A Prayer About Being Desired
I belong to my lover and his desire is for me. Song of Songs 7:10
Lord Jesus, the Song of Songs has never been one of the most underlined books in my Bible, perhaps for several reasons. However, the more I look for you in every portion of Scripture (Luke 24:25-27), the more I am drawn to its startling, scintillating, sensual imagery. To read Song of Songs is to tap into my deepest longings for intimacy, playfulness, passion, delight, knowing and being known.
How I praise you that you are the great lover of whom this book speaks. And we, your Bride, are the beloved, upon whom you have set your deepest affections, and for whom you have given your very life. I desperately need the work of the Holy Spirit to help me lay hold of everything implied in this amazing book, for I am diseased and deluged with unbelief. To know you, through the riches of the gospel as the one to whom I belong, is one glorious thing. But to believe that you actually desire me, is quite another breathtaking thing.
To be desired is to be wanted, pursued, enjoyed… seen and accepted, known and nourished, remembered and cherished. All of these are promised in the gospel and only in the gospel can they be realized in part, and only in heaven, fully realized.
Forgive me, Jesus, for believing that any human being could possibly satisfy the very longings you created and came to fulfill in our lives. Forgive me, Jesus, for assuming I could ever be to someone else what you alone can be. Lord Jesus, help those of us who are married to give one another little tastes of your incomparable love. Help all of us realize-the unmarried, the happily married, and the miserably married, that you, Jesus, are the spouse we always wanted, and the one to whom we belong. And more importantly, Jesus, help us to know that you are the Spouse that always wanted us, and the one who truly desires us. So very Amen we pray, Jesus, in your name.
