Song of Solomon 3:1 (ESV) … “On my bed by night I sought him whom my soul loves; I sought him, but found him not.”
The Shulamite woman is still talking to the women of Solomon’s court, still recalling the past. She recounts another incident that also had happened some time before.
She tells first of her frantic search. “On my bed by night I sought him whom my soul loves; I sought him, but found him not” (3:1). She had dreamed of her beloved, a dream so real that when she awoke she put out her hand to touch him, but he was not there. It was only a dream. The dream, however, had been so vivid that it had left her shaken and with her whole heart crying out for the absent one.
In her dream, she had sought her shepherd in all of those realms where the soul wanders while the body recuperates in sleep. When at last she opened her eyes and stared into the blackness of the night, her dream memories were still so vivid that she hardly knew at what point she passed from dreams to reality.
We have all had dreams like that, and we have all awakened wondering what they were all about and what they meant. But have we ever dreamed that vividly about our heavenly Beloved? Perhaps not! Even so, the night watches are a wonderful time in which to seek Him deliberately upon our bed as the Shulamite sought her beloved in the yearning thoughts of her heart.
When sleep takes its flight, we often toss and turn upon our beds. Instead, we should quietly compose our thoughts to think of Him. We should recall Psalm 23; Isaiah 53; John 10, or some other great passage of Scripture that speaks of Him. Imagination can take its flight to worlds unknown in our dreams. So then let us summon imagination and make it our servant to take us to Bethlehem, Nazareth, Galilee, and Jerusalem. Let us climb with Jesus up Golgotha’s brow, or let us creep with Mary through the gloom of the morning to the empty tomb. Let us call on imagination to summon the faces of our family and friends and, thus, bring them one by one to Jesus for His blessing. Let us use the sleepless hours to reach out to Him whom our soul loves in the darkness of the night. Let us tell Him how hungry we are for His love. A hungry love will search for Him.[1]
[1] Phillips, J. (2009). Exploring the Love Song of Solomon: An Expository Commentary (So 3:1–3). Kregel Publications; WORDsearch Corp.
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