Samson - Living out My Purpose

--- Welcome to week six of our women's Bible study on the book of Judges that's called A Time of Turning, and this week's lesson in your study guide I called it Turning from Purpose, because both Israel and Samson we see have turned away from the purpose that God had intended for them. But my message is going to be titled Living with Purpose, because that's what we want for us. Okay, so they Samson is turning from his purpose, we want to live with purpose. And so I want to start off with a psalm that I'm gonna put up on the screen for you. Psalm 138 verse 8. I love this one. It says,

The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me. And that's where I get my inspiration to bring the application to this message today. So throughout the book of Judges, these judges have become increasingly more complicated and increasingly more compromising. Gideon is the king, or excuse me, Gideon. Samson, he is the last and he is the worst, I think. This is Judge number 12. And even Gideon and Jephthah, they at least started with, started well. Samson doesn't even start well. He slides, the other judges slid into pride. Samson just starts with this pride. And here is the hardest thing for us to accept about this lesson, is that God still uses him to push forward his unfolding plan of redemption. We don't like that. We like things to be tidy. We like it when God uses good people who are obedient and when God sets aside disobedient people. That's how we want it to be, right? And so it really bugs us when God allows the sinful or the disobedient to actually be used for his purposes. In this lesson, Samson doesn't try to obey God once. He's prideful. He disrespects his parents. He cares nothing for obeying God. He under appreciates God's gifts and he over appreciates his own abilities. He sets his heart on his own pleasure. He sets his heart on his own revenge. He wants what he sees and he seizes what he wants. There's nothing to commend him to us as a worthy judge of Israel. We want him to be the least in the kingdom of heaven. And yet we find him in the Hall of Faith in Hebrews chapter 11, right next to Gideon and Jephthah. And that really bugs us. One of the lessons, one of the subtitles I guess I would say for this week, is that God's ways are not neat and tidy. God does not think like we think. For some reason, God's grace sees fit to use people who are weak and prideful and selfish and disobedient. People like me. People like you. God uses those people. But that should not lead us to a response to say, oh good, then I'll just live however I want because God's going to use me. It's not a problem. No, that's not to be our response. Our response should be that we want God to fulfill his purpose for me. Do not forsake the work of your hands. Continue to mold me. Continue to teach me. Continue to grow me. We want to walk out God's purpose for our life. And we want to submit our gifts to God. And we want to walk in obedience. Although it's true that God may not take away the gifts that he gives us, as we see in this lesson, we want there to be a satisfaction in it. I don't think the way I see it. I never see Samson satisfied. I never see him walking in any level of joy in being used by the Lord. Well, I want to live my life walking in a sense of joy. And so we want the Lord to grow us. So as with last week's lesson, we don't have near enough time to go through verse by verse. I'm going to have to summarize a few things. So I made an outline for how we're going to approach this lesson. Part one is Samson's purpose, which was given to his parents. And then I broke up his life based upon the women in his life, because women were his weakness. So Samson and his Philistine wife, Samson and the prostitute, Samson and Delilah. And then we're going to end with Samson fulfills his purpose. So Judges chapter 13, verse 1.

In your study guide, you are underlining those phrases that have to do with the familiar cycles of sin. And so you probably underlined that again they did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. And so what does God do? He raises up an oppressor. This time it was the Philistines, and it was 40 years. So as we kind of interpret that into our life, since 1980. So in my life since 1980 there has been an oppression by someone ruling over us, ruling over me. Now in this lesson there is zero mention of Israel crying out to God. Israel repenting, asking for help. There's nothing. I don't know if they forgot about God. I don't know if they believed they had fallen away so far that they couldn't ask God for help. But they don't ask God for help at all. But that doesn't stop God from fulfilling his purpose that he intends. So verse 2,

