This is the time of year when movie studios release the films they think have the best chance of winning the Oscar for Best Picture. How many of those hyped-up movies have you gone to see only to leave the theatre muttering: “I just wasted two hours of my life and twenty bucks”? Will we conclude something similar about Samson as we continue our sermon series on that long-haired strongman of the Bible? Last week we heard how Samson was the most likely to succeed. His birth had been announced by God himself and he was born to pious parents. Did Samson live up to the hype and deliver his people from the Philistines? Was he a champ or a chump? In today’s sermon based on Judges 14 and 15 we’ll see how Samson was armed and donkey-ish. The real hero, not surprisingly, is our God of patience and grace. Let’s find out more.
Judges 14 picks up the true story of Samson after he returned from the nearby Philistine village where he had seen a girl he liked. Samson said to his parents: “Get her for me as my wife” (Judges 14:2b). Kids, do you bark orders at your parents like that? “Get me some Mac ‘n Cheese!” I hope not. It seems that this was a habit of Samson’s, however. For even when his parents tried to dissuade him, gently asking if there wasn’t a fellow Israelite he could marry, Samson retorted: “Get her for me. She’s the right one for me [literally: she’s right it my eyes]” (Judges 14:3). Samson cared about one thing: looks. It didn’t matter to him that God had said that Israelites were not to marry their unbelieving neighbors, as his parents lovingly reminded him. What a chump.
Now if you’re familiar with this text, you’ll remember that after this exchange we read: “His parents did not know that this was from the Lord, who was seeking an occasion to confront the Philistines” (Judges 14:4a). We should not understand that to mean that God had prompted Samson to seek this marriage. No, it’s informing us that God had decided to use Samson’s sinful choice in his divine plan to give relief to the Israelites from the oppression of the Philistines. This pattern will be repeated throughout our lesson today.
Samson’s parents relented and agreed to meet the Philistine girl. Samson himself now chatted with the girl for the first time and decided that one date was enough for him to confirm that she should be his life-long partner! It’s no wonder there was tension between Samson and his parents. In fact on the way to the girl’s village, parents and son had not walked together. That’s why when a young lion jumped out at Samson, his parents weren’t there to witness what happened. The Spirit of the Lord came upon Samson so that he was able to tear that lion in two with his bare hands. When Samson returned for his wedding, he looked for the lion carcass and found a beehive in it from which he scooped out some honey and shared it with his parents.
These details are important because they show again what a chump Samson was. As a Nazirite, a special servant of God, he was not supposed to touch anything that was dead. That divine command didn’t stop Samson however. There was honey in that dead lion and Samson wanted some. Does this sound like a spiritually mature individual who, with the help of the Holy Spirit, worked to keep his passions in check? No. This chump did whatever he liked, whenever he liked.
Such a track record makes us wonder whether or not Samson even tried to refrain from drinking wine at his seven-day wedding banquet. As a Nazirite, wine too was off limits for Samson. What we do know is that he willingly gave into his covetous desires at the banquet. He made up a riddle based on his recent experience with the lion and the honey and bet his wedding companions a set of clothes each that they couldn’t guess it. The riddle went like this: “Out of the eater, something to eat; out of the strong, something sweet” (Judges 14:14). For three days his thirty groomsmen pondered the riddle but couldn’t solve it. But these were Philistines – the mafia of the ancient world; they knew how to get their way. They approached Samson’s bride and threatened to burn her and her family if she didn’t coax the answer out of Samson. The drama queen first accused Samson of not loving her because he hadn’t told her the answer to the riddle, and then she sobbed…for the next four days of the wedding banquet (!) until Samson gave in. The triumphant groomsmen must have snickered as they gave the answer to Samson’s riddle: “What is sweeter than honey? And what is stronger than a lion?” (Judges 14:18)
Samson knew how they had gotten the answer but a bet was a bet. Burning with anger he left his bride standing at the altar and went to Ashkelon, one of the big Philistine cities, where he killed 30 men, took their clothes, and gave them to his groomsmen before storming off to his parent’s home. Samson clearly had an anger-management problem and yet the sacred text reports that it was the Spirit of the Lord who gave Samson the power to kill those 30 men! God again uses Samson’s sinful motives in his divine plan of deliverance.
