The Pursuit of Love

Personal Story

Joelle and I have been married for nearly seventeen years, in which time we’ve been able to experience the joy of oneness and intimacy in our marriage, and the bitter pain of distance and selfishness. Actually, to be honest, we didn’t have to wait for 17 years, we experienced all of that in the first week of our marriage!

Marriage is the closest, most intimate relationship that you can have. It’s vows encompass every aspect of the body, mind and emotions. If done well, you will never be separated from this person you love. And sometimes you’ll hate it.

Early in our marriage I took Joelle to my childhood home in Kentucky. We spent several days traveling around Kentucky and Tennessee and while we enjoyed ourselves—swimming in a pond I swam in as a child, riding four wheelers at a farm I lived on, and being tourists around Chattanooga—nearly the entire time there was a huge gulf between us. I had done something that really hurt Joelle and she wasn’t excited about being around me that whole week. There is no guarantee that the person you love will keep loving you when they really know you. It is always and only a work of grace to continue to love. And Joelle has always been filled with grace for me, and sometimes I have the privilege of extending forgiveness and grace to her.

For us, we’ve found a pattern in our relationship. One of us hurts the other by some sin in our lives, then a confession, followed by a time of adjustment which may include anger and resentment, then forgiveness followed closely by reconciliation and intimacy.

This pattern requires that both of us pursue each other in love.

The person who has done the wrong needs to lay themselves out and be vulnerable, admitting their wrong.

The person who has been wronged has the hard task of forgiveness and chooses not to hold the wrong against them.

I’ve found that after I have been forgiven, I have a hard time embracing and receiving love. I feel ashamed of myself and I feel unloveable. That makes my wife’s pursuit of me all the more precious and reassuring. She loves me even though I am unworthy. That’s truly love.

Before we get into the Bible, I have to admit that I can be a neglectful husband. I provide for my family and I don’t entirely neglect them, but I’m not always bringing her flowers or speaking affectionately to Joelle. I work too much, and when I’m not working I struggle to be engaged. I’m a real person with issues. I do make some great efforts. A couple Christmases ago I gave Joelle several dozen tickets that she could redeem for various things—a week of me doing the dishes, a massage, a night out with her girlfriends, etc. Once I washed the car and wrote all over it like we were a newly married couple and drove the car around for a week with “still married” written all over the back window and balloons in the car. Just last week I handled the kids supper and bedtime routine so Joelle could have a night to accomplish some things in town without the kids in tow. —— I don’t think I’m a terrible husband; I’m just not as consistent with my pursuit of my wife as I’d like to be. So, this little talk is hopefully something that will bless you as you think about marriage, as well as challenge myself as I look in on my own marriage.

Pursuit in the Song of Solomon

The Song of Solomon is written as a call and response poem between Solomon, his bride the Shulamite woman, and a crowd of “others” that sometimes appear as an audience and sometimes participate. There are several themes that come out in this poem, but one of them is the idea of pursuit. Before we read in The Song of Solomon, I’d like to clarify the word “pursuit” in three ways:

Emotional pursuit — those words that fill up your partner with joy and appreciation including affirming words, statements of adoration, and expressions of pleasure and enjoyment with the relationship.

Physical pursuit — those actions that demonstrate you’re desire to be in the presence of your spouse including looking at them, coming close to them, touching them, and removing barriers that prohibit you from being in their presence.

Social pursuit — those things that demonstrate to your spouse and to others that you like to do the things that your spouse likes to do—that you’re doing life together, and enjoying it!

Let’s read SOS 2:4-5

Song of Solomon 2:4–5 NLT

He escorts me to the banquet hall; it’s obvious how much he loves me. Strengthen me with raisin cakes, refresh me with apples, for I am weak with love.

This is the woman saying of her man, “He provided me with a banquet, he thought of everything that would make me happy.”

