Samson - Made in the Image of God

Let's open with a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we are glad that we can be together today to look at your word and to get a clearer picture. Spirit and your written word, we are totally blind to know you and understand you.

And your word says that if we would boast in anything, let us not boast in our money, our might, or our mind, but rather that we know you and understand you. And so I pray, Lord, that through the worship and praise that you receive through the reading of your word today, I just pray you'd be lifted up and honored for who you are, Lord. In Jesus' name we pray.

It is very much an honor to be speaking here today. I believe I attended a service or two here as a little kid, a very little kid. If you would have told me for most of my life that I would have been speaking a sermon here today, I would not have believed you.

But very much a privilege and I very much blessed by the service so far. You guys sing wonderfully. And for a small community church, you have an amazing church here.

And it was very encouraging to hear the testimonies and everything so far. So very glad to be here. My grandparents, Samford and Julia, farmed just a little bit that way across the highway.

And one of my clearest memories with my grandfather, Samford, I used to go and stay at the farm for about a week. I was a city kid, grew up in Regina, but I'd get to come out to the farm for a week in the summers when I was around 10 or 11 years old. And one stormy night, my grandpa, Samford, had me sitting on his knee and he had found some old Sunday school papers, I think from the 50s, and he was reading to me the story of David and Goliath.

And boy, I can still see it like it was yesterday. The papers weren't really like the ones we have today. They were very realistic and very graphic looking.

And as a little kid, I was just struck sitting with my grandfather about the realities. It was, the story was so real to me. And so fast forward decades, one Sunday afternoon in Regina, I was watching VeggieTales with my kids, and I had a flashback of sitting in my, in the chair with my grandfather.

And I thought, what in the world am I showing my kids? Now, I don't mean to offend anybody if you love VeggieTales, but I don't. I thought, I'm teaching my kids that David and Goliath were cucumbers and pickles. And I got up off the couch, and I, I did, I scooped it all up and I chucked it in the trash.

I said, you kids can keep these videos of Larry the Cucumber stepping on a rake and teaching kids to put away their stuff. I don't, you can keep that kind of stuff, but the Bible stuff is out. The Bible is a serious book.

We live in a pretty safe culture. But there is a lot of real evil in the world, and a lot of very, a lot of real stories in the Bible. And so, as, your said earlier, it's good to have an encounter with Jesus.

Not who your whims might hope he is, but who he actually is. And as we sang that song earlier, I hope by the end of my message, you see him as your only, your only defense and your righteousness. I've always been fascinated with the Samson story.

Many years ago, when I was younger, I cut a tree down in my backyard. I thought I was kind of good at that. I wasn't.

It fell right into the roof of my neighbor's house. It was a good-sized tree. And so, feeling like I was stronger than I actually was, I put my shoulder under the trunk of the tree and began dragging it through the yard off my neighbor's house.

And I could feel my spine compressing as I carried it. No lie, I said to myself as I was dragging the tree, time to pull a Samson. And I started to drag the tree across my yard off my neighbor's roof.

Well, I didn't pull a Samson. I pulled my back, something fierce. Within moments, I could hardly breathe.

The tree dropped. My wife was watching from the kitchen window adoringly as I couldn't even breathe. She yelled, is something wrong? I couldn't even speak.

She had to get me in the car and take me to the hospital. So, if at any time during this message, if you're ever wondering, you know, is Chad at all like Samson? The answer is no, I am not. And there are some characters in the Bible that are like that.

We hear songs that, you know, we should be carrying five stones like David did. And if we have faith, we can take on the Goliaths of the world. I used to believe that.

I don't anymore. There are some pictures the Bible gives us. And God's giving us a very different message.

He's telling us that we shouldn't really have, we shouldn't have faith in ourselves, but we should have faith in Jesus. When David confronted Goliath, it's one of the most amazing verses in the Bible to me. For, I think it was 40 days, the entire Israeli army was being taunted by Goliath and the Philistines.

And not one of them had the courage to go and fight that nine-foot warrior, that descendant of the Anakims. These were the people that the Hebrews said made them feel like grasshoppers when they first came into that land. They were terrifying.

