Amen, so of course Judges chapter 14 got the real famous, well-known story about the Judge Samson, someone we're probably all familiar with.
And make no mistake about it, Samson was a mighty man of God, he was a judge of God, he was used by God greatly.
And you know, he has a lot of flaws that we see in these stories about him in chapters 14 and 15 and 16 as well.
But I really believe the reason is because all men of God at the end of the day aren't just men.
That they all have flaws and shortcomings, and that's one thing we can definitely learn about him.
But I don't think we should ever write off a guy like Samson as somebody who just made a mess of his life.
Of course his life ended very poorly, but there were a lot of great things that he did as well.
In fact, I think there was a lot of things that go unrecorded for those 20 years that he judged, as it says there at the end of chapter 15.
That he probably was doing the right thing for a few decades perhaps.
And he was a great man of God, and really I just wanted to read Judges 14 this morning to kind of get the back story.
We're going to spend most of our time in Judges 15 and kind of focus in on a few things here.
But we kind of see the story here in Judges 14 about how Samson desires to go and marry a Philistine girl and he ends up marrying her.
And then of course there's a story about the riddle and him eating from the lion, and they solve his riddle.
And some real dysfunction there at the end where, you know, he rebukes them for having used his wife to find the answer to the riddle.
And he ends up, of course, going back to his father's house.
He goes down and he kills these other men and gives the change of raiment because he made a bet he couldn't, you know, was able to pay himself.
So he had to go get somebody else's stuff and pay that wager that he had made.
And he ends up going back to his father's house. So we see it's not really an ideal situation that Samson got himself involved in.
And that's kind of the back story. That's where we're at when we pick up the story here in chapter 15 verse 1 where the Bible reads,
But it came to pass within a while after, in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his wife with a kid.
And he said, I will go into my wife into the chamber, but her father would not suffer him to go in.
And her father said, I thought, I verily thought that thou hast utterly hated her, therefore I gave her to thy companion.
Is not her younger sister fairer than she? Take her, I pray thee, instead of her.
And Samson said concerning them, Now I shall be more blameless in the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure.
So again this dysfunction just continues on here in chapter 15 where he comes back and decides, you know,
I've had enough just hiding out and pouting or whatever he was doing up there at dad's house.
And decides to go back and visit his wife and finds out that they just assumed that he didn't want anything to do with her.
When he just kind of left abruptly and says there had been a while, within a while after,
that he decided to come back there thinking, okay well I guess Samson doesn't want anything to do with her.
And they gave him to this one that he had used as his friend, his companion.
And they offer him the younger daughter. Of course he's not pleased with that and rightfully so.
I don't think anyone was really doing the right thing in this situation.
But notice what Samson, how he retaliates here, it says,
Samson went and caught 300 foxes and took firebrands and turned tail to tail and put a firebrand in the midst between the two tails.
And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines
and burnt up both the shocks and also the standing corn with the vineyards and the olives.
So out of all of the mighty acts that we see Samson do, I really think that this one really particularly impresses me.
I mean out of his life we see him do many great battles.
We see later in his life where he takes the gates of the city and carries them up on a hill.
He slays men left and right. But he goes out and he catches these foxes.
He catches 300 of them. That's quite the feat.
Now I don't know if he used a snare or a trap, but I always tend to think that he just went and pounced on these animals and found them.
He found 300 of them. Now a fox is a very elusive animal.
When we think about it, they're normally nocturnal. It's very rare that you'd even see one during the day.
So Samson's probably out there in the night catching these animals bare-handed and not just a few. He catches 300 of them.
To me that's just amazing. Out of all the things that Samson did, that's probably the most impressive thing that I see him do.
He turns them tail to tail and he ties that firebrand in between them and he lets them go in the corn with that firebrand on fire and burns down their crops.
And of course he's retaliating.
There's a lot of lessons we can learn from the life of Samson about how we ought to behave and how far we should take things, when it's right to retaliate, when it's not.
That's not really what I want to focus in on this morning. Again, there's just so many things in the life of Samson that we can learn from.
What I want us to know here is that Samson is accustomed to doing these great feats with his bare hands.
He's used to going out and catching these foxes. He's used to going out and beating up men.
If you recall back there in Judges chapter 14 verse 5, the Bible says that when Samson down and his father and mother,
it says there that he went to Timnath and came to the vineyards of Timnath and behold a young lion roared against him.
And what's he doing? It says in verse 6, and the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him and he rent him as he would have rent a kid.
Of course it's not talking about a child. It's talking about a little baby lamb.
So I know we use that word kid a little differently today. I don't want you to get the wrong idea.
He was picking on this lion as if it was just a little lamb. He tears this thing and he rents it.
What's that mean? He tears this lion, this young lion, and he had nothing in his hand.
Now it's important to notice that as we get into the sermon that the Bible makes a point of telling us here
that when the spirit of the Lord came upon Samson at this time that there was nothing in his hand.
He didn't have anything in his hand. The Bible makes a clear point of telling us that.
That he did this barehanded by the strength of the spirit of the Lord. That he was able to do this. To tear this lion in half.
Now that's pretty impressive. Sometimes I try to imagine how he did that. Did he grab it by the jaw and just rip it?
Or was it the legs? Or did he grab a tail in the head? I don't know.