A couple years ago Joelle went out for tea with some ladies and she came back gushing about it. For her next birthday I bought her a tea set and pulled together fruit and finger sandwiches and deserts and threw Joelle a private tea party in our living room. From her response, I’m pretty sure she loved it. Apparently, there’s something wonderful about a man who cares about the things that his bride is interested in, and then does something about it. The fact that he listens to the little things she says and then takes action shows that he’s really into her. It’s one of the ways you pursue your spouse.

Song of Solomon 2:8–10 NLT

Ah, I hear my lover coming! He is leaping over the mountains, bounding over the hills. My lover is like a swift gazelle or a young stag. Look, there he is behind the wall, looking through the window, peering into the room. My lover said to me, “Rise up, my darling! Come away with me, my fair one!

Notice how he comes to where she is. Maybe this was after an argument and she’s off at her parents place unhappy with him. Then, there he is, “leaping over the mountains” to pursue her. How can she stay mad at him when he “stands behind [the] wall” and whispers through the lattice “rise up my darling, my beautiful one, and come away with me…”

The poem doesn’t tell us if there has been a dispute, but that’s what usually creates the biggest spaces in a marriage. You can lie there in bed next to each other but be a world apart—each of you stubbornly silent, neither willing to make the first move towards reconciliation.

Pursuing each other is about bounding over the mountain of anger between you and stretching across the chasm of pain that whatever wrong that was done has created. If you’re the one who did something wrong, apologize and pursue, and if you didn’t do anything wrong, apologize anyway for allowing space to grow between you.

Song of Solomon 3:1–4 NLT

One night as I lay in bed, I yearned for my lover. I yearned for him, but he did not come. So I said to myself, “I will get up and roam the city, searching in all its streets and squares. I will search for the one I love.” So I searched everywhere but did not find him. The watchmen stopped me as they made their rounds, and I asked, “Have you seen the one I love?” Then scarcely had I left them when I found my love! I caught and held him tightly, then I brought him to my mother’s house, into my mother’s bed, where I had been conceived.

You’ll find that this whole poem repeats this concept over and over again. They are separated, by something, and one or the other of them has to go find the other one. Sometimes the bride is hiding in her family’s vineyard, sometimes the groom is down in the grove, and sometimes he’s out around town. Whatever the reason for the distance and wherever the person is, in order for them to be together, one of them has to go looking for the other one. They have to pursue.

Song of Solomon 4:1 ESV

Behold, you are beautiful, my love, behold, you are beautiful! Your eyes are doves behind your veil. Your hair is like a flock of goats leaping down the slopes of Gilead.

…. He continues to provide descriptions of her beauty from the head down and of his desire for her.

We’re not going to read the entirety of this chapter because it’s all about foreplay, but the beginning verse sets us up to understand something about emotionally pursuing our spouse. Solomon is the one talking in this passage and he describes his wife as beautiful. He says it twice—repetition emphasizing his profound awe at her beauty. Later, in chapter six, the “others” ask the wife what her husband has on the other fellows around town she begins to tell them something similar:

Song of Solomon 5:10–16 NLT

My lover is dark and dazzling, better than ten thousand others! His head is finest gold, his wavy hair is black as a raven. His eyes sparkle like doves beside springs of water; they are set like jewels washed in milk. His cheeks are like gardens of spices giving off fragrance. His lips are like lilies, perfumed with myrrh. His arms are like rounded bars of gold, set with beryl. His body is like bright ivory, glowing with lapis lazuli. His legs are like marble pillars set in sockets of finest gold. His posture is stately, like the noble cedars of Lebanon. His mouth is sweetness itself; he is desirable in every way. Such, O women of Jerusalem, is my lover, my friend.

These words of affirmation are OVER THE TOP! I’m a rational person. I find Solomon’s descriptions of his wife to be embarrassing. I know my wife is beautiful, and I tell her so, but I struggle with the language. To simply say, “Joelle, you’re beautiful to me” isn’t enough. I need to tell her specifics. Solomon had an awesome, historically appropriate, comparison for every feature he saw as desirable in his wife, and she had some pretty amazing things to say about his body too. Was Solomon really the MOST handsome man in the land? No. I can assure you he wasn’t. Yet she found him to be desirable and she used over the top words to describe him so he and everyone else knew that her DESIRE was for HIM. He did the same for her. We pursue each other when we find ways to put our desire into words.

