The need of agape love to protect the soul in personal love, part 2; John 15:17.

Title: The need of agape love to protect the soul in personal love, part 2; John 15:17.

Personal love, though potentially wonderful, is a problem generator and needs agape love as a problem solver.

 

With that in mind I want to briefly look at the two areas of human personal love so that you can see how agape love must exist. There is nothing wrong with personal love. We have a desire to love and to be loved. However, as is often the case with any desire, it can be perverted into a desire for happiness. Personal love cannot give lasting happiness.

 

Category 1 love: love for God.

Category 2 love: love in right man right woman.

Category 3 love: love in friendship.

 

Principles of category #2 love

 

Though it is useful for principles of romance, Song of Solomon has a deeper meaning in the relationship of Christ to Israel and Christ to the Church. I quote:

 

Category #2 love involves one person in your soul whom you can never forget and never erase. It is unique and special, SOS 1:7.

 

Category #2 love is protective. It is important to realize that once you have the right man in your soul you are protected from a lot of things, SOS 1:13, 2:4.

 

Christ is always protecting us and our thoughts should often turn to Him. The right woman should orbit her husband and be ready to respond to Him. I emphasize the word “respond.”

 

The problem is that you must be careful of reaction.

 

Reaction instead of the response of the woman destroys the protection of the right man’s love.

 

A reaction instead of response will produce stress as the soul will be disordered. A woman is a natural responder for it is a part of her curse at the fall, GEN 3:16. If she reacts consistently the stress will build and her marriage will become a source of pain instead of the source of protection as it was designed for her.

 

Don’t forget that every one of these principles of marriage have a corresponding reality in the relationship between the believer and Christ.

 

A reaction to Christ is a lack of faith rest and patience on the timing and will of God. It is a failure to apply faith to who He is.

 

Naturally you may say of your husband, “I know who he is and I have no faith in him.” I must remind you that the object of faith in the CWL is never, ever, ever a person other than TLJC. He works all things together for good to those who love Him.

 

EPH 5:22

Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord.

 

If you want a marriage that glorifies God you must obey this command.

 

I repeat, the woman is a natural responder, but she has a tendency to rebel and attempt to initiate. This doesn’t mean she can’t make decisions. It means that she cannot take the authority away from the man and put him under it. This will eventually cause her stress and mental attitude sins.

 

The Shulamite woman was not reactive. Protective has to do with having the right person in your soul. When the woman becomes reactive to the right man he no longer is protective. If you become reactive you are in a danger area. The protective principle is important. As long as you are not reactive you can be anywhere in the world and you are safe, and his love protects you. He is in your soul. That is the greatest protection a woman ever had.

Both are going to fail at times and maybe for longer periods at certain times. We are commanded to live with each other in an understanding way and to forgive each other and to overcome these troubles with agape love. [I told you marriage has trouble]

 

Category #2 love must come from human volition. The initiator and the responder must do so freely. A slave cannot respond. A task-master is not a leader, SOS 3:5, 8:3.

 

Song 3:5 "I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,

By the gazelles or by the hinds of the field,

That you will not arouse or awaken my love,

Until she pleases."

 

Therefore anything that destroys, for example, the woman’s free will destroys her ability to identify and to respond. A man whose wife is not responsive cannot rule well. Both are free agents and both can help the other by living in their roles as God has designed.

 

The husband is called to love his wife as Christ loves the Church. Christ never violates our volition, is always forgiving, and has laid down His life for our highest and best.

 

The husband lacks leadership when he loses this attitude and gives no virtue for his wife to respond to. Either he becomes a tyrant or he becomes a wimp, and both are weak.

 

Husbands, just think of how Christ has and does treat you and you have your model to follow.

 

Song 8:1 "Oh that you were like a brother to me

Who nursed at my mother's breasts.

If I found you outdoors, I would kiss you;

No one would despise me, either.

 

Song 8:2 "I would lead you and bring you

Into the house of my mother, who used to instruct me [moms instruct your children!!!];

I would give you spiced wine to drink from the juice of my pomegranates.

 

Song 8:3 "Let his left hand be under my head,

And his right hand embrace me."

