Spiritual warfare can also be seen in the Song of Songs, for spiritual warfare is a major part of our love affair with the Lord; our will needs to be subdued and strong in resurrection, and it will be like the tower of David, the armory for spiritual warfare.
In our prayerful consideration of the spiritual warfare of the church as the new man, this week we are entering deeper into the topic of, Fighting the Spiritual Warfare through Living in Christ’s Ascension as the New Creation in Resurrection to Become Christ’s Duplication and Counterpart.
If we love the Lord, we will engage in the spiritual warfare.
The subject of the entire Bible is the romance between God and His chosen and redeemed people; this is also the secret of the universe. Our relationship with the Lord needs to be personal, affectionate, private, and spiritual.
For us to fight the spiritual warfare, we need a personal, affectionate, private, and spiritual relationship with the Lord.
When we speak of a personal relationship with Him, we need to tell Him, Lord, draw me, we will run after You! Lord, draw me from so many distracting things!
Our relationship with Him has to be affectionate; we need to tell the Lord, Lord, kiss me with the kisses of Your mouth! I love You, Lord – kiss me with the kisses of Your mouth!
Our relationship with the Lord has to be private, and we need to tell Him, Lord, bring me into Your chambers; bring me into my mingled spirit as the chambers of the King of kings!
In the New Testament we also see these four aspects of our relationship with the Lord; our relationship with the Lord is personal – God has prepared wonderful things for those who love Him (1 Cor. 2:9).
When we turn our heart to the Lord and exercise our spirit, telling Him, Lord Jesus, I love You! then the Spirit does active research into Christ as the depths of God, and He applies these riches to us for our realisation, participation, and enjoyment in our spirit. However, if we do not love the Lord, we are set apart to woe (see 1 Cor. 16:22).
The love of Christ constrains us, limits us from all sides, and presses us, so that we no longer live to ourselves but to Him who loved us, died for us, and has been raised; this is an affectionate love for the Lord (2 Cor. 5:14-15).
Our relationship with the Lord should be private, as the Lord instructed us in Matt. 6:6; we need to enter into our private room, shut our door, and pray to our Father who is in secret, and our Father who sees in secret will repay us.
Finally, our relationship with the Lord has to be spiritual; we need to walk according to the spirit (Rom. 8:4), set our mind on the spirit and pay attention to our spirit (8:6), and live in spirit.
We need to use our spirit, exercise our spirit and be spiritual men, those who are dominated, led, governed, controlled, and move by the mingled spirit.
God fell in Love with Man; God Courts man; God Transforms man to be His Counterpart
The entire Bible speaks in a consistent way concerning one thing, which is God’s economy; in brief, the content of God’s economy is God falling in love with His chosen people. Song of Songs is an abridged version of this romance, and the entire Bible is the whole revelation.
One day God was incarnated – He became man to court man. Incarnation was God’s courtship of man, just as king Solomon courted a country girl. Solomon didn’t go in all his glory and splendor, but he became a country man to reach this country girl.
God became man to become “a country man” in incarnation so that He may court us, a country girl, and make us His queen. This is what Song of Songs talks about.
What we have in the Song of Songs is a history of love with an excellent marriage, revealing the progressive experience of an individual believer’s loving fellowship with Christ; as we go on with the Lord, this becomes something corporate, resulting in the bride of Christ.
As we are drawn by the Lord to pursue Him and love Him, our courtship and relationship becomes very corporate, and our individual pursuit of Christ is for the corporate bride of Christ.
Before Song of Songs, however, we have the book of Ecclesiastes, written by the same author; here we see that everything is vanity of vanities. The conclusion Solomon arrived to in trying all these things is that it’s all vapor of vapors, emptiness of emptinesses, futility of futilities; human life apart from Christ is vanity of vanities and chasing after the wind (Eccl. 1:14).
But God put eternity in man’s heart – a divinely implanted sense of a purpose, working throughout the ages, which nothing under the sun but God can satisfy (see Eccl. 3:11). Within every man there’s such a sense.
In Song of Songs we see the living of Christ’s seeker. In the first stage, she is attracted by the Lord’s love, she is charmed by His name, And she is captivated by His person to pursue Him and be led into the church life.
In the second stage, the seeker is called to remain in the cross so that she may be freed from her introspective self, for the fulfillment of her beloved’s purpose in the divine life.
Many times we are introspective – we look into ourselves, we analyze ourselves and what we have done, etc; the result of introspection is that we are discouraged. The Bible never says that we should look into ourselves but that we should look away unto Jesus!
In the third stage the seeker is called to live in ascension, even within the veil, so that she may experience the stronger cross and be one with God in spirit, even before the rapture. We are called by Christ to live in ascension; we are seated with Christ in the heavenlies – this is a fact, and He is in ascension, where we also are with Him.
