Epilogue: The Flame

[1] God appeared to Abraham in the form of a flaming torch (see Genesis 15:17), to Moses as a burning bush (see Exodus 3:2), and to the children of Israel as a pillar of fire (see Exodus 13:21). He was the Consuming Fire on Mt. Sinai and the eternal flame on the altar of sacrifice (see Judges 13:20). Given these manifestations, it is understandable that God would associate Himself with the flame of love between a man and his wife in Song of Solomon 8:6 (NASB).

[2] Adapted from Joseph Dillow, The Reign of the Servant Kings (Miami Springs, FL: Schoettle, 1992), 2.

[3] See Isaiah 14:13-14.

[4] Satan means “adversary”; see William F. Arndt and F. Wilbur Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1952), 152.

[5] See Isaiah 14:12.

[6] See Ezekiel 28:17.

[7] See Genesis 1:27; 2:21-23.

[8] Summary of Genesis 1:27-28.

[9] God gave the gift of sex to the first couple. While sex is one factor that helps man accomplish God’s mandate (to reflect Him, to multiply and fill the earth, and to subdue it), it is important to acknowledge that single men and women also accomplish aspects of the mandate apart from sex. Each man and woman is made in God’s image, all have the ability to multiply in ways other than through childbearing, and all can participate in subduing the earth as they submit to the headship of Christ.

[10] It is noteworthy that it was a combination of “them” both, what the man and woman in their uniqueness brought to the totality.

[11] See Psalm 8:5; Hebrews 2:7.

[12] This image is based on Genesis 2:24, where, through sexual intercourse, two become one in the eyes of God. The authors do not intend to imply that Satan is defeated through a couple engaging in the pleasures of sex but rather that Satan is threatened when a husband and wife live out their oneness in dependence upon God and in service to each other.

[13] Paul described the sexual union between a husband and wife as a picture of Christ and the church (see Ephesians 5:31-32). It is this picture, not the act of sex, that poses a threat to Satan.