Now God raised up the Philistines as oppressors. They're gonna be a problem through the whole life of Samson, through the entire life of Samuel, through the entire life of King Saul, and all the way into King David. But Samson will begin to save Israel from the Philistines. Now in your study guide you looked up, you went to Numbers and you read about the Nazarite vow, and you learned some things about it that there was, a lot of people took this vow for a particular season of time in their life, but this was to be Samson's manner of life, even from the womb. His mother was to uphold the Nazarite vow while she was pregnant. This was to be his lifelong situation, and the Nazarite vow contained things like drink no fermented drink, no wine, nothing from the vine at all, no grapes, no raisins. He was not to consume, eat anything, or eat or touch anything unclean, not even approach a dead animal or anything dead, even a close relative. And no razor was to touch his hair, his hair was to be uncut, and this would be the symbol of this Nazarite vow, and the symbol of something that meant he was separated unto the Lord. Samson was intended to be separated to the Lord, holy to God, from the beginning. And this is unique. No other judge was given these instructions, and no other judge did the Lord come and talk to his parents first. So, just to summarize, so Mrs. Manoa, who the angel had told her this, she went and told Mr. Manoa, and the mister wanted to hear this for himself, so he prayed. And he said, Lord, would you send that angel back and talk to me? And the angel did come back to Mrs., and she went and got mister. And I love, in verse 12, I love how Manoa says to the angel of the Lord, now, when your words come true, what is to be the child's manner of life, and what is his mission? Here's what I love about that conversation. Two things, faith and future. Look at how he says, now, when this comes true, not, well, if it comes true, like you say it's going to. No, he had faith right from the gate, and he wanted to know about the future. What is to be the child's mission or manner of life, and what is his... Wow, if more of us moms would ask those questions, that would be a good thing. But let's not just think about our children. What I'm going to do today is I'm going to pause once in a while on the story of Samson and bring us some application for our life. So let's pause Samson, and I'm going to put on the screen here how we can live with purpose. And here is a great thing. Ask the Lord, what do you have for me to do? What is my mission and what is to be my manner of life? Have you asked the Lord that lately in life? This is a way for us to fulfill God's purpose. I wish we had time right now to take us to the parable of the talents in Matthew because I love that section of scripture where one was given this and one was given that, two talents for this and five and ten, and there was a difference. But we can ask the Lord, what do you have for me to do? And our manner of life may shift a little bit depending on that because in order to fulfill our purpose, we may need to say no to some things, and we may need to say yes to other things. And it could be quite different depending on what God has for us to do. So let's unpause Samson and go back. Verse 13,

And just like Gideon, Manoah wanted to have a fellowship meal with the angel of the Lord, and he went and prepared a young goat and brought that with grain and put it on a rock and it was consumed. And up in the flames went the angel of the Lord, and the mister said, we're surely going to die. And the missus says, I think they would have done that by now. I think God would have killed us by now. I think it's going to be okay. I don't think God would have sent an angel to come tell us all these things if he was just going to kill us. We're good. And they were good. And so the chapter ends, verse 24,

This is the first of five times in the life of Samson that we see a connection with the spirit of the Lord. And it started right here. All right, part two, Samson and the Philistine wife. Chapter 14,

Because culturally, in both of those cultures, you didn't just go on a date, go to the wedding chapel. That wasn't how it was done. There were arrangements that needed to be made. But his parents knew his purpose in life. The angel of the Lord had told them his purpose. They knew that his purpose was to begin to save Israel, not to begin to entangle Israel with the Philistines. And so they wanted none of this. And they said to him, isn't there a pretty girl in Israel that you would like? Verse 3, the end of verse 3,

So we're going to pause, Samson, and talk about us living with purpose. Point number two, do not chase what's right in your own eyes. Things are not always as they appear. And I put there Psalm 101, verse 3, I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless. This is good inspiration for us when we're considering how to live out the purpose God has given to us. I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless so that I resist that temptation to achieve or to get or to seize what is right in my own eyes. Back to Samson, verse 4, his mother and father did not know that it was from the Lord, for he was seeking an opportunity against the Philistines. At that time, the Philistines ruled over Israel. And remember our important note that we started with, we like things tidy. And we don't really care that much for this concept that God uses disobedient people. We want him to use good people, but we want him to set aside bad people. Even though Samson was skirting his purpose at this point, being disobedient in marriage, God is still going to use him for his purposes. Look at verse 5,

