“The Song of Songs, which is Solomon’s. May he kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for your love is better than wine.”
This is a cry from the bride of Christ to receive his affection, and then a celebration of it. It has been emphasized before that Jesus isn’t going to have erotic (physically sexual) make-out sessions with us, but it is also clear here that the physical relationship between a man and wife are being used as a picture of our spiritual relationship with God. It is not, as some would say, a picture created by men clumsily using human sexuality as a metaphor to try to understand a God who is really above that. No, it is that God created human sexuality and romance in his own image, as a direct picture of what he is like, of how he relates to us spiritually. We are LITERALLY his marriage partner in Christ, it isn’t just an idea or a metaphor. We impact him that way. We are of his nature and likeness in the new creation, as Eve was made in Adam’s likeness out of his substance.
This is a cry from the bride of Christ to receive his affection, and then a celebration of it. It has been emphasized before that Jesus isn’t going to have erotic (physically sexual) make-out sessions with us, but it is also clear here that the physical relationship between a man and wife are being used as a picture of our spiritual relationship with God. It is not, as some would say, a picture created by men clumsily using human sexuality as a metaphor to try to understand a God who is really above that. No, it is that God created human sexuality and romance in his own image, as a direct picture of what he is like, of how he relates to us spiritually. We are LITERALLY his marriage partner in Christ, it isn’t just an idea or a metaphor. We impact him that way. We are of his nature and likeness in the new creation, as Eve was made in Adam’s likeness out of his substance.
Put succinctly, that is the meaning, and plenty to meditate on, but a more in-depth explanation is added below.
First I want to say that this subject is going to be uncomfortable to us if we are looking at it from a mentality of lust, as in, "I can't think of God like that," but if we see the subject through the eyes of love rather than lust, it isn't uncomfortable. If our minds have gotten into the lust gutter, this subject can renew them in some serious ways, as long as we don't step back from it at the first reaction.
On to the in depth (a little more heady) explanation:
God transcends one gender or another, and we do as well in Christ. (in spirit) When he created man in his own image, man hadn’t yet been divided into male and female, and so he contained both aspects fully, as God does. (see Genesis 2) In spirit, we transcend one gender or another, as “in Christ, there is neither male nor female.” Our relationship with God is spirit to spirit, but the affections exchanged are not less passionate, they just aren’t erotic. (they aren’t physically sexual, but they involve the heart aspect) The bride is crying out to receive these affections, knowing experientially that “we love him because he first loved us.” She needs to receive his affections first.
In Ephesians 5, Paul reveals that the creation of man and woman and their joining in marriage are a picture of Christ and his bride. Just as Adam was put to sleep and out of his side was taken a “helpmate fit for him,” one like him, Christ went to the cross and out of his side poured blood and water, a sign of a birth. (Blood and water pours out of a womb while a woman is giving birth.) It was our new birth out of his side as a companion fit for him and according to his own nature and likeness as Eve was to Adam. These things happened to Christ as a fulfillment of that prophetic act of Eve’s creation.
We are created in Christ, new creations, a bride fit for him birthed out of his death and resurrection, when mere natural humanity could never fulfill that role just as the animals couldn’t fulfill that role for Adam. The fallen, carnal man is symbolized in scripture by the beasts, and has a beastly nature, “whose god is their belly and whose glory is in their shame,” according to Paul, centered on natural things and unable to change himself from the core. We however, have been made and are being made (“by one sacrifice he HAS perfected forever those who are BEING sanctified,” meaning it has been done in our innermost being which is already in him in eternity, but is manifesting outwardly in our natural bodies and lives as a process within time, all as a gift of grace) a divine natured creation fit to spiritually marry the son of God, to marry into the family of the trinity.
So, what Paul calls in Ephesians “a great mystery” is that man and woman are created as a sign of the relationship between Christ and his (new creation) bride, us. We are also told in Ephesians 4 that as we are nourished, we mature into “the fullness of the stature of Christ.” He will have a body proportional to the head, a bride at his own maturity level rather than a mere immature child who he has little in common with. That sounds daunting, but it is all a free gift of grace from beginning to end, based only on what he did for us. It is done, but our outward vessel still comes into it more and more over time. If Jesus was right with God but still had to mature, still had to grow in favor and wisdom, we can be right with God by faith and yet still mature in our outward lives. This is not legalism or performance, but just obvious reality to anyone who looks at anybody’s life.
The kisses of his mouth are his affections expressed to us spiritually by his word. Paul reveals in Ephesians 5:25-26 “Husbands, love your wives just as Christ has loved the church, and gave himself up for her, so that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word.” We are cleansed by God’s affections expressed to us, his word. He is not beating us up with condemnation for our “spots and wrinkles,” but he is cleansing them by his affections, as revealed here. As his affections are revealed, our hearts become fulfilled in him. We come to know and trust him who is love. We take on that nature ourselves. We never grow past our need for this.
The kisses of his mouth are his affections expressed to us spiritually by his word. Paul reveals in Ephesians 5:25-26 “Husbands, love your wives just as Christ has loved the church, and gave himself up for her, so that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word.” We are cleansed by God’s affections expressed to us, his word. He is not beating us up with condemnation for our “spots and wrinkles,” but he is cleansing them by his affections, as revealed here. As his affections are revealed, our hearts become fulfilled in him. We come to know and trust him who is love. We take on that nature ourselves. We never grow past our need for this.
The bride cries out for his affections, knowing that “we love him because he first loved us.” Practically, this can look like receiving a new experience of his expression of love for us, or it can look like meditating on what has already been revealed, in his word or in our past experiences with him, drawing life out of that. Just remembering can be as spiritual as an open vision or a trance. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever, so our past revelations of his affections are no less true about him today.
This issue is in not just hearing or reading his words, but his "voice." This implies the tone and heart behind the communication rather than just the form of it. Are we seeing the heart behind his communication with us and work in our lives? Everything he does is about revealing his love. Are we hearing the "voice" of our bridegroom in what he does and has done, or are we missing the point?
This issue is in not just hearing or reading his words, but his "voice." This implies the tone and heart behind the communication rather than just the form of it. Are we seeing the heart behind his communication with us and work in our lives? Everything he does is about revealing his love. Are we hearing the "voice" of our bridegroom in what he does and has done, or are we missing the point?
“Your love is better than wine,” –chapter1, verse 2b, means that his love is better than his blessings, that the relationship we have with the giver is even better than his best gifts. Wine is not used here in a negative sense. Wine is typically used in scripture as a symbol of the blessing of God, especially that which delights the heart. The bride is seeking relationship above blessings, the best thing more than the good things. Her focus is on receiving his affections, knowing that the rest will fall into place as a result.
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