Intimacy is opening up who I really am to another person. We need to be known, to have that deep connection with someone. Yet intimacy is harder to come by. We are lonely because we don’t have intimacy with someone. We turn the radio and TV up to hear voices of people. We work hard to gain success hoping someone will know and appreciate the good things in our selves. But what about the whole of our selves? Who will know and love the real me? Who can I tell about the things I really struggle with?

The Song of Songs, deals with intimacy between a husband and wife. Our text concerns the heart to heart intimacy that is deeper than (and should be foundational to) sexual relations. V. 6: Place me as a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy (or passion) unyielding as the grave. The reference is to an ancient Egyptian custom of burying the dead. They believed the keepers of the afterlife would weigh your heart to see if there were enough good deeds in it. If so, you went to "heaven." A gold ornament was often placed on the arm or over the heart, hoping its weight would attach to the heart and tip the scales.

The Bible does not condone the practice, but the imagery is striking. She says, "Bind me to your heart. My soul will add the weight your soul needs." What is intimacy if not to have your soul bound to the soul of another? Isn’t this the type of love we are looking for? Where does it come from?

True intimacy starts in shared ideals that are greater than either person and that each act on. One of our problems is we want to base intimacy on ourselves. We think, "as long as I can find someone who is as crazy about me as I am crazy about me, then we are all set." It isn’t going to work. We were created for something bigger than ourselves: the glory of God.

One of the most intimate relationships in the Bible is not romantic at all. It was between 2 warriors who shared a common passion for the glory and people of God: Jonathan and David. Jonathan (see 1 Samuel 14) put his life on the line to help deliver God’s people. The odds were stacked against him, but he knew that God could deliver with few as well as many. He climbed a cliff and took out a garrison of more than 20 men. God delivered the people through his actions.

David (see 1 Samuel 17) put his life on the line to take on the giant Goliath. His odds at defeating the great warrior were worse than Jonathan’s had been. But the Lord delivered the people through his actions. Jonathan’s reaction to David’s victory was to give him his royal robe and receive him as a brother. The scripture says that Jonathan loved David as himself. Why not? They were men who laid their lives on the line expecting God to deliver the people through them.

Real intimacy is based on deep trust. We see this with David and Jonathan as well. David trusted Jonathan with his life when King Saul tried to kill him. Trust is the key to intimacy. You don’t open up to someone you don’t trust. If you think they will spread your dark secrets and fears, you won’t tell them. Having been burned a number of times, trust comes harder to us. Who can you trust? What can you trust them with? One of our real fears of intimacy is we lack trust in one another. And how trustworthy are we?

Intimacy is reached when we have real love that is based on something outside ourselves. This is borne out in the lives of David and Jonathan. They were passionate for the glory of God. Our catechism teaches that our chief end is the glory of God. Is there anything better to build an intimate relationship on? Once we know the glory of God revealed in Christ, we will not know anything greater.

God made us to need close human relationships. But human relationships can’t fully fill our need for intimacy. They are not perfect and will not last. Real intimacy flows out of God himself. There is intimate love in God among the Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Before anything was created, God knew intimate love. God created us to know it too.

Our search for intimacy does not begin or end in a romantic relationship. It does not even begin or end in a mother-child relationship, deep as that is. Our search for intimacy begins and ends in God’s love for us in Christ. Only Christ attached to our soul gives us the weight we need for glory. We can be open with God completely because he knows us already. He loves us in spite of our sin. Jesus died for us while we were still sinners. When we know God’s unconditional love for us, we can open up to God. Here is the root of our ability to build any intimate relationship. As we pray with others, our relationship with them will grow more intimate. And with a common passion for the glory of God, will we not be more able to trust each other enough to have those relationships deepen?