mother,
pure to her who bore her.
The young women saw her and called her blessed;
the queens and concubines also, and they praised her.
10 “Who is this who looks down like the dawn,
beautiful as the moon, bright as the sun,
awesome as an army with banners?”
She
11 I went down to the nut orchard
to look at the blossoms of the valley,
to see whether the vines had budded,
whether the pomegranates were in bloom.
12 Before I was aware, my desire set me
among the chariots of my kinsman, a prince.2
Others
13 3 Return, return, O Shulammite,
return, return, that we may look upon you.
He
Why should you look upon the Shulammite,
as upon a dance before two armies?4
Footnotes
[1] 6:2
Or to pasture his flock; also verse 3
[2] 6:12Or chariots of Ammi-Nadib
[3] 6:13Ch 7:1 in Hebrew
[4] 6:13Or dance of Mahanaim (ESV)
After the fracture of chapter 5, this appears to be a time of reconciliation between the groom and the bride. The bride is asked where her husband has gone (v1). She speaks of how he has gone to the garden (v2), a place where they had met before, and the bride is confident of their relationship despite what has happened before (v3).
The strength of their relationship lie sin the love of the groom which is expressed here (v4-10). Tirzah was the original capital of the northern kingdom of Israel and Jerusalem of course of the southern kingdom of Judah (v4). This highlights how the love for the bride, is a picture of god’s love for His covenant people.
The reference to the bride being his perfect one (v9), in contrast to the sixty queens and eighty concubines mentioned (v8), speaks of fidelity in the relationship. The Lord has devotion to His people, we need to have single-minded devotion in return. What gets in the way of your devotion to Jesus?
The bride follows her groom down into the orchard (v11) for their relationship to be restored. It has often said when we drift from the Lord, He’s waiting where we left Him. We need to return to the place of fellowship and previous blessing with the Lord after we drift. The Lord waits for the prodigal to return.
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