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The Song of Solomon – Part 13a, He Brought me to the House of Wine

The Seat at the Edge of the Ruin

[Study Aired October 10, 2026]

Preface 

Almost everyone who has ever read the Old Testament has read it from a safe seat. We watch Israel grumble in the wilderness, melt down the gold, refuse the land, and we do what spectators have always done at a wreck: we slow down, we look, we shake our heads, and we drive on with a quiet, private certainty that we would have handled it differently. That certainty is the most expensive thing most believers own. It costs them the one lesson the wreck was staged to teach.

To the Elect of Christ, the opening verse of this passage is not another demolition of a physical people, as the same Lord once did to Old Israel when she had virtually no holy spirit to sustain her. Old Israel is not the villain in a story we are to observe. She is spiritual food — bread — laid on the table so that the Shulamite Bride can look at what she was and see, without the usual cushion of distance, that if she had not been raised in her Lord’s vineyard, she, too, would still be dancing with her sister kid-goats beside the tents of Kedar and calling the dance worship.

Num 14:9 Only rebel not ye against the LORD, neither fear ye the people of the land [within]; for they are bread for us: their defence is departed from them, and the LORD is with us: fear them not.
Num 14:10 But all the congregation bade stone them with stones. And the glory of the LORD appeared in the tabernacle [Within] of the congregation before all the children of Israel.

Notice the grammar of the first verse. The enemies are bread. The land is within. The tabernacle is within. Even the stoning crowd is within — and the glory of the LORD appears precisely in the middle of the mob that wanted to silence the only two men who told the truth. The wilderness was originally a place on a map. Now, it is a room in the house, and every one of us has stood in it with stones in our hands.

This verse shows, with a tenderness that only becomes visible after the sting has passed, the reality of Him giving her to make herself ready, by His own might and power, to be His Wife. The wording matters. She is brought. She is not marched, not herded, not argued into the building. She is brought to the banqueting house, and this study will not let you dodge the question the Lord Himself asks at the door.

The Guest Who Always Had an Answer

Mat 22:11 And when the king [Christ] came in to see the guests, he saw there a man which had not on a wedding garment:
Mat 22:12 And he saith unto him, Friend, how camest thou in hither not having a wedding garment? And he was speechless.

Mat 22:13 Then said the king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth [In the fiery Resurrection to Judgment].
Mat 22:14 For many are called, but few are chosen.

Wedding garment — G1742 enduma
1. a garment, an outer robe, apparel; from G1746 enduo, to sink into, to put on, to clothe oneself.

A garment, by its root, is something one sinks into (immersed), not something one picks up and carries. The guest was not missing an accessory. He was missing a covering he had every opportunity to be sunk into, and the Giver of the feast has already said whose garment it is.

Rev 19:8 And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.

Gal 3:27 For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.

Speechless — G5392 phimoo
1. to muzzle, to close the mouth with a muzzle; to silence.

The same verb Paul uses of an ox that must not be muzzled while it treads out the corn. The man in the parable did not merely go quiet. He was muzzled — the one with the ready answer, the practised alibi, the well-worn sentence beginning with but stopped mid-breath by a question that had no defence. 

There is a person in every congregation, and in every one of us even on a good day, who arrives at the greatest occasion of his life in whatever he happened to be wearing and defends the choice with the most common alibi in religious history: God knows my heart. It sounds humble. It is the opposite. It is a man announcing that the dress code is for lesser people, that the host’s taste is negotiable, and that his own sincerity is a garment sufficient to stand beside a King. The Lord does not argue with him. He asks one question, and the answer dies in his throat.

Notice also the Lord’s first word to him in Matthew 22:12: Friend. 

Joh 15:15 Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you. 

The man is not a stranger who sneaked in. He was brought in to the gathering before being seated. He was among the called, disconcertingly, even a dragged Elect. The verse that follows draws the line that the whole banquet turns on.

Called — G2822 Keltos
1. invited, summoned, called.
Chosen — G1588 eklektos
1. picked out, selected, chosen; from G1586 eklego, to pick out for oneself.

Eklektos is the very word used of Christ Himself as the stone chosen of God, so that to be chosen is to be picked out in the same manner and for the same purpose He was.

1Pe 2:4 To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious,

Joh 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw [H1670 – Phonetic: hel-koo’-o- Definition: 1. to draw, drag off ] him: and I will raise him up at the last day. 