But it says that he rent this thing as he would have a kid and he did it with nothing in his hand.
So we see that Samson is very accustomed to doing these acts barehanded.
Fighting men barehanded. Tearing a lion barehanded. Going out catching these foxes barehanded.
Tying them together and letting them go. He's really able to do it through the spirit of the Lord.
That's what gave him his ability. It says there in Judges chapter 14, look at verse 19.
And the spirit of the Lord came upon him and he went down to Ashkelon and slew thirty men of them
and took their spoil and gave the change of garments unto them which expounded the riddle.
Now again it doesn't mention anything about him having anything in his hand.
It doesn't say that he took a weapon, that he took a staff, that he took a spear, that he took a bow and arrow,
that he had a sword, that it makes no mention of any kind of a weapon in his hand.
And I think that he actually went down there and he did this, perhaps barehanded.
You look there in verse 6 of chapter 15, the Bible says,
Then the Philistines said, Who hath done this? Of course referring to who is it that has burnt up our crops?
And they answered, Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because he had taken his wife and given her to his companion,
and the Philistines came up and burnt her and her father with fire.
Now I don't think Samson was probably counting on that being retaliation.
He was probably thinking he could just get away with it and he could just set this field on fire and they'd be upsetting him.
But what we learned, just kind of a side note from this, is that oftentimes when we retaliate
and the people that we've retaliated retaliate against us, they might do it in ways we don't expect.
They might attack us in a way, in a non-direct way.
They might try to hurt those around us. And again, that's a hold on their sermons.
So many lessons we can learn from Samson.
And Samson said unto them, Though ye have done this, yet will I be avenged to you?
And of you, and after that I will cease.
And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter, and went down and dwelt in the top of rock Getham.
Now when Samson smote them there, again, notice, no mention of a weapon.
No mention of a sword or a spear or a staff. Nothing like that.
Not to say that there wasn't one, but I tend to think that he didn't have anything in his hand.
Just because of what he was able to do with the lion, the Bible is explicitly telling us there was nothing in his hand.
And later in the story we see that when he does use a weapon, the Bible is very explicit to tell us that.
And he smites them hip and thigh.
Now what does that mean when it's their hip and thigh?
Well I believe it's because they're standing close together.
Like we would say today that somebody's rubbing shoulders with someone.
You know, they stood shoulder to shoulder, right?
Well they stood hip and thigh together.
That's how close these men were, they were in a formation.
I don't think it means that literally he went and smote their hips and their thighs, right?
And he went and smote them as a formation.
They were close together.
It was a 30 on 1 type of situation.
It wasn't 30 men progressively.
It was all at once these men came upon him.
And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter and he went down and dwelt in the top of the rock Eton.
Now why was it that Samson was able to do all these money acts?
Why was it that Samson was able to just tear a lion as he would a kid?
Why was it he was able to catch 300 foxes and set them on fire?
Why was it he was able to go and smite 30 men standing shoulder to shoulder,
standing hip and thigh together all at once with a great slaughter?
Well it's because, explicitly because of the fact that Samson was a Nazarite.
He had taken the vow of the Nazarene from the womb.
This vow of the Nazarite was upon him.
If you would turn to Judges chapter 13 we'll look at this.
Because it's important to understand where Samson's strength came from.
And in fact the source of Samson's strength is a lesson that he himself had to be reminded of.
And that's kind of where we're going with this sermon this morning.
Is that we often have to be reminded who is our true source of strength.
And it's always the Lord.
And the true source of Samson's strength was the Lord.
And part of that came from the fact that he was a Nazarite.
Look there in Judges chapter 13 verse 1.
And the children of Israel did evil against the sight of the Lord.
And the Lord delivered them in the hand of the Philistines forty years.
And there was a certain man of Zorah of the family of Danites whose name was Winoa.
And his wife was Baron and Baronot.
And the angel of the Lord appeared on the woman and said unto her,
Behold now thou art barren and barest not, but thou shalt conceive and bear a son.
Now therefore beware I pray, they drink not wine nor strong drink,
and eat not any unclean thing, for lo thou shalt conceive and bear a son,
and no razor shall come on his head.
And for the child shall be a Nazarite unto God from the womb,
and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.
So we see that he had this vow of the Nazarite upon him.
The Bible says there that he shall be a Nazarite unto God.
And if you want to keep something there in Judges, but turn back to Numbers chapter 6.
Where we see the vow of the Nazarite is explained a little bit more in depth exactly what it is.
Now many of the things are mentioned here that are part of that Nazarene vow.
But there's one thing that is not mentioned.
Of course what is mentioned is the fact that he was not to allow any rays to come upon his head,
that he was not to drink or eat certain things.
We see that here in Numbers chapter 6 verse 1.
The Bible says in Numbers chapter 6 verse 1,
And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them,
When either man or woman shall separate themselves to vow a vow of a Nazarite to separate themselves unto the Lord,
he shall separate himself from wine and strong drink.
That's what we saw the angel told Samson's mother.
And shall drink no vinegar of wine, of vinegar of strong drink,
neither shall he drink any liquor of grapes, nor eat moist grapes or dry.
So basically if it had a raisin in it or a grape in it, it was off limits to a Nazarite.
