The lure of eros…
as a bird rushes into a snare;
he does not know that it will cost him his life.– Proverbs 7:23b
Then the LORD God said,
“It is not good for the man to be alone.
I will make a helper who is just right for him.”
Genesis 2:18 NLT
23 Then the man said,
“This at last is bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called Woman,
because she was taken out of Man.”
24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. – Genesis 2 ESV
Eros: sexual love of a man for a woman and of a woman for a man; often misleading us into sin, though God intends this most intimate love exclusively for a man and his wife to join them together as one.
By sexual intercourse we become one in the flesh and in the spirit with another human being. It is a great and wonderful mystery.
Genesis 4: Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD.” And again, she bore his brother Abel… 25 And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and called his name Seth, for she said, “God has appointed for me another offspring instead of Abel, for Cain killed him.”
In the beginning, a husband and wife and children.
Do you recall that the controversy between Cain and his brother was over worship of God? Two kinds of love both dependent on the love of God.
It’s all relational and Genesis continues with these themes of interconnected types of love which all affect our relationship not only to God, not only between a husband and wife, and not only between parents and sons and daughters; but all relationships within families and beyond the love and boundaries of family.
These intimate relationships all become quickly complex. (Just take the love of Jacob for Rachel, for example.) At the middle of many intimate controversies we will often find eros, the sexual attraction between a man and a woman.
We remain united in spirit to one we have engaged and known in the flesh. It is an unknowable mystery. The awesome connection of sex becomes even too weighty for our own hearts when we stray outside of God’s will.
Yet Love Is a Many Splendored Thing within the boundaries, commitment and vows of marriage.
Let your fountain be blessed,
and rejoice in the wife of your youth. – Proverbs 5:18Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight;
be intoxicated always in her love. 5:19b
He who finds a wife finds a good thing
and obtains favor from the LORD. Proverbs 18:22
Man adam, and woman taken from man and given to man by God that they might be one. A godly wife for a godly husband to bear godly children, to keep boundaries of godly families… from this we have strayed far in these last days.
Eros is a sensual soft linen of the marriage bed, perfumed with the nectars of passion between a man and a woman in love.
How lightly does the world of the flesh misrepresent this beautiful love given to us by God.
The Song of Songs, which is Solomon’s.
The Song of Songs, which is Solomon’s.The Bride Confesses Her Love
She
2 Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth!
For your love is better than wine;
3 your anointing oils are fragrant;
your name is oil poured out;
therefore virgins love you.
4 Draw me after you; let us run.
The king has brought me into his chambers.
Solomon and His Bride Delight in Each Other
He
8 If you do not know,
O most beautiful among women,
…
9 I compare you, my love,
to a mare among Pharaoh’s chariots.
10 Your cheeks are lovely with ornaments,
your neck with strings of jewels.
Do you not know how the stallion and the mare mate in passion?
The love song of Solomon for his bride becomes as sensual as any erotica or story of sexual love you will ever read. I commend it to you, lovers betrothed, husband and wife. God has intended our love for good and for our pleasure.
Song of Solomon – read by Max McLean
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