They were warriors and they knew how to fight. And the reward of that contest was either life or death and slavery of the entire peoples. And all of Israel, all their army, everybody was frozen in fear except David, who was a picture of Christ.

He was the one that finished the deliverance that God told Samson to start. And that's an amazing verse. It says that David ran to confront Goliath.

So, if during my message you feel uncomfortable putting yourself in the shoes of some of these men, you don't have to. Some of these pictures in the Bible, like David and Samson, are pictures of Christ that we should look to as our our judge, our king, our deliverer. Not so much to emulate, but to be glad the Lord is on our side.

It's fitting that I'm speaking on Samson today in this area, I think. I come from a family on my dad's side. There were some fairly tough scrapper-type guys.

I have an uncle that was pretty strong himself. And I loved, like most of you guys, I think, hearing stories of feats of strength. Now, one of your neighbors in this vicinity came out to our farm many years ago.

He actually picked up a four-wheel drive truck of ours that was loaded with firewood with a topper on it and big mudder tires, and he grabbed the back bumper and picked it two feet up off the ground. That's impressive. My dad had a big round bale in the yard that he had put some logging chains around, and he was trying to rip it out of the ice with a tractor, and the tractor couldn't budge it.

And so this neighbor of yours said, let me try, and he wrapped his arms around the bale and stuck his huge fingers into it, and he ripped it out of the ground. And my dad said, you could hear the ice cracking 15-20 feet out around the bale. There are some strong people in the area, but there are none like the man we're going to read about today.

It was about 20 years ago, I was in my basement reading the story of Samson, and I came across one verse in particular that made zero sense to me. It was one of the craziest verses in the Bible, and it was from that moment for the next year, all I did was read the story of Samson. We're going to get to that verse in a little bit, but about a year after that study of Samson began, one night, I think I can share this because we're in a Pentecostal church, I felt the Holy Spirit fill me up to a point that it actually scared me, and I began to see things in this story all over the place that I'd never seen before.

So I'd like to share some of them with you today. As Wally mentioned, I've given a couple sermons on Samson in the last 20 years or so. My view of Samson is very contrary to what the popular view out there is.

If you do a search on the internet on what kind of guy Samson was, you might be surprised, you might not. I don't know what what you guys think of this man, but I'd like to read to you what a few people, a few theologians, thought of Samson when I researched it. One theologian said that God had a purpose for Samson.

He wanted Samson to rescue his people, but Samson became a complete failure. He should have brought honor to a holy God, instead his evil life brought dishonor to a holy God. Another man said that Hebrews 11.32 states, what more shall I say, time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, and Jephthah, David and Samuel also, and of the prophets.

He said it is strange to me that Samson is included in the Hall of Faith. It doesn't seem to me that Samson rates up there with Abraham, David, Noah, and so forth. It seems to me that Samson is not a person of faith because he broke all three commands given to him by God as a Nazarene.

The first time I spoke on Samson, the church I was attending a little over 20 years ago, they were doing a series on the great men of faith in Hebrews 11, and so I asked them, is anyone speaking on Samson? And they said to me, of course not. And I said, would you mind if I did? And so that was the first time I spoke on Samson. And I'll never forget the one deacon, as I was heading up, he told me that Samson didn't even belong in Hebrews 11.

And over the years, as I've shared my view of Samson, all I have come across is anger, antagonism, raised voices, how dare you even imply that Samson was a righteous man, that he was a type of Christ, or that he belongs really in Hebrews 11. But I can be kind of scrappy too, and I like to stand up for Samson because he deserves it. Years ago I came across a sermon from one of my favorite Christian writers, a fellow that most of you have probably heard on the radio, we emailed back and forth quite a bit, arguing, debating about Samson.

He wrote of Samson in a sermon that he was one of the saddest stories in all the Bible, a wasted opportunity, a life of compromise and worldliness, a miserable failure, a negative example of what a child should be. God turned his great defeat into victory, and he asked why was he such a failure as a person and as a son. Not very flattering words, are they? It seems that the consensus among the majority is that Samson was a man of little faith, or worse yet, not a man of faith at all.

A man that failed for most of his life, somehow managed to repent in the end, thus squeaking into Hebrews 11 by the skin of his teeth. But something is not right, for it was God, of course, that placed Samson among the giants of faith, and he listed him by name no less. And with God, there are no mistakes.

