Come With Me

DEVOTION

SONG OF SONGS

COME WITH ME

Song 2:8-13

8 Listen! My lover! Look! Here he comes, leaping across the mountains, bounding over the hills. 9 My lover is like a gazelle or a young stag. Look! There he stands behind our wall, gazing through the windows, peering through the lattice. 10 My lover spoke and said to me, "Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, and come with me. 11 See! The winter is past; the rains are over and gone. 12 Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing has come, the cooing of doves is heard in our land. 13 The fig tree forms its early fruit; the blossoming vines spread their fragrance. Arise, come, my darling; my beautiful one, come with me."

NIV

Well, we could think this is all about some lover and a beautiful woman, but then we would have to think God only means for us to know about how men and women relate to each other, as if we did not know. But this is about the Lord and his church. It could be seen in two different contexts. First it could be a description of the coming of the Lord in the flesh to his beloved Israel. They have been in the winter of the Old Testament long enough and he comes to bring the spring, the New Testament life, and a refreshing time of renewal for them. It could also be seen as the Lord coming in the clouds for his beloved church. A church that has been in the winter of this world, and he comes bounding over the hills calling his church to arise to come and meet him in the air. But then it can also be an individual call to arise from our slumber, from the life of this sinful world and join him. What joy it is to see the Lord after we have been living in the winter of life, living in sin. He comes to us, peering into the window of our soul, and calls to us there, “arise, my darling, my beautiful one, the one I created in my image, come with me, see the winter is past”. It is the call to salvation, to a better life, a life of singing, rejoicing in the Lord. The two lives described, the winter and the spring. The life in sin and the life in salvation. He calls his people, the people of the earth, to come to him. We all are his creation, all peoples of the earth. There are none who live that have life because of any other reason than because of God. So he calls everyone to himself. He loves all the world so much he sent his only Son so that whosoever believes in him should be saved. Anyone merely has to look up and see him coming, calling to them, “come with me”. He calls to his church, to the world, “Come with me”.