In the fourth stage the seeker is conformed to the image of her Beloved to be the Shullamite, the feminine version of Solomon, a type of the New Jerusalem. If we love the Lord to the uttermost and participate in the divine romance, we will engage in spiritual warfare for the defeat of God’s enemy!
Lord Jesus, thank You for becoming a man to court us and draw us to Yourself. Keep us in this divine romance, in the courtship of God and man, so that we may advance in our spiritual life and be part of Your overcoming bride. Amen, Lord, make us the same as You are for us to be Your duplication, Your reproduction, for the fulfillment of Your purpose. We love You, Lord, and we are drawn by You to pursue You and run after You. We love You, Lord, and we are willing to engage in spiritual warfare for the defeat of Your enemy!
Having a Will that is Subdued and Strong in Resurrection for the Spiritual Warfare
In Song of Songs 4:4 it says, Your neck is like the tower of David, / Built for an armory: / A thousand bucklers hang on it, / All the shields of the mighty men.
The neck refers to our will; often our will is strong and stubborn and the Lord refers to His people as “stiff-necked”.
The neck signifies the human will under God; the Lord considers the submission of our will a most beautiful thing.
In Song of Songs 4:1 we see that the seeker’s hair is like a flock of goats that repose on Mount Gilead; this means that the will of the seeker has been subdued and gathered together. The Lord wants to subdue our will, and this is a beautiful thing to Him.
We need to not only love the Lord and tell Him how much we love Him, but we also need to have our will subdued. The more our will is subdued, the more it will be transformed. To have complete, adequate, and thorough transformation, there must be the subduing of the will.
Many of us love the Lord, but our will is still ours – we are not subdued. Our mind may be renewed, our love may be burning for the Lord, but we may still be stubborn in our will. To have our concept changed and to love the Lord is not enough; for the fighting of the spiritual warfare we need to have our will subdued.
In Phil. 2:13 we see that it is God who operates in us both the willing and the working for His good pleasure; if we feel we are unwilling, we need to ask the Lord to operate in us both the willing and the working.
The lover of Christ is beautiful in having a will that is submissive to Christ (neck like the tower of David) and that is rich in the defending power (bucklers and shields of the mighty men).
If we have a submissive will, a will that has been subdued like a flock of goats on a mountainside (v. 1b), our will is expressed like the tower of David that holds all kinds of weapons against the attacks.
Having a submissive will is beautiful to the Lord and fierce to the enemy; when our will is submissive to the Lord, it will also be resurrected and strong against the enemy. When we come out of our natural will, we will stand in our resurrected will against the enemy (Eph. 6:11, 13).
The more our will is subdued, the more it will be transformed, and we shall will what the Lord wills. The more our will is subdued by the Lord, the more it becomes in line with God’s will.
God’s will is for us to enjoy the Lord and live the Body life for the building up of the church as the organic Body of Christ (Rom. 12:2; Heb. 10:5-10; Eph. 1:5, 9, 11).
First, our will must be subdued; then it will be strong in resurrection and be like the tower of David, the armory for the spiritual warfare (Eph. 6:10). It is here, when our will is subdued and strong in resurrection, that we have an armory for the spiritual warfare.
The weapons for spiritual warfare are kept in our subdued and resurrected will (see 2 Cor. 10:3-5).
Our will needs to be subdued by Christ and resurrected by Him. The bucklers and shields that protect us against the arrows of the enemy are kept in the tower of the subdued and resurrected will of the Lord’s seeking one. Amen!
Lord Jesus, subdue our will and resurrect our will with Your person. We want to be transformed to be part of Your overcoming bridal warrior. Operate in us, Lord, to work out in us both the willing and the working for Your good pleasure. May we not reserve our will from You but may we allow You to subdue our will and make it strong in resurrection for the spiritual warfare. Amen, Lord, may there be bucklers and shields to protect us against the arrows of the enemy in the tower of our subdued and resurrected will!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message given by Ed Marks for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1972, vol. 1, “Life and Building as Portrayed in the Song of Songs,” ch. 6, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Spiritual Warfare of the Church as the New Man (2018 Memorial Day Conference), week 4, Fighting the Spiritual Warfare through Living in Christ’s Ascension as the New Creation in Resurrection to Become Christ’s Duplication and Counterpart.
- Hymns on this topic:
# The Bible is a romance / In the most holy sense: / God and His chosen people / In love it so presents. / This Universal Couple / Throughout it is displayed; / God in Christ is the Bridegroom, / His saints, the Bride, portrayed. (Song on, The Bible is a romance)
# Oh, save me, Lord! Subdue this stubborn will; / Oh, save me, Lord! / In spite of all, Thy purposes fulfil / In me, Oh, Lord; / I yield my self, and all I have and am, / To follow Thee, Thou all redeeming Lamb! (Hymns #385)
# By the cross discern the spirit, / With the mind by light renewed, / All emotion consecrated, / And the will in love subdued. (Hymns #748)
About aGodMan
