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Chapter 3 of Song of Songs shows us the maturity of the seeking one, and chapter 4 explains that maturity is reached by the subduing of the will:
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The secret of the maturity of the seeking one is that her will has been completely subdued and resurrected—3:6-9; 4:1b, 4.
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The neck signifies the human will under God; the Lord considers the submission of our will a most beautiful thing—v. 4.
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First, our will must be subdued; then it will be strong in resurrection and be like the tower of David, the armory for the spiritual warfare—Eph. 6:10.
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If we have a submissive will, our will becomes like the tower of David that holds all kinds of weapons for warfare—2 Cor. 10:3-5.
Morning Nourishment
S. S. 4:4 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.Eph. 6:10 Finally, be empowered in the Lord and in the might of His strength.
Song of Songs 3 tells us of the maturity of the seeking one, and chapter 4 continues by explaining how she reached such a mature stage….Eventually, she is reckoned by the Lord as Jerusalem. This is the maturity that is mentioned in chapter 3 when she becomes the palanquin. A palanquin is a miniature of the city. The city contains the Lord in a full way, and the palanquin contains the Lord on a smaller scale….Then chapter 4 explains that such a maturity is reached by the subduing of the will.
In 4:4 the Lord likens [the seeking one's] neck to the tower of David….The hair signifies our will, and…our neck also signifies our will. 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 [S. S. 4:1] 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. (CWWL, 1972, vol. 1,”Life and Building as Portrayed in the Song of Songs,” pp. 273-274)
Today's Reading
How poetic the Song of Songs is! First, our will must be subdued; then it will be resurrected like the tower of David, the armory for the spiritual warfare. All the weapons for spiritual warfare are kept in our subdued and resurrected will. If our will has never been subdued by the Lord, it can never be a strong armory to keep all the weapons for spiritual warfare. All the weapons are mostly defensive, not offensive. It is not so much a matter of going out to fight as it is a matter of standing to resist. Bucklers and shields are all for protection in order to stand. In spiritual warfare, we are not so much on the offensive as we are on the defensive, standing against all the devilish, subtle attacks of the enemy. Most of the items of the armor mentioned in Ephesians 6 are also defensive. There is really no need for us to fight; the Lord has won the battle already.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. We all know this by our own experience….The sisters who are stubborn in the matter of submission are the first to surrender when the enemy attacks. But if we have a submissive will, a will that has been subdued like a flock of goats on a mountainside, our will is expressed like a tower of David. 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 [of the seeking one in the first three chapters of Song of Songs], the first one, [the mare], is strongest in the will, and the last one, [the crown], 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. 274-275)
Further Reading: CWWN, vol. 23,”The Song of Songs,” pp. 61-62; CWWL, 1972, vol. 1,”Life and Building as Portrayed in the Song of Songs,” ch. 6