which I think would be hard enough. But he did not tell his father or his mother what he had done. Why not? Touch no dead thing, right? Verse 7, he went down and talked with the woman, and she was right in Samson's eyes. And after some days, he returned to take her and turned aside, and he saw the carcass of that lion. And behold, there was a swarm of bees in the body of the lion and honey, and he scraped it out with his hands, and he went on eating as he went out of this dead carcass. And he came to his father and mother and gave them some, and they ate. But look, he did not tell them that he had scraped the honey from the carcass of the lion. Why not? Well, when your mom and dad keep teaching you your whole life what is right and what is wrong, and you decide to do what is wrong, you don't exactly tell them, right? Which I think tells me that Mr. and Mrs. Manoa did a good job of preparing him. This isn't on them. And we often, when somebody goes off the rails, don't we sometimes think, well, I wonder what their mom and dad did wrong? I think in here, they did a pretty good job. This is on Samson. That's just the way I see it. So seven days of feasting, which undoubtedly included wine, fermented drink, and Samson was given these 30 hired companions. And what I mean is that he's in Philistine territory. He has no friends. And so they provided these 30 companions for him. In these days, they hired people to cry at your funeral, and they hired people to celebrate at your wedding. So here's these companions who were hired and given to Samson. And after a while, the social lubricant of the day had caused Samson to think, wouldn't it be fun if we had a little game here? And so he said, I have an idea. I'm going to tell you guys all a riddle. And if you can guess it, then I will give every one of you a fancy new outfit. But if you can't guess it, every one of you will give me an outfit. And they're thinking, hey, sounds fun. Sounds fun. Let's do it. And they agree. Here's his riddle. Out of the eater came something to eat. Out of the strong came something sweet. And in three days, they could not solve the riddle. They're halfway through this wedding feast. So on the fourth day, they start pressing the wife, who is not yet his wife technically because their marriage has not yet been consummated. This is the feast leading up to that. And so they press in verse 15, and they say, entice your husband to tell us what the riddle says, lest we burn you in your father's house with fire. See, they're just hired. They're not friends. And they say, have you invited us here to impoverish us? And so in verse 16, Samson's wife wept over him and said, you only hate me. You do not love me. You have put a riddle to my people, and you have not told me what it is. And Samson said, I didn't tell anybody. I didn't even tell my mom and dad what it was. But nonetheless, she wept and pressed him hard all the days of the feast until he finally told her. And so we're going to pause Samson, and we're going to talk about living with purpose. Point number three, don't entangle yourself with the things of the world because you will eventually become worn down. The world will eventually wear you down in the same way that Samson's wife eventually wore him down. Maybe not the first day or the third day, but on the seventh day as all things are completed, we get worn down. So look at this inspiration from Matthew chapter six. Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, for where your treasure is there your heart will be also. The things that we begin to treasure eventually wear us down. So there's a caution for us in our life. And then we unpause the story of Samson. And in verse 18, the men of the city said to him, what is sweeter than honey and what is stronger than a lion? Samson was mad and he said if you had not plowed with my heifer you would not have found out my riddle which I really love that literary way he has there of like he should have been an author that's good right there and this look at number three time the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon him this is the third time that the Spirit has come upon him and he went down to Ashkelon and struck down 30 men of the town took their spoil gave the garments to those who told who had told the riddle and in hot anger he went back to his father's house and Samson's wife was given to his companion who had been his best man judges chapter 15 after some days when he had cooled off a little bit at the time of the wheat harvest Samson went to visit his wife with a young goat because every woman will swoon over a young goat right and he said I will go into my wife in the chamber meaning I will go now and consummate that marriage that we started okay but her father would not allow him to go in her father said I thought you hated her so I gave her to your companion but look I have another daughter is not her younger sister just as beautiful or more beautiful please take her and Samson said this time I shall be innocent in regard to the Philistines when I do them harm which leads me to believe that last time he felt a little guilty about his overreaction to the riddle but he said this time I'm gonna be innocent and so he caught 300 foxes and he tied their tails together put torches let them loose in the grain fields and in the orchards and just basically burned down the place and when the Philistines figured out that it was Samson the son-in-law of the Tim night they retaliated and burned the father and his wife so we have this full-blown war that we can't even really comprehend but here's how it goes Samson says I tell a riddle and they cheat and find the answer and I kill 30 Philistines to pay off the debt and they give away my wife and I burn up their fields and orchards and they turn around and burn the wife and the father so we're kind of even tit-for-tat right now but Samson wants to end on top so in a final act of retaliation in verse 8 he struck them hip and thigh with a great blow and then he went down and stayed in the cleft of the rock at eat him but nobody in a culture like this will keep