It was off limits to somebody who had taken the vow of a Nazarite.
They were not to have anything to do with grapes.
Look at verse 4,
All the days of his separation he shall eat nothing that is made of the vine tree,
from the kernels even to the husk.
All the days of the vow of his separation there shall no razor come upon his head,
until the days be fulfilled in the which he separated himself unto the Lord,
he shall be holy and shall let the locks of his head grow.
All the days that he separated himself unto the Lord,
he shall come at no dead body.
Now that's one thing we didn't see mentioned back there in the judges,
is that he was to come at no dead body.
Of course they having the law, them having the law of Moses and understanding what the vow of the Nazarite was,
would have also understood that this would have been a part of that vow.
That he was to come at no dead body.
Now notice how strict this is.
Verse 7,
He shall not make himself unclean for his father, or for his mother, or for his brother, or for his sister when they die,
because the consecration of his God is upon his head.
All the days of his separation he is holy unto the Lord.
Now that is a very strict requirement there.
I mean can you imagine if someone as close as your father, or mother, or brother, or sister,
someone in your immediate family were to pass away or to die,
and you were told you can't go to the funeral.
You can't go and look at the casket.
You can't go and pay your last respects.
But that is what is being told here, that he was not to go and come at no dead body,
whether it be his father, his mother, his sister, his brother.
All the days of his separation he was not to go.
That is more strict than the vow that the Levites had to take upon themselves.
They were at least granted to go and make themselves unclean at certain times,
for the sake of an immediate family member.
An aunt and uncle of course were off limits, this would have applied.
But they were at least allowed to go and to make themselves unclean by going near a dead body
if it was an immediate family member.
But it is even more strict for the Nazarite, for someone who would take this vow upon themselves.
So we can see that the Nazarite vow is a strict one.
These guys today, these Rastafarians and things,
want to act like they are some Nazarite just because they got some dreadlocks.
But they are going to be the first ones, they are going to be drinking some wine,
eating the raisinets, and going to the funeral.
They only want part of it.
Well this is a very strict vow, this is something that was very,
and there is a deep significance, there is a real meaning to this,
where it is likened to a picture of Christ,
and the fact that he was able to, he bore shame upon the cross,
the hair grow and so on and so forth, don't really have time to go into all that.
But he was to drink no wine, he saw that,
he was to have no razor upon his head, he was to let the locks of his hair grow,
and that he was to come at no dead body, not even for his immediate family members.
And really when we start to look at the life of Samson,
we start to see that Samson is one who has tended to push the limits here.
At certain times in his life, Samson seemed to kind of flirt with breaking these vows.
And we see him kind of just push these limits,
and in one instance of course, if you would turn back to Judges chapter 14,
we see that when it comes to this issue of not coming near,
or not having anything to do with grapes or vines,
and it grew of the vine tree, or having anything to do with the grape,
be it a raisin, or the juice, or the liqueurs, or the heart, or a strong grape.
It says there in Judges chapter 14, look at verse 5,
Then went Samson down, and his father and his mother to Tinnath,
and came to the vineyards of Tinnath, and behold, a young lion roared against him.
So where is he coming near to? He's coming near to these vineyards.
He's getting close to this vineyard.
What are you doing so close to these vineyards?
You kind of wonder, why is he even going near? Why would he go around that way?
I'm not saying he was in the midst of that vineyard,
but boy, he's getting awfully close to that vineyard.
And I almost wonder if sometimes the Lord kind of sent that lion there,
just to kind of keep him from going any further.
So we see him, of course, kind of pushing limits there,
coming down near to these vineyards.
Then of course, it says here, one of the other areas he might have pushed a little bit
was when it came to the subject of coming near the dead.
Of course, we know what happened to the lion, right?
He rents that lion as he would a kid, and he kills it.
Look at verse 7 of Judges 14,
And he went down and talked with the woman, and she pleased Samson well,
and after a time he returned to take her,
and he turned aside to see the carcass of the lion.
So he kills this thing, and he wants to go admire his handiwork once more.
He wants to go see, I don't know what it is about men,
sometimes they have this morbid obsession with seeing dead things.
He wants to go watch how rotted this thing has become, right?
And he got these guys that will go out and look for antlers
and sheds and things up in the hills,
and they were always trying to find the leftovers of some body or something.
Some moose or elk.
And he goes, and he's looking for this lion,
and behold, there was a swarm of bees and honey in the carcass of the lion.
So it wasn't near it, it wasn't around it, it wasn't in a tree next to it,
it was actually in the carcass of the lion.
And he took thereof in his hands.
Now, if you're going to get honey out of the carcass of the lion,
you're probably going to come near under that lion, aren't you?
You're probably going to reach inside there.
It says he took it with his hands.
So he's probably having to deal with this dead body.
He's coming near to something that is dead.
This is something that was not to happen in his life.
He was not to be coming near unto dead things.
And he came to his father, his mother, and he gave them, and they did eat.
But he told them not, he told not them,
that he had taken the honey out of the carcass of the lion.
He didn't want them to know what he had done.
Now, I don't care how good that honey is.
If you're pulling honey out of a dead carcass, I don't want anything to do with it.
I mean, you can find that honey somewhere else.
I mean, I'm sure this wasn't the only place that Samson could have gone to find some honey.
