Song of Solomon 5:6

She must learn more about herself yet. Whatever she was in His eyes, He was not everything to her. It will be the same for the godly Jewish remnant in a coming day. The fullest assurance of the Saviour's love tends to make our hearts careless. When we know we are precious to Him — if we know Him at all — we are earnest and persistent. But once His matchless grace has come fully out to us, how easily the flesh creeps in and takes advantage of it, as if it were a matter of course! … She gave way to laziness and to her circumstances. She truly loved Him, yet she made difficulties and slighted His love. Then she found, to her shame and sorrow, that He had withdrawn Himself — was gone!

"My soul failed me when He spoke." She could hear Him, but could not see Him, and her heart fainted within her. She had slighted Him in an evil hour, and, being still on the ground of righteousness, He had withdrawn Himself and was gone. But He did not love her any less for doing this. And if she felt the hiding of His face keenly, He felt it infinitely more.

The bride is thoroughly aroused. "I rose up," "I opened to my beloved," "I sought him," "I called him," is the language of her heart. Every expression proclaims the renewed energy of her affections. But for the moment it is all in vain. He was gone, and He gave her no answer. The Beloved was the seeker at first. He found no response from the bride, so His love takes another way. That way turns the bride into the seeker — and now it is she who finds no response from the Bridegroom. Had the love of the Bridegroom changed, then? Had He given up His bride? No — it was not the love, but the way of expressing the love, that had changed.

Had her Beloved renounced His love, then? Far from it. He was only teaching her a needed lesson, and seeking the restoration of her soul by calling out the energies and desires of her heart. In this way He was exposing her true state to her own eyes, and making her learn as well that restoration is only possible through discipline. The enjoyment of the presence of Christ may be lost in a moment; it may often take days to recover it. Forgiveness, on confession of sin, is immediate; but the restoration of communion can only be gradual, and a work of time.

Love deals in the same way with the "slow hearts" of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. They wandered, but the Lord followed. He dealt with their affections in restoring grace, and turned their "slow hearts" into "burning hearts." Then, having awakened their affections, He "vanished out of their sight." The One who sought them withdrew from them. In doing so He left behind Him two seekers after Him instead of two wanderers from Him.

Many people think that Christ sometimes withdraws Himself, or hides His face, from Christians to test and prove them. The epistles give no ground for that idea. With the Jew under law, of course, everything was different. God dwelt in thick darkness. The way into the holiest place of all was not yet open. The perfect sacrifice had not been offered, and nothing had yet perfectly purged the Jew's conscience, so he could not have full peace. But with Christians the position is entirely changed.