3rd Friday of Advent (December 20). MANY WATERS

Prepare to Listen.  Set me as a seal upon your heart.
 
Prayerfully Read Song of Songs 8:6-7
6Set me as a seal upon your heart,
   as a seal upon your arm;
for love is strong as death,
   passion fierce as the grave.
Its flashes are flashes of fire,
   a raging flame.
7Many waters cannot quench love,
  neither can floods drown it.
If one offered for love
   all the wealth of one’s house,
   it would be utterly scorned.
 
Prayerfully Wonder and Reflect
Flood waters can neither quench nor drown love.  What does this mean to you, especially when related to God’s love for the world?
 
Song of Songs is unique in biblical literature, a love poem focused, not on obedience to the law, but on love that sets one free.  It’s a dialogue between the woman (bride) and her lover (groom).  The two verses for today are sung by the woman and form the climax of the poem.
 
The first words are crucial—set me as a seal.  A seal, in ancient culture, “was identified with a person’s commitments and integrity; it marked one’s word as binding.”[1]  It also displayed to the world to whom you belonged.
 
The seal was needed because of love.  Love is a powerful force, as strong as death.  We don’t usually compare love favorably with death, but there are similarities.  We often say that only two things in life are certain—death and taxes!  By comparing love with death, the bride has changed that; love is as certain as death.  And, unlike death that is a once-off future event, love is a continual present reality.  We experience it now and always.
 
There are a variety of ways to interpret the Song, one is to see it as a picture of Christ’s personal love for his followers.  His love won’t be drowned in many waters, or destroyed by threats of chaos.  Nothing, claimed Paul, can separate us from Christ’s love (Rom. 8:38).  Love isn’t a commodity that can be bought and sold in the marketplace.  Any attempts to buy love “with all the wealth of one’s house,” will be “utterly scorned.”  We can only receive this love and respond with our love.
 
What symbolic flood waters have you experienced and survived?

Prayerfully Respond
Because of your love, O Lord, you sent your Son to us.  Set your love as a seal on my heart so that I live in love towards you, myself and those I meet today.  Amen.
 
Live obediently.  Rest in Christ’s love that is certain and powerful.
[1] Davis, Ellen F.  Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs.  Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.  2000, p. 296.