So, I don't want to take up too much time today. I guess the the main things I'd like to try and show is that Samson was a great man of faith, and that he was also one of the greatest types, or Old Testament foreshadows, of Christ that there is. I don't think there are too many men that foreshadowed both advents of the Lord better than Samson.

He is constantly foreshadowing and typing both the first and second coming of our Lord. We'll start in chapter 13, And the children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord delivered them into the hands of the Philistines for forty years. Now, I just got open by saying, to understand Samson, you need to understand the calling that God put on this man's life from before he was even born, and we're gonna get to that right away.

When Moses had brought Israel out of Egypt, there's an interesting verse in Genesis that said that God actually took the Hebrews around the long way, so that they would not see the Philistine people, and be scared of the prospect of war, and want to go back. The Philistines were pretty nasty people, and so in verse 5 here, when his birth is announced by the angel to Samson's barren mum. By the way, I'm fascinated with types.

If you notice, many of the great deliverers in the Old Testament had mothers that couldn't have children. I don't know if there's a right or wrong answer for this, but I believe this is God foreshadowing the virgin birth in the Old Testament. Many of these great men of God, these great deliverers, God had to come and personally intervene, so that they could be born.

Just a little side note there, and Samson, just like Isaac, and Samuel, and John the Baptist, and a few others, is in that group. So, I'm assuming most of you know the story, I'm not going to read it all, I'm just going to try and cruise along a little quicker, and there's just a few kind of main points I'd like to touch on at the end, but Samson is one of very few people whose birth was actually announced from heaven by an angel. When Gabriel came and announced to Mary that was quite a big deal, that she was going to have a son.

Well, an angel came from heaven and announced that Samson was going to be born to her, and the angel told Samson's mom that this child was going to be a Nazarite from the day of his conception and to the day of his death. One of very few men that had to take on the Nazarite vow through the entire course of their life. The Nazarite vow was not an easy thing to do.

As you know, you couldn't cut your hair, which I believe was a sign of submission. You weren't to be around a dead body, and I think some people get this kind of mixed up because theologians like to blame Samson for being around the carcass of a lion that came to kill him. It's absolutely ridiculous, I hate to say it.

I'll try and be gracious, but for all those that think Samson was an undisciplined failure and train wreck of a life, the most gracious way I can say this is that you're wrong. He was not. A Nazarite vow for your entire life was a very difficult thing.

Not only could you not have wine or strong drink, you couldn't eat anything off the vine either. There were not Olive Gardens and 7-Elevens and a lot of choices in those days of what you could eat or drink, and so if you lived in those days and couldn't eat or drink anything off the vine, you lived a pretty sparse life in that way, and he did throughout his entire life. So nothing from the vine, which might suggest purity as well as abstinence, just not being able to partake in all the blessings and joys of life, it made life tough.

Submission, not cutting your hair, and not being around dead people. You can read of the vow in Numbers chapter 6 where it's explained, and when the vow came to an end, the one who took on himself the Nazarite vow was to cut his hair and then offer up a sacrifice. So the angel comes to Samson's mother, says you're gonna have a son, and verse 5 says that he will be a Nazarite unto God from the womb, and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.

Many people criticize Samson for not finishing what God told him to do, but God didn't tell him to finish it. That's that was going to be David's job. God said that Samson was to begin this deliverance.

So they have the baby, and Samson begins to grow. They call this name Samson. The child grew, and the Lord blessed him.

Verse 25 of chapter 13, and the Spirit of the Lord began to move him at times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Eshphel. As you know, Samson was from the tribe of Dan, a word that was prophesied of the tribe of Dan. There was a few prophecies that came from Moses and Jacob, and it said that Dan would be a judge of his people, and as you know, Samson became one of the judges of Israel.

I believe he was the last, if you don't count Samuel. It was prophesied of the tribe of Dan that he would be like a serpent on the way, biting the hooves of the horses, and I think it was Moses' prophecy that said Dan would be like a young lion, and Samson, I think very fittingly, portrays both those things, as you'll see. Verse 14 begins with talking about Samson going down to Timnath to take of himself a wife of the Philistines, or a Gentile.