We understand that the Elect are “dragged” to Christ to mean that God’s sovereignly brings His chosen people to Christ. John 6:44 is understood literally through the Greek meaning of “draw” H1670, helkuō: the Father “drags” us to Christ because, left to ourselves, the carnal mind would not choose Him, like the wedding-guest imposter who didn’t wear a wedding gown; ‘she’ didn’t make herself ready. She is speechless because she, with barely enough oil in her lamp to light the way, didn’t think it necessary to “bring every thought into captivity in Christ” (2Co 10:5) to, and like the Orthodoxy says, “to just come as you are”, him not knowing that he was dressed in Joshua-like filthy rags he thought smelled of spikenard.

As my former Babylonian friends used to say, with great sincerity and the free-will doctrine fully intact: “no, no—all are called, but few choose!” Believing themselves to be the few, off they went to frolic blissfully beside the tents of Kedar. Look at the psychology before you look at the doctrine. That sentence (Mat 22:12) is a masterpiece of flattering authorship. It keeps the invitation and quietly moves the signature. It tells the listener that the decisive act belonged to him, that he took the harder road, that he read the invitation more wisely than his neighbor. A man who believes he chose to be among the few has placed himself on the guest list in his own handwriting — and the King, who wrote the list before the foundation of the world, has never once mistaken that handwriting for His own.

2Ti 3:12  Indeed, all who desire to live godly lives in Christ Jesus will be persecuted,
2Ti 3:13 while evil men and imposters go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. 

1Th 4:17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

There will be no guest in that company without the appropriate garment waiting with those left alive, when the Lord comes to lift them into the clouds in the sight of men toward the banqueting house. The garment is granted, never woven. The seat is given, never claimed.

The Verses Before Us

Son 2:4-5 He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me was love. Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples: for I am sick of love.

This first study takes only the fourth verse. The fifth, with its flagons, apples, and famous sickness, requires a study of its own.

A House Built of Wine, Under a Banner

Banqueting — H3196 yayin
1. wine; from an unused root meaning to effervesce.

House — H1004 bayith
1. house, dwelling, habitation; shelter or abode of animals [beasts].
From H1129 banah, to build. A house, in Hebrew, is not merely where people sleep. It is what has been built, and the same word names a household, a family, a dynasty.

Banner — H1714 deghel
From H1713 dagal: 1. to look, behold; (Qal) looked at, conspicuous (participle); 2. to carry a banner or standard, set up banner or standard.
Strong’s: a primitive root; to flaunt; to raise a flag; figuratively, to be conspicuous: (set up with) banners,chiefest.

Read the three words together, and the verse stops being a pleasant picture. The Bride is brought to a house of wine — a built thing, a dwelling made of effervescence, the very substance the opening verse of the Song declared inferior to His love. A standard is raised over her, and its root is the verb “to look.” A banner exists to be seen. It tells a watching crowd who this person belongs to and whose (little) Gideon-like army of hand-selected men she is, to fight in the Lord’s battle on their behalf, only to show how to fight their fight through faith.

Patently, this humbling glory is Christ holding His Bride in unspeakable honor, second in command on the throne with Him. He brought her, ascending as spirit as He is, to the wedding supper, where she is no longer a spectator of the banquet but a partner in its purpose — for it is at this table that she shares with her Husband the labor of their mutual and eventual saving of the whole world through the Lake of Fire.

The Hebrew of a later passage will not let the wine slip away from the table. When the queen of Persia prepared her feast, Scripture called it, in the identical word, a banquet of wine.

The Queen Who Waited at the Edge of the Court

Every detail of Queen Esther’s entrance unmistakably represents the Bride of Christ. Haman, who represents our Old Man, Esau, our former flesh, hates the New Man, Mordecai, who, ironically, is also Esther. She is the “me” in Song 2:4 and in the psalm of the prepared table: Christ has brought her into His banqueting house — Him, the Temple she enters.

Psa 23:5 Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.

Est 5:1 Now it came to pass on the third day, that Esther put on her royal apparel, and stood in the inner court of the king’s house, over against the king’s house: and the king sat upon his royal throne in the royal house, over against the gate of the house.

Third day: the number of resurrection. Royal apparel: not her own wardrobe but the righteousness given her. Then the detail that separates the Bride from every would-be bride in the room — she stands. She does not storm the throne room. She does not rehearse a grievance on the way in. She takes up a position at the edge of the court, and she waits, in full view, to be seen.

