Song of Solomon 8 - Verse by Verse Bible Study

Song of Solomon 8 - Verse by Verse Bible Study

Video

September 18, 2013

So, tonight we are finishing up this fascinating book of Song of Solomon Chapter 8, Verse 1, the Bible reads, "O that thou wert as my brother, that sucked the breasts of my mother! When I should find thee without, I would kiss thee; yea, I should not be despised."

Now, if you would go to Lamentations, Chapter 4, it's interesting, the Book of Song of Solomon talks a lot about the breast, and in this Chapter that’s something that comes up a lot, and you know, first of all let me say this, a lot of people consider the Book of Song of Solomon to be explicit, because there are so many references to breasts in the Book of Song of Solomon, they then think, well this book is really explicit, this is in appropriate for children.

But in reality we've gone through all eight chapters of Song of Solomon, and really there's been nothing explicit, there's been no description of, the act that takes within marriage, there's no description of that act taking place, nothing overt anyway, and there's nothing talking about private parts or anything like that, it's actually a completely clean book, because we now that God's word is clean, and we know that every word of God is pure, the Bible teaches. He is a shield onto them that put their trust in him.

So, although there are a lot of intimate acts that are alluded to, or insinuated, the book is very clean and it does to go into any graphic detail about those types of things. But just because of the mentioning of the breasts, that’s basically why people think of it that way, but part of the reason for that is because our society kind of has a strange view toward breast, and here is why. I'm not trying to be inappropriate or anything, but honestly it's because of the fact that, breastfeeding used to be pretty much the only way that children were fed.

If you go back to just a few generations back, I mean, breast feeding was how babies were fed, they weren’t doing Enfamil, and this kind of formula-fed thing, and even in the Bible you'll notice that if a woman is not able to breastfeed her child, or doesn’t want to breastfeed her child, they would hire another woman to breastfeed that child. That was the other option. Or they would sometimes the grandmother even breastfed, like in the case of the Book of Ruth. Remember Naomi actually breastfeeds her grandchild, Ruth's son. And so we see throughout the Bible there's a lot of talk about breastfeeding, throughout the Bible.

Go to Lamentations 4, where I had you turn, and I'm taking the time to talk about this subject, you say, well, you are a preacher, you shouldn’t be talking about this, or you are a man, and you don’t have the right to talk about this. But do you see, here is the thing, I believe that everything in the Bible should be preached by a man, because I don’t believe in women preachers, in church.

RESPONSE: Amen.

If it's going to be preached in the house of God, and I believe that the whole word of God should be preached in the house of God, it's going to be preached by a man in this church. Look at Lamentations Chapter 4, and this is a very subject and this is why I want to cover it, but Lamentations Chapter 4, Verse 3, it says, "Even the sea monsters draw out the breast, they give suck to their young ones; the daughter of my people is become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness."

Again, the Bible is always scientifically correct, understanding the fact that whales are mammal, and that a mammal breastfeeds, that’s what mammal even means, is that it's something that gives suck to its young. So, the Bible gets it right here, because the sea monsters here is referring to whales, the great whales that God created, the huge animals that swell in the sea, that draweth the breast and give suck to their young ones. It says, the daughter of my people, by contrast, is become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.

What does he mean by that. God to Job 39, and we can see exactly what he means by the ostrich, two animals are being compared here. The whale and the Ostrich. The sea monster draws out the breast and give suck to its young, on the other hand, the daughter of its people had become cruel like the ostrich. Look what it says in Job 39, Verse 13, "Gavest thou the goodly wings unto the peacocks? or wings and feathers unto the ostrich?"

Now watch what the ostrich does, "Which leaveth her eggs in the earth, and warmeth them in dust, and forgetteth that the foot may crush them, or that the wild beast may break them. She is hardened against her young ones, as though they were not hers. Her labor is in vain without fear; Because God hath deprived her of wisdom, neither hath he imparted to her understanding."

Now it's pretty interesting God is comparing certain women onto an ostrich, and he says the ostrich does not care about its children, I fact it's hardened against them, meaning it doesn’t have that natural tender-hearted soft spot that natural love and affection that a mother would have for her child, it says the ostrich has hardened against her children, like they are not even hers. Doesn’t even care or realize that a foot may crush them, somebody might step on them, they might be devoured by a wild beast. Doesn’t even care, because God has deprived her of wisdom.

Now, what I want to cover with this, is that, breastfeeding is important, and it's something that women have done for thousands of years, and you might say, well, it's optional, and again, this sermon might offend people but whatever. Now here is the thing about breastfeeding though, okay. Breastfeeding actually requires you to be with your child, because breast-fed babies, and by the way, putting your child on a -- a lot of people recommend a four-hour schedule, put that newborn on a four-hour schedule.

Let me explain something to you, my wife and I do not use any birth control. We don't practice birth control. Now, say, why do you preach about this, because here is the thing, most people knew this for the last 6,000-some-odd years, but today our society has lost a lot of knowledge and a lot of wisdom, and it needs to be brought back, and God's word has the answer here.

You have to understand, in Josiah Chapter 1, Josiah talks about the fact that when his wife weaned their child, it says, when she had weaned Loruhamah then she conceived, and brought forth another child. You see, when a woman breast feeds her child, she does not conceive again until she weans that child. Now, a lot of people will dispute that, doctors will laugh at that, oh, yeah, that’s a myth, and that’s a wives' tale. No, it's the truth.

Here is the thing, my wife and I don’t use any birth control, we don’t believe in birth control.

RESPONSE: Amen.

We believe in letting God open and close the womb. People will say; ah, you are just going to have children every nine months, that’s not healthy. You are going to just, your wife's uterus is going to fall out. Here is the thing. We don’t have children every nine months, if you look at our children they are naturally spaced, and we do not use any type of birth control, and a lot of times, they will say, oh, I know what you mean, you just don’t use this kind of birth -- No, we don't use any kind.

When I say that I'm including abstinence. I believe abstinence is a form of birth control, and we do not believe in that and we do not use that. We do not use any kind of birth control, because here is the thing, our children are naturally spaced through breastfeeding. If you are putting your child on a four-hour schedule, you are right, it's not going to work.

You are going to conceive again. But if you feed the child on demand, meaning when it's hungry you feed it, and if you sleep with the baby in bed with you or feed it on demand throughout the night, it will cause your children to be spaced further apart, because it will only be once they are weaned that you even are able to become pregnant.

Now, what we see though, is we see women today sometimes, and I'm not trying to insinuate anything about anybody, but I'm just saying that there are women today that I've seen and known they were hardened against their young ones as if they were not theirs, and they are just like, just gave birth, how fast can I get back to work, how fast can I drop this thing off, and go to great America, how fast can I drop this thing off and take a three-day vacation with my husband.

How fast can I drop off my eight-week old and go back into the workforce, that is not normal, that is not natural, that is not biblical. Women are supposed to give birth to children and care for those children, and part of that is through breastfeeding. That is something that causes a lot of bonding, that’s something that’s very healthy for the child.

Obviously, look, the milk that is made by the mother, is better than what's made in a factory. That should just tell us if God designed it, that’s the healthiest for your child. I get ads in the mail telling me that my child is going to be smarter if it starts on formula. I don't believe that for one second. I believe that the best option for your child is breastfeeding. Now, you might say, well, you don’t understand my situation, or whatever, okay, that’s fine, I'm not judging you, I'm just preaching to the church here, that that’s the best solution. Science will tell you that, the Bible is telling us here, that drawing out the breast giving such to the young one is a loving act that a mother does for her child. It's a good bonding time, it cause them to spend time together, unlike the society that says, two weeks after you give birth, six weeks after you give birth, you are dropping your newborn off as if it's not yours, and you are going to work.

Who knows what's going to happen to it. It's like the ostrich. Who knows? You are dropping it off at some random daycare, who knows what they are doing to it there, who knows the way that they treat it there, and how it's going to grow up.

And so I'm a strong believer, and I always have been, and it offends people sometimes, but I'm a strong believer in women staying home and raising the kids. No daycare, no dropping them off to go to work, stay home. If you say, well, it takes two incomes, then dad needs to get two jobs.

RESPONSE: Yes.

It's no fun working two jobs, but do you know what, children need their mother, that newborn needs its mother. What I wanted to say about the breast, go back to Song of Solomon, if you would, Chapter 8, is that part of the reason why when we see breast, we are just thinking that it's a taboo subject, it's partially because there's a lot less breastfeeding going on than there used to.

So many people are using formula, so many people are using bottles, that basically now, breastfeeding is like, if you see a woman breastfeeding, you freak out. Look, I've been in a church where there was no breastfeeding allowed in this church. It's like they expect you to show up for Sunday school, church, go through the whole thing without being able to feed the child. Look, I understand that they don’t a woman just completely whipping out her breast, just completely exposed, and just like not even trying to cover anything up, just letting it all hang out, but I get that.

But this church, they got upset eve if a woman had a blanket over it, completely covering it, and we said to the pastor, like, what in the world is the problem, if it's completely covered. He is like: yeah, but everybody knows what's going on under that blanket, so that could come -- It's like, are you insane, this is how women feed their child. Is this like that thing where pregnant women can't go in public, because everybody is going to know how they got that way or something, I mean, it's ridiculous. It's nonsense.

Look, and I'm telling you, I'm offended by it, because what it does it's this birth control culture is what it is. It's a birth control culture, because whenever you try to complain about it, and say, hey look, my wife needs to feed the baby. Or, hey, we don’t want to stick our kid and drop it off for three hours in your nursery. This is what it always is; oh, this is just a short little phase you go through in your life, and you'll get through it. That little phase when you have little kids.

That’s not a phase for me, having little babies and toddlers in the phase, it's my life. Okay? And so it's this birth control culture that basically doesn’t want to cater to people who are having a lot of kids, like God told you to. Be fruitful and multiply. I take a stand against it, I don’t think that anybody in our church should ever be hassled for breastfeeding. Do you know what I mean? Just understand that it's a normal part of life, and look, honestly, when the Bible talks about your nakedness, it talks about from your loins to your thighs.

Again, I don’t believe that women's breasts should just be exposed because of modesty. Right? Obviously we believe in modest apparel, and obviously when we talk about the breasts, they have two functions, biblically. Go to Proverbs Chapter 5, there are two functions of the breast according to the Bible, and we need to understand both functions.

