Killing Me Softly (Part 2)

Long ago Charles Williams noted that “sensuality and sanctity are so closely intertwined they can hardly be separated.” Paul said as much: “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh [another term for sexual intimacy].” Then he concludes with this thought: “This [sexual union] is a profound mystery—but I am [also] talking about Christ and the church” (Ephesians 5:31–32).

Here Paul clearly links marital sexual intimacy with spiritual intimacy with God. One is a representation and reflection of the other. Thus, I say, sex is holy, an eloquent expression of our profound, inexpressible hunger for God, a passionate urge to merge with the object of our love and ultimately with the God who loves us as no human lover can.

That longing—to know God and experience His love—originates with God. It is His calling, His wooing that awakens us to desire. Indeed, we would not seek Him if He did not first seek us. Our longing for intimacy and union is the answering cry of our hearts to His call. “Even when men knock on the door of a brothel,” said G. K. Chesterton, “they are looking for God.” That hunger may be masked and distorted and misunderstood, but it is undeniably there.

This marital love and sex is good, but not as good as it gets, which is why God has placed limits on the depth of all human relationships. Our need for intimacy always outstrips the capacity of another human being to satisfy it. We will always betray another’s love in one way or another. This is what Original Sin means: No one is completely trustworthy; no one will always “keep covenant.” We will always let one another down.

“An image can easily become an idol and romantic love is a powerful image,” wrote Peter Kreeft in Three Philosophies of Life. “We expect joy from this human experience, but it ends in bitter disappointment. We have heaped on the shoulders of our beloved a burden of joy-making only God can carry and we are scandalized when those shoulders break.”

That hunger—for something beyond human love—is the way God leads us to His love. In each of us there is a deep and holy place reserved for Him alone, a place that no one else, not even the greatest human lover, can ever fill. We draw near to God to find final affection.

May I suggest a journey, then, an exploration? Read each poem in the Song of Songs at a leisurely pace and put yourself in it. Meditate on each line. Make Shulamite’s words your words and offer them up to God. Then read Solomon’s (the lover’s) words as God’s words to you and listen to His response. Hear Him speak to your heart, “Come away with Me, My one, My bride.” The longer we stay with the symbol and reflect upon it, the more it will yield. “A symbol should go on deepening,” said Flannery O’Connor in The Habit of Being.

Imagine! God wants you, not for your body, your clothes, your talent, your intellect, your personality, but simply because you are you! He loves you. He cannot take His eyes from you.

“Ah,” you say. “How could He love poor me? I am dark with sin and guilt, loathsome, grotesque.” No, you are His “perfect one” (Song 6:9). He sees awesome beauty in you.

“Love is blind,” you say. No, infatuation is blind, but not God’s love. He sees you as you are, yet He sings to you.

My dove in the clefts of the rock,
in the hiding places on the mountainside,
show me your face,
let me hear your voice;
for your voice is sweet,
and your face is lovely (Song of Songs 2:14).

Is this illusion? No, it is clear-sighted love. God’s eyes are filled with your beauty. He loved you before your father, spouse, or children loved you (or wounded you). “If you were the only person on earth, He would have gone to all the trouble He went to just to win you,” one early Christian writer said. Does this not excite us?

Whatever your heart may be saying at this moment, you must know that God is the lover of your soul. Even now, in your unperfected state, He cries out to you, “How beautiful you are . . . how beautiful.”

We are special objects of God’s favor and affection. His is a love that swallows up every love in its fullness. The Song in this way becomes more than a love song. It becomes adoration and worship.

Taken from Seeing God, © 2006 by David Roper. Used by permission of Discovery House Publishers, Box 3566, Grand Rapids MI 49501. All rights reserved.