SOS 1:5-6 BLACK BUT LOVELY

Chapter 1:5-6

            “I am black but lovely, O daughters of Jerusalem, like the tents of Kedar, like the Curtains of Solomon. Do not stare at me because I am swarthy, for the sun has burned me. My mother’s sons were angry with me, they made me caretaker of the vineyards, but I have not taken care of my own vineyard.”

The bride is sharing the paradox here of two apparently contradicting truths. She shares that she is in a condition of brokenness and dysfunction in her outward life, even ashamed to be seen by others, and at the same time sharing the more significant truth that she is lovely and that she is pure in her innermost being. His redemption is real in us, even when it's process hasn't been fully walked out in every area of our lives. We don't come to him on the condition that we have to get our stuff all together first, but he is getting our stuff together as we continue coming to him without already having it all together. Our bridegroom’s love creates a safe environment for us to be ourselves without being punished. He has not created an environment where you have to pretend to have it all together, (or else) as religious systems and other broken groups of people can create. She also knows that even though she is broken, and even though she is ashamed of other people seeing her, she is really lovely and white as the curtains in the Holy of Holies of Solomon’s temple. Not only does this passage and the ones that follow reveal that it is part of the bride’s journey to deal with shame and dysfunction along the way, but answers to that are revealed also without any condemnation.

She is black like the tents of Kedar, which refers to a people group descended from Kedar, a people who were known for their black tents scorched by the hot sun, yet she is also like the curtains of Solomon, which are said to be white curtains leading into the Holy of Holies in Solomon’s temple. She tells the people not to stare at her because her skin has been burnt and scarred by the sun. Burned by the sun speaks of the scars from “labor under the sun” as the idea is used in Ecclesiastes, and as she later reveals in the song. (when she says she was made to care for other people’s vineyards instead of her own) It speaks of the scars which come from the harsh elements of life in this world, from the slavery to those elements that natural man lives under in performance orientation and seperation. She has been scarred. She has been taken advantage of and has not taken proper care of her own heart. (her vineyard is her heart, more on that later as well) Inwardly, like Solomon’s temple, she contains the very resting place of God, the true holy of holies in her core. She is still one with God, and she contains a purity that is greater than any outward brokenness and shame that is on the surface. In Christ, we are the temple of God, who lives in us, our bodies are members of Christ’s body. The OT holy of holies with the ark of the covenant is only a picture of what lives inside of us, even in the midst of our outward brokenness. He is changing us from the inside out, we don’t have to get it together first to come to him. You don't have to qualify for the gift of grace.

At the last supper, as revealed in the various accounts of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, Jesus revealed his heart and the Father’s heart for the disciples, even though he knew that they would all fall away that very night, and that Peter would deny him despite his boasts otherwise. Jesus said “With great desire I have desired to share this meal with you,” he said that he loved them as the Father loved him, that the Father also loved them as he loved the Son, and that he had given them his glory and the love of the Father for the Son was inside of them. These things were not spoken to a group of mature apostles willing to lay down their lives in the way of the cross, but to those men who had just been fighting over who was the greatest among them, who were still filled with pride and selfish ambition, and who would even forsake and deny Jesus in a few hours. These are statements we can apply to ourselves even in our brokenness and immaturity and sin just as it applied to those men, that the Father loves us just as he loves Jesus, that Jesus loves us as the Father loves him, that he desires to commune with us with a great desire, and that the love with which the Father has for Jesus is also inside of us, as Jesus said of them in John 17. He has given us his glory that we may be one with him even as he and the Father are one, just as he gave to those men. We are lovely, even if we are black and scarred on the outside, even if our hearts are messed up. He said it. We don't need to hide from him in shame.

The bride speaks of the cause of her brokenness, “My mother’s sons were angry with me, they made me caretaker of the vineyards, but I have not taken care of my own vineyard.” Like Jesus, born of God and of Mary, our Father is God and our mother is humanity. The bride’s mother’s sons are simply human beings, children of humanity.

In this fallen world, people compete for power, control, and survival. A world system of fear and competition is also filled with hate and anger towards other competitors. The world, in a fallen state, is outwardly focused and performance oriented. This goes for the secular world and the religious world. People are assigned identities and roles according to how they can serve somebody else’s agenda. This can look like people being given an identity based on what they produce in their job/career, leading them to live life centered around that. It can look like people being centered on and identifying with what they produce in a hard driving/works based ministry that isn’t really coming from an overflow of Life from the heart, but serving ambition or selfish purposes. It can look like people being centered on and getting an identity from how they bring sexual attraction to others. (or whatever else it is that produces something for somebody and causes people to be pleased in being able to use us, and to give us a shallow form of acceptance and identity in return) We were created for much more.