And I'm sure when he went there, he went to just see the carcass.
He just wanted to look at it.
You know, but when he sees that honey inside of it, he decides to go near it.
The next thing you know, he's pulling out of it.
And it's just a picture of how sin works in our life.
Sometimes we just want to go look at the sin, just see it, just see what it might be like.
Not actually do it, not actually get involved in it.
But then we notice when we look a little closer at that sin, boy, there's something sweet.
There's something to be desired about. There's pleasure in sin for the season.
And the next thing we know, we find ourselves right in the midst of that sin.
And we take that sin with us, and then we're giving it, we're spreading it to others.
And we're giving unclean things to other people.
We're even defiling those that are closest to us.
So we see that there's this kind of progression,
but we see in Samson's life where he starts to kind of push the limits a little bit.
And he starts to push the limits with these vows.
Now if you would, continuing on in our story there in Judges chapter 15.
The Bible says in verse 9,
Then the Philistines went up and pitched in Judah and spread themselves in Lehi.
So of course now they're retaliating again for what he had done.
And they're coming back at him.
And after he'd smoked 30 of them, they'd come back.
You see how things in our life, we get into this back and forth in life,
and everyone's got to one up the other one where things just escalate out of control.
So they come, and notice it says they spread themselves in Lehi.
When it says they spread themselves in the Bible, that's usually because there's a great multitude of men.
We know that for a fact, as we'll see later in the story,
there was over a thousand men that came up against them.
So when they're spreading themselves in Lehi,
I mean this isn't like an army, this is something that armies would do elsewhere in the Bible.
They would spread themselves in some valley and to go to battle.
So they're really getting serious about dealing with Samson here.
And the men of Judah said, why are you coming up against us?
And they answered, to bind Samson or we come up and to do him as he had done to us.
Again it's retaliating, just going back and forth.
Then three thousand men of Judah went up to the top of Rock Itam.
So we see that even the men of Judah are getting serious about Samson.
They know who they're dealing with, they're like, look, we're going to get this resolved.
We don't want these Philistines, we don't want our enemy spreading themselves in this valley and coming up against us.
We don't want to have to suffer for the things that Samson's done.
So they take three thousand of their own men and they go up,
and it's interesting where they find him.
They find him in the top of the Rock Itam.
He didn't just go back to his house, he didn't go back to his father's house,
he didn't go back and just hang out somewhere.
He went up into the top of a rock where it was difficult to get to.
I mean it almost seems to me like at this point that Samson kind of starts to come to his senses
and realize what it is that he's done and maybe he's even a little bit scared.
He just sees that every time he retaliates they come back even stronger.
He retaliates and he smites thirty of them with a great slaughter and he goes,
whoa, these guys are going to come after me for sure, this isn't the end of it.
So he goes up into the top of a rock and he's hiding up there.
That's what it seems to me, that's my opinion.
That he's almost hiding from these men.
It says there, they come up and in verse 11,
Then three thousand men of Judah went up to the top of Rock Itam and said to Samson,
Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us?
What is this that thou hast done unto us?
And he said unto them, As they did unto me, so have I done unto them.
And they said unto him, We are come down to bind thee,
that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines.
And Samson said unto them, Swear unto me that ye will not fall upon me yourselves.
And they spake unto him, saying, No, but we will bind thee fast,
and we will deliver thee into their hand, but surely we will not kill thee.
And they bound him with two new cords and brought him up from the rock.
And when they came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him,
and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him.
And the cords that were upon his arms break as flax that was burnt with fire,
and his bands loosed from off his hands.
So we see again, he's about to do this mighty act,
and of course we know the story, this is where he takes the new jawbone of an ass
and he smites these men, and he kills a thousand of them.
And time and time again, that phrase is used,
where it says that the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him.
We see that often in Samson's life, where the Spirit of the Lord is what's coming upon him
and giving him his strength.
You know, I don't think Samson would look like the Incredible Hulk.
I don't think he looked like some bodybuilder or some muscled-up dude.
He's probably just a very average-looking man,
and it was the Spirit of the Lord that came upon him.
That's what gave him his strength.
If we were to just look upon Samson, we'd probably say,
he's probably a man of average strength, just to look at him.
But the reality was, it was the source of his strength.
Samuel's strength was the Lord.
It was the Spirit of the Lord that came upon him.
And really, that is the same for us today,
and this is really the lesson that I want us to learn this morning from the story,
is that our strength is found in the Lord.
That if we're ever going to do a mighty work for God,
if we're ever going to accomplish anything for God in our lives,
it's going to be done in the strength of the Lord.
If we're going to live for God,
if we're going to apply the Word of God to our lives
and continue in it and not fall out,
and not to fall by the wayside,
but to continue on for an entire lifetime of serving God,
it's going to be done through his strength.
And if we begin to rely on our own strength,
we will fail. It happens.
The Bible says, you don't have to return there.
Actually, turn over to 2 Corinthians 12.
Keep something in Judges, but go to 2 Corinthians 12.
The Bible says in Zechariah,
not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, sayeth the Lord.
The only time we're ever going to accomplish anything for God,
it's not going to be by our own might.
It's not going to be by our power
that we go out and accomplish something for God.
