Song of Songs 2:8-15, James 1:17-27 Sermon 

 

This is a great ancient love song. It glories in the sheer physicality of romantic love. It did not take long for religious folks to turn it into an allegory of God's love for us and our mystical love for God. I think we have plenty of room for both approaches. James says that every good and perfect gift comes from above, and certainly romantic love or spiritual intensity emerge from that same source.

 

The song knows that romantic love uses the 5 senses.Our discomfort with this in church stems from the fundamental error of seeing the spiritual as somehow above the physical.  I sometimes wonder if Sunday worship is impoverished when it comes to the senses, as we so emphasize hearing above all. Certainly in our private prayer time, we can make an effort to work with the different senses as aids toward closeness with God. We can make an analogy to romantic love as an entree into God's love for  us and our love for God . According to James we live as lovers of the world and not of God. Love is proved in our acts of devotion. As the song says in My Fair Lady-don't talk of love-show me. Few of us experience the constant yearning and intensity of romantic love in our religious experience. At its best deep prayer does get at that merged sense of self with the other, that approach toward unity that marks romantic love. When prayer has an urgency, you know you are in deeper relationship with God.  Love can be extravagant. We stumble over the most elaborate superlative. We do that when we describe the attributes of Go. Love lingers over detail.

 

Eugene Peterson (Five Smooth Stones) says that the love of God is an "assault on our indifference (59)." We may have to generate feelings of compassion. When we don't we are dealing with the love for family.He reminds us that God regards us with all beneficence for the beloved. God, delighting in us, festoons his creatures,just as we are,when we delight in each other, enhancing and elaborating the beloved (57).  If we are the object of God's love we acquire special value. One of the great feelings of romance is that someone sees you as special. The lovers in the song see each other at their best,as lovers often do. Maybe that is the one time we see clearly, with the blinders of love. Sometimes love is blind to faults, at least for a while. I think that one of the diiferences between men and women is that a man will look at himself and think: haircut, new coat, lose ten pounds, Jessica Alba. A woman looks critically at herself, every element an issue, so they fully yearn to be appreciated, to be seen as beautiful.

 

It is incumbent on Christians to tend their relationships with each other, including their romantic ones and the intimacy of a deep, abiding relationship with God. Our spiritual life tends toward the abstract, but the abstract is difficult to love. After some time, we lose some of the initial excitement of early infatuation. We may not be sure about the little foxes, but can think up many things that can spoil a moment. Love needs tending, as a spiritual life needs tending. Love lingers over detail, but it takes the time to linger.

 

Recall some of your favorite love songs. Do you have your song together? Do you have some favorite hymns? Aren't those a type of long song to God? Maybe we could think of our relationship with God as a life long spiritual love affair.