Now, Samson, like I said, is I think a great type of Christ. In verse 2, well let's just read the first few verses in 14, and Samson went down to Timnath and saw a woman in Timnath of the daughters of the Philistines, and he came up and told his father and mother and said, I've seen a woman in Timnath of the daughters of the Philistines, now therefore get her for me a wife. Then his father and his mother said unto him, Is there never a woman among the daughters of thy brethren, or among all my people, that thou goest to take a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines? And Samson said unto his father, Get her for me, for she pleases me well.

But his father and his mother knew not that it was of the Lord that he sought an occasion against the Philistines, for at that time the Philistines had dominion over Israel. Some of these theologians criticize Samson for doing this. The text clearly says it was of the Lord.

It talks about the spirit moving Samson. Samson had a very unique calling of God. I don't think anyone in this room has a calling of God to deliver Israel from his enemies.

And one of the most fascinating things about Samson, as you'll see as we read on, is there is only one person in the entire Bible that foreshadows the delivering work that Christ would one day do. When we read in the Gospels, right before Jesus went to the cross, we read that the Old Testament was referenced, and it said when the shepherd is struck, the sheep will scatter. If you read in Leviticus 16, it says that on the day of atonement, when the deliverance was going to happen, only one man in all of Israel was allowed to work, and that was the high priest.

In Samson, you have an incredible picture of the aloneness in which the Lord was going to deliver his people. Samson is the only guy in the entire Bible that has a calling from God that is so insanely difficult and dangerous and terrifying, and there is not one mention in Judges 13 to 16 of a single soul offering one iota of help to Samson. You talked about the twister that came through last week that seemingly God held up out of the way, and you talked about the community coming together.

Samson had no community coming together to help him ever. There is no mention. There is only mention of his people hindering and opposing him every step of the way, and in that way, Samson is a very clear picture of our Lord.

What the Lord had to do, he had to do alone. So on the way to the wedding, as you know, Samson walking through the vineyard on the way to Timnath, a young lion, not a cub, but a full-strength lion attacks Samson, and it says that Samson ripped this lion apart like he would a little goat, and it said that he had nothing in his hands. That's another thing that is very, very peculiar and particular about Samson.

Never once in all of his wars, his battles, his anything, does he ever once use a conventional weapon of war. God wants to see the uniqueness of this man. He's not one that we are to imitate, but we are to look to as a great deliverer.

Never once does he use a conventional weapon of war. When the lion comes upon him, he rips it apart with his bare hands. So Samson meets his wife.

It's also fascinating that Samson didn't even tell his dad. Like, they're walking. I mean, mom and dad must have been a little ways away.

How many of you men in your prime, if a lion had attacked you between Tribune and Lake Delma, would have ripped it apart with your bare hands and not even told your dad? This guy had some humility, I think. So when the wedding begins, Samson puts forth a riddle, because as we read, it was of the Lord to start to agitate and make things happen with Israel's enemies. And so Samson puts forth a riddle.

Out of the eater, something to eat. Out of the strong, something sweet, because on his way back to the wedding, as you know, there were bees in the carcass making honey. And we won't stay here long, but I think it's a pretty interesting picture, even if it's not exact, of the Deliverer of Israel taking for himself a Gentile bride.

I don't know if any of you are Hebrews, but Ephesians 2 says those of us that were once afar off were brought nigh through Christ. We are the wild shoot that it talks about in Romans 9 to 11. I think this is a picture of the Deliverer of Israel going after a Gentile bride, not just a Hebrew one.

And there was dislike from his parents, but it was of the Lord. And at the wedding, a riddle goes out. Now our New Testament Gospels are filled with parables that people couldn't understand unless the Lord or his people explain them.

And it's kind of fascinating to me that Samson gives a riddle, and it's not until the Philistines threaten the bride, the Gentile bride, that she gives the answer to the riddle. And what do they receive as a reward? New garments. And that's what the Bible says you wear when you enter the kingdom of God, new garments.

It's pretty interesting all these parallels that there are in the Samson story. But Samson, as I said, shows both advents of the Lord. He is both against the enemies of God's people and for God's people at the same time.