Psa 27:14 Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD.

Est 5:2 And it was so, when the king saw Esther the queen standing in the court, that she obtained favour in his sight: and the king held out to Esther the golden sceptre that was in his hand. So Esther drew near, and touched the top of the sceptre [H7626 Spear, rod, staff, branch, tribe—Christ].

Under the possibility of death, access to the throne is only granted by the King’s initiative, never earned by the petitioner’s persistence, and the Bride’s part is to receive it and, in deep honor and reverence, draw near to a prospective Husband. The sceptre extends; she touches only its top. She takes no more of His authority than He offers, and she takes all that He offers. The apostle James captured this posture in four verses.

Jas 4:7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Jas 4:8 Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.
Jas 4:9 Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.
Jas 4:10 [Like Esther] Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.

Scripture will go on to tell us that the third month, (Hebrew) Sivan, is the month in which the decree of deliverance was written and sent to every people in their own language — the very month, in the later calendar of the Spirit in the fifth, of Pentecost, when every man heard the apostles speak in his own tongue. The resurrection weight carried by Esther’s third day is not accidental. It is the Bride’s day of access, and it is the same day the word goes out.

Est 8:9 Then were the king’s scribes called at that time in the third month, that is, the month Sivan, on the three and twentieth day thereof; and it was written according to all that Mordecai commanded unto the Jews, and to the lieutenants, and the deputies and rulers of the provinces which are from India unto Ethiopia, an hundred twenty and seven provinces, unto every province according to the writing thereof, and unto every people after their language, and to the Jews according to their writing, and according to their language.

Act 2:6 Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language.

Est 5:3 Then said the king unto her, What wilt thou, queen Esther? and what is thy request? it shall be even given thee to the half of the kingdom.

Half the kingdom: This is no figure of speech in the Bride’s story. It directly indicates the Bride as co-heir, the exact pattern of Pharaoh placing Joseph over all Egypt.

Gen 41:40 Thou [Joseph] shalt be over my house, and according unto thy word shall all my people be ruled: only in the throne will I be greater than thou.

Here is the sharpest psychological observation in the whole account. Just like Satan tempted Jesus to have His kingdom of the world, she is offered anything, and she does not take it. Every person reading this knows the temptation she resisted: you finally hold the leverage, the room is yours, the offender is within reach, and everything in you, like Esau for pottage, and lust for a beautiful, yet strange woman, wants to cash the moment immediately before it evaporates. She asks only that the king and Haman come to a banquet she has prepared.

Est 5:4 And Esther answered, If it seem good unto the king, let the king and Haman come this day unto the banquet that I have prepared for him.

Est 5:6 And the king said unto Esther at the banquet of wine, What is thy petition? and it shall be granted thee: and what is thy request? even to the half of the kingdom it shall be performed.

Est 5:8 If I have found favour in the sight of the king, and if it please the king to grant my petition, and to perform my request, let the king and Haman come to the banquet that I shall prepare for them, and I will do to morrow as the king hath said.

Here is a woman taught in the righteous art of anticipatory elegant seduction (Son 4:9). Twice she defers her request and arranges a second feast. The Bride brings the opposer to the King’s own table. She does not confront what opposes Christ’s word by her own hand. She stages it in the King’s presence, where He will judge it. Her patience states plainly that the Bride’s work is not to force the outcome but to bring all things before the King at the appointed time. The delay was part of the judgment process. It allowed events to unfold so that Haman’s destruction and Mordecai’s exaltation occurred in God’s timing, not hers.

Haman is being brought into the judgment of the old man—even within Esther, who represents the Elect, ready to die for righteous judgment. The first feast begins the process, and the second feast brings matters to their appointed conclusion. On that second day Esther finally makes her petition, and the Haman in you and me is exposed and destroyed—only one of the two remains in the King’s bosom, “betwixt his breasts.”

