Song of Songs 3:8 - The Valour And Glory of The Lord's Body Guard

Hidden Treasures of the Song of Songs, which is Solomon's. And so we get to the eighth verse or the het verse of the third chapter, which is once again to me, a glorious miracle verse.

I mean, it just really is in all so many ways. So I, probably before I say this first, we got to be reminded that this unbelievable situation here that we are beholding the bed of Jesus or the bed of Solomon as it's described here. And that is literally our hearts, but it is also the heart of the church.

It is the arc of the covenant, you know, collaborative arc of the covenant when we think about the church's heart, which is where Jesus rests, where we rest with Jesus, where it all happens. And so when you think about what we're talking about here is the Lord's bodyguard, you know, it's so beautiful to think that this is the guarding of our hearts and the church's heart. And so it's just spectacular. Glorious is the best way I know to put it, as it is clearly a miracle.

Okay. So again, we're describing the 60 Valiant of Israel and it says, they all hold swords being experts in war. Every man hath his sword upon his thigh because of fear in the night. And the beautiful, amazing thing that this particular verse, everybody seems to agree on when it comes to Rashi and Matthew, Henry and Spurgeon. And they all wax completely eloquent on the subject of the first thing is no doubt whatsoever that the sword that they have is the sword of the spirit. And the sword of the spirit is the word of God. And when you look at that word sword in Hebrew, and you really dig into it, what's spectacular.

I mean, I just feel like, oh, if you could see what is there, it would just encourage you so much. Cause the idea of the sword starts out with this miracle verse with a, with a hat. It starts out with that letter that begins the word statutes, which is what we have been studying. Again, our union with Christ is the beginning of the word sword.

That's it's fantastic to me. And then it has a rage, which again would speak back towards the spirit and then a bet, which clearly is the son. And he is the word.

I mean, you know, in other words that the word son begins with a bet, and there's no doubt in my mind whatsoever. And so many times when you see the idea of cutting a covenant and all these things have to do with the sword, it also has to do with the word, which can cut between right spirit and soul. And so here we have this, this unbelievable weaponry that these bodyguard of the Lord's heart is wielding, which is his word itself.

Okay. The sword of the spirit. And you know, you can't help, but then just go to the next word, which is they're experts in war, right? That in other words, when they says, and it says, they all hold swords being experts in war. And that word expert, by the way, is the word teacher and is literally the word Lamed. And, you know, if we, if you've been with me through the 119 Psalm, we studied and studied and studied the Lamed because it has to do with your heart because our hearts love to learn. And that's the reason why we're all listening to this and talking about it is because we love to learn this stuff. And, and again, being experts in the word is comes from a discipleship point of view where our hearts long for it.

Okay. And seems like so much comes together right here that it being an expert in war means that you are a disciple of the word of God in so many different ways in a disciple of Christ being that it is his word. And so the more that you learn about his word, the more of an expert you become in war, right? And the word war is again, it's loaded with Malick's and Lamed's it's it's and, and hats.

It's, it's, it's just the same. All these things kind of come together again to say that as we are united with God, of course, it's going to come against persecution. Of course, Satan is going to come against that. And the way that he came against Satan always was with words with the word of God and the way that he's going to straighten out everything at the end of the age is going to be through his word.

And it says that so clearly. So as we become experts in this, we become swordsman. And so are you not surprised that Solomon's body guard were experts, experts, or Jesus's body guard or experts, experts in the word of God. And then, um, then where do they have these sorts?

And that this also is very beautiful, amazing stuff from my perspective. They have it upon their thigh because of the fear of the night. Well, we're going to talk about the thigh for a minute because that too is just loaded with meaning because you might remember that Abraham had his servant put his hand under the thigh as did Joseph.

I mean, as did Jacob have his son put his hand under his thigh when he told him he want to be buried. And you might remember that it's the thigh that got wrenched, um, of Israel and it's all pointing to something. It's, it's pointing to the flank.