And so to get these new garments, he goes out and kills 30 Philistine men and takes their garments to give them as a prize. He is not doing this, as a lot of people say, selfishly or fleshly or whatever. He's the judge of Israel.

Samson is Israel's government, and he's fulfilling a calling that God gave him, and that is to bring his people out from under the domination of the Philistines. And so when they find out that Samson slew 30 of their men for these garments, they come back, and while Samson's gone, it says they burned Samson's wife and father-in-law with fire. And so the story starts to get interesting.

The father in law pleads with Samson and says, you know, at first I gave your wife away. I thought you hated her. Can you not take her younger sister, for she is fair.

And Samson said, concerning them, now shall I be more blameless than the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure. He went and caught 300 foxes, put firebrands in their tails, and sent them out into the Philistine cornfields to burn them down. So I'm always fascinated with pictures of Samson.

You watch strongman competitions Samson could move too, like he was not one of these muscle men that couldn't even, you know, touch his hands behind his back. This guy could fly. Catching 300 foxes, tying their tails together, amazing.

So the first thing he does is strikes out again at the Philistines for taking his wife, burns their crops down. So when they ask who did this, they hear that it is Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite. And so because of that, they come and burn Samson's wife and father-in-law to fire.

Samson says, though you have done this, yet will I be avenged of you, and after that I will cease. It is so easy to read verses in the Bible as just something small and carry on. As I was walking down the grid road by Josh and Julia's last night, I just pictured myself like Samson, walking out with no weapon in my hand, and declaring that I am about to go and deal the Philistines another deadly blow.

I'm gonna smite them hip and thigh with a great slaughter. Absolute chaotic slaughter. One man army, no weapons, fulfilling God's call to deliver Israel.

Amazing. This guy was absolutely fearless, and every time that he goes out to do what I call him to do as a deliverer, the spirit of the Lord comes upon Samson and gives him great might. So after he does that, Samson goes down to, it says, the Rock of Edom, and there the Philistines find Samson, and a thousand Philistines come to the men of Judah, and they demand that Samson be handed over to them.

So 3,000 men of Judah come down and get Samson, and they said, we're binding you and handing you over to the Philistines. Now this, again, is such an amazing foreshadow of what is coming a thousand years later, because as they bind Samson with these cords, they said, we are handing you over to the Gentile enemy that wants to torture and put you to death. And they asked Samson, why are you doing this to us? The Philistines blamed everything that was going on in Samson, and that's always how it goes.

But these strong men of Judah come and bind their deliverer and hand him over, and Samson says the most fascinating things to these men of Judah. He says, I'll let you do that as long as you make a promise to me that you don't kill me yourself. I think it's a picture of what happened at the cross, because Jesus allows his own people to bind him and hand him over to the Gentiles to be mocked, tortured, and put to death.

And at this rock of Edom, at this instant, Samson gives such an amazing clear picture of both the grace and justice of our Lord, both the first and second advent, both the Lamb and the Lion, because as Samson is being marched forward, bound with ropes, with 3,000 of his own people, handing him over to the enemy to be put to death, he then comes face to face with a thousand armed Philistines that it said lay out a war cry when they see him bound and they're ready to kill him. But now we see the second advent of the Lord coming out, and it says that the spear of the Lord came upon Samson, and he snaps the ropes like they're burnt flax, and he reaches down and picks up a very unconventional weapon of war, a jawbone of an ass, and he proceeds to cut down a thousand armed men with a jawbone. I don't know if you're familiar with Joshua 23.10, but after Joshua brought the Hebrews into the promised land, and they'd begun the conquest that wasn't finished yet, they were supposed to finish it.

As a matter of fact, before Joshua even died, he rebuked the people of Israel for not going out and finishing the work that God gave them to do, this work that Samson is now busying himself with doing. But in Joshua 23.10, Joshua told the people, one of you will chase a thousand, because it is the Lord that fights for you. Amazing.

That one guy that Joshua was talking about, I believe, was Samson, because he cut down a thousand men. In verse 16, it says that Samson went to visit a harlot, in 16 verse 1, in the city of Gaza. Now, right after that, he goes to see Delilah, and it said that he loved this lady Delilah, who was from the valley of Sorek.