The number one function is to feed the child, and the Bible talks a lot about that, and I'm not even turning -- if you want to I can just take the whole sermon, and we can go through all the breastfeeding passages. "Blessed is the womb that bear the in the paths which thou hast sucked."

We can go down the whole list, there is so much scripture on this subject, it could be a whole sermon, but what I'm saying is, we ought be squeamish or act like somebody is doing something when they are feeding their child, and breastfeeding their child. That's the way God designed it. Do you know what? God did not design it on a four-hour schedule, and newborns often need to eat every hour, I mean literally. Anybody who has kids know, a lot of times they need to be nursed constantly when they are a newborn.

The Bible says, "As newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby." I question the sincerity of some formulas. Sincere means pure. I know that what's coming from my wife is pure, as long as she's eating pure food going in. Because it ends up going through the process whatever you do.

Look what the Bible says here, it says in Verse 19, of Proverbs 5, ”Let her be…" just talking about your wife, the wife of your youth, it says, "Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts satisfy thee at all times; and be thou ravished always with her love."

So obviously there is an erotic component to the breast, obviously we are not ignoring the fact that there is an aspect that has to do with husband and wife there, for the breast, but here is also a nursing or breastfeeding aspect, both of those two things exist. And so we have to understand that a child nursing his mother has nothing to do with anything obscene, it's just a normal activity. Do you know what, if you see a woman breastfeeding at our church you just need to chill out.

I mean that literally. Have you ever seen these articles in the news, where women are getting arrested. They are arrested in a restaurant, one of them got kicked off an airplane, just for nursing, just for breastfeeding. People have a weird view of it, because of that. People probably think that this sermon is over the top, what I've been preaching for the last 15 minutes.

Honestly, it's just because our culture has drifted away from just a normal culture where breastfeeding is just like an everyday thing that’s just constantly happening all the time, they are not really going to think anything of it, right? Whereas to us it's this rarity. Oh, wow, normal human behavior is happening, I'm shocked, because we live in such an artificial synthetic society.

On that same note, go down on the chapter, Chapter 8 -- Okay if you couldn’t handle what I just preached you are definitely not going to handle this. God down, if you would, to Verse 5, it says, "Who is this that cometh up from the wilderness, leaning upon her beloved? I raised thee up under the apple tree." Watch this, "There thy mother brought thee forth." Just in case you didn’t get it the first time, "There she brought thee forth that bare thee."

Where was she born? Where was she born? The Apple Tree Methodist Hospital? No. She was born under the apple tree. Now you say, whoa, that’s crazy, can you imagine giving birth outside, under a tree, oh that’s so unsanitary. But do you know what's really unsanitary, going to a place where sick people go, to give birth. Why would you got to a hospital to give birth. If you try to bring a newborn to the hospital, here is what they say, you can't bring that baby in here, way too many germs. It's like, well, they are giving birth in there.

And again, I understand that sometimes there is a need to go to the hospital and I'm not against hospital, and if you just choose to say: Pastor Anderson, I'm just doing a hospital birth, I'm going to be completely doped up, I'm going to be numb from the waist down, I'm going to just schedule a cesarean. You do whatever you want, I'm not trying to tell you how to live your life here, but I'm just trying to give you some wisdom that -- My first child was born at the hospital, Solomon, and we had such an awful experience, that the subsequent six children were born at home.

My wife has given birth at home six times with no anesthetic, no pain killer, just natural childbirth six times, and every time turned out great, healthy, no problem. You say, well, what if something goes wrong. Well, if something -- first of all, if you have a midwife, we don’t use a doctor either, we use a midwife, the midwives that we use are so knowledgeable, they can prevent like 99 percent of problems. They’ve done so many births, they are so knowledgeable, they do such a good job, that they can actually preempt a lot of problems.

A lot of our medical system, they create problems and then fix the problems. Whereas, the midwives seem to be more like trying to prevent problems from happening in the first place. For example, your baby is in the wrong position, the doctor is just like, cesarean. But then if it's in the wrong position the midwife is like, I don’t know, stand on your head, and do this and that, and they flip over. They are able to do a lot of stuff like that, and they are pretty smart.

It depends on the midwife that you are, there are some midwives that are awful, and there are other midwives that very good at what they. Honestly, if something goes wrong at the hospital, they still have to wheel you over, and get the staff and get the surgery ready, and if there's an emergency C-section, well do you know what, unless you are living out in the boonies, they can do that while you are on the ambulance ride.

Do you know what I mean? The hospital is still there, 911 is still there, the ambulance is still there, if something to go wrong, you can rush to the hospital, or drive yourself to the hospital. As far as the husband or the midwife, okay, don’t drive yourself. The husband or the midwife can get you there is what I meant by that. Anyway, I mean drive her to the hospital yourself.

What I'm saying is, people are like, wow you are this daredevil, having a home birth, you are just playing Russian roulette, but honestly, look up the statistics. It's safer. Just look at the statistics. And by the way, the statistics that the hospital does are fraudulent. They have been doctored to make it look better than it really is. But even their fraudulent statistics, home birth comes out better. Look it up, and the numbers don’t lie.

So, I think I read a quote a few days ago by Hypocrites, who is called the Father of Modern Medicine, he said, "If the doctor can't do anything to help he must be prevented from harming you." That’s pretty much the way I look at doctors a lot of the times. So they need to make sure that they do no harm, but what I'm saying is that giving birth under the apple tree used to be pretty normal. Now I'm not necessarily recommending an outdoor birth, simply because of the fact that today, you're probably not going to be able to privately do that, or modestly do that, because we live so close to one another.

If you were out in the middle of nowhere on your property, this could be viable, this could happen. Honestly, giving birth at home, we live in an overly sanitary society. Here is the thing, when you go through life in a plastic bubble, you don’t really develop any immunity, if you never let your kids go out and play in the dirt. And you just constantly just hand sanitizer washing, and just -- and I'm all for being clean, but if you read the Bible, there weren’t sandals, their feet are dirty all the time, they are outside they are giving birth under apple trees. Do you know what I mean?

Jesus is like; don’t worry about washing your hands before you eat. To each with unwashed hands defileth not a man. Now here is the thing, because there are so many germs, yeah, if you are touching a lot of other people, or getting around other people, you should wash your hands before you eat. But if you just have literal dirt, like soil on your hands, I've eaten with unwashed hands many times.

I quote that verse first just so that God, I'm like, God I'll do this. I quote the verse, "He with unwashed hand defileth not [SIC] a man," then I eat with dirty hands. But I wouldn’t like, if I touched other people, or if I touched something dirty, or if I shook hands with somebody, then I'll definitely need to wash my hand before I eat, because there is so many germs that people are carrying today.

As far as dirt, goodnight. I get so much dirt in my mouth, man, we swam in a dirty river a few days ago. Anyway, I'm just saying this overly sanitary, overly hospitalized. Look, women have been given birth for thousands of years, birth is not a disease. Pregnancy is not an illness. You say; why in the world did you give birth at home? It's like, what do they do at the hospital? The woman does all the work. And really, the only reason we even have a midwife, is just in case something goes wrong, that’s the only reason.

Our midwife pretty much doesn’t do anything. She just monitors, she checks signs and monitors, just to make sure everything is fine, but the less we need her, the better. We just let nature take its course, God has designed it in a very good way.

And part of the pain of childbirth is what produces the joy and ecstasy when it's over, and it's a bonding between mother and child. That's a whole other sermon of itself. Anyway I just wanted to show you that in here, that we need to understand that some things about our culture are a little bit imbalanced, and a little bit weird, and we are a little bit too obsessed with overly sterilizing and overly sanitizing everything, and it's actually harmful for our immunity.

It's good to get out in the dirt a little bit. You don’t have to just be obsessively, like Howard Hughes or something, about germs. Then also we see here that the Bible is talking a lot about breast, just relax, it's nothing weird, just take it easy.

Anyway it says in Verse 2, "I would lead thee," she said, "I would kiss thee; yea, I should not be despised." Verse 2, "I would lead thee, and bring thee into my mother's house, who would instruct me. I would cause thee to drink of spiced wine of the juice of my pomegranate."

Now what's interesting about this verse is that this is the only place in the whole Bible that the word juice is ever used. And the word wine is used many times, isn't it. The word juice is only used one time in the whole Bible.

Now go to Isaiah, keep your finger Song of Solomon, go to Isaiah 65, because a lot of people when they read the Bible that think that every time the word is used, they think it's always alcohol, they think Jesus turned water into booze. They think that every single time you see wine in the Bible it's alcohol, but in reality the word wine in the Bible is used to refer to both juice and wine.

Because back then the word juice was not the most common word. You see in English there are almost two words for almost everything in English, and the reason for that is because English was originally a Germanic language. It was a purely Germanic language when we were speaking Anglo-Saxon, Old English. But in 1066 AD, William the Conqueror invaded England, and the French Normans ruled over England, and they got rid of a lot of the English nobility, and so therefore the ruling class was all French, and all of the underclass were all speaking English, Old English, Anglo-Saxon.

And what happened is, over the next hundred years, they developed like a hybrid language, sort of like Spanglish. Except they developed a hybrid language between English French that they can communicate with one another. That hybrid language of English and French became what we would call Middle English, then over the next few hundred years, so by about 1150 AD they are speaking Middle English, and then that slowly evolved from Middle English to Modern English, and the King James Bible is written in Modern English.

People are like; ah, you are reading that Old English Bible. No, it's Modern English. This is Modern English. What we speak is called Contemporary English, but this is called Modern English, is the proper term for the language of 1611. So, because of the French influence, French is a Latin-based language. English is a German-based language, okay, so what you have is two words for everything, the Latin-derived word, and the Germanic derived word, and usually the fancier, big fancy smanchy words are going to be the Latin-based, because that was the ruling, the upper-class was speaking French.

Then the more everyday common word that the common man is using are more Germanic. Let me give you some examples, for example, in German the word sun is sonne, but in Spanish it's what? Sol, el sol, right? Here is the thing in English we have the word sun which Germanic but then we also have solar.

We have the moon which is German word, and then we have lunar, right, that comes from Latin. Because you are like, why is it lunar if it's about the moon, what is that. For example, we have fingers, with is a German word, but if we do something by hand, hand is a German word also, we do it manually. Well, that comes from the Spanish word, mono, okay Latin word mono, Spanish is a Latin language, I'm using Spanish because a lot of people here speak Spanish.

