Song of Solomon 8:4 "Daughters of Jerusalem, I charge you: Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires."
Years ago, I bought some fruit trees. Every spring, I prune the branches. I meticulously keep the trees watered and fertilized all in the hope of one day harvesting fruit from them. I have two apple trees and two pear trees. This year was the first year of seeing any hope of my efforts paying off. One of my apple trees blossomed and budded with wee little green apples. I rejoiced and thanked God that someday I would be eating some apples that I had raised!
Now, those wee green apples have matured and are brazenly donning a glowing red blush. They are ripe and round and look so delicious. However, there's a problem-- they are sucker fruit. I don't know the reasoning behind it, but I've had many farmers warn me not to pick the first crop from my fruit trees, but to let them mature and die and wait for the next year to harvest the fruit. It's so hard to resist the urge to to pluck just one from the branch just to taste the fruit of my labors, but I want my trees to bear the full potential of fruit for the next many years, so I wait...and wait....and just resist that urge.
In my heart, I began to reflect on how God has a perfect design for things. Sometimes, it seems as if He is withholding good things from us just as a cruel joke, but I know He's not that malicious. It seems to me that one of many things in our life that we must resist plucking from the tree prematurely is sex. Premarital sex is a lot like sucker fruit. If we sample it before we should, we could be limiting the fruitfulness of that tree in future years. I don't claim to understand how God works, but I know He's always trying to tell us something.
I've heard the testimonies of many people who are married Christian couples this day, but they slept together before they we were married and regret it fully even now. Some might say, "What's the point of regretting? You're married now, so what does it matter?" The answer they give is: "It just does." When you know you've not done things God's way, you know you've gypped yourself, and that's just that. I'm not saying that God doesn't restore and forgive and make things right, but I am saying that there will always be a consequence for our actions. Oftentimes, God is merciful enough to keep us from seeing the full consequence because if we really understood, we might have a harder time getting over the disappointment and may even succumb entirely to a self-destructive grief.
In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. (Romans 6:11-13)
Sucker fruit must be left alone. God's plan for things in their maturity and fullness is perfect. Patience and trust are some of the most valuable things we could ever nurture in our hearts. To harvest a dozen apples today might be robbing myself of hundreds in years to come.
I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. (Philippians 3:14-15)
