The Bride’s Garden has been filling out with blossoming shrubs, budding fruits, fragrant flower spires, and now blooming pomegranates bring passion and vivid boldness into view. While pomegranates are conspicuous fruits, distinct with their showcase of tart seeds tucked behind thick, leathery rinds, those fruits begin as vibrant, vermillion flowers in springtime, punctuating sprays of branches from multi-trunked trees. And this is where we have found our bride and Bridegroom, adventuring to see if the pomegranates are in bloom:
Let’s go early to the vineyards; let’s see if the vine has budded, if the blossom has opened, if the pomegranates are in bloom. There I will give you my love. Song of Songs 7:12 HCSB
Blooming pomegranates inspire the lovers’ devotion to each other, making the tree a prominent must-have in The Bride’s Garden. Such a token of rapture turns a garden into a love-struck refuge—bursting vitality into a special meeting place for two engaged hearts.
In fact, King Solomon considered these plants such signposts of God’s abundant love that he had two pillars forged to stand in the portico of the temple, the holy place of meeting the Lord, decorated in pomegranates.
Likewise he made pomegranates in two rows around the one latticework to cover the capital that was on the top of the pillar, and he did the same with the other capital. 1 Kings 7:18 ESV
The two pillars established exalting praise to the Lord’s strength. How do we know that? Because the king nicknamed the pillars Jakin (meaning “he establishes”) and “Boaz” (meaning “in strength”). See the congruence as pomegranates are part of the Bridegroom’s description of his beloved’s confident countenance:
What a pleasure you bring to me! I see your blushing cheeks opened like the halves of a pomegranate, showing through your veil of tender meekness. When I look at you, I see your inner strength, so stately and strong. Song of Songs 4:3-4 TPT
But back to their blooming.
Blooming Pomegranates
Flowers appear in clusters, first as big, red teardrops, then opening their ruffly petals to bell-shaped blossoms with rose-like, tufted, golden anthers in the center. The tree will continue to flower through the summer, even as fruits are forming. Though blooming pomegranates are not strongly scented, the lover envisioned them among the most intense fragrances and luxurious spices traded in his day.
My sweetheart, my bride, is a secret garden, a walled garden, a private spring; there the plants flourish. They grow like an orchard of pomegranate trees and bear the finest fruits. There is no lack of henna and nard, of saffron, calamus, and cinnamon, or incense of every kind. Myrrh and aloes grow there with all the most fragrant perfumes. Song of Songs 4:12-14 GNT
The lover spoke these Words for his bride, yet also pictured for us is the inherent profusion of God’s love for us, His bride: first by evoking the vibrant multitude of seeds under the pomegranate skin-covering, then by imagining this abundance within the greater host of heavenly scents and lavish spices. Take in His loving-kindness encircling you, upholding and crowning you in His vivid, plentiful glory. O glory! Our response to this gush of luscious fruit? Exalting praise and wonderful worship.
The Lord gives me strength and makes me sing; he has saved me. He is my God, and I will praise him. He is the God of my ancestors, and I will honor him. Exodus 15:2 NCV
But You, O Lord, are a covering around me, my shining-greatness, and the One Who lifts my head. Psalm 3:3 NLV
Be exalted, O Lord, in your strength! We will sing and praise your power. Psalm 21:13 ESV
But I know the loving God will redeem my soul, raising me up from the dark power of death, taking me as his bridal partner. Psalm 49:15 TPT
You’ll be called Hephzibah (My Delight), and your land Beulah (Married), Because God delights in you and your land will be like a wedding celebration. For as a young man marries his virgin bride, so your builder marries you, And as a bridegroom is happy in his bride, so your God is happy with you. Isaiah 62:5 The Message
Arise, O Lord, and enter your resting place, both you and the ark of your glorious strength! May your priests wear the robes of righteousness, and let all your godly lovers sing for joy! Psalm 132:8-9 TPT
Pomegranates Detail
Look at that – “robes of righteousness (Psalm 132:9)” bring us around to my favorite pomegranates detail in Scripture. God called for pomegranates to embellish the hems of the priests’ robes, alternating with golden bells to encircle their feet.
They made pomegranates of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen around the hem of the robe. And they made bells of pure gold and attached them around the hem between the pomegranates. The bells and pomegranates alternated around the hem of the robe to be worn for ministering, as the Lord commanded Moses. Exodus 39:24-26 NIV
This detail stirs my gardener’s heart, because blooming pomegranates are shaped like little bells adorning the tree canopy, and pomegranate trees turn gloriously golden in the late fall after fruits are harvested. The golden bells to be embroidered on the hems circle back around to the horticulture, how fun! There seems to be no end of showy color to these trees, reflecting God’s unending, cascading abundance.