Of course, this can require effort and strength
on our part to do things and initiative,
and it's going to take motivation and discipline
to do the things that we need to do for God.
But ultimately, to actually accomplish those things
and to be steadfast, unmovable in those things
is going to be done through the Spirit of God.
The Bible says, and you're there in 2 Corinthians 12,
the Bible says,
and lest I should be exalted above measure
through the abundance of the revelations,
there was given unto me a thorn in the flesh,
the messenger of Satan to buffet me,
lest I should be exalted above measure.
So, of course, this is the Apostle Paul talking about the fact
that he was given many revelations from God,
that he saw things in heaven that were not lawful to speak of,
that he was given many revelations from God,
and that lest he should be puffed up,
lest he should be lifted up above measure,
lest he should begin to think
that he was something more than he was
or that he was something special,
the Bible says, or Paul says,
that there was given unto him a thorn in the flesh,
a messenger of Satan to buffet him,
lest I should be exalted above measure.
For this thing I besought the Lord thrice
that it might depart from me.
Verse 9, and he said unto me,
My grace is sufficient for thee,
for my strength is made perfect in weakness.
Most gladly, therefore, will I rather glory in my firmness
that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
You know, if we want the power of Christ upon us,
we have to realize something,
that our strength is not found in ourselves,
that we are weak and that he is strong,
that if we're going to have the power of God in our lives
to be able to work effectively for God,
it's going to come through his power,
and in order to have God's power,
we have to realize that there's nothing in and of ourselves
in order to accomplish the work of God,
that we are weak and that we need God in our lives,
that we need Christ day in and day out
to help us live the Christian life.
Paul understood this so much that he says there in verse 10,
Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities.
I mean, can we honestly say that this morning?
That we take pleasure in the fact that we find ourselves
sometimes weak, discouraged, distraught,
not knowing what to do,
having to throw ourselves before the throne of God
and come boldly before his throne
and looking for grace and mercy and help and time of being.
Do we pleasure in that?
We should.
I mean, that's what Paul says.
He takes pleasure in infirmities and reproaches
and necessities and persecutions
and distresses for Christ's sake.
For when I am weak, then am I strong,
but not by his own strength,
but through the strength of Christ.
So we find ourselves in these positions in life,
these difficulties that we go through,
but we have to understand that we should take pleasure
in those things because it's at those times
that we find how strong Christ,
the Spirit of God, really is in our life
when God comes through for us.
Go ahead and turn over to 2 Corinthians 4.
You're going to 2 Corinthians 4.
The Bible says in Philippians 4,
I know both how to abase and how to abound.
Everywhere and all things I am instructed
both to be full and to be hungry,
both to abound and to suffer need.
I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me.
It's through the power of Christ
that is the source of strength that's going to help us
to abound everywhere and in all things.
You're there in 2 Corinthians 4. Look at verse 7.
The Bible says here,
We have this treasure in earthen vessels,
that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us.
The treasure that we have, Christ,
the hope of glory, the fact that we can go out
and even preach the gospel and see other souls saved,
that we can live a life that is pleasing unto God,
the fact that we can accomplish works for God in this life,
that is something that is given to us.
That treasure is given to us in an earthen vessel,
in a weak body, a body of flesh,
that has weaknesses, that has failures,
that has shortcomings, and it's that way on purpose.
There's a reason why God, when you got saved,
didn't just remake the flesh as well.
And so that the excellency of the power
may be of God and not of us,
that no flesh should glory in His presence.
That is the source of our strength this morning,
just as it was the source of Samson's strength,
and it is found in Christ.
Now if you would go back to Judges chapter 15 where we were.
But sometimes we understand,
and sometimes I think we really need to be reminded of this,
because the tendency is that we forget this.
The tendency is that we start to do things in our own strength.
The tendency is we start to do things in our own wisdom
and our own ability and our own intellect, perhaps.
Just the things that we think that we can do on our own
that we stop relying on Christ as we should.
And that's what I think happens here
with Samson at this point in his life.
He's of course done many mighty acts with his bare hands.
The Spirit of the Lord has come upon him.
He's rent a kitty with his bare hands.
He's smote thirty men with his bare hands.
He caught those foxes.
It appears with his bare hands he's done all these things.
Through the Spirit of God.
We find here in verse 15,
and he found a new jawbone of an ass.
When they finally catches up to him,
they have to go up to the rock and pull him down from where he's hiding
and say it's time to face up to the consequences.
It's time to go ahead and face your enemy.
Maybe Samson got a little bit scared,
even though the Spirit of the Lord had just come upon him
and those new cords that they had tied him with
were his flax and his hands and they just fell off.
He was able to break them asunder like they were nothing.
Like it was just some burnt piece of rope.
And even amidst of all that,
when he's facing a great and mighty foe,
the biggest battle he's ever fought.
I mean they're spread in the valley.
They're spread.
They're spread out.
The Philistines are there in abundance.
And he's facing them.
He's face to face and says,
and he found a new jawbone of an ass
and put forth his hand and took it
and slew a thousand men there with,
yes, he did that in the power of the Lord, but the Lord still used him.
But I would dare say,
and I've thought about this for many years.
This is something I've gone back and forth with.
There's a lot of guys I've talked to about this.
Was it right for him to pick up that jawbone?
I believe that is a violation of his Nazarite vow.