Est 7:3 Then Esther the queen answered and said, If I have found favour in thy sight, O king, and if it please the king, let my life be given me at my petition, and my people at my request:

The Man Who Had Everything and Could Not Sit Down

Est 5:9 Then went Haman forth that day joyful and with a glad heart: but when Haman saw Mordecai in the king’s gate, that he stood not up, nor moved for him, he was full of indignation against Mordecai [Joh 15:18]
Est 5:10 Nevertheless Haman refrained himself: and when he came home, he sent and called for his friends, and Zeresh [H2238 – gold] his wife.
Est 5:11 And Haman told them of the glory of his riches, and the multitude of his children, and all the things wherein the king had promoted him, and how he had advanced him above the princes and servants of the king.
Est 5:12 Haman said moreover, Yea, Esther the queen did let no man come in with the king unto the banquet that she had prepared but myself; and to morrow am I invited unto her also with the king.
Est 5:13 Yet all this availeth me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king’s gate.

Joh 15:18 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you.

1Jn 4:17 Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world.

Joh 15:19 If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.

Read that scene as a diagnosis, because it is one. A man leaves the most exclusive dinner of his career elated, walks past a single person who did not stand, and the entire evening collapses. He, the Great Whore within, has the wealth, the imaginary ‘husband’ and sons. He has the promotion above every prince. He has the private invitation no one else received. Yet none of it is worth anything to him while one man refuses to bow. Everyone has met this person. Most of us have been him — refreshing a page to see whether one particular rival has noticed the good news, unable to enjoy a promotion because a colleague merely nodded, tasting nothing at a feast because someone at the gate has not stood up.

Mordecai, as the old flesh in transition toward salvation, sits at the gate: no longer a slave to the adversary, refusing him honor, though not yet raised to his place. That refusal is the provocation. This is exactly Satan’s situation. He holds Orthodox Christianity safely tucked in his bed, and he cannot rest while the remnant, the little flock, the budding Bride of Christ, still exists — a reality that, with current world events, could very soon become far more dynamic for the Bride today.

Rev 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.

The emptiness of self-glory is set against the word of Christ: all the honor of religious and worldly standing counts for nothing as long as one faithful, unbending witness remains. Now notice who Haman consults. Not a counsellor who will tell him the truth. Not a friend who will say that the problem is inside the man who cannot enjoy his own feast. He goes home and gathers the people who will agree with him.

1Jn 4:17 Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. 

Est 5:14 Then said Zeresh his wife and all his friends unto him, Let a gallows be made of fifty cubits high, and to morrow speak thou unto the king that Mordecai may be hanged thereon: then go thou in merrily with the king unto the banquet. And the thing pleased Haman; and he caused the gallows to be made.

Every grievance finds its Zeresh, representatively Old Israel and Babylon full of her gold and riches. It is the circle of voices that confirms the injury is as large as it feels, that your restraint was saintly, that the other party is exactly what you suspected, and that something decisive ought to be done by tomorrow. Notice the line that sells the whole plan: then go in merrily. The plan pleased him because it promised that the pain would end and the party could resume.

1Th 5:2 For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. 
1Th 5:3 For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.

Gallows — H6086 ‘ets
1. tree, wood, timber, stock, plank, stalk, stick, gallows; a. tree, trees; b. wood, pieces of wood, gallows, firewood, cedar-wood, woody flax.

Ironically, the word means highly flammable material, indicative of a person’s false doctrines consumed by fire in the Resurrection to Judgment.

Fifty — H2572 chamishshim
fifty (or five).

Fifty cubits is about seventy-five feet of timber — like the negative meaning of a “banner”, a terrible structure built tall enough to be seen from the whole city, which tells you that Haman did not want justice. He wanted an audience.

The numbers speak in the Bride’s own grammar. Three and a half years is the length of Christ’s ministry, and of ours in witness with Him, doubled to seven. The five is the number already named in this study as grace through faith, taught by chastisement. Haman’s fiery and dreadfully humiliating chastisement is hung on his own gallows, and the fifty itself is the Jubilee number for him and humanity in the Lake of Fire—a Jubilee of them returning to Christ through the Bride.

Lev 25:10 And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubile unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family.

Ultimately, the meaning of fifty cubits gives Haman, and the world he represents, liberty through Christ’s chastising fiery word. The timber he cut for a hanging is the timber of his release.

Est 7:10 So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then was the king’s wrath pacified.

Haman, in representing Orthodox Christianity and the world of humanity awaiting salvation, is brought by the gallows into pure judgment and the destruction of self — the only way humanity, the Bride’s and her Husband’s children, pass through death into redemption. After the One-Thousand Year Reign, under the rod of iron, upon Satan’s release for a little season, they are figuratively hung on the gallows they were given to build for themselves, figuratively executed on the same day the plot against God’s people was exposed to the king by Queen Esther — the Bride of Christ. Esther enters the wedding feast with King Ahasuerus, who represents Christ.