Okay. And when you're talking about war, flank is a critical understanding and the flank is either the side or the back because someone's strength is always facing forward, but where they're where they're the most vulnerable is at their flank. And, and so a flanking maneuver is like the number one thing in all of, of, you know, understanding war.

And so, you know, if you can see all through the scriptures, they take that Satan, he bites at the heels, he comes at the flank, he comes at you. And so the fact that these swords are girded on their side and, and you'll see this throughout the scriptures, it talks about it several times that their floor, their sword was on their side and that, and that's the idea of the flank. They're guarding the flank. In other words, we've got to use the word of guard to guard our flanks and our brother's flanks and the church's flanks and the heart of God's flank. And you get the idea is that it's our, it's the flank that needs to be guarded and that's why the sword is there and it's ready to be drawn and it's sharper than any two-edged sword. So the fact that it's on the flank is huge. It's just, it's a, it's a beautiful understanding of, you know, spiritual warfare as he hits it with the, with the end of this where he says, uh, from the fear of the night, right?

And that they're the bride for every reason in the world. When you look at it all about warfare and Ephesians six, right? It says for, we battle not against flesh and blood, but spiritual forces of darkness, the forces of darkness, right? And, and these, these, these forces are, they bring darkness against the light. And so what a beautiful thing that we have the sword of the spirit that brings light, right?

And that the flank is, is the darkness that we, that we're going to come up against, right? And so when you look at this, to me, it's like, wow, you're talking about 60 valiant men of Israel, wrestlers with God in prayer, wrestlers with his word in prayer. And what are they wrestling for?

The bed of Solomon. They're wrestling for the heart. And those of us who know John Eldridge's ministry or know the masculine journey is where are we always wrestling?

Where's the fight taking place? It's for our hearts because that is the heart of the church. It's where we meet with Jesus. And we, we've got to protect that place where we meet with Jesus.

It just has to be protected so that he can do his work. And, um, you know, we need the healing and we need to become wholehearted. All those things happen with ministry of the heart. And so, you know, for those of us who are John Eldridge lovers, you can't help but look at this passage and go, Oh my goodness, is he on target with his ministry fighting for the hearts of his beloved, right?

Of Jesus is beloved. So when you go after fighting for someone's heart, especially with the word of God using your sword, right? Here's this scripture or here's this understanding of this passage that all of a sudden, boy, this makes sense. And let me share this with you because you're just, it's going to make all the difference. And when I think about the life and death struggles I'm even in this morning as I, I am reaching out to one of my children and, and they seem very, uh, like doubtful of many things. It was beautiful that I had the word of God to lean on, to point out that they were chosen.

They were chosen as, as by God and chosen by me because I had the word of God right there in the sword. All you have to do. I love, I love, I love what it says in the 16th Psalm. It says, my goodness is nothing apart from you.

Okay. So you know, the, the sword knows what it wants to do, but you got to know what the sword is, right? And like the, the Varpel sword that the Alice held in, um, in the movie that Disney did the, you know, the Varpel sword on the Alice in Wonderland knows what it wants, but in order to know that you've got to be in communion with him, with that sword in your hand. And so there to me, I love to be in that situation where I know God is doing something and I'm in a battle where God is wanting his beloved's hearts and he will give you that word just like he did for me this morning as, as we're battling for our children, as we're battering for our friends, battling for our friends hearts, as we're battling for the church's heart. This verse is glorious.

Okay. It is the eighth verse of the gimel chapter. In other words, the idea of gimel is it's going to bring greatness. And if you don't see how great this verse is, man, I don't know what to say.

It's spectacular. Read Matthew Henry, read Spurgeon, read Rashi, whoever you want to read that understands what this is saying. Oh my goodness is this a glorious verse. I hope we can all get it in our hearts where we can use it the next time we come to a place where we need to be the Lord's bodyguard.