Now, the valley of Sorek, Samson, like the tribe of Dan was in a buffer zone between the Philistines and the captured land of Israel, the valley of Sorek is right in the middle. We don't actually know if Delilah was Hebrew or Philistine. It just said that Samson loved her.

Now, Samson never married, never had a wife, but Delilah either caught his eye, or like the woman of Timnath, that it said Samson, when he talked to her, she pleased him. Everyone likes to make Samson out like he's the most fleshly, lustful failure in the Bible. If you take a close look at these verses, I don't know if we can say that with any certainty.

It said that Samson loved Delilah. I'm more prone to think that she was a Hebrew, because when the people of Jericho knew that there was two spies in Rahab's place, they didn't come and offer her 5,500 pieces of silver. They said, you got spies in your place, get them out, we want these guys.

And they sealed the gate and tried to catch them. But they're offering a lot of money to Delilah. Maybe it's because she was a Hebrew, I don't know.

The story moves quick and it doesn't say. But regardless, Delilah is kind of a picture of Judas, the one that betrayed the Lord for 30 pieces of silver. And the Delilah story is quite interesting, and there's so much to talk about in these things, but I don't want to go on too long here.

But, you know, she's offered all this money, and the Philistine lords say, get the secret of his strength, so that we can bind and afflict this guy and take him out. And three different times, Delilah tries to get the secret of Samson's strength out of him. And each time Samson gives her an unaffectual route to doing that, she cries out, the Philistines are upon you.

I don't know if you've ever thought of this, but you would have to be a very dense person to go ahead and give the secret after those three attempts. And maybe what the Lord is showing through this story of Samson is that the Lord knew that he was going to be betrayed. And the Lord knew what he was walking into.

He wasn't taken by surprise. He's not stupid. I don't think he can be a judge of Israel and be that dense.

I don't know. One theologian writing of Samson said, you know, this guy is a riddle himself. He is a hard guy to figure out.

I agree. And so, as you know, Samson finally tells her the secret to his strength. His hair is cut, which he didn't cut.

She did. The Philistines did. And the spirit of the Lord departed from him for a time.

It said that his hair began to grow back as soon as it was cut. And as you know, Samson is then taken to Gaza, where their god Dagon is. And they have a feast and a celebration.

And they praise their god Dagon for delivering Samson into their midst. But it's very hard to checkmate the Lord. Because as they're praising their false god Dagon, Samson, who had his eyes gouged out, mocked, made a fool of, just like Jesus was blindfolded, mocked, tortured right before his death.

Samson does an amazing thing here. It was the Philistines that led him between the two main pillars that supported this whole tower. It says there was 3,000 lords of the Philistines, men and women, on the roof alone.

And in an incredible type, Samson asks this young guy to help him find those pillars. And Samson asks the Lord to one last time give him the strength back, so he can do his job. And so with outstretched arms, Samson offers up himself as a sacrifice at the end of this Nazarene battle, at the end of his life.

And in doing so, he takes out more enemies of God than he did during his life. You know, that's what they said about Jesus when he was born. That Jesus was showing up for the fall and rise of many.

We worship God during a covenant of grace, where God is always concealing his strength, and this anger, and this holy violence against sin and the enemies of God. And just because we don't see it very often, doesn't mean it's not there. As Larry pointed out before the service began, Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

He does not change. Just because the Covenant's changed, our Lord doesn't change. I want to go back and look at one last verse, and then I'll wrap up.

I shared at the beginning that there was one verse that just absolutely downfounded me when I was reading through the Samson story, and it's Judges 16.3. 16.1 says that he went to see a harlot in the city of Gaza, and he stayed there, lay there till midnight, but in the middle of the night he gets up, and he decides it's time to head out. Then when Samson to Gaza saw there a harlot, and went in under her, and it was told the Gazites, saying, Samson's come hither. And they compassed him in, and laid wait for him all night in the gate of the city, and were quiet all the night, saying, in the morning when it is day, we shall kill him.

And Samson lay till midnight. This is the verse that, like, it just drew me into the story. And Samson lay till midnight, and arose at midnight, and took the doors of the gate of the city, and the two posts, and went away with them bar and all, bar and all, and put them upon his shoulders, and carried them up to the top of a hill that is before Hebron.