Do you see what I mean about how a lot of things can be expressed both Germanic and English. Here is the thing, juice is a Latin-based word, because if you think about it, what's the Spanish word for juice?

RESPONSE: Jugo.

Jugo. J-U-G-O, you can see the similarity with juice, right? Wine, German wein, okay, and I know it's similar in Latin as well. What I'm saying is, these are two words that mean the same thing, wine and juice. Well, in 1611, wine was by far the more common word, that’s all that’s used.

Now, you say, no Pastor Anderson, you are wrong, wine is alcohol. Okay, look Isaiah 65 Verse 8, and see if wine is alcohol, "Thus saith the Lord, As the new wine is found in the cluster, and one saith, destroy it not; for a blessing is in it, so will I do for my servants' sakes, that I may not destroy them all."

Here the new wine is found where, in the cluster, the cluster is the grape. Now are grapes alcoholic, have you been carded when you buy grapes. They ever asked you for ID, hey, you look like you are under 30, let me some idea on those green grapes. So this proves that the word wine, can just refer to juice right here, and this is one example, many times in the Bible it's referring to just juice. You say well, Pastor Anderson, why don’t they use the word juice? Because juice was not the common word. You say, okay, well then, why juice used in Song of Solomon 8?

Here is why, look at the verse again. The only reason that the word juice is used here is because the word is used in a row, and if they didn’t use it -- a different word, then it would sound weird, because look, it says, "I would lead thee, and bring thee into my mother's house, who would instruct me: I would cause thee to drink of spiced wine…" wine of the wine, you see it doesn’t right does it. Juice of the wine, that sounds better, or wine of the juice that sounds better.

It's like in Hebrews 1:1, the word divers is used many times throughout the Bible, tons of times you'll see the word divers, but the word sundry is only used in the Bible one time. It's used in Hebrews 1:1 because it says, "God, who at sundry times and in divers manners." The only reason he used sundry there is because he didn’t want to say, divers times and divers manners, it doesn’t sound good.

And the Bible that we have in English the Kings James Version, is not only translated accurately, but it's also translated into a very beautiful language. You read the NIV, it sounds like garbage, it sounds like -- it doesn’t even sound like good literature. Whoever translated it, it just seems they were this complete dweeb, that just didn’t understand anything about poetry. They just -- it's a machine -- it's like they typed in the King James in Google translate, and then out came the NIV. Literally, doesn’t it? It seems like they put the Greek into Google Translate, comes all wooden, comes all stilted and just sounding bad.

Look, you know the NIV sounds bad when you read. It's poor translation. The King J is very beautiful, and there's a lot of things in the Bible that, in the King James that rhyme, a lot of alliterations, where he uses the same letter a lot, there is a lot of time where he uses two different words to make it sound it sound more poetic, to make it sound better, and that’s what we have here, that’s the only reason why he use juice here, when you see the word wine, sometimes it means alcohol and sometimes not. You go by the context, it's easy to tell from the context.

Look at Verse 3, it says, "His left hand should be under my head, and his right hand should embrace me. I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, that ye stir not up, nor awake my love, until he please." We already saw Verse 5, about giving birth under the apple tree, that’s kind of a doozy there.

But look at Verse 6, it says, "Set me as a seal upon mine heart, as a seal upon mine arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as the grave, the coals thereof are coals of fire, which hath a most vehement flame."

And here the Bible is comparing onto like a burning fire, a very vehement burning fire. Go back -- keep your finger in Song of Solomon, and go to Proverbs Chapter 6 [SIC], and also he covers in that verse, he says, "Jealously is cruel as the grave, love is strong as death. The coals thereof are coals of fire." So he compares jealousy and love to coals of fire. You see love and jealousy are something that should be a part of every marriage. Because jealousy in the bible is when we are possessive of our spouse. We don’t want to share them.

We are very possessive of them, and we don’t want other people filling any of our roles, as husband, as companion, as provider, we want to fill that role, and are jealous of that role, God's name is jealous, he is jealous God. We ought to be jealous husbands, that means we don’t just let our wives hang around with other men, hang on phone calls to other men, go out to eat with other, we need to be possessive of our wives and say, no, you are my wife.

But do you know what, it's a two-way street guys, we shouldn’t be going around and hanging around with other women either, we shouldn’t have all these female friends, we need to basically have close friends that are men, and our female companionship should all come from our wife. As a woman your male companionship should all come from your husband. Obviously a brother, or a father, or a son, is appropriate. But you know what I mean. Outside the family, there is no reason in the world, for you as a woman to have a male friend.

RESPONSE: Amen.

You say, well, he's gay so it's okay. He needs to be stoned to death then, that’s what the Bible says, all right. So don’t give me this, he's gay. These bunch of gays, these bunch of filthy faggots is what they are, do you know what, they are predators, and they all go both ways. Don’t buy into the world's propaganda of LGBT. Do you know what LGBT stands for in my book, let God burn them. That’s what I make it, LGBT, let God burn them, like he burned Sodom and Gomorrah.

And I'm not advocating killing gays, because I want God to kill them all, and to rain fire and brimstone. I'm not saying that we should do it, I wouldn’t -- I didn’t even harm a butterfly at that field trip, but anyway let alone killing someone. I'm not trying to kill people, but do you know what, they are worthy of death, and they ought to be executed by the government, okay.

RESPONSE: Yeah.

Anyway that was the law of the land back in the day, the good old days in Leviticus. Anyway, this thing of, oh, he's just a little lovable, queer little thing, do you know what, don’t you dare hang around with Sodomites. You say, well, I just have this make friend at work. And that’s the worst place for you to have a male friend at work. Because, look, you are hanging around with him all day, more than you are even at home, even. Women who work a fulltime job, and they are constantly playing around with another guy, I mean, that’s just a recipe for adultery right there.

Do you know what? Even if there is no adultery, you are going to make your husband jealous and angry. Man, if I hear somebody give my wife a compliment, I'm like, what's that’s supposed to mean. No. But you know what I mean. Obviously we are jealous of our wives; and you, as wives, should be jealous of your husbands, we as men should -- there is nothing that’s going to help enhance your life, or help your marriage, or help you serve God more by you having some close female friend.

And ladies, it's not going to help in any way, shape or form, having some male friend that you are close with. Outside of a close, blood relative, a close family member. I understand family is one thing. A non-relative, you don’t need to be buddy-buddy with the opposite gender. It's going to make your spouse jealous and it ought to make your spouse jealous.

But look what it says about adultery in Proverbs 6, because he actually uses the same illustration about coals of fire about jealousy.

Look at Proverbs 6 it says, Verse 27, "Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?" Look at the next verse, "Can one go upon hot coals, and his feet not be burned? So he that goeth in to his neighbor's wife; whosoever toucheth her shall not be innocent." Don't even touch a woman that’s married, stay away from her you will not be innocent."

He says next, "Men do not despise a thief, if he steal to satisfy his soul when he is hungry; but if he be found, he shall restore sevenfold, he shall give all the substance of his house. But whoso committeth adultery with a woman lacketh understanding; he that doeth it destroyeth his own soul. A wound and dishonor shall he get; and his reproach shall not be wiped away. For jealousy is the rage of a man: therefore he will not spare in the day of vengeance. He will not regard any ransom; neither will he rest content, though thou givest many gifts."

Do you know what that’s basically saying in a nutshell, if you commit adultery with another man's wife and die. You commit adultery with another man's wife he's probably going to kill you. I had a friend that worked with, and this guy was not a violent type guy, he was a peaceful guy. I'm a peaceful guy, but I could see myself killing somebody pretty easily in that situation.

But this guy was a pretty peaceful guy, he came home to find his wife committing adultery with another man, in the very act. And this guy that was committing adultery with his wife, was a Marine, and he was physically fit, but jealousy is the rage of a man. And my friend from work, he grabbed this guy, and literally beat him almost to death. He started beating him, and then he threw him through the front window of the house.

So the guy got all cut up, I mean the guy almost died, the guy went to intensive care, because he literally -- somebody finally pulled him off this guy, as he's just killing him with his bare hands. Obviously, we sympathize with him, because we all probably would have done something similar. And so, you understand not to play around with that. It's a wicked sin. God says those who commit it are worthy of death.

We see that also, you might be just revenged right then and there. When you start messing around with somebody else's wife. And you had better even put yourself in a compromising situation with somebody else's wife, that could even be misunderstood or misconstrued. You be very careful with that. Remember what Potiphar did when he thought that Joseph had committed adultery with his wife, he threw Joseph in prison. Obviously Joseph was innocent, but Potiphar, he believed his wife.

So, in Song of Solomon the Bible talking about the fiery, passionate, fervent love, and that’s how love should be within our marriage, it should be very strong. Now, look at Verse 7, going along with that same illustration about fire, it says, "Many waters cannot quench love." Quench meaning, the Bible often use the word quench, of putting out a fire; "Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it; if a man would give all the substance of his house for love it would utterly be contemned."

Contemned means despised. What's that basically saying there is that love is worth more than all the money that you own. Love has more value. It says, if a man gave all the substance of his house, what he's saying that wouldn’t even be enough. Basically what he's saying is that our relationship with our spouse is more important money, it's more important than material things, it's more important than the substance of our house. Okay.

Go if you would to Romans Chapter 8. With that in mind, if the Bible is teaching us that love within marriage is more important than financial blessings, the substance of our house, our wealth. Okay, that tells me that it's not worth it to sacrifice my marriage for financial gain, or to sacrifice the happiness of marriage. For example, sending my wife to work. Now if I send my wife to work, it's possible that we could have more money, the substance of our house might increase, but then I'm also sacrificing our relationship. We are not going to have as good of a relationship. We are not going to have the right male-female rules.

The fire is going to be quenched in some ways, and we are not going to also have as much time together, we are not going to have as good as a relationship, other things that we might do, for example, you might have a job opportunity that estranges you from your wife. I've seen it where the guy goes far away to work for months or something, and his family is back.

I can see if it became a survival, but honestly, I wouldn’t separate from my family like that for months on end for financial gain. Because, honestly, we need to put people first, and things need to take a back seat. We need to not have an attitude where it's all about money, it's all about possessions, it's all about things. No, we need to have an attitude that says people are what's important, my marriage is what's important, my wife is what's important. And do you know what? I don’t really know anybody who is in danger of this, and I rarely meet people who are in danger of this, but working too much could also be an issue. Some men can be a workaholic, work too much, and not invest in their marriage.