Song of Solomon 5:2–8 NLT

I slept, but my heart was awake, when I heard my lover knocking and calling: “Open to me, my treasure, my darling, my dove, my perfect one. My head is drenched with dew, my hair with the dampness of the night.” But I responded, “I have taken off my robe. Should I get dressed again? I have washed my feet. Should I get them soiled?” My lover tried to unlatch the door, and my heart thrilled within me. I jumped up to open the door for my love, and my hands dripped with perfume. My fingers dripped with lovely myrrh as I pulled back the bolt. I opened to my lover, but he was gone! My heart sank. I searched for him but could not find him anywhere. I called to him, but there was no reply. The night watchmen found me as they made their rounds. They beat and bruised me and stripped off my veil, those watchmen on the walls. Make this promise, O women of Jerusalem— If you find my lover, tell him I am weak with love.

This last passage is a cautionary tale. He’s initially there, but she rejects him and pushes him away. Then, her mind changes and she goes looking—pursuing him. He can’t be found, and she ends up injured by the watchmen on the walls.

Here’s the lesson: when we don’t allow ourselves to be pursued then we end up getting hurt. And when we don’t pursue our spouse, we both end up hurt.

God pursues us

Throughout the Bible we find the church described as virgins at a wedding, or the guests at a wedding, or the bride who God is marrying. In some places God’s people are described as adulterous and yet God still pursues them.

Hosea 2:16–20 NLT

When that day comes,” says the Lord, “you will call me ‘my husband’ instead of ‘my master.’* O Israel, I will wipe the many names of Baal from your lips, and you will never mention them again. On that day I will make a covenant with all the wild animals and the birds of the sky and the animals that scurry along the ground so they will not harm you. I will remove all weapons of war from the land, all swords and bows, so you can live unafraid in peace and safety. I will make you my wife forever, showing you righteousness and justice, unfailing love and compassion. I will be faithful to you and make you mine, and you will finally know me as the Lord.

There is no excuse for the sins of Israel, but in mercy and love God patiently pursues them anyway. He even confidently says that His pursuit of them will draw them to Him so they will call him “My Husband.”

God even pursues people who are surrounded by spiritual darkness. Standing on the Areopagus reasoning with the idolatrous heathen people of Athens Paul says this in

Acts 17:26–28 NLT

From one man* he created all the nations throughout the whole earth. He decided beforehand when they should rise and fall, and he determined their boundaries. “His purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though he is not far from any one of us. For in him we live and move and exist. As some of your* own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’

The picture Paul paints is that even in the face of the darkest, most abhorrent actions against God, He is still so close that all they have to do is reach out in the darkness and they’ll run into God. He’s pursuing us all the time.

An appeal

Steen and Sasha, in a few hours your about to make a vow to each other. Probably something about loving each other in sickness and in health, whether poor or wealthy, etc. As you make that vow I’d like you to think about love in the context of active pursuit. Like Solomon leaping over the mountains to reconcile with his wife, or God nudging up so close to the heathen that they can’t help but bump into him if they just turn around to seek Him, you too should be quick to forgive and pursue each other.

I guarantee that you’ll make mistakes and cause each other pain. But when you’ve been hurt by your partner, be the first to forgive. Don’t antagonize, or bite back. Instead, extend grace for sin, and kindness for hurt. The result will be exactly what Solomon’s wife says in Song of Solomon 8:6-7

Song of Solomon 8:6–7 (NLT)

Place me like a seal over your heart,

like a seal on your arm.

For love is as strong as death,

its jealousy* as enduring as the grave.*

Love flashes like fire,

the brightest kind of flame.

Many waters cannot quench love,

nor can rivers drown it.