Rev 6:10 And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?
Rev 6:11 And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellowservants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.

The Banner Over Her

The banner raised over her at the wedding banquet, expressing her Lord and Husband’s love, is graphically complemented by the psalm of the royal wedding. That banner, as its root vividly says, is her conspicuously glorious crown.

Psa 45:8 All thy garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia, out of the ivory palaces, whereby they have made thee glad.
Psa 45:9 Kings’ daughters were among thy honourable women: upon thy right hand did stand the queen in gold of Ophir [Hag 2:8 The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the LORD of hosts.]
Psa 45:10 Hearken, O daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear; forget also thine own people, and thy father’s house;
Psa 45:11 So shall the king greatly desire thy beauty: for he is thy Lord; and worship thou him.
Psa 45:12 And the daughter of Tyre [Babylonian Christianity] shall be there with a gift; even the rich among the people shall intreat thy favour.
Psa 45:13 The king’s daughter is all glorious within: her clothing is of wrought gold.
Psa 45:14 She shall be brought unto the king in raiment of needlework: the virgins her companions [Solomon’s harem, the Orthodoxy] that follow her shall be brought unto thee [At the Resurrection to Judgment].
Psa 45:15  With [eventual] gladness and rejoicing shall they be brought: they shall enter into the king’s palace.
Psa 45:16 Instead of thy fathers shall be thy children, whom thou mayest make princes in all the earth.
Psa 45:17 I will make thy name to be remembered in all generations: therefore shall the people praise thee for ever and ever.

Psa 35:18 I will give thee thanks in the great congregation: I will praise thee among much people […as will the “much people” in the Great White Throne Judgment praise Her]

Read the order of the psalm, and you have read the order of redemption. She is brought in glory; then her companions are brought after her; then the daughter of Tyre arrives with a gift; then gladness fills the palace. Esther, coming in royal dignity, honour, and respect for the King, is not destroyed for her normally fatal impudence in approaching the throne uninvited. Her immense respect for the crown moves the King to admire her righteous courage and answer quickly.

Rev 3:11 Behold, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.

Closing: The Gallows in Your Garage

We are all in our time and order, a Mordecai. You intimately know his name before you finish reading this sentence, which is the first piece of evidence.

Also, and as a Haman, you may think that the Mordecai within has wronged you in a way that deserves the word. He may have done nothing but fail to figuratively stand up when you passed. This study isn’t asking about the size of the offence; it’s about the size of the structure. Measure what you have built. A ledger in your head has dates of offences. You rehearse conversations in the car, in the shower, at three in the morning, where you are eloquent and he is silent. There is a Zeresh—one person, perhaps two—with whom you share the latest instalment, and you have noticed you share it only with those who will agree. A fifty-cubit timber is rising in the yard of your mind, tall enough to be seen from far away, because some part of you does not want the matter resolved. It wants an audience—even, God forbid, revenge.

Name what it reveals, without euphemism. Your satisfaction is hostage to one person’s posture. You cannot taste the feast the King prepared for you because a man at the gate did not bow. This is not justice. It represents the Haman within you, donning the attire of a wounded individual at the hands of God.

Name what it destroys. It destroys your table, first: the home, the work, the worship you cannot enjoy while the ledger runs. It harms the one you are building the gallows for, and every witness who learns to flinch around your name. It is making a man of you, plank by plank, who will one day be carried up the very structure he cut.

Ask it while it is still today, before the habit of defence assembles and sears: who is the one person whose failure to honour you has quietly taken the taste out of everything you were given, and what exactly have you built for them?

Now the other road, the one Esther walked and the one open to you today. Do not execute the matter. Stage it in the King’s presence. Lay the whole file before Christ in plain words — the injury, the ledger, the rehearsals, the timber — and leave the verdict where it belongs. Stop recruiting. Tell your Zeresh you will not bring them the next installment. If you owe an apology for the part you played, deliver it before the sun goes down, in a form that costs you something (pride?). When the ledger reasserts itself, pray one sentence for the man by name, and mean at least the first word of it.

A grievance you refuse to place before the King does not go away. You carry it up the steps yourself, and you are the one the timber was cut to hold.

End of Part 13a

Part 13b continues: Son 2:5 — the lovesick Bride and the sick man Amnon.