I believe that when he picked that up,
because he's coming at him, it's a dead thing.
And it's not just some Nazarite people say,
well, he came at a jawbone, he picked up the jawbone,
but it's probably just the bone.
It's not a big deal.
It's just a cardinal.
It's not necessarily a carcass.
But it says there it was a new jawbone.
It was new, meaning it was fresh.
I mean, I don't know where the rest of the animal was.
It might have been right there.
Maybe it got picked apart by scavengers
and they were spread out all over wherever he was,
and he finds that new jawbone.
It probably might even still had some flesh on it
from the animal.
It probably might even still had some teeth in it
from the animal.
This was a new jawbone.
This is not something he should have been handling.
This is an unclean thing, just as that carcass of that lion was.
And he picks that up,
and he goes and he puts forth his hands
and he takes it and he slew a thousand men.
There it was.
It was done with the bone of a dead animal.
The new jawbone.
The fresh jawbone.
And I think maybe it was because
Samson had a moment of weakness.
That Samson might have felt overwhelmed
despite knowing that the Lord was with him.
I mean, there was no doubt
that he knew the Spirit of the Lord was upon him.
But why would he need to even pick up that jawbone
if the Spirit of the Lord...
He'd done all these other mighty acts
without anything in his hand.
Well, I think it's because it shows us that
even as Samson, a man as mighty as Samson,
can still have doubts.
I mean, think about John the Baptist,
the man who baptized Jesus Christ,
the man who prepared the way for the coming of the Lord
and preached and said,
This is he of whom I spake.
Behold, the Lamb of God had no doubt
who Jesus Christ was,
saw Jesus baptized and heavens opened
and the voice from heaven saying,
This is my beloved Son.
That same man in a moment of weakness
when he was in jail doubted,
saying, Art thou here?
Or look we for another.
So we can see that even mighty men of God
like John the Baptist,
a mighty man of God like Samson,
even in the midst of being used by God mightily,
can have a moment of doubt,
can have a moment of weakness,
and can feel overwhelmed, perhaps,
and can forget or maybe doubt
the promises that God has given us.
The Bible says in Hebrews 13,
Let your conversation be without covetousness.
Don't desire things you don't need.
Don't desire things you can't have.
Don't desire things that God hasn't given to you.
Don't be covetousness.
Be content with such things as you have.
That's what I want to tell Samson here.
You don't need that job alone.
You don't need to pick that up.
You've got the Spirit of God.
Be content.
God will help you.
He says, Be content at such things as you have,
for He has said,
I will never leave thee nor forsake thee,
so that we may boldly say,
The Lord is my helper
and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.
I mean, that's really what Samson could have done.
He could have just left that job alone right where it is
and say, I will not fear what man can do unto me.
The Lord is my helper.
And he probably could have accomplished
just as much, in fact, I know he could have,
through the Spirit of God without that job alone.
See, that job alone represents something.
It's not just in there accidentally.
He didn't need that job alone.
He had the Spirit of God upon him.
I mean, the same guy who could pick up the skates
of a city and carry it up a hill.
The guy could tear a lion right in half
with his bare hands.
And this guy was a mighty man of God.
He didn't need that job alone,
but he had that moment of doubt, I believe,
and he picked it up.
And you know, we can fall victim to the same thing.
We can end up mistaking God's strength for our own,
thinking that God's strength is not enough.
You know, maybe God carries us through seasons
where everything's going great
and we don't even realize we're really relying
on the strength of God.
It's him that's working on behalf all this time.
And then we come up against a real difficult situation
in our lives, and we start to rely a little bit
too much on our own strength.
And really, what ends up happening when that happens,
the danger of it, is that when God carries us
through that, when God goes ahead and uses us
and follows through for us, in spite of ourselves,
in spite of our own shortcomings,
in spite of our own doubts,
is that we end up giving,
we don't give God the glory that we should.
Because we think, well, my strength was involved.
And that's exactly what we see happening here with Samson.
Look there in verse 16, and Samson said,
With the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps,
with the jawbone of an ass, have I slain a thousand men.
Where's the glory to God?
There was a spirit of God that came upon you, Samson.
Hold up here, buddy.
How come no mention of the Lord?
How come no mention of what God,
God coming upon you and helping you,
and delivering you from the hand of the enemy,
slaying thousands of these men?
And he says, no, I did it.
I did it with the jawbone of an ass.
I have slain a thousand men.
Now, it's true Samson did slay him.
But it wasn't because he had a jawbone of an ass in his hand.
It was because the spirit of God came mightily upon him.
And when we get in these times in our life,
we're relying just a little too much on our own strength.
When we're doubting God's ability to see us through a difficult situation
while too much, God's not going to let us get away with it.
He's going to draw our attention to it.
And he's going to do it out of mercy and love
and help us to not make that same mistake again.
And, you know, it's the same way in our lives today.
We should understand that God is the one that is our strength.
He is the source of our strength.
He is the one that's going to carry us through.
And sometimes we look around and we see those that we're serving alongside of
and we look at ourselves in the mirror and we say,
who are we? Who am I that, you know,
who is my house that the Lord has brought me here to?
That he has brought me thus far.
Who am I, Lord, that you would use me?
But that's exactly the person God wants to use.
