A Response to Song of Songs 5:2-8
Sometimes I wonder how many times you will ask me to surrender. You’ve asked me to submit to hardship and disappointment. You’ve repeatedly asked me to let You do whatever it takes to make me and my family more like You.
You’ve taken my writing and my writing dreams, even much of my place, small as it was, in the writing world.
It’s been 16 months since I gave You permission to send the North Wind. I thought it would be quick and end soon, but still it continues, its howling presence calling me to fear even as I fight to stay in the safety of You, my strong Tower.
And after this intense season, when I am worn and weary, You ask again, “Will You give me permission to do whatever it takes?”
I hesitate—angry that You would ask again after all these months of my determined surrender, after all of the times I’ve said, “yes.” After all the times I’ve pleaded with You, asking You to make me willing.
I hesitate—knowing that beneath the anger there is a person who is still tempted to say, “no.” Knowing that I must wrestle once again and fight my way to “yes.”
“Yes, let the north wind blow if that is what You know to be best. Yes, do whatever it takes to shape me and my family into the bride we are called to be. Yes. Yes. Yes. I want what you want. Nothing more. Nothing less.”
Even as I submit my old companion fear lurks in my heart. Even as the yes slips begrudging from my heart, accompanied by tears, I hear the hissing of doubt. What will this yes require of me? Is it really possible to rejoice in suffering, to see all of this an identifying with the suffering Savior? Hasn’t the wind blown long enough?
You whisper that this is the road to selflessness, to giving up myself for your purposes.
I weep as I put away my stories. I cry as I put away my books. I stare vacantly out the window as the devotions cease to come, as the blog is mostly silent.
How can this forward motion? How can stopping really be moving forward? And if this is all of You, why do you feel so far away? Why do You seem so close, and then slip away like sand through my grasping fingers? How can this time bring intimacy when the anger of my situation calls to me, begging me to fling accusation toward You. Screaming, “unfair!”
And why in this hard and lonely time do I sometimes weather the wounds of accusation. Wounds that come from unexpected places—as well as from the expected. People who once held my heart have hurt it. Though I’m certainly not without fault, some of the wounds are unjust and untrue. And my soul trembles at how many more I may be asked to sustain in this season.
God help my fears. Make me willing to stand in surrender—the storm raging around me, the winds blowing and screeching—kept me safe in Your strong Tower.
It’s a paradox in a way.
I do feel protected. Safe in Your Tower. Confident that You are with me every moment even though Your manifest presence isn’t what it once was.
And yet . . .
I fight the hurt and the fear. And sometimes it feels You’ve taken it all. Desire. Passion. Dreams. Even Yourself.
I miss You. I miss the quiet hours between us when our relationship felt full, swelling with new insight, new devotion, glimpses of You and how much You love me.
You give me quick little moments of You. Just enough to keep me holding on. And in the whisper of Your departure I hear, “When everything is gone, will you be mine?
How can I answer such questions?
There is no answer but, “yes.”
“Yes!”
I love You. I want to be Yours no matter what.
“Yes!”
Have your way in me. I don’t have to like it. I don’t have to enjoy it. I can follow in obedience. Learn these tiny pieces of sacrifice that You ask of me.
“Yes!”
But I know I can only do this as You give me the power and the strength to surrender. Even when I don’t feel You, it is You who builds me. Grows me.
It is You who gives me what it takes to say, “yes.”
The answer is yes only because You enable me to speak it.
But it is such a lonely place, Jesus. I look forward to the refreshing south breeze. I long for garden intimacy.
I can see how this is the only way to maturity, to putting “self” to death so that I can be fully yours.
Make me faithful in this season. Help me to close my ears to the accusations of the enemy who would say you don’t really care. That the journey has been long enough and I don’t need to keep walking it.
Help me to let go of the angry and embrace the trusting. Even when I don’t understand, help me to want You and Your ways.
And help me to love you always.
Note: I worked through this particular part of the Song of Solomon study a while back, but never sat down to process it again and turn it into a prayer for on-going blog series.
I can’t tell you how it feels to summarize my prayers from this study from this vantage point. On this side of the storm—where the north wind has been blowing for some time and not yet withdrawn—instead of looking out of my window and watching the storm build.
Somehow the above prayer validates the journey I am on. Retracing my prayers of surrender and the parts of the study that talk about giving up ministry, His presence, etc., helps me understand much of what I’ve walked through in the last 16 months.
The temptation to fear is always there. Even now as I write, even as I see how much He’s brought us through. My mind asks how much more this time of the cleansing north wind will require.
(Oh Jesus! Make me willing. Teach me to trust You. Keep me safe in Your strong Tower until the storm subsides.)
Here are a few of my favorite thoughts from this particular session of the study. Some are direct quotes from Mike Bickle, some are a mixture of His teaching and my response. Many of them are hard thoughts. (Please Lord, by Your grace may I say yes to these things as well.):
“What grips her (the bride’s) heart is the fact that she belongs to Jesus. She begins to view her life through the lens of the pleasure she brings Him . . . her greatest pleasure is found in doing the will of God.”
“Jesus wants us to open for Him, not a new set of circumstances.”
“He knocks” SOS 5:2e “He knocks when He desires to bring us through a new door in the Spirit . . . He knocked that we would come to feast at His table. This is also His knock to send the bitter north wind . . . His knock sometimes brings us into hardship but it is still a good knock. It ultimately brings us into deeper communion in the Holy Spirit.”
“I have set before you an open door, and no one can shut it; for you have a little strength, have kept My word, and have not denied My name.” Rev. 3:20
“Lord, we are willing to be made willing. Lord, Help me! Put Your hand on my heart. Let my heart yearn for You more, as you unlock the door of my heart by the grace of God. I will open to You, even the Jesus of Gethsemane.”
I want to be willing to say: “I want to do whatever you say, regardless of what it costs me.”
“We love to feel the passion of God in our soul—to feel passion for Him and from Him . . . (It) is the most powerful passion and pleasure available to human make-up. God removes His manifest presence in response to the bride’s desire for full maturity.”
“God hides his face, sometimes from the most devout, to draw something out of their hearts, that they would be wholly and only the Lord’s.”
“Will I obey for His sake alone or only for my own spiritual pleasure? God is looking for a people who will stand regardless of circumstances.”
“The silence of God is part of His training to cause our hearts to mature. We must refuse the Devil’s accusations against God’s love in such a season . . . all of God’s dealings with me are to eventually reveal His love for me and to impact His love to me in a deeper way.”
“When everything is gone, will you be mine?”
“Jesus is not a means to an end. He is the end.
The Song of Solomon series on this blog is a response to a study called Song of Songs by Mike Bickle. The study version I have is so old they no longer sell it, but I found this link that seems to be an updated version of the study.