I don't think most people have that problem, but most people don’t work enough, but some people don’t work, they work too much and that could be a danger, that’s putting things and the substance of your house before love, before your marriage, before that relationship.

But he said many waters can't quench love, he's talking about all the things that could try to extinguish the love in our marriage, that he can't do it. Look what the Bible says in Romans 8:35,"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" And remember the husband is supposed to love you wife, as what? Christ loves the church. Well, this is love of Christ, that means that our love as husbands should be patterned after this love in Romans 8, the love of Christ.

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation," we all are going to be gone, right. Just kidding. "Tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, for thy sake we are killed all the daylong; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

So, that tells me that our love for our spouse should be for better, for worse, till death do us part. I mean we should not let anything come between us and the love we have for our spouse. We need to still love our spouse no matter what happens. I mean, that means when the finances are bad, maybe your spouse gets injured or disabled, or diseased, and they are not as lovable as they used to be, or maybe one spouse even goes to prison.

A lot of people divorce their spouse, because their spouse goes to prison, and maybe their spouse goes to prison, wrongfully, or maybe their spouse goes to prison, because they actually broke the law, you should still love your spouse, you should still forgive your spouse, you should not divorce your spouse who was sent to prison, no matter what they did to go there.

Obviously if they committed some really weird thing then they should be dead anyway, if they like a molester or rapist, or something like that. Most people that go to prison, 90-some percent is like drugs; 97 percent is a non-violent crime, it's drugs, it's taxes, it's embezzlement, it's something like that.

We ought to stay true to our spouse even when the make mistakes, even when they do wrong. Look, honestly, even if your spouse commits adultery, I don’t believe that you should divorce your spouse, I don’t believe in it. Now, I believe that you spouse should be killed if they commit adultery, but because we live in a society where they are not going to be killed, because it's not the law of the land. Look, adultery is not even against the law, is it?

RESPONSE: No.

Now, under God's way of life, if your spouse committed adultery, they are going to die, and then you marry someone else. But today, that’s not the law of the land, so honestly, theoretically, if my spouse ever committed adultery, I have two options, murder or stay married. But I will not divorce my wife. And I'm not saying that I'm going to murder my wife either, but I'm just saying, I would stay married, even though that would be hard, even that will be tough. Do you know what, God forbid it would ever happen, but I don't believe that there's any grounds for divorce.

I think that you should love your wife through thick and thin no matter happens, as a picture of the love of Christ. Let ask you this, if you commit adultery are you going to lose your salvation?

RESPONSE: No.

Is Christ going to stop loving you?

RESPONSE: No.

Well that’s the love that we need to have as husbands, that’s a love that knows no bounds, neither height nor depth. That's the love that we should have.

Go down if you would to Song of Solomon Chapter 8, Verse 7, we read, "Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it; if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned. We have a little sister, and she hath no breasts: what shall we do for our sister in the day when she shall be spoken for? If she be a wall, we will build upon her a palace of silver; and if she be a door, we will inclose her with boards of cedar. I am a wall, and my breasts like towers; then was I in his eyes as one that found favor."

And again, this is just referring to the erotic aspects of breast, it's just talking about the fact that, her husband likes the fact that she is well-endowed in that area, that’s all she's saying in those scriptures, as opposed to the little sister that has no breast.

Verse 11 says, "Solomon had a vineyard at Baalhamon; he let out the vineyard unto keepers; every one for the fruit thereof was to bring a thousand pieces of silver. My vineyard, which is mine, is before me: thou, O Solomon, must have a thousand, and those that keep the fruit thereof, two hundred.

Now, that’s an interesting verse because this verse goes in the face of communism. Now I know we are preaching about marriage, now what in the world, communism? But honestly, communism teaches that basically the worker should get all the benefit and all the proceeds as the owner. Basically communism teaches that the owner of the company should not make more than the worker. Everybody should get paid the same, and they are against capitalism, meaning they are against a guy owning a field, having workers come reap it and then they only get a fraction, even they are the ones doing the work.

Now in this passage, we see that there's a vineyard that’s owned here and it's hard to understand for me this scripture, but it's either owned by her or it's owned by Solomon, you know, depending on how you look at these verses. One of them two owns it, and basically the fruit thereof, when they sell the fruit that’s grown in this vineyard, it brings in a thousand pieces of silver. That’s how much the fruit goes for.

I don’t know how big those pieces of silver are, but let's say they are like an ounce, then I guess you are looking at, I don’t know, an equivalent of $25,000. I think silver is like what, 25 bucks an ounce, maybe it's a smaller coin, maybe 12, but I don’t know. It's some major vineyard, where the fruit of that vineyard goes for a thousand pieces of silver.

But look what it says in Verse 12, "My vineyard, which is mine, is before me; thou, O Solomon, must have a thousand, and those that keep the fruit thereof two hundred."

So out of that 1,000; 200 is being paid to the people who were actually doing the work. Does everybody do that? Two hundred goes to the actual worker, 800 are going to the owner. So, you say, well I don’t think that’s fair. The thing is, if you own land, and you own the vineyard, and you hire people, you can pay them whatever you want. And if you are paying them a wage, that’s a fair wage, for a fair amount of work, and you are making a killing like this looks a pretty good profit here. A thousand pieces of silver, give 200 to the people who actually kept the vineyard. Nothing in the world wrong with that.

And so, don't let people deceive you, occupy Wall Street, or whatever to try to tell you that basically, everybody should be making the same amount of money. Because do you know what, the owner of the vineyard has risk, because guess what, sometimes there's a crop failure, and then you still have to pay the 200 pieces of silver. Plus they are going tax the fire out of you when you make that kind of money too, honestly.

I didn’t understand this until I ran a business. I can honestly say that when I first started working, and I was an employee, sometimes I would be envious and think, oh, it must be nice. When you look at management, and when you look at the owner. It's easy to think to yourself, man, I'm doing the all the work, and I'm not getting paid. But do you know what, then you own your business and you realize the stuff they have to deal with. the paperwork, they are working -- they are staying up all night, they are working long days, they are on call all the time, and the risk.

I mean, when I started my fire alarm business, I borrowed $70,000, that’s a big risk. $70,000, and you don’t know, are you not going to get paid, is something going to happen, is something going to go wrong. Of course I got it all back, paid it all off in the first year, year-and-a-half of business, but still that’s stressful, right. Honestly, there are a lot of jobs where you don't get paid, there are jobs where you lose money, whereas when you are the worker it's a guaranteed thing, even though it's a low wage, it's guaranteed. Friday comes, you are getting paid. This is just a good scripture just to show capitalism in action, in Song of Solomon 8, Verse 12.

It says in Verse 13, "Thou that dwellest in the gardens, the companions hearken to thy voice: cause me to hear it. Make haste, my beloved, and be thou like to a roe or to a young hart upon the mountains of spices."

And so as we finish the Book of Song of Solomon, let me say this, there's a lot of good stuff in this book. I couldn’t even cover everything, it's such a deep book. There are some things that are difficult to understand, there are some things that are right on the service. But honestly, I hope that throughout the series the biggest thing that you take from it is that you just love your spouse that you care about your marriage, that you invest in your marriage, that you put time and energy into it, and that you go back and read the Book of Song of Solomon on your own, and try to glean from it.

I think it's a pattern book for a marriage that’s really on fire, for a marriage that’s passionate. Two people that are madly in love with each other. That’s what I want for my marriage, that’s what I want for your marriage. And so let's keep reading the Book of Song of Solomon, study it, learn it, memorize, understand it, and let it change you and help you to be the best husband and the best wife that you can be.

Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father we thank you so much for this Book, and for the things that we've learned from it Lord. Please just help us to put these things into practice and to use the wisdom of your word to not fall into the trap of going the way of this world, which most marriages in this world will fail and end in divorce, and even the ones that don’t end in divorce are not where they need to be.

Help us to be different, help us to have a great marriage, patterned after your word, patterned after Proverbs, patterned after Song of Solomon, and so many other places, where you’ve taught us, in Ephesians 5 and elsewhere how to have a good marriage. In Jesus' name we pray.

 

 

Song of Solomon 7 - Verse by Verse Bible Study

Song of Solomon 7 - Verse by Verse Bible Study

Video

September 11, 2013

Song of Solomon Chapter 7, Verse 1 reads, "How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O prince's daughter! The joints of thy thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a cunning workman."

Now, I just preached a few weeks ago, if you remember, on Sunday, about the feet, and if you remember that sermon I showed how, throughout the Bible the feet are associated with the gospel. Even when Jesus is washing the disciple's feet, there is some imagery there in the gospel. But one of the things that comes up over and over again with the feet is that the feet are associated with soul winning, because he talks about in Romans Chapter 10, "Behold how beautiful are feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things."

And it's interesting that this concept comes up exactly the same way in Song of Solomon 7:1, it says, "How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O prince's daughter!" And of course the Bible tells us that we should be having our feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. The shoes in the Bible represent being prepared to preach the gospel, being prepared to go preach the gospel, and the reason why the feet and the shoes are always associated with preaching the gospel to every creature, and going is because they are not going to come to us.

That’s why this is a soul-winning church, we don’t just say, well, we just have services, and if the lost come in, we'll get them saved. No. We are going to go out into the highways and hedges and compel them to come in that God's house may be filled. We are going to go find them.

But the Bible says, "How beautiful are thy feet with shoes," and this is speaking to a woman."

Now if you would go to Acts Chapter 2 in the New Testament, because we know that, beautiful feet in the Bible; whether it's Isaiah 52:7, or whether it's Romans 10, are associated with the soul winner, where the Bible says, how beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel. And this woman in Song of Solomon Chapter 7, yes, she had beautiful feet physically, but the symbolism of there is that she had beautiful feet in shoes, because she had her feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace, representing a woman who is a soul winner.

Now there are a lot of people who think that soul-winning is just for men, they don’t think it's for women. I've been to a lot of churches the men do the soul winning, but there are very few women in the church to do any soul winning. And one thing that’s great about our church is that we, from the beginning, have had a lot of ladies out soul-winning, and that is how it should be in a Bible-believing church. A lot of people get this attitude that says, well, soul winning is just for the men, and it's okay if I as a lady don’t do any soul winning at all.

