Song of Solomon 5:9-16: a reflection

9How is your beloved better than another beloved, you fairest among women? How is your beloved better than another beloved, that you do so adjure us? 10My beloved is white and ruddy. The best among ten thousand. 11His head is like the purest gold. His hair is bushy, black as a raven. 12His eyes are like doves beside the water brooks, washed with milk, mounted like jewels. 13His cheeks are like a bed of spices with towers of perfumes. His lips are like lilies, dropping liquid myrrh. 14His hands are like rings of gold set with beryl. His body is like ivory work overlaid with sapphires. 15His legs are like pillars of marble set on sockets of fine gold. His appearance is like Lebanon, excellent as the cedars. 16His mouth is sweetness; yes, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, daughters of Jerusalem.

The daughters of Jerusalem ask a simple question: what makes your beloved better than any other? The bride answers with a long, glowing description, dwelling on every feature of the one she loves. Her love is not vague or embarrassed. She has looked closely at her beloved and can say, feature by feature, why he holds her heart.

The church has long read this song as a picture of the soul's love for Christ, and the closing words carry that reading beautifully. He is altogether lovely, the bride says, and then adds, this is my beloved, and this is my friend. Love and friendship meet in the same person. The one she adores is also the one she can call companion, near and dear at once.

The passage invites you to grow specific in your love for Christ. When someone asks what makes him worth following, can you answer with more than a shrug? Take time to look closely at him, at his mercy, his truth, his patience, his beauty, until you too can say from the heart that he is altogether lovely, your beloved and your friend. Love ripens when it learns to name what it treasures.

Lord Jesus, you are altogether lovely, my beloved and my friend. Teach me to look closely at you until my love grows specific and glad. When others ask why I follow you, give me an answer full of what I have seen of your goodness. Be to me both the One I adore and the companion who walks near. Amen.