the keep things on even so now they want to get revenge on him so they go down they encamp in Judah they make a raid on Lehi in verse 10 the men of Judah said why have you come up against us we haven't done anything they said we're coming for Samson we want Samson and so then the men of Judah they go to Samson they say why have you done this to us what is going on don't you know they rule over us don't you know that you're supposed to keep the status quo because they're ruling over us right now and they're mad at him and as per Samson's suggestion he goes just bind me with new ropes and give me to him and they do exactly that verse 14 look at what we have then the spirit of the Lord rushed upon him for the fourth time God is with him God is gifting him we think he's a big dud and God is gifting him and the ropes that were on his arms became as flax that has caught fire and his bonds melted off his hands and he found a fresh jawbone of a donkey and with it he struck 1,000 men now the fresh jawbone of a donkey meant that it was a dead animal and so what in the world is going on here God gifts him he uses something completely out of agreement with his vow to be successful we don't like it I don't like that why does God give him success why the spirit of the Lord rush upon him four times how could God let Samson be successful with a dead body part and these are hard questions for us they're just as hard as things that happen in our life when a pastor or an evangelist or a worship leader who we see have spiritual success and be gifted we find out later that while they were successful they were disobedient and that really bugs us and we ask the question how could God allow that to happen I want to just I didn't make a slide for this but first Timothy 524 says the sins of some people are conspicuous going before them to judgment but the sins of others appear later we're reminded in this lesson that all heroes are flawed all people are flawed and but the work of the Lord is perfect in the Old Testament these heroes that we have were to prime us for the perfect hero Jesus Messiah that would come and live the honorable life live a perfect life and judge perfectly and in the New Testament when we see things that we feel like are not right someone is spiritually successful while yet they are disobedient it should also remind us that we're waiting for the return of that perfect one Jesus the Messiah who will make all things perfect in a perfect way well we come to part three of Samson's life Samson and the prostitute judges chapter 16 Samson went to Gaza again this is Philistine territory and there he saw prostitute and he went into her the Gazites were told Samson has come and they surrounded the place and set an ambush for him all night at the gate of the city okay so an ambush at the gate of the city and what does Samson do he lays until midnight and then he gets up and he takes hold of the doors of the gate of the city and the two posts he pulls them up he puts them on his shoulders Hercules style and he carried him off to the top of the hill in front of Hebron and nothing really happens here except that Samson uses his gift to please himself to kind of show off and to escape from the Philistines and I wanted to I wanted to pause and make a slide but I didn't but we could say don't use your spiritual gift to show off but but we're gonna move on to Samson and Delilah so verse four after this he loved a woman in the Valley of Sorok whose name was Delilah and it's going to become obvious to us in this chapter that Delilah does not love him back I don't really think Samson loves her in the first place that said he loved a woman I think it's probably more appropriate to say he lusted a woman so I think that they're an even match actually here but physically she may have been in bed with Samson financially she was in bed with the lords of the Philistines because they could easily buy her for 1,100 pieces of silver to disclose his secret what is the secret of his strength and so she's kind of a spy here I don't think her spy work is that great I wouldn't hire her but anyway one thing you got to give her she just comes right in the front door there's no intrigue we're gonna read four attempts that she tries to find out his strength attempt number one starts in verse six Delilah said please tell me where your great strength lies and how you might be bound that one could subdue you and Samson says if they bind me with seven fresh bow strings that have not been dried then I shall become weak and be like any other man and so the Philistines provide her with those seven fresh bow strings and she binds him and she says the Philistines are upon you Samson and he snaps them like they were nothing so attempt number two in verse ten behold you have mocked me and told me lies please tell me how you might when Paul teaches this he doesn't use that voice he doesn't have it but I'm somehow like rolling back to cartoons from my childhood so anyway please tell me how you might be bound and he said if they bind me with new ropes that have not been used then I shall become weak and be like any other man and so Delilah takes the new ropes and she binds him and she says the Philistines are upon you Samson and he gets up and breaks the ropes like they are a thread attempt number three verse thirteen until now you have mocked me and told me lies tell me how you might be bound this is just crazy to me that he doesn't just leave but and he says you know what if you weave the seven locks of my head with the web and fasten it tight with a pin then I shall become weak like any other man and so she did that with his hair and she says the Philistines are upon you Samson and he breaks loose and he takes the loom with him, and about now, Samson is feeling bulletproof. Nothing, nothing touches him. Everything falls off. His gift works every time, regardless of his disobedience, and I think he thinks it always will. So let's pause, Samson, and let's look at our purpose in life, number four. Do not allow success to deceive you. And I put Galatians 6, verse seven and eight up for us.