That's exactly what God wants to use.
The weak, the foolish, the base,
the things that the world will look at and say it's a nobody.
That's who God wants to use.
Because then God gets all the glory for it.
That's what it says in 1 Corinthians.
It says there,
For you see your calling brethren,
how that not many wise men after the flesh,
not many mighty, not many noble are called.
But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise,
and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty,
and the base things of the world,
the things which are despised have God chosen.
Yea, the things which are not to bring the thoughts that are.
And why is it that God uses the base things?
Why is it that God uses the foolish things of the world?
Why is it that God uses weak man to accomplish his will?
That no flesh should glory in his presence.
But if him are ye in Christ Jesus,
who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption?
That according as it is written,
He that gloried, let him glory in the Lord.
If you're going to glory in anything this morning,
it's the fact that God saved you.
It's the fact that Jesus Christ died for you,
that he is made unto you wisdom, and sanctification, and redemption.
It's not because of your cleaned up life.
It's not because you repent of your sin.
It's not because you got in church and started reading your Bible.
Those are all great things to do.
But let me tell you something,
don't get so caught up in yourself and start glorying in that.
To think that somehow you had something, some part in it.
The Bible says that if you're going to glory in anything, glory in the Lord.
And that's really what Samson forgot to do here, isn't it?
After he had slain a thousand men,
and the Spirit of God came upon him and he slayed those men,
he stops and says,
He stops and says with the jawbone of an ass,
and he gives the glory to some stinking, rotten bone
that he never should have picked up in the first place.
In his own strength, he tries to get some of the glory.
Look there again in Judges chapter 15,
God's not going to let us get away with it.
God will draw our attention to it if he needs to.
It says in verse 17,
And it came to pass when he had made an end of speaking,
so often that's when God speaks to us,
when we finally decide to shut up,
and we're ready to listen.
And it came to pass when he had made an end of speaking,
that he cast away the jawbone.
He didn't want anybody else to see that
he was holding on something he had in his hand.
He cast it away out of his hand.
I mean, I can imagine him just throwing it aside like it was nothing.
And he called that place,
And he was sore of thirst and called on the Lord.
So now he's thirsty.
And now that it's convenient for him,
and now that he has a genuine need,
he's ready to call upon the name of the Lord.
He's ready to call on God and get something from him.
And he said,
Thou hast given me this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant,
and now shall I die for thirst
and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised?
Notice when he starts to thirst,
and starts to ask God for something,
he starts giving God the glory.
Once he realizes,
Hey, I need to get something from God.
I need a drink or I'm going to die.
Now he's ready to say,
Thou hast given this great deliverance into my hand.
Now it's not so much about that jawbone anymore.
Now he starts to come around and say,
Yeah, it was God.
And look at what happens here in verse 19.
But God claimed an hollow place that was in the jaw.
He's talking about that same jawbone.
And there came water there out,
and when he had drunk,
his spirit came again.
And he revived.
It's interesting that God,
who can split a rock and make water come out,
that God who can open up the windows of heaven
and cause rain to come down in a day
that could have broken up the fountains of the deep,
and could have made water come out of anywhere he wanted,
decided, Samson, why don't you go pick up that jawbone?
That's where you're going to find your water.
You're going to go pick up that nasty...
I mean, you thought that jawbone was bad when he got started with it.
It was way worse when he got done with it.
And he slew 1,000 men.
I guarantee you, you go slay 1,000 men with anything,
it's not going to be the most sanitary thing there is.
Bits of flesh, blood, who knows what on there.
And God says, why don't you go pick up that jawbone,
and I'll give you something to drink.
So he makes him go pick it up,
and it says he went and picked it up,
and when he had drunk, his spirit came again.
And I could have just imagined
how humbling that must have been for Samson
to have to go find that jawbone,
and pick it up,
and hold that nasty thing to his lips,
and put it right in his face.
You're going to drink out of it.
And that's probably when he came to a realization
that it had nothing to do with that jawbone,
and that he was relying maybe just a little too much
on his own strength.
You see, when we start to rely on our own strength,
and we're not giving God the glory that's due unto him,
he'll put it right in our face,
and remind us of who it is
that's going to sustain us in this life.
So God put Samson face to face with his sin.
I mean, he could have given water any way he chose,
and he makes him pick up that same jawbone.
And what happens?
Well, Samson finally gets it right, doesn't he?
Notice what he does.
It says there,
And his spirit came again and revived,
wherefore he called the name thereof,
and Hakor, which is in Lehi unto this day.
He changes the name of the place.
He calls it one thing,
gets thirsty,
God corrects him,
he gets right,
and he changes the name again.
I think there's some significance to that.
Maybe not necessarily entirely what the words mean,
but there is some significance to the fact
that he said,
You know what?
It was this,
but now it's this.
What happened in between him
changing those names
was God dealing with him,
God making him acknowledge the fact
that he was perhaps relying a little too much on himself.
From what I've read,
that word,
Ramath Lehi,
the first name that he gave in a place,
means the hill of the jawbone,
or the place where the bone was lifted up.
Now that doesn't sound like a place,
if you heard that,
you'd probably think,
Am I on an Indian reservation somewhere?
Is this some kind of Indian name?
This isn't something
that's going to give glory to God.
