Better than wine

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… For your love is better than wine. (Songs 1:2b)

 

The reason why we ask for His kisses is because we’ve come to realise that there is nothing else that can satisfy us. Only He can! To be able to experience the love of the Bridegroom firsthand is better than anything on this earth.

Wine in this verse in Song of Songs refers to anything that we enjoy.

 

When we start our journey on the narrow way, wine will refer to things like wordly pleasures and the pride of life. A typical introspection question will then be: ‘is knowing Jesus better than my alcohol or nicotine addiction?’. Another example can be: ‘is knowing Jesus better than my wrong circle of friends?’

It’s quite easy to ask these type of questions when we have to choose between knowing Jesus and something that is easy recognisable as evil. Then, as we continue our walk, the questions probe deeper. Wine will then start to include good things that we enjoy. The labels on some wine bottles will maybe read a beautiful house, car and clothes. Other bottles will be labeled: desires, ambitions and wonderful experiences. These are but a few examples. Wine can even represent things in our spiritual life. Then it becomes a bit more difficult to distinguish, because we tend to view spiritual things as Jesus self. It’s also quite hard to reject things that look very spiritual as something that might be a misleading mixture.

I’m now thinking of a very popular christian music band in California. Some people love their music so much that they find it almost impossible to accept that the spirit behind the music is a false spirit and not the true Holy Spirit. Is knowing Jesus better than listening to their music?

Many people make a god of their church denomination or even their position within the church. This is a hard one to swallow But sometimes God calls us out or allows circumstances where we have to lay down our position. He uses this to reveal the ‘wine’ in our heart. Wine, that we didn’t even know exist. Is knowing Jesus better than to belong to a certain church or serving in a certain position, even if that position is something good like being a prophet, worship leader or deliverance worker?

 

We cannot talk about wine without referring to the brand of wine that Babilon serves. Babilon in the Bible, and specifically in Revelation, doesn’t refer to just a specific country. It refers to the global world system, of which the church became part of to a great extend.

 

Babilon includes: security, systems, a large selection of products, expensive food and clothes, luxurious holidays and grand destinations. Taken at face value, these things are not evil, as long as it doesn’t sit on the throne of our heart. We cannot allow it to determine our identity. We should not even desire any of it.

Can we agree with Paul that we are satisfied regardless of what we own or don’t own. Whether our holiday destination is lovely or if it’s at home. Regardless of where we shop for our food and clothes. Irrespective of awesome experiences or even the lack of exciting events in our lives. Whether our church is a fancy theather type building with a profesional music band or if we are worshipping in simplicity from house to house. Babilon drives mankind for bigger, better, more expensive and more professional. The kingdom of heaven is based on simplicity, but power.

Babilon will come to a fall. May we be not counted among the merchants that will weep for the fallen system and the loss of all her wealth. We, as disciples of Jesus, are invited to rejoice over her destruction.

“They threw dust on their heads and cried out, weeping and wailing, and saying, ‘Alas, alas, that great city, in which all who had ships on the sea became rich by her wealth! For in one hour she is made desolate.’ “Rejoice over her, O heaven, and you holy apostles and prophets, for God has avenged you on her!” (Rev 18:19-20)

 

Up until now, I’ve talked about concrete things. The Holy Spirit always leads us deeper. We start at the outward things, then move to our thoughts and emotions and then even deeper, to our desires. The deepest form of introspection that I know about is the motivation of our heart. Each time when the Song of Songs growth graph spirals back towards this very first verse in Song of Song, the search in order to identify the wine in our lives, delves deeper. This is wonderful: it’s all part of the process where we can associate with the cross, the death of Christ. The result of this process is that we become less and less and He becomes more.

 

Wine also includes our relationships with people. The question in this regard is whether the kisses of the Bridegroom weighs more than our marriage and even our children. Can it be that our loved ones are sitting on the throne of our heart? These are very difficult questions to answer honestly. Sometimes we need to test ourselves by asking some hypothetical questions and choices.

 

Another type of wine is our desires and ambitions as well as the image of what we believe life must look like. Many times we have a picture of what a perfect life must look like. A husband and wife must look and act in a certain way. There must be so many children, so many years apart. The eldest must be a certain gender. Everyone in the family must be successful, smart and goodlooking. This is just one example of a picture that might be light years away from the reality of the perfect will of the Father for our lives.

Our desires and ambitions can be related to our career and job. Is His love even better than what we do for a living?

The test is what our reaction will be to the loss of any of these things. Will we be unhappy? Will our lives fall apart? Will we loose our identity when the wine is no longer there?

 

Recently the Lord started to reveal an even deeper level of wine. He calls it our holy cows. Holy cows include all good spiritual and church related things.

