Song of Songs/Acts/1 Kings

Song of Songs
Song of Songs has a long and storied history of interpretation. It is on the surface a story of romantic love. It is also seen as an allegory of love in at least three different ways: God and Israel; God and the church; God and the human soul.

Of course all four of these layers can be seen in this work, whose words resonate through history.

Acts 5-7
5: All is not well in the church. First Ananias and Sapphira lie about their finances. It would have been one thing to set some money aside; it is another thing to lie about it.

6-7: The communal living in the early church was not working out as planned. While we get a rosy view of things earlier, we find out now it is not working out so well, and the first deacons are assigned to make sure everyone who is hungry is taken care of. We also read of the first martyr, Stephen, who was a deacon.

1 Ki 5-7
Solomon builds the temple. The cultic worship space of the people had been the tabernacle, a mobile tent shrine. In fulfillment of God's promise to David in 2 Samuel 7, his son Solomon, now builds the temple.

This is another "blue-prints in prose" section, so don't get bogged down in the details.