«　WEEK 4　DAY 1　»

　　S.　S. 4:1 Oh, you are beautiful, my love! Oh, you are beautiful! Your eyes are like doves behind your veil; your hair is like a flock of goats that repose on Mount Gilead.

　　4 Your neck is like the tower of David, built for an armory: A thousand bucklers hang on it, all the shields of the mighty men.

　　Hair in the Bible always indicates something of the will. All her scattered wills have been gathered together into rows to appear as a flock of goats on a mountain [S.S. 4:1]....Some of the goats are standing on a lower part of the mountain, and some are standing on a higher part.

　　The goats are not scattered but gathered; they are not on the plain but on the mountainside, giving a picture of submission. This means that by the improvement from a mare to a palanquin, all the wills of the seeking one have been dealt with. They have been subdued and gathered together to be made into rows full of submission. (CWWL, 1972, vol. 1, "Life and Building as Portrayed in the Song of Songs," p. 272)

　　Song of Songs...speaks not only of love but also of the subduing of the will. To have complete, adequate, and thorough transformation, there must be the subduing of the will. The more our will is subdued, the more we will be transformed.

　　Many of us love the Lord, but we still hold on to our will. Our concept has been changed, and our mind has been renewed, but our will needs subduing. Many of us are so stubborn—not only the brothers but also the sisters. The problem is not with our heart. We do love the Lord. I believe that in the past few months the Lord has heard many voices saying, "Lord Jesus, I love You!" But in answer to these voices, I believe the Lord would say, "Yes, I know that you love Me, but what about your will?" To have our concept changed is not enough. We must go on to have our will subdued....Maturity is reached by the subduing of the will.

　　The Lord likens her neck to the tower of David (S.S. 4:4). We have seen that the hair signifies our will, and we know that our neck also signifies our will [cf. Isa. 3:16]. Those who are rebellious toward God in the Bible are called stiff-necked (Exo. 32:9; Acts 7:51). So we see that a flock of goats appearing on the mountain shows the subduing of her will, and the tower of David illustrates how strong her will is in resurrection. First of all, our will must be subdued; then it must be strong in resurrection. The natural will must be dealt with, and then we will have a resurrected will. The crucified and subdued will is just like a flock of goats standing on a mountainside, but the resurrected will must be like the tower of David builded up as an armory. An armory is a place where weapons for fighting are kept.

　　We simply need to stand and resist all the enemy's attacks. The bucklers and the shields that protect us against the arrows of the enemy are kept in this tower, which is the subdued and resurrected will of the Lord's seeking one. This is the real maturity in life.

　　An unsubdued will is, on the one hand, stubborn, and on the other hand, weak. When the enemy comes, the stubborn, unsubdued will always makes an unconditional surrender....But if we have a submissive will,...when the enemy comes, our will is like the tower of David that holds all kinds of weapons against his attacks.

　　The secret of the maturity of the seeking one in Song of Songs 3 is that her will has been completely subdued and resurrected. Of all eight figures, the first one is strongest in the will, and the last one has no will of its own at all. The mare has an exceedingly strong will, but the palanquin and the crown have no will at all. She has come out of her natural will and is now standing in her resurrected will against the enemy. She is like the tower of David builded as an armory for the spiritual warfare. (CWWL, 1972, vol. 1, "Life and Building as Portrayed in the Song of Songs," pp. 272-275)

　　Further Reading: CWWL, 1972, vol. 1, "Life and Building as Portrayed in the Song of Songs," ch. 6; CWWN, vol. 23, "The Song of Songs," sec. 3