Theologians all agree that this is the single greatest feat of strength ever recorded in the Bible. The double doors, the gates of a fortified city, most likely weighed two to three thousand pounds, just the doors. And there are two verses in the Bible that I have always shared that I find very humorous.

When you read in Acts, the story of Ananias and Sapphira, and Ananias and Sapphira lied to the Holy Spirit about what they gave to the church, and the Lord killed them both on the spot, there's a verse following that says that the people weren't really pumped about hanging out with the Apostles just then and there. I've always found that verse very humorous. The Bible has a, God has an amazing way of understating things.

And one of my favorite non-verses is the verse that talks about the men that were waiting in the gate to kill Samson. That verse kind of disappeared when Samson ripped the gates right off their city and carried them away. Pretty wild.

Now, you've all heard this story, but I just want to share a few neat things I found out just in the last three weeks about Gaza and these gates. In Joshua 11, it said that when Joshua came into the Promised Land, into Canaan, he started, with the Lord's blessing and spirit, started to rout the cities of God's enemies. Now, there was a people that I alluded to earlier that Goliath was from, the Anakim, the descendants of Anak, I believe was his name, and he was an unbeatable giant of a warrior.

What's interesting is that there was three cities in this Philistine territory that it says in Joshua that the Anakim were not routed out of. It said that there were still giants in Ashdod, Gath, and Gaza. And when I looked that up, all of a sudden it started to take on a little bit of a twist with me because I started asking, what is Samson doing here? Everyone likes to talk about the prostitute and why Samson was such a failure.

But maybe, just maybe, Samson had in mind the account of Joshua that he would have read. Because this is 400 years after the Hebrews went in and took the Promised Land. They would have had the account.

Samson would have read them. He would have read about how Joshua and Caleb went into Rahab's place to scout things out and prepare for war. Maybe that's what Samson did.

Maybe Samson went into this very fortified town as the most wanted guy on the poster in Gaza. He walks into the city himself, hides out till midnight, and then rips the very gates off their city, carries them, they think, 38 miles on his shoulders. It is uphill, just like our parents did.

Uphill, the one way at least, through sandy ground, and it's said that he put the gates on a hill overlooking Hebron. When I first read this verse, it made no sense to me. Why is verse 3 just plopped in the middle for no reason? But I think there's a really good reason.

I think what the Lord wants us to see through Samson, as he types the deliverer that's coming, is that the gates of hell are not going to prevail against the Lord and his people. And for all those that are trapped in Gaza, the deliverer has ripped the gates right off so that God's people can escape. And then he carries them on a shoulder to a hill outside of Hebron, firmly in Israeli territory.

Well, when this started to come to me, that it was a really close picture to Jesus carrying his cross on his shoulders to the top of the hill outside of town. I had a friend of mine make this picture for me. I don't know if you can see it, but that's Samson carrying the gates, Gaza in the background, and I had asked my friend to put just a silhouette picture of the cross that Samson was looking up to.

In John chapter 10 verse 9, what did Jesus say? He said, I am the gate. When Jesus laid down a perfect life on the cross, he defeated, he defeated our enemy, he defeated Satan, he defeated death. They brought him there to make sport of him, to torture him, to taunt him to save himself, and he would not.

And when he laid down his life and paid for all of our sins that believe in him, he became the gate, the only way in. He is the Alpha and Omega. He's the one who rips the gates off of Gaza and sets them up to enter heaven with.

There are very few that show the great picture of the coming Lord the way Samson does. So with that vast tour through Judges 13 to 16, can we see Christ through Samson? Absolutely. In Exodus 15 verse 3, when the Hebrews sang to the Lord after they were delivered from their enemies out of Egypt, Moses sang in 15 verse 3, the Lord is a man of war.

The Lord is his name. In Job 49 to 12, we read, hast thou an arm like God, or can thou thunder with a voice like him? Cast abroad the rage of thy wrath, and behold everyone that is proud, and abase him. Look on everyone that is proud, and bring him low, and tread down the wicked in their place.

That's what God asked Job when he began to question God's ability to be the righteous judge. In Nahum chapter 1, it says the Lord is a jealous and avenging God. The Lord is avenging and wrathful.