She got caught up in feeling obligated to fulfill the roles assigned to her by the world’s systems, all the busywork involved in that, and she neglected her inner spiritual life. That is what it means that her mother’s sons were angry with her and made her caretaker of the vineyards, and that she neglected her own vineyard. She became one who was being used to meet the desires of others as if her own heart didn’t matter or had nothing better than that to offer. We are meant to live from the inside out, but the world (and church) pressures us to live backwards, from the outside in, and we get messed up on a deep level as a result. This is where we all come from. It can be especially tricky in religion, where we are told that we need to live up to a standard to be accepted, (just another way of being defined by what we produce for someone else’s judgments and agenda, rather than who we really are) and where we are taught to put others first and to neglect ourselves, even though we really can’t give anything to others of true value unless it comes from our own heart relationship with God, which needs to be put ahead of other people to become healthy and vibrant and a source of life to give out from. She became “scarred” and dysfunctional by living from the outside in just as sure as a car is going to become scarred and dysfunctional if you put gas where the engine oil is supposed to be and oil into the gas tank and drive it for a while.

Her vineyard, which she has neglected, speaks of her heart. In truth, our heart is a spiritual garden and vineyard. It is no coincidence that, along with this reference to "her vineyard," Christ stated that he is the vine, we are the branches, and our job is merely to abide in the vine and bear fruit as a result, as he said in John 15. It is no coincidence that love, peace, joy, patience, etc are the “fruits” of the Spirit as listed in Galatians 5. This all speaks of a life of relying/centered on Christ within and fruit growing as a result, not one of trying to manufacture the fruit without the vine. Also, the fruit is not primarily successful business deals and ministry positions and popularity and all the things like that which the world seeks first and judges us according to, the fruit is primarily the things of the heart (love, joy, gentleness, etc) which God prioritizes. As we rest in him and delight ourselves in him, the fruit grows, and produces seed which can be scattered to grow fruit elsewhere, and the life centered on our heart relationship with Christ brings life to others’ vineyards as an overflow, as a byproduct.

The simple truth is that an apple tree produces apples, and a thorn bush produces thorns. No matter how hard the thorn bush tries to make apples, it can’t, it can only make thorns, but the apple tree produces apples with ease, because it is an apple tree. It takes in nutrients from its roots and the apples just happen. If you try to work your old nature into acting like Jesus, you still can’t produce Jesus, only Christ the vine can produce Christ’s fruit. So is our walk, we can’t manufacture it, we can only abide in the right vine from the heart.Let him love you, and you will love back. It's how you were designed.

Later in the song as well, her “garden” is used as a picture of her heart. Her garden and her vineyard are basically the same thing. It is also no coincidence to this that Adam was placed in a garden, (the garden in Eden, meaning garden in “pleasure,” no less) and that his job in life was to cultivate this garden which contained the tree of life, bearing fruit to eternal life. Surely, you can search the location in the middle east where the garden is said to be in scripture and you will not find a physical garden with an angel guarding it with a flaming sword and a physical tree which if you eat it’s fruit you will live forever. No, the garden is a spiritual garden. Adam’s job, which we are now restored to through redemption, was to abide in Christ, the True Vine, who IS the tree of eternal life, to delight in his pleasing and Life giving fruit, to cultivate and keep the garden or vineyard of his own heart. He was to water the earth by the river of Life which flowed through his garden, a son of God taking dominion over physical creation through that flow of divine Life. (see genesis 2) Jesus said that “he who believes in me, out of his innermost being (heart) will flow rivers of living water.” We regain Adam’s communion with the Father through our redemption in Christ, and we are restored to his place of dominion as well. We follow the pattern he demonstrated of cultivating a garden/vineyard, which is our heart, and “channeling” Holy Spirit’s river into the earth through it. This is what the bride had neglected when she was caught up in the busywork pushed on her by the world and the church and did not care for her own vineyard. She was not living her God given purpose and design from the heart, but living someone else's purpose and design for her. Sadly, everyone else has a much lower value and purpose for us than our bridegroom does.

Jesus came to deliver us from that slavery of performance driven living, but it is often like the children of Israel who Pharaoh saw as a threat and put into slavery. His was a religious kingdom also, not only a commercial one. As soon as they began responding to the call to come out of their forced labor obligations and worship God, Pharaoh called them lazy and he gave them more busywork for his own agenda to keep them from even entertaining such thoughts. When we hear the call to come out of people-pleasing bondage and learn a lifestyle of worship, and when we begin to change this pattern of being used from the outside in to one of flowing in God from the inside out, to bear fruit from the Vine, we meet much resistance from the world just like Israel did, especially from those who are used to having their way with us. (or with others) Our deliverer is faithful and he always makes a way for his will in our lives though, no matter what the resistance.