Planting Pomegranates
Pomegranates, Punica granatum, are cold hardy to zone 7b, sort of; sadly, when our zone 8 garden plunged to -1⁰ during our “snowmeggedon” of 2021, we lost our tree. On the other hand, I recently visited Dumbarton Oaks in Washington, D.C., and spied a pomegranate tree full of dried winter fruit in this zone 7b garden. Between that garden visit and this season’s deep dig into Song of Songs, I am inspired to replant!
‘Al-sirin-nar’, ‘Salavatski’, ‘Surh Anor’ are a few cold hardy varieties, check out this complete list of pomegranates at www.cultivar.guide/pomegranate
A dwarf variety, Punica granatum var. nana, is available if your colder climate garden requires you to keep pomegranates in a pot. They produce many blooms and diminutive fruits, perhaps too small for eating but beautiful as they dangle on the shrubs. The dwarfs can also be planted to grow as a unique, colorful hedge.
Northerners, you could use poetic license to plant pomegranate-colored plants in your Bride’s Garden, like the Cool Glow® Pomegranate Nandina from First Editions. These leafy, easy-to-grow shrubs fill the garden with valiant red color throughout the late fall and winter, cold hardy to zone 6.
Find more planting information on pomegranate in the Garden in Delight Plant Guide
More Praises
Let’s finish up with a few more praises resounding the stature and vibrancy of blooming pomegranates.
If you plant the good seeds of Spirit-life you will reap beautiful fruits that grow from the everlasting life of the Spirit. And don’t allow yourselves to be weary in planting good seeds, for the season of reaping the wonderful harvest you’ve planted is coming! Galatians 6:8-9 TPT
The way he leads me is divine. His leadership—so pure and dignified as he wears his crown of gold. Song of Songs 5:11 TPT
The sound of joyful shouting and salvation is in the tents of the righteous; the right hand of the Lord performs valiantly. The right hand of the Lord is exalted; The right hand of the Lord performs valiantly. Psalm 118:15-16 NASB
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 1 Peter 2:9 NIV
Closing Prayer
O Lord, thank you for the blessings You put in our lives, including the tufts of Your personality and metaphor we can see in so many plants. Blooming pomegranates bring a punch of color and attune me to Your strength and vitality, qualities You will grow in me. And the abundance of Your love—thank you for encircling me, dearest God! Let me envision the pomegranate portico and imagine coming into Your Presence to meet You and enjoy Your company. Fill our relationship with vivid love and juicy goodness. I am so happy to be Your bride, even if it is still a bit of a mystery to me. Thank you for cultivating a longing for You in my heart. You are wonderful! Amen.
But your forgiving love is what makes you so wonderful. No wonder you are loved and worshiped! This is why I wait upon you, expecting your breakthrough, for your Word brings me hope. I long for you more than any watchman would long for the morning light. Psalm 130:4-6 TPT
The Bride’s Garden is a 7-week series for the Lenten Season, focusing our thoughts and meditations on God’s Words of garden matrimony. Especially, the Scriptures swooning with flowering, fruiting plants contained in Song of Songs. While God hints throughout the Bible of His Bridegroom-like devotion to His people, He goes all-out with lavish botanicals in King Solomon’s bridal songbook, describing scents and fruits and enthralling garden views, giving us things to have and to hold as we cultivate a deeper longing for Him.
Naturally, Song of Songs has been a joy to dig into for years in the Devotions Blog at Garden in Delight, with a wide range of enticing plants to spice up a Biblical Garden. Refer to these articles for additional ideas for your Bride’s Garden: Verdant (maidenhair fern, Songs 1:16); A Father’s Tree, The Lollipop® Crabapple Story (Songs 2:3); Strengthen Me with Raisins, Refresh Me with Apples (Songs 2:5); Under your Own Vine and Fig Tree (Songs 2:13); Cultivating Calamus (Songs 4:14); God’s Focus in Saffron Crocus (Songs 4:14); Eaglewood in God’s Word (aloes, Songs 4:14); Pistachio Cookies or A Lenten Look at Trees: Almond (nut trees, Songs 6:11); Blue Wheat (Songs 7:2); Fresh Kale & Date Salad (Songs 7:8). Additionally, Song of Songs includes 5 of the 7 Species, read more at The 7 Species: A Garden-to-Table Guide
Do you love connecting God’s Word to your gardening work and the trees and plants around you? You will love my new book, My Father is the Gardener, Devotions in Botany and Gardening of the Bible, order at this link.
Read more devotions on the Song of Songs gardens in God’s Word for Gardeners Bible in the Garden Tour section on En Gedi, beginning on page a-16; find pomegranates in devotions on Bearing Fruit beginning on page a-34
Find each year’s Lent series from the Devotions Blog on a new webpage called Series of 7 Studies. They are 7-part, successive devotions focused on garden topics in God’s Word to dig into at any time
Photo Credits: Many thanks to Bailey Nursery and First Editions Shrubs & Trees for permission to include their photo of Cool Glow® Pomegranate Nandina, and for being a great host last summer to GardenComm in Minneapolis! All other photos ©Shelley S. Cramm
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