Right before the Feast of Trumpets in 2022, the Holy Spirit showed me an image of a person on an airport. There was a large dustbin in front of the door. It looked like on of those bins where you have to dispose of the items not allowed on the plane. The door represented a deeper level of intimacy with the Lord. On the drum was a label that read: ‘holy cows’. It’s impossible to go through the door while holding holy cows firmly under our arms. The holy cows belong in the bin otherwise we will not be able to enter. We can fervently desire deeper and closer, but it will not avail much.

 

So what are these holy cows?

A word of warning: in the next paragraph I’m going step on a few toes and it will also not be the last time. I will not apologise; we are in desperate need of truth. Initially truth will make us uncomfortable but later we will embrace it and start to love it. It’s all part of process of buying truth (Prov 23:23). Everything that must be purchased comes at a price.

 

Back to the holy cows… This includes every good thing, church and spiritual activities that we enjoy. I’ve already touched briefly on this. It can include certain songs and music groups. Sometimes we need a certain song to enter into His presence and the Lord doesn’t want us to become dependent on these type of things. More examples include: the listening or watching of teachings and messages of certain people. It can also include our traditions; the way we were taught to serve the Lord. Holy cows can include our church membership. Maybe the Lord is calling us out in order to grow, but we cling to our church because we were raised there or because we are scared of our family and friends opinions. Or maybe we are scared of losing our salvation when we don’t belong to a known denomination. People like to use statements like: ‘this person was sifted out or the person fell from the faith’. If these are our reasons and motivation to stay, it might well be that fear is sitting on the throne of our heart.

 

Think about a beautifully decorated inner chamber, prayer room, warrior room, or whatever name you prefer. How effectively can we pray without it?

More examples include wonderful (and not so wonderful) things like blowing the shofar, lighting the menorah, removing of shoes, lighting of candles, decorating a table for communion, celebrating feasts in a certain manner, using of Hebrew words and dressing in a certain way. There are a magnitude of these holy cows. In our house we like to use the word embellishments to describe these kinds of things that  are being used to decorate our spiritual lives so that it can look and sound exciting.

 

I’m thinking of the tradition that Communion can only be used once a month and that only certain people may administer it. The same goes for baptism.

The celebration of pagan feasts is another sore point. The clinging to the decoration of a tree and to father christmas is the holy cow of a great experience, childhood memories and fear of the opinions of family and friends.

 

On the other side of the pendulum lies the celebration of the Lord’s feasts. The celebration of these feasts can also become a holy cow when the traditions and customs to celebrate it becomes more important that Jesus Christ Himself. There are so many instructions on exactly how to celebrate these feasts, most of it Jewish cultural traditions that cannot even be found in the Bible.

So many ‘things’ entered the church and even non-denominational movements, that it became difficult to identify holy cows. They can look so wholesome and holy!

 

I’m just listing a few examples to get your mind working. There is nothing wrong with most of these things. Great power is released when we blow the shofar under the leading and anointing of the Holy Spirit. When we celebrate Passover according to the leading of the Holy Spirit for that specific year, we walk in obedience. The key is to Shama – to listen to what the Holy Spirit, not people, teaches us and then to obey Him.

 

We cannot allow good things to determine our identity. His love, in other words to truly know Him, must be better than any of these things. It’s unfortunate that many good things lead to idolatry: the worship of a cow under a thin veneer of holiness. It became more important than Jesus and it started to define His people.

 

The test

I like to image a small prison cell with a cement floor and a tiny window. No chair, bed, book or room mate. Just us and the Lord. Should this become our reality, will we be able to still love and serve Him? No music to make it easier to enter into His presence. No shofar to blow during worship. No Bible to read. What will remain? Only that which is inside of us will have to do. In this prison cell example all the embellishments fall away and the raw reality of our true identity in Jesus Christ cannot hide behind it anymore.

 

When the fire will test the ‘wine’ in our lives and it devours the wood, hay and straw, will it reveal at least some silver and gold? (1 Cor 3:11-15)

 

Should the Bridegroom stand at the door, asking us to throw some of these things in the bin, will we be able do it? Or will we cling to it and defend it?

 

The key to the rest of Song of Songs

The door to the palace in Song of Songs was opened. She was able to enter and experience all the glory and loveliness because she was able to say: “His love is better than wine”. This is the key that opens the door. Without it we will unfortunately always stay in a routine type of religion.

 

Please don’t condemn yourself when you discover wine in your life that at this stage taste better than Jesus. It’s a constant process of laying down. We have to listen to the Holy Spirit and obey, step by step, by laying down one thing at a time as He reveals it to us.

If His light is today revealing a hobby, sport, person, religious conviction, or whatever, don’t let the sun set before you have made work and layed down what He has shown You.

Shama – listen and do … while we dwell in Him in a perfect sabbatical rest.

 

This is an extract from the book: Deep treasures in Song of Songs by Yolandie Mostert.