But look what the Bible says in Acts Chapter 2 Verse 16; it says, "But this is that which was spoken by the prophet; and it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. And on my servants, and on my what…

RESPONSE: Handmaidens

Handmaidens; what is the gender of the handmaidens, these are women. It says, "And on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit; and they shall prophesy."

Now obviously we know that the Bible teaches that a woman should keep silenced in the church, for it is not permitted onto them to speak," 1 Corinthians 14 tells us, that the Bible tells us, "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection." If she will learn anything let her ask her husband at home. It is a shame for women to speak in the church, that’s what 1 Corinthian 14 teaches, that’s what 1 Timothy Chapter 2 teaches, but when it comes to outside of the church it's, of course, every woman's job to preach the gospel to every creature, and the word prophesy means preach.

And you say, ah, well, Deborah the prophetess; that proves that women should be preaching in church. No, it doesn’t, because the prophesying of women takes place outside of the church. First of all they prophesy and preach unto their children, because the Bible talks about it in Proverbs 31,the virtuous woman chapter. The prophesy that his mother taught him in verse 1 of that chapter, so women have a role of preaching the gospel to the unsaved, also they have a role of preaching the gospel to their own children.

They do not have a role of getting behind the pulpit in a New Testament church, and saying anything, because in church the Bible teaches that men are supposed to be the leaders in the church, the pastors should be a man, the deacon should be a man and the people who are doing the speaking and the teaching the church should be men, and that ladies should not be teaching. But out there, and you say, oh, I just want to be a woman preacher so bad, well, show up at soul winning, and you can be a woman preacher, female preacher, But look! The Bible here is saying, I'll pour out my spirit and your daughters shall prophesy. "I'll pour out my sprit and your daughters shall prophesy. I'll pour out my spirit upon the handmaidens," and he is saying here that that scripture was fulfilled at the Day of Pentecost.

Why? Because in Chapter 1 the Bible says that they were all with one accord in one place, it says the number of names together were about 120, and it says they were there with the women, and including the women it was 120 people.

Well in Chapter 2 it tell us they were one accord in one place, they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, they all began to preach the gospel in other tongues or other languages as the spirit gave them utterance. It was not gibberish or falling on the ground, but rather 17 specific languages that are listed in Verses 9 through 11 there. They preached the gospel, they were out giving the gospel to the lost, and the Bible says it was a fulfillment of the prophesy that the daughters would prophesy and that the handmaidens would prophesy.

So this shows women soul-winning at work in the Bible is a great example of it. Go to Philippians, we'll see the same thing in Philippians Chapter 3, so when God tells us, go in to the world and preach the gospel to every creature. When God tell us, go ye therefore and teach all nations, that’s not just saying, I want the men to do that, but do you what, the women can just ignore commands to open their mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel.

Look what Paul said in Philippians, Chapter 3 … I'm sorry … Philippians Chapter 4, Verse 2, it says, "I beseech Euodias, and beseech Syntyche, that they be of the same mind in the Lord. And I intreat thee also, true yokefellow, help those women which labored with me in the gospel, with Clement also, and with other my fellow laborers, whose names are in the book of life." Look! It says that these women labored with him in the gospel. It doesn’t say that they labored with him in the nursery, or by babysitting, or by running a Christian school. No. It says, they labored with me in the gospel, they were there preaching the gospel. And if you remember Aquila and Priscilla, were two that were used by God to speak with Apollos, and expound unto him scriptures and so forth.

Look! It's okay for women to go out and use the Bible, and give the gospel, knock on doors, preach this gospel, knock on doors, preach this gospel to the unsaved. In fact, it's not just okay, it's commanded. Now obviously men and women are different, obviously we know that women are the weaker vessel, men are stronger than women; that’s and undisputed fact. Also we know that our lifestyles are different.

Men and women do not live the same life, for example, men don’t go through this thing of being pregnant, giving birth, nursing a newborn, so obviously there are physical issues that can sometimes prevent women from going out soul winning that don’t really affect men. Obviously, if you just gave birth, the Bible tells you that you need to rest and recover and all that, and obviously there are concerns with the newborn, and there are times when it's hard for women to go out soul winning, but do you know what, women need to make this a priority to get out soul winning when they can. Because, yes, there are events of life, pregnancies, or illnesses, or even men could be affected by ailments, illnesses injuries, but do you know what, if it's a priority though you'll get it done, because honestly I understand taking breaks, being laid up to have children, and you see in this church women have children every couple of years. In a lot churches it's like a one-time deal, or a two-time deal. My wife has had 7 children, and so obviously this is something that just kind of keeps happening over and over again, it's a recurring pattern.

But do you what though, my wife needs to be out soul winning, and she does go soul winning, and I believe that ladies, when they get … and when I say there's differences between men and women, ladies might not go out and do the long hours that men do, also, just because of their more delicate nature. I understand that. Some women do go out there and do the long haul, and that’s even better, that’s great.

But do you know what, I'm not saying be like the men, or I'm not saying, you need to be out there even you are nine months' pregnant, and it's 115, and you are not … it's 115-degrees outside, and you are nine months' pregnant, get out there and go soul winning for three hours. That’s not what I'm saying, but do you know what, when you are not nine months' pregnant, and when it's not 115 out, you can go out soul winning for an hour or two hours, or whatever you can do, 45 minutes, a half hour, if you are not in the phase where you have your full strength, after having a child. I'm just saying, you know what, it's between you and God, but don't just have this excuse; oh, that’s for the men. I'm not going to tell any man in this church how much to go soul winning, I'm not going to tell any woman in this church how much to go soul winning, but don’t make an excuse that says' soul winning is for men, because that is not a biblical doctrine. And many great soul winners have been ladies and they are great lady soul winners in our church that get a lot of people saved. But do you know what, you ladies should look to them as a role model and learn from them, and go soul-winning with them, and honestly, I just strongly believe in ladies being out soul winning as well as men. Are there differences physically, sure. Are there differences in lifestyle, absolutely, but don’t just write it off and say I don’t need to do it. No, get out there do it.

And do you know what the great thing is? It's not like you are going to be the only lady that’s going. Friday night is time when the ladies go, but there are ladies at other soul winning times too. We had a lady out soul winning on Wednesday soul winning. Most of the soul-winning times have at least one or two ladies, so there are plenty of partners to choose from if the times don’t work for you, find a lady that lives near you, get out and do soul winning.

Be safe about it. Obviously, we are not saying, do you know what, you need to go to the worst ghetto, and you need to go soul winning there at night. Obviously, we men can maybe handle the worst ghettos, or most of our soul-winning times there are men and women going so, the men can be right across the street, in case they need … in case somebody starts swinging, and somebody needs to protect. Not that that almost ever happens. I mean it's so rare that there's ever any danger involved, but do you know what, obviously we need to be safe and think about those things. And so many ladies in our church are carrying guns concealed anyway that is why it's not even an issue, right? There are more ladies in this church carrying concealed weapons, than men in most churches. Honestly, it takes like two just to count all the ladies in our church that carry a weapon, so they are probably fine. They’ll probably protect us on soul winning. Do you know what I mean?

Anyway, I just wanted to cover that because it's important, and it needs to be said, because I don’t want you to just tune out when you hear preaching on soul winning. Do you know what ladies, you might way, well my situation prohibits me from getting out door-to-door. I can't get there, I can't get to that. Do you know what, ladies have a lot of other soul-winning opportunities that aren’t just door-to-door. Just like we, as men, have other opportunities where we are at work, and we can give a coworker, I've had a lot of coworkers saved, and it's great because then you disciple them, and you see them every day, and you can keep talking to them, but do you know what, ladies, a lot of times you have opportunities to give the gospel when the milkman shows up. Yes, we have a milkman that comes to our house, I know you don’t. I know that 99 percent don’t, we are not living in the '50s. But believe it or not we have a … but the water delivery guy that brings the bottle of water, the milkman, people that show up for whatever reasons. Homeschooling groups, PE groups, science class groups, whatever the homeschooling group. You say, I'm not going to do that. Well, whenever you come into contact with people, whether it's your neighbors, whether you are … whatever. There are going to be times when you talk to people that aren’t saved, and do you know what, if I weren’t going out door-to-door, I would dead sure, really be on the alert of those types of opportunities so that I could be a soul winner.

Now I think going door-to-door is the best way to get people saved, we are going to get the most people saved that way, that’s what I believe. But it's great to supplement that with other soul-winning opportunities as they come, and especially if you are someone who can't get out door-to-door a lot, or a lady that isn't really in that stage, do you know what, there are opportunities that all of us pass up, you need to tune in and pay attention to those and be alert about those.

" How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O prince's daughter!" I'm sure it's great, the pedicure or whatever women do to their feet to try to make them look good, but if you want to have beautiful feet in God's eyes, it's because you are a soul winning. I believe that this passage has that as an underlying meaning. Now what's interesting too is if you finish the Verse in Song of Solomon 7:1, it says, " The joints of thy thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a cunning workman." So, he's talking about how beautiful her feet are and how beautiful her legs are, and he says that they are work at the hands of a cunning workman. Do you know what's interesting whenever the Bible talks about soul winning he says, he'll make you a soul winner. Like a cunning workman that will …" you say, well, that’s just not me. Well, if you follow Him, He'll make you a fisher of men.

Not only that, but Jeremiah tell us the parable of the potter, and that God is the potter, and that we are the clay, and that he will form us and fashion us into the image of his son. Look! If he's forming to fashion you into the image of his son, he's making you a soul winner because that’s what he was. He came to seek and save that which was lost.

Again, we see another parallel here, with the beautiful feet, that they are made by a cunning workman, by a God who will form and fashion us in his image. The other thing we see from this, when he says, "The work of the hands of a cunning workman." Then he goes to describe other parts of her body. "Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor: thy belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies. Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins." Go to Psalm 139, because the Bible here saying that her feet and her and her legs are so beautiful and that they are the … they are the work of the hands of a cunning workman, and in fact, that is quite literally true. That’s not even just a metaphor, that’s not even just symbolic, they are really are the work of the hands of cunning workman.

Look at what the Bible says in Psalm 139, Verse 13, this is David speaking, "For thou hast possessed my reins; thou hast covered me in my mother's womb. I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made." Not just a genetic accident, not just DNA combining and just randomly, certain genetic traits are coming out, and it's all just a science equation, that’s not what the Bible teaches, the bible teaches that he was fearfully and wonderfully made. "Marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect."