I mean, where's the glory to God in that?
But notice there it says,
and then of course he calls it Enhekor.
Later, after he gets right,
after God deals with him and he gets it right,
he calls it Enhekor.
And what that means is the spring of him that called.
So again,
I think that's,
you know, referring,
it's reminding him of the fact,
not necessarily what he did with that jawbone,
not necessarily the great works that he accomplished
where the bone was lifted up,
the hill of the jawbone,
but it's the spring of him,
or excuse me,
the spring of him that called,
to remind him,
not of the great victory that he did with the jawbone,
but to remind him that it was God
that had to quench his thirst,
what he called upon him.
And he gets it right.
You know,
that's the great thing about Samson,
is that, you know,
he often made,
he made some mistakes in his life,
but we always see him getting it right,
getting it back on track.
Sometimes things are so far gone,
of course we all know how he ended his life,
you know, blind, grinding,
and the Philistines have made him captive
and are mocking him,
making sport of him,
and he prays and says,
you know,
let the spirit come upon me once more,
and he pushes the pillars of the house apart
and brings down the house of the Philistines
and kills more Philistines in his death
and in his life,
but that's not exactly how you want to end your life,
but he does get it right,
but sometimes the consequences are already done,
are already taking effect,
you know,
there's no getting his sight back,
there's no correcting all the things that are done,
you know,
sin will take you too far,
sin will take you much further
than you ever intended to go,
but he does get it right here,
I believe,
and he had it right for some time,
it says there in verse 20,
and he judged in the days of the Philistines 20 years,
and really we don't,
we pick up the story 20 years later,
and I tend to think that in those 20 years
that Samson did a good job,
that he went on for two decades serving God,
understanding that God was a strength,
that he had to stay right with God,
that he had to keep things right,
and kept himself out of trouble,
and you know,
it wasn't until he was later on in life
that he falls back into some old ways,
he falls back into sin,
and not keeping things right with God.
So really what we can learn from all of this
is that we can have victory in the midst of our enemies.
I don't care what the situation is,
I don't care how difficult,
or how many the enemy is,
or what circumstance it is
that we're going through life,
we can have victory,
you know,
we are more than conquerors
through him that loved us.
And we are, you know,
we have that available to us at all times,
just like Samson did.
The spirit of the Lord came upon him,
and there was nothing that he couldn't have done
to defeat his enemies.
But the problem is that we sometimes forget
where that strength lies,
where that victory,
the source of that victory,
where it comes from,
who it is that's really fighting our battles for us.
And we have to realize that our strength
is the same as Samson's.
Our strength lies in the Lord.
You know,
and hopefully we realize that in our life,
to where it doesn't take God
putting a jawbone in our face,
and saying,
we need to get this right,
and having to remind us
of something in our own life
that, you know,
is out of sorts with God.
You know,
we can realize that right now,
just from this story.
I mean,
that's why we have stories like this
in the Bible,
so that we can look at
and read these things,
and understand that our strength
is found in the Lord.
That is the source of our strength.
That is the source of Samson's strength,
is God.
Go ahead and turn over
to Romans chapter 8,
and we'll wrap it up here.
Romans chapter 8,
you're going there,
I'll read to you
from Psalms chapter 18.
As for God,
His way is perfect.
The word of the Lord is tried.
He is a buckler
to all those that trust in Him.
For who is God,
save the Lord?
Who is a rock,
save our God?
It is God that girdeth me
with strength,
and maketh my way perfect.
He maketh my feet
like hinds' feet,
and seteth me
upon high places.
He teacheth my hands
to war,
so that a bow of steel
shall be made,
and a bow of steel
shall be made,
and a bow of steel
shall be made,
and a bow of steel
shall be made,
so that a bow of steel
is broken by mine arms.
Thou hast also given me
the shield of Thy salvation,
and Thy right hand
hath holded me up,
and Thy gentleness
hath made me great.
Thou hast enlarged
my steps under me,
that my feet
did not slip.
I have pursued
my enemies,
and overtaken them.
Neither did I turn again
until they were consumed.
I have wounded them
that they were
not able to rise again,
they are fallen
under my feet.
For Thou hast girded me
with strength
unto the battle.
And here's the
psalm of David,
one of the mightiest
men of God
you'll ever read about.
A great warrior for God,
a man who fought
many battles for God.
And you know,
a guy who had it right,
who understood
that it was God
that had girded him
with strength
into the battle,
that had subdued
those under him
that rose up against him.
He said,
Thou hast also
given me the neck
of my enemies,
that I might destroy
them that hate me.
So David's
a perfect example
of somebody who
understood that
the source of his strength
to fight those battles
for God
and to be victorious
from God.
And we need to understand
that's the same case
for us today.
That we have that
same source of strength
available to us
that we might be able
to fight the Lord's
battles spiritually.
The Bible says in
Romans chapter 8 verse 35,
Who shall separate us
from the love of Christ?
Shall tribulation,
or distress,
or persecution,
or famine,
or nakedness,
or peril,
or sore?
As it is written,
for thy sake
we are killed
all the day long,
we are counted
as sheep for the slaughter.
Nay, in all these things
we are more than conquerors
to him that loved us
for I am persuaded
that neither death,
nor life,
nor angels,
nor sin,