I had never connected that verse with Samson before in my life, but I think it is a good connection to look at the one who sows to the flesh. Samson is just about done with his sowing to the flesh and he's just about ready to reap corruption. Unpause, Samson. Delilah's attempt number four in verse 15. How can you say I love you when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times and you have not told me where your great strength lies. And she pressed him hard with her words day after day and urged him and his soul was vexed to death. And he told her all of his heart. And he said, a razor has never come upon my head for I have been a Nazarite to God from my mother's womb. No, he has not. There is nothing about his life that has upheld that Nazarite vow except this. Now, the strength was not in his hair, but he had finally reached the end. He had finally reached the last thing that he basically wrote off about his separation to the Lord. And he goes on to say, if my head is shaved, then my strength will leave me and I shall become weak and be like any other man. And when Delilah saw, now she sees, that he had told her all of his heart, she sat and called the lords of the Philistines saying, come up again for he has told me all of his heart. And the lords of the Philistines came up to her and they brought the money in their hands. And she made him sleep on her knees. And she called a man and had him shave off the seven locks of his head. And she began to torment him and his strength left him. And this time she said, the Philistines are upon you, Samson. And he awoke from his sleep and said, I'll go out as other times and shake myself free. Here's the fifth time that we see his relationship with the spirit, but he did not know that the Lord had left him. And that brings us to part five in Samson's life. Verse 21, and the Philistines seized him and they gouged out his eyes and brought him down to Gaza and bound him with bronze shackles. And he grounded the mill in the prison, but the hair of his head began to grow again after it had been shaved. And so we have this festival that comes upon us, this God, their God Dagon. They have a big festival to him, which is interesting because this God Dagon seems to be one of his primary purposes is a God of grain. Here's Samson grinding out the grain right before this festival to this God. And so they have this building where 3,000 of the Lords of the Philistines gather on the lower level and the upper level, and they're drinking. And it says when their hearts were merry, they called Samson that he would entertain them. Verse 28, as he's entertaining them, then Samson called to the Lord and said, oh Lord God, please remember me and please strengthen me only this once. Oh Lord, that I may be avenged on the Philistines for my two eyes. And Samson grasped the two middle pillars on which the house rested and he leaned his weight against them, his right hand on the one, his left hand on the other, and Samson said, let me die with the Philistines. And then he bowed with all of his strength and the house fell upon the Lords and upon all the people who were in it. So the dead whom he killed at his death were more than those whom he had killed during his life. And his brothers came and took his body and it says he judged Israel for 20 years. No joy in his purpose whatsoever. Sad ending to a life that honestly never even started well. But what I want to end with here is just to recap for us. What can we learn about our purpose by looking at how Samson turned from his purpose? Did not fulfill, well, the Lord had his way, that's for sure. But, so I just want to kind of go through these again. Ask, for me to ask God, what do you have for me to do? What is my mission and what is to be my manner of life? What do I need to say yes to? What do I need to say no to? To not chase what's right in my own eyes, to not fixate on things because they will turn on me. I know that they will turn on me. Don't entangle myself with the things of the world. They will wear me down. They will turn me from my purpose in life. And not to allow success to deceive me. Just because I'm able to do something for the Lord doesn't mean my life is all put together, doesn't mean I'm obedient, doesn't mean I don't need to confess my sins, doesn't mean that I don't need to sanctify myself in some way. So I want to end just by reminding you of the psalm that we started with, beautiful psalm.

Lord, we ask humbly that you would grow us. Lord, we know that you will not forsake the work of your hands. We ask that your work would go forward in our life. We ask that each one of us, as we have processed this lesson, the story of Samson, that we would be able to apply this into our life and say, Lord, we want to serve you. We want to fulfill the purpose you have given for us. And we ask for your spirit to be upon us in order to do that, Lord God, that we would not go forward in a selfish way or become entangled or allow things to wear us down. Lord, would you work in our lives and help us to honor you and serve you, we pray in Jesus' name, amen. ---