He's talking about the matter or the substance that he's made of. Even basically the nutrients or the elements in the earth that went into the food, that went into his mother, that basically, eventually became he's basically saying, God was there for every part of that process. God is all-knowing, He can count the sand by the seashore; He calls all the stars of heaven by name, even though to us they are enumerable. He knows the hairs of our head, the hairs of our head are numbered. And so He actually is part of this process of forming and fashioning mankind. From the food going into your mother's mouth, as it was processed and metabolized and the body used that food as building blocks to form and fashion the child in the womb, it says that he was curiously wrought, it says in Verse 16, "Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect;" unperfect in the Bible means incomplete. So he says, "He saw my substance, yet being unperfect;" or incomplete, "and in thy book all my members were written," members mean body parts, "Which in continuance were fashioned." Meaning that God did not start a genetic ball rolling, or just start a ball rolling with the seed hitting the egg, and he just kind of got it going and just took his hands up, and let nature run its course. No. It says, that the body parts were in continuance fashion, meaning that God continued to form and fashion throughout the nine months pregnancy. He fashioned each body part in continuance, and then is says, "That all his members were written, the substance being yet unperfect," It says they were in continuance to fashion, when as yet there was none of them.

Meaning that when certain body parts didn’t even exist yet, because if we were to look at a picture of the blastocyst, which later becomes the fetus, these different terms that scientifically used for the stages of the development of that living child. In the real early stages it's what the world call a blob, it starts out round, it's start out as a blastocyst, and they would just look at that and say, oh, it's just a blog, but God says, even when the members or the body parts weren’t there, even when there weren’t fingers he is still fashioning. Even when there wasn’t a beating heart, he's still fashioning it.

Then you start to see the head kind of take shape, as you look at progression of this, and you start to see the hands, and then slowly the fingers become distinct. And different body parts are being added. It doesn’t just start with all the body parts and just grow, it starts out a round thing, the blastocyst. And it's funny, because even in the Book of Job he talks about being fashioned in the womb round. So it starts out just round, microscopic. But then the different members are fashioned in continuance.

So, look! Life begins at conception, and the Bible teaches, it says that women conceive seed, meaning that conception takes place when the seed is present, when the seed touches the egg, not like modern dictionaries that are starting to change the definition of conception to implantation, which takes place 7 to 14 days, after fertilization.

Now, biblical definition for conception is fertilization because it talks about conceiving seed. Unless you are reading the NIV it completely takes that out, but if you are reading the King James Bible, they conceive seed. And therefore life begins at conception, fertilization, when that seed hits that egg, even though it's just a round single cell or double cell or quadruple cells it multiplies, it's alive, it's a human being that is being formed and fashioned by God.

RESPONSE: Amen.

God makes us in the womb. He didn’t just make Adam and Eve and then they procreated, he makes all of us, he made me, he made you in the womb, he formed and fashioned us to the way he wanted us to be. He said, well if that’s true then everybody would come out perfect. Everybody would come out, looking fantastic and being completely healthy. Okay. What about the man who was born blind in John Chapter 9 and 10 that story is found; and that man who was born blind it says he was not born that as a result of anyone's sin, but it says he was blind for the glory of God. So God might have a reason why he allows one to be born with Down Syndrome, or one to be born blind, one to be born deaf, and many in the world would say, abort it, and they have all these tests now where you can test the child in the womb to make sure there's going to be nothing wrong with it, because if there's going to be wrong with it, let's just end the pregnancy right now.

Do you know what, I don’t even think that you should even take those tests, because if you find out there's something wrong? Are you actually going to just abort it anyway, if it has something wrong? No. You say, well, there are these other reasons to get that. Whatever, I don’t believe in doctors 90 something percent of the time anyway.

But any they are a bunch of quacks in my mind; and I'm not saying they all are, because there are good doctors out there, but do you know what, a lot of modern medicine is quackery and for one reason, for one reason.

RESPONSE: Two.

Well, okay two reasons, because you guys are so right, you are even more right than what I was going to say. Yes, the love of money, the root of all evil, the pharmaceutical industry, yes.

But the reason I was going to say it's because they go to school and are taught that there's no God, because every single doctor went to medical school, and pretty much every medical school is part of the godless public school system, or a part of a private school system that’s based off of the godless system, and they evolution, they teach the big bang, they teach that we are all animals. So basically they are going into it with just a completely wrong foundation, that God did not create the body.

Therefore the body can't heal itself, the body has all these mistakes in it that we need to fix, and they don’t really let nature take its course. They don’t take a naturalistic approach, because they believe it's all random, and that they need to step in, they are smarter than God, they need to step in and fix things that aren’t ever broken.

They want to fix problems that weren’t even there in the first place. So, therefore, I'm skeptical of a lot of doctors and medicine for that reason. I would go to the doctor if I needed it, if I'm in that bad of a situation, if I'm healthy I just don’t go to the doctor. The need to behold me not a physician.

So what I'm saying is, that these tests are out there and doctors are out there, and they’ll guarantee you, this child will not survive, this child isn't going to see the light of day, let's just go ahead and just terminate this now, let's just go ahead and do the D&C now. But let me tell you something, I've heard people say, oh, this pregnancy is not viable, this is never going to come, and then the baby is fine. Oh, this baby is going to die anyway, and for your safety we just need to just clean it out, because this could hurt you. Do you know what, take it with a grain of salt, get a 25th opinion before you … because honestly it's been so many times that they’ve been wrong about these things, and you just trust that and just abort it. But even so, do you know what, if I had a child that has Down Syndrome, I'll praise God for it, I'll thank God for it.

I'm not going to say, oh man, I wish this child would have never been born, I wish it would have been a miscarriage. God can use a person with Down Syndrome for his glory. First of all people with Down Syndrome can be saved, because they are at a lower level of comprehension, they are mentality of a young child. They are basically just a perennial child. If you talk to people that are adults with Down Syndrome, they basically act just like a little child, because they are developmentally disabled, they have a slow maturity, so they might be 20 years old physically, but they are 7 years old in their mind, and in their mentality. But do you know what, a 7-year-old can be saved. So I've know people that had Down Syndrome that were saved, and I've even known someone who had Down Syndrome that was a soul winner. And by the way, my grandpa got a saved as a result of a 5-year-old boy giving him the gospel. My grandpa got … Who knows if my whole family on that side would even be saved, if my dad would have been saved, or if his dad would have been saved.

It's more for a 5-year-old boy, because my grandpa and grandma, had moved into a new neighborhood, a new area, and they hadn’t found a church, and they had a list of churches that they were going to try, and Faith Baptist in Canoga Park was not on the list. They were checking some different churches, and this 5-year-old boy, came down the street, and gave the plan of salvation to my grandpa, quoted him the Romans Road, and he didn’t get saved right then and there with the 5-year-old boy, but he was so blown away by it, he was so impressed by that he said, I've got to … let's try this church.

He went and visited the church a couple days after he visited the pastor, and a deacon came to my grandpa's house, gave him the gospel, got him saved. So there is a 5-year-old boy used by God, go get my grandpa saved. Do you know what, God could use people with Down Syndrome to plant a seed like that, to give the gospel, maybe even to win somebody to Christ all the way. With God all things all things are possible, and God has chosen the foolish things of this world to find the wise, because his strength is made perfect in weakness.

Who are we to sit there and say, oh, we don’t want blind people to exist, we don’t want deaf people to exist, we don’t want, Down Syndrome people, we don’t want the handicap, we don’t want the lame. Look! God loves everybody that’s born into this world whether they are handicapped or whatever, and they all have a shot at being saved, and they all can be used by go. Praise be unto God.

By the way, I know another person whose child had Down Syndrome and that’s why the parent got saved. Because before they had no interest in the things of God, no interest in church, they had a child with Down Syndrome, and it basically made them reevaluate their whole life. Because they had lived kind of a life that was based on them. Now all of a sudden they are looking at things in a different and it caused them … just that event just caused them to seek after God, and just to want to know more about God and the Bible, and they ended up getting saved. You don’t know what God's doing, and so don't tamper with what God does in the womb. God opens the womb, God closes the womb, I'm not going to tamper with it. And especially once a child has been conceived don’t tamper with it. There are things that people do, to end the pregnancy even without going out and getting an abortion, people have literally tried to eat things and drink things that they know could cause them to miss-carry the child.

That is wicked, that’s ungodly, and do you know what, if you are doing it on purpose, it's murder. Abortion is murder, the doctor is a murderer the nurse is a murderer, and the woman who goes in and says abort my child is a murderer. Quit sugar-coating it, call it what it is, it's a human being, you are a murderer if you’ve had an abortion. You say, do you hate me? No. But repent and get right with God, and admit it and confess it as a sin, and quit trying to downplay it. Well, it's not as bad as if I would have taken a gun and shot somebody, you're right, it's worse, because you are killing someone who is more innocent. How can you downplay that. But anyway it says, "How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! How great is the sum of them!" Verse 18, "If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand; when I awake, I am still with thee." So God loves and cares about the individual, doesn’t he? And He takes the time to fashion us.

Now, look! When we go to Song of Solomon Chapter 7, it talks about our body is the work of the hands of a cunning workman. Now you might feel that there's something about your appearance that you don’t like, for example, you might be taller than you'd like to be, or shorter than you'd like to be, or whatever imperfections you have about your body or your appearance.

But do you know what? If that’s how God made you, who is to say what is beautiful, and what is not. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. You might look at some great soul winner's feet say, his feet aren’t that beautiful, and I'm not going to take off my shoes and show you my feet, and I'm not saying I'm the greatest soul winner, but I am a soul winner, and I could take off my shoes, and I could you a really messed up toenail that fell off.

Who has ever had your toenail just completely; your big toe nail just completely off. Well, it happens, and I had one of my toenails just completely fall off. But do you know what, they always come back, and the human body is an amazing thing. There are people who have lost so many times, I was once responsible for somebody losing a toenail. And their wife said, oh, it's not going to come back. I said, it's going to come back, just chill out, your husband's foot is going to look normal again, someday, just get over it.