Who can stand before his indignation? Who can endure the heat of his anger? His wrath is poured out like fire. Psalm 711, God is a righteous judge and a God who deals indignation every day. Psalm 9011, who knows the power of your anger? According to the fear of you, so is your wrath.

Exodus 15 and 7, in the greatness of your majesty, you overthrow your adversaries, you send out your fury, it consumes them like stone. In Revelation 1915, he will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. In Revelation 6, hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb.

For the great day of the wrath has come, and who can stand? Isaiah 26, 21, for behold the Lord is coming out from his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. Hebrews 10, 31, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Psalm 212 says, kiss the sun lest his wrath be kindled but a little.

In Psalm 3712, it says, the wicked plot against the just and gnash upon him with his teeth. The Lord shall laugh at him, for he sees that his day is coming. I don't think there's anyone in the Bible that shows this aspect of our Lord like Samson does, and we don't see a lot of it because God keeps this concealed.

But one day, when he comes back, this isn't going to be concealed anymore, and I think we do well. If we're going to worship God, we need to worship him for who he is. We see the Lord through this great Judge Samson in some ways better than by any other man.

Yes, we see the submissive ones waiting on the Lord through men like Joseph, Daniel, Gideon, and Moses, but all as these passages tell us, there is a fiery, thunderous, violent wrath that Jesus is bringing when he returns as a lion, and no one in Scripture shows this better than Samson. So yes, the Judge who judges rightly has already made his ruling. Samson is in Hebrews 11, and by name.

When you read Hebrews 11, you need to remember that there's basically two categories of the faithful. In the first part, we read of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, and Samuel, who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the enemies. You have to remember, God never once promised Samson strength.

You won't find it anywhere in the account. God told him, begin the deliverance of your people, and every time Samson stepped out, he was like no other man, other than the Spirit of the Lord came upon him, and enabled him to do what he called him to do as he stepped out. Hebrews 11 goes on to say, others were tortured not accepting deliverance.

Others had trial of cruel mocking, scourgings, yea moreover of bonds and imprisonment. They were stoned, sawn asunder, tempted, slain with the sword, they wandered about, being destitute, afflicted, and tormented. I think Samson shows both of those.

I think Paul understood the story of Samson too. In 2nd Timothy 4 16, Paul says at my first answer, no man stood with me, but all men forsook me. I pray God that it may not be laid to their charge, notwithstanding the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me, that by me the preaching might be fully known, and that all the Gentiles might hear.

And what Paul? And I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion. It sounds to me like Paul, like the writer of Hebrews, is very familiar with the story and faith of Samson. Many of God's people through the ages to a degree, usually one lesser than Samson, have felt the loneliness of serving God alone and being abandoned, betrayed, and hated without a cause.

But Samson stands out as the deliverer of Israel that was completely alone as he did the work and fulfilled his God-given calling. He's the only one in Scripture who not one time receives help or aid from a single soul. Only hindrance and opposition from his people, hatred and violence from his enemies.

He showed grace to his people when they didn't deserve it, and he judged the wicked as the Lord is coming back to do. Jesus said in Matthew 28 that all power and authority is given unto me in heaven and on earth. We should be greatly encouraged to go out and take the offensive as Samson did.

And Samson did. The Lord has ripped the gates from the city of destruction that bound the lost. We need to go in faith in the strength of the Lord and fulfill our calling as well.

All the heavy lifting has been done. In Isaiah 63 3 we read, I have trodden the winepress alone and of the people there was none with me. For I will tread them in my anger and trample them in my fury and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments and I will stain all my raiment.

We hear often that we should not fear the Lord in that kind of way. I think that's absolute nonsense. If you've ever come close to the evil that's in this world and what God may or may not allow you to go through, you should be terrified and thankful that like the men of Judah, the Deliverer is going to cause your sins to pass by.

In Romans, Paul tells us that the just shall live by faith. So put yourself in Samson's shoes. Never once being promised strength, just setting out to do what God gave him to do.

Samson lived by faith and not just in the end, but his whole life was a life of faith and maybe better than most, Samson has shown us a picture of what the Lord is like in his completeness, full of grace and truth, a lamb and a lion, a prince of peace and a man of war. Amen.