 

This is a confident embrace under the roof of her mother meaning that this is in no way a lewd affair done in secret, but a marriage that she desires. Her mother once taught her wisdom and now she desires for her husband to teach her. This is based on his volition and hers. It takes two to tango and it takes two positive volitions to realize a marriage that brings glory to God.

 

This is the whole package; comfort, love, embrace, openness, instruction in wisdom, and great happiness. Christ to the believer and the husband to the wife.

 

Husbands, you have a high calling in the Church-age as do you wives. Take one day at a time and forgive each other and yourselves while you strive for the honor and virtue that God has placed upon Christian marriage. This is application of grace orientation in Christian marriage.

 

Category #2 love is tone-oriented. One can tell if something is wrong or right by the other’s tone of voice or body language, SOS 2:8-9.

 

This has to do with the fact that there is one person in your soul and you can tell if something is wrong by his voice, and that something is right or wrong.

 

Song 2:8 "Listen! My beloved!

Behold, he is coming,

Climbing on the mountains,

Leaping on the hills!

 

Song 2:9 "My beloved is like a gazelle or a young stag.

Behold, he is standing behind our wall,

He is looking through the windows,

He is peering through the lattice.

 

Here we have the attentive ears of the Shulamite who knows the sound of her beloved. When he arrives and she is in the house he playfully darts to window to window looking in for his loved one. The word for look is a piercing look. Piercing as a ray of light, he looks for her and she knows he is there. She enjoys the game as it reveals that he is not bored with her.

 

Husbands may take a note from this and have some fun with their wives. Women are curious creatures and love surprises and games, not head games.

 

If you think that sounds overly romantic and fluffy think of how often God has peered in to the window to your life. What I mean is, how often does God show Himself to you in the most interesting and unexpected ways?

 

We often see the presence of Christ in things that others call “coincidence,” but we know it is our lover warmly showing us that He is near.

 

He’s not playing games, but neither is He bored with us. He reveals Himself over and over again.

 

Category #2 love causes illness when unrequited - Song of Solomon 2:5; 5:8. This is a psychosomatic (soul-body) illness.

 

Song 5:6 "I opened to my beloved,

But my beloved had turned away and had gone!

My heart went out to him as he spoke.

I searched for him, but I did not find him;

I called him, but he did not answer me.

 

Song 5:7 "The watchmen who make the rounds in the city found me, They struck me and wounded me;

The guardsmen of the walls took away my shawl from me.

 

According to verse 2 this was in a dream. But the vivid dream pierced her so much that she longed for her beloved.

 

Just like placing faith in a person is never required, lovesickness to a person should be overcome by agape love, however, it is painful and the pain is real. Doctrine must be applied with the open eyes of the spiritual soul that looks towards eternity and your true mate which is Christ.

 

To my older congregation they say, “Ya, no duh,” but I’m not speaking to them. A message from the HS has parts for the young and old, the new and mature, so if you’re thinking, “duh”,  know that your good behavior and manors in class are affecting many young people.

 

Lovesickness will affect your whole body, but you must understand that this too will pass. Be strong and know that your Lord has you personally in mind all the time and He will make things OK as you learn a valuable lesson.

 

The lesson: not all men or women are honorable.

 

/John 2:25

and because He did not need anyone to bear witness concerning man for He Himself knew what was in man.\

 

This is in no way meant to make one cold or isolated. It is only to make one knowledgeable of the frailty and frivolity of man.

 

Song 5:8 "I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,

If you find my beloved,

As to what you will tell him:

For I am lovesick."

 

Being a dream I would put these actions in the conscience. Verse 6 says that the beloved spoke but had turned away and gone. She had estranged herself from him and slighted him and it gives her great fear and causes her to be lovesick. This is the pain of love. In the end she will marry this lover but things don’t always work out.

 

Verse 7 indicates what the lovesick presume. They always presume disaster.

 

Like the prodigal son our conscience wakes up to certain mistakes in the past when we did not head the word of our lover, Jesus Christ. As with the Shulamite our conscience can burn.

 

In personal love things may not work out and you have to deal with your broken heart. But when it comes to Christ, He Himself has said that He will never leave us or forsake us. He cannot deny us since He cannot deny Himself.