Of course it grew back, but when it first comes back it looks a little gnarly, and then after it comes all the way back, then it looks great. But do you know what, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Everybody has got imperfections. Pastor Anderson had a toenail that fell off, that didn’t look good. Everybody else has issues with their appearance, whether it's their face, whether it's their body, whether it's their hair or lack of hair, or whatever it is, that they feel like they don't like about the way they look, but do you know what, we need to get a biblical view of our appearance and the appearance of others, let's get a biblical view.

And a biblical view says that, do you know what, God made me the way that I am, I'm going to be content with the say I am. God made me with brown hair, God made me 5'11", God made me built a certain way, I mean praise God for it, this is who I am, and I'm this way for a reason. I knew a guy who was very short, and he was short his whole life, and he hated being short, but do you know he met his wife and she was really short. He said, do you know what, maybe this is why I was short, because God ordained, or planned, that maybe we wouldn’t have hit it off if I weren’t also her same height. You never know.

Do you know what, honestly, I'm 5'11" right now, but when I was growing up I was always the shortest kid in the class, always. And I hated being short, and I was made fun of and called shrimp, and other things, for being short, for being small, and I hated it, but do you know what, I think God now, that I was short. Eventually I became normal White man height, but do you know what I'm thankful for being short, because I'm sure that it taught me a lot of things about humility, it taught me what I … because it's good … Being made fun of, being ostracized or teased, at least it makes you feel like, well, I'm not going to treat other people that way, because I don’t like being treated that way.

Here is the thing, what if God would have just created me, just a great-looking guy, and the perfect height, and athletic and good-looking and a great personality, do you know what, I might been so prideful and arrogant, just because of how everything is going my way all the time. I get all lifted up in spirit, and I might have married the wrong person, and gone into the wrong career, and just gone into a life of sin, and just gratified myself. You don’t why God made you the way that He did, but I promise you, God made you the way that He did.

I guarantee you, no matter what, and you say, I don't like, but do you know what, maybe your spouse would have never even married you if you were made differently, if you didn’t have the imperfections that you have. You don’t know what God is doing, just trust the Lord. Get a biblical view of your appearance and say, God made me. Quit altering your appearance, dying your hair, and just tattooing and piercing it. Do you know what I mean? Just trying to make yourself look different.

Just caking on a bunch of makeup so that you can just look totally different. Do you know how I like my wife, with no makeup, that’s the way that God made her, that’s the way I like. In fact, that’s not just the way I like her, that’s the way that I demand her to be. When we first got married and I'm not … Look! I'm not preaching against you if you wear makeup, you do what you want in your house, but in my house, that’s the rule that I have in my house, and I can make whatever rule in my house that I want.

So I'm not saying it's a sin to wear makeup, because I'm not saying that the Bible specifically commands you not to wear makeup, but my wife doesn’t wear makeup because I don’t allow my wife to wear makeup. I would never allow my daughters to wear makeup as long as they are in my house. Jezebel painted her face. Anyway, I'm saying one time … we got married, and one time my wife put on makeup, and I just … I looked at my wife and just said, you are never going to wear makeup again, and then I walked in the bathroom, and just took all the makeup and just threw it in the thrash, and just said, you don’t wear makeup. She's, like okay. She didn’t really wear it that much in the first place, it was just something that she wore every once in a while, but I just said, no. You don’t need makeup.

And by the way, makeup is filled with … usually filled with harmful chemicals, oh, my complexion is bad, yes, that’s because you wear makeup, because honestly, you are putting all these chemicals and preservatives, and do you know what, because careful because some makeup, and I know sound … I'm going to sound like a lunatic when I say this, but do you know what, it's true, so I'm going to tell the truth. There are literally, and I'm not saying all makeup, but do the research, there is a lot of makeup out there that is made with human foreskins in the makeup and aborted fetuses in the makeup.

You can just say, oh, you are a psycho, you are crazy. Look it up, huge amounts of makeup, and I'm not saying that one time a batch from China contained this, I'm saying there is an industry that takes human foreskins from circumcised babies and uses them to make foundation. Okay. Look it up, it's true. And do you know what, just be thankful that your pastor is willing to sound like a lunatic to tell you the truth.

You need to be careful what you are putting on your face, and a lot of it is unhealthy and a lot of it is giving you a worse complexion because you are putting all these chemicals and clogging up your pores, and putting all this junk on your face, and painting your face. I talk to most men and they agree, I like my wife without makeup.

RESPONSE: Amen. Only one amen on that? Let me say it again, I talk to most men, most men, okay, and they say, I like my wife without makeup.

GROUP RESPONSE: Amen

All right that’s better. I'm just kidding, but honestly, and I'm sure there are men out there that like their wife better with makeup, but the vast majority of men that I talk about they are like, yeah, I know I don’t want why my wife to wear makeup. So, honestly, ladies, I think that women wear make more because of other women, than they do because of their husband.

It's more like to fit in with other people, this is just my opinion. I'm just telling you that I like the way that my wife looks the way that God made here, the way that she gets out of bed in the morning. And by the way, I'm the one who looks at my wife. She doesn’t stare at herself in the mirror all day, so she's going to look the way that I want her to look.

You say, well you don't have the right to tell your wife to tell your wife what she's to do. I have the right to tell my wife to do whatever I want. It's called being a man, it's called being the husband, it's called, let the wives be in subjection under their husband in all things. So, if the husband says, I don’t like the way that you look in makeup, or I just don’t like makeup, general, because I think makeup is stupid and unhealthy, or I just think that you look great the way that God made you. Imagine that! The way that God made you.

Look! You don’t see men wearing makeup. Do we all just look awful? Do we all just look like monsters or something? I know we don’t look as good as the women, but come on, do we look that bad. Come on just keep it real, is my opinion. Anyway I love the way that my wife looks because I like what God made, and a lot of this thing, oh, let's change the way we look, no, be content with how you look, accept who God made you.

Also get a biblical view of the appearance of others, not thinking that everyone has to fit a Hollywood mold of; this is what everybody has to look like and dress like and be like. No. No. No. Just realize, God made us all, He made us different, and beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and what is beautiful to one might not be beautiful to another, and vice versa. Let's keep reading because this comes out in the passage. It says, "Thy navel is like a round goblet." Now, there are two kinds of navels in this world, what are they called, an innie and an outie. Now does this woman have an innie or and outie? If your navel is like a goblet, right, and it says, "It's like a goblet which wanteth not liquor." Not liquor, when we use the word liquor, we mean booze, we mean alcohol, but actually the word liquor at that time it just means liquid, it just means any drink would be a liquor.

You can look that up in the dictionary and see that that’s what it means, but it says, "Her navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor." So if your navel is at the point where you could pour liquid into it, that’s not an outie, that’s an innie belly button, okay.

Anyway you say, are you going to make a whole doctrine out of that? Well let's keep reading, because in the next phrase of the verse it says, "Thy belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies." Now here is the thing, if you were complimenting a woman today, and you say, I just love your belly, it's like a heap of wheat. This might not be seen as a compliment to a lot of people, because today, there is kind of an unrealistic expectation of the way women are supposed to look, because basically the look that today is seen as beautiful or attractive amongst women, it's basically for a woman's stomach to be completely flat. No belly, no heap of wheat, no round goblet full of liquor. Okay.

Just a completely flat stomach, right? Even today you'll see advertisements and things with women, with a six pack, like washboard abs. You'll see women, abs of steel, and it's like a washboard, flat stomach, flat abs. Guess what? When women are pregnant that’s definitely not what their stomach looks like. But even when ladies are not pregnant they might not necessarily have that flat washboard look.

But look! In the next verse it says, "Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins." Later on he says, in Verse 8, halfway through the verse, it says, "Now also thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine, and the smell of thy nose like apples." So he's describing this woman, and he says that her belly is like a heap of wheat, her two breasts are like two young roes that are twins, and they are like clusters of grape, you can't have it both ways guys. But today basically the view that the world puts out, is that basically that there's going to be substantial breasts, and a flat stomach.

Well, let me explain something to you. Do you know what? And I'm not trying to be graphic, I'm preaching the Bible. I'm not just, well Pastor Anderson how dare you talk about breasts, the Bible this is what the Bible, what am I supposed to preach on Song of Solomon Chapter 7? This is what the Bible is saying, I'm preaching the Bible. And honestly do you want to know a huge major component of what real breasts are made out of, it starts with an F and it ends with a T. RESPONSE: Fat.

Fat, anybody can tell you that breasts are predominantly made of fat. This is why women have a higher percentage body fat than men. Part of it is because their breasts are very high in fat. So let me just explain something to you, if a woman loses weight, they get smaller, if a woman gains weight, they get larger. And here is the thing, you say, no, no, pastor. I see all these really thin, really slender, flat-stomached women, and they have these great, big breasts, let me explain something to you, they are fake, they are not real. I'm not even kidding. It's not real, it's fake.

Look! The statistics are that there's like, some huge number, does anybody the percentage of women that go out and become altered in that way. Does anybody know? Where is my wife, she'll know? (Zsuzsa 00:42:56), what percentage of women, do you know? You are just embarrassed to tell me. I'm just going to make something up the, 25 percent, no I'm just kidding, just kidding. Anyway, I don’t know that I know that it's millions and millions, my wife, listen to this, my wife had … she brought home a home-school magazine, and I think it was a free publication that just tells you all the family events in the Valley, where you can take your kids to educational opportunities, and there was a magazine geared toward parenting and homeschooling.

I picked up the magazine, and every other page was like plastic surgery ad. Then I was in California and I was waiting in a waiting room for some kind of a form that I needed to get notarized, or whatever, and I'm looking through a magazine and it was a thing geared toward moms, and it like plastic surgery, plastic surgery, plastic surgery, plastic surgery. Look! It's just not going to happen, guys, this really slender, you are going to have to choose what's important to you guys, and look not everybody likes the same look, and that’s why there is a lid for every pot. God created all men differently, he created all ladies differently; and do you know what, some men are attracted to a very thin woman. Other men would like a more endowed woman. But look! God made us all different. Don’t get this warped view of, I want to find this woman that just … she just has flat stomach, abs of steel, really slender, she runs 10 miles every morning.

Guys! Her chest isn't going to be there. It's going to be gone, if you are willing to sacrifice that, then go for it. Do you know what? There are guys that they like a thin woman, and I'm down on you if you are thin, just like, I'm down on you if you are larger. Look, I'm only married to one woman, and that’s the only woman whose body I'm interested in, and do you know what, I love the way my wife looks, and I couldn’t be happier with the way she looks.

But do you know what, there are people out there, that look at their wife and they are not happy with the way that their wife looks. And that’s sad. And a lot of it is just through social engineering. It's not even that their wife isn't attractive, it's not even that their wife has something wrong with her, isn't beautiful. It's just, they’ve been socially engineering to be looking for something that they saw on TV that’s fake, that’s not real, or something that they saw out in public, that’s fake, that’s not real.

Do you know what? Women who have been altered and had their breast implants or whatever, they are not even able to nurse children anymore. Did you know that? They can't even use the breast for what they are even created for, because they’ve been tampered with in that way, that’s my understanding of it. Again, I'm not an expert on this.

I got an email from somebody saying, I'm thinking about quitting, I literally got this email, I get a lot of emails, but I got an email from somebody who said, I go to Independent Fundamental Baptist, King James only, soul-winning church, and I'm thinking about quitting the church because my pastors wife just got these implants.

I'm like; good and I don't blame you. I'm just being honest, I would quit that church. I would find somewhere else to go to church. We look in a weird society, and do you see how it even affects God's people, when eve the pastor is allowing his, or maybe even encouraging his wife. Or at the very least, he's allowing her to go out and do this mutilation, this augmentation, or whatever, just be happy with who you are, and do you know what, love your wife, and love your wife's appearance, and understand, do you know what, if your wife is thin, understand that, hey, a lot of mean think that thin women are very beautiful, and that’s, in fact what our society promotes the most, is a really thin look.

If your wife is more full-figured, do you know what, just praise God, and just say, hey, there are pros and cons to everything. We need to get past … You say, I don’t think you should preach on something like that. Well, do you know what, I don’t think our society should brainwash everybody to have an eating disorder, and expect women to be like men, and have six pack abs, I don’t want my wife to be strong.

I like the fact my wife is very strong, because she is actually very strong, but I don’t want her to become this bodybuilder. Do you know what I mean? I'm glad that she's strong, be she carried the kids around all day and doesn’t … she works really hard and so she's pretty strong, and she has great endurance. But let me say this though, I like her the way she is, I don’t want her to get all buffed or something, and I don't want her to have six pack abs. If I want to look at six pack abs I'll go look in the mirror. Some of you will get that later. Anyway, I don't want to look at that on my wife, I'd rather look at navel that’s navel that’s a goblet. Do you know what I mean? But anyway, let's not go too far into that. But this is great, this is great teaching of the Bible.

Do you know what we are doing, we are taking what the Bible actually says, and expounding it and applying it to the day that we live in, and I think this is profitable.

But let's keep reading, "Thy neck is as a tower of ivory," probably not a compliment in 2013 necessarily, but do you know what, like I said, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, some people might like that look. "Thine eyes like the fish pools in Heshbon, by the gate of Bathrabbim: thy nose is as the tower of Lebanon…" You say, oh, man, my nose is, I wish I had a smaller nose, I wish my nose looked like Michael Jackson's after 10 surgeries. If your nose is like a tower Solomon thought that was the coolest thing, that’s what he's praising right here.

It says, "…which looketh toward Damascus. Thine head upon thee is like Carmel, and the hair of thine head like purple; the king is held in the galleries. How fair and how pleasant art thou, O love, for delights! This thy stature is like to a palm tree." Just referring to the fact that she's tall, because palm trees are very tall, "Thy breasts to clusters of grapes. I said, I will go up to the palm tree, I will take hold of the boughs thereof: now also thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine, and the smell of thy nose like apples."

Smell your wives' nose and see what it smells like, anyway, "And the roof of thy mouth like the best wine for my beloved, that goeth down sweetly, causing the lips of those that are asleep to speak. Now I've got to hurry, I'm almost out of time, but I want to talk about a few more things in these last verses, because there are some great teachings in these last verses. It says in Verse 10, "I am my beloved's, and his desire is toward me."

I've already covered this in previous weeks, but that possessive mentality of a woman seeing herself as belonging to her husband that’s going to cause him to have more desire toward you when he feels possessive of you, and the wife should feel possessive of her husband, that’s why it said, I am my beloved's, he is mine, I'm his, it goes both ways throughout this book.

But look at Verse 11, it says, "Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field; let us lodge in the villages. Let us get up early to the vineyards." Now, you say, what's the point of that? Well, this is showing kind of like a getaway for the husband and wife, they are going out in the fields, they are going out in the fields, they are going to go to a village. That’s like going to a different town and spending the night. Because, hey, let's lodge in village; hey, let's go out in the field. Hey, let's get up early and to the vineyards.

So we see that the husband and wife are spending some quality time together, but what's interesting about this is that, if you study the Book of Song of Solomon, all the seven chapters we've seen so far, and especially these verses here, we see that a lot of their special time together is outdoors, that they are going out in the field. They are going into the garden in Chapter 6. It talks a lot about them eating fruit, and today when we think about husband and wife, going on a date together, or spending time together, what do we think of? Going out to dinner, go out to dinner, go out dinner.

And do you know what the problem with that is, number one, when you go out to dinner usually the food you are eating is not as healthy as what you would eat at home. Because let me tell you something, restaurants cost the same now as they did when I was a kid. Do you know what's gone down, the quality, seriously. You go do restaurants that used to be pretty good, and you are like, ugh, gross, because the quality is gone down. Most, unless at like at an organic restaurant, just a high-end restaurant, which can be expensive, right, most restaurant you go to, and you might even say, no, no, it's a fancy restaurant; even fancy restaurant though, a lot of them are using a lot of GMOs, and just a lot of low quality ingredients. And they are really polishing the apple, but it's a conventionally-grown apple, all right, that’s got pesticide residue.

What I'm saying is that going out to dinner is not the healthiest option, number one; and number two it's expensive. And you may not be able to afford it, and then you think, like, oh, man, my husband can't take me out to dinner, oh, we can't go out to dinner, and then wives can become disgruntled, and then husbands can become irritated like, oh, man, I'm trying to build a relationship with my wife, trying to have some quality time with my wife, and it's costing me a fortune.

Now I'm not saying that going out to dinner is bad, we go out to dinner, but we go out to dinner rarely. You say, oh, you don’t spend time with your wife. News flash! There are ways to spend time with your wife that don’t involve going out to dinner. And people just think that the only way to have fun is to go out to eat, spend a bunch of money, you’ve got to pay the tip, you’ve got to pay for the meals, you’ve got to pay for the drink, and your wife is always going to order dessert, so you’ve got to pay for that, and she orders dessert and then just put it in a box and not even eat it, and take it home.

But the thing is … I just had to get that off my chest. But what I'm saying is, there are other ways to have fun without just going out to dinner, and spending a bunch of money. Do you know what you could do, you could have a picnic. And it's probably even more fun, and you live in Arizona, half the year, it's great weather, it's dry, it's sunny, it's cool, you can go out. And we are just getting into that season, the paradise, we are coming out of an inferno, and going into Paradiso right.

What I'm saying that you should think about the fact, okay, I'm poor let's not waste my money out to dinner that I don't even have anyway in the first place, going to some junky restaurant, where we could make better food. One of the things that my wife and I do, and do you know what, you say, oh, but some of the food you take picnicking is expensive. It's still way cheaper than going out to dinner, I don’t care what you are bringing, no matter what you bring.

But one of the things that we like to bring is we get these little fresh mozzarella balls. Who knows what I'm talking about? We get fresh mozzarella balls in oil, in olive oil, cherry tomatoes in oil, right. We'll just put like a little Tupperware like cherry tomatoes and mozzarella balls, in olive oil, and then just like a baguette, sliced up.

Then we just have a picnic like that, where we just a piece of white, like baguette bread, and you can put oil and basil, you’ve got to basil on it, I don’t know how to make it, my wife makes it, but I'm sure there's salt, pepper and basil involved, and whatever Italian seasoning. You could make something like that and bring grapes on the side.

And look! In Song of Solomon they are eating a lot of fruit, they are eating a lot healthy stuff, they are eating a lot of healthy stuff. They are not just going out, I'm going to just get a burger and fries every single Friday night, or every single night, burger and fries, burger and fries.

They are basically having fruit, they are having fresh fruits and vegetables and things, and I'm all for eating meat and eating bread and all those things, you can have a picnic, you can have the mozzarella, and the tomatoes and the bread, and it's more romantic and everybody is happier and it costs less, and you get the fresh air and the birds and everything.

I'm just saying you need to think outside the box, go on a little hike with your wife, go out into the field, go to the villages, go into the vineyard, take a walk, I mean take a walk, you could probably have just as much enjoyment with your wife, going out to dinner, instead of going out there, just take a walk, just take a walk through the neighborhood, take a walk through the park, go to Kiwanis Park, there's that little lake there, and there's paddle boats, and you can have a picnic. I'm just saying, be a little more creative than, okay, let's go to the Outback again, let's go to Chili's again. Do you know what I mean? Just get outside that box. My parents used to go to Chili's every Friday night, they are divorced now. Anyway I'm just saying, think outside the box. It's really not funny.

Anyway, think outside the box. You can have fun without having to go out to eat every single time, there's other way. And by the way, there's a lot in these passages about flowers and fruit and these are the things that are romantic.

In Chapter 6, he's gathering lilies to give to his wife. Giving her flowers, giving her fruit, that’s another thing, gather the flowers, and you don’t have to pay for them either. Anyway, what I'm saying is, you can have a good time with your wife, just by going up early to the vineyards; Verse 12, "Let's see if the vine flourish, whether the tender grape appear, and the pomegranates bud forth: there will I give thee my loves."

So look, this is a romantic outing, just checking out the plant life, just going into the vineyard, going into the gardens. "The mandrakes give a smell, and at our gates are all manner of pleasant fruits, new and old, which I have laid up for thee, O my beloved."

Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father we thank you so much for this chapter and thank you for the very practical things that we can learn from it. So often when we read the Bible we just miss what's right there on the surface. Eat fruit, go out in the field. Have a picnic. Walk through the vineyard, go hiking, whatever. Compliment your wife's appearance, different body types that he lists there, that’s what he found attractive.

Help us to learn these truths and apply them. Help us to just renew our minds, get out of this worldly simple mindset and get a biblical view of all things, and then help us to also follow the spiritual application that we found in Verse 1 of being a soul winner whether we be man or woman. And in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.