After several weeks if not months, Samson returned to his bride’s house taking with a valentine gift of a young goat, as if that would make up for leaving his bride standing at the altar. But she wasn’t waiting for him. She had married one of Samson’s groomsmen instead! Again Samson’s anger flared up. This time he caught 300 foxes, tied a torch between their tails and let the animals loose. Fires spread across Philistine grain fields and orchards. When the owners discovered the motive for the arson, they burned Samson’s ex-fiancé and her father! This only made Samson so angry that he started killing Philistines left and right before withdrawing (fleeing?) to a place called Etam where he literally (and perhaps fittingly) lived as a caveman.
The Philistines weren’t done with Samson, however. Remember, they were ruling over the Israelites at this time so they brought an army into Israelite territory to put the squeeze on their subjects. They demanded Samson. Poor Israelites. What were they to do? Well, they should have rallied around Samson. After all, God had said that he was to deliver them from the Philistines. Instead they bind and deliver their deliverer to the enemy! Doesn’t that remind you of the way they would treat Jesus thousands of years later? Instead of welcoming the Savior they arrested him because he was upsetting the status quo. Is that the way we treat Jesus? He is our deliverer from sin and yet when he upsets the status quo through one of his messengers who calls us to repent of those sins, do we wish he would just mind his own business? Lord have mercy on us!
As Samson approached the Philistine army, they raised a great shout of victory. But at that moment the Spirit of the Lord came upon Samson again with great power so that he was able to snap the ropes which bound him. He then thrust his hand into a dead donkey that was lying nearby and yanked off its jawbone (even though as a Nazirite he wasn’t supposed to touch anything dead). With this jawbone Samson killed 1,000 Philistines and he made up a little poem about it too. “With a donkey’s jawbone I have made donkeys of them [or “made a heap or two”]. With a donkey’s jawbone I have killed a thousand men” (Judges 15:16). What can I say? Armed and donkey-ish, that was Samson.
But then, for the first time, we hear Samson call out to the Lord. He said: “You have given your servant this great victory. Must I know die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?” (Judges 15:18) It was nice of Samson to acknowledge that God had given him the strength to win but couldn’t he have been a bit more humble in the way he asked for a drink? What a chump! What would God do? Would he answer this insolent servant of his? He did! God miraculously opened up a spring at Samson’s feet from which he drank and was revived. Samson would call that spring En Hakkore which means “Caller’s Spring.”
Do you see what I mean when I said earlier that the real hero of today’s lesson is not Samson but our patient and gracious God? From the beginning to pretty much the end of today’s lesson, Samson made bad decisions. He ignored his parents’ godly advice when insisting on marrying that Philistine girl. He touched a dead carcass not once but twice. He regularly failed to hold his anger in check. And yet in spite of all that, God blessed Samson with victory after victory and even answered his presumptuous prayer. What grace! That’s how our God deals with us - we who also often ignore God’s Word and godly advice and then presumptuously demand God’s help. At our feet he miraculously pours out his abundant love and forgiveness.
Do you know what that patient love revives you to do? It empowers you to be patient with the Samson-like chumps in your life. These are the people who easily lose their temper, who can only think of themselves, who do whatever makes them feel good and generally make a mess of other people’s lives. When we come face to face with such chumps it’s easy to wonder why God doesn’t remove them since they’re a pain and cause such stress! But today’s text makes this startling revelation: chumps are God’s tools too. God unleashed Samson on the Philistines so they would turn from their idols and acknowledge that the God of the Israelites was the only true God. God still lets us bump up against chumps. When he does he’s not excusing the sins they may commit against us. He is, however, using their rough edges to sand down and to smooth out our splintery characteristics. He is teaching us patience and giving us opportunities to offer the divine forgiveness we ourselves have received through Jesus.
No, there isn’t a lot to like about Samson in today’s episode. He was armed and donkey-ish – more chump than champ. But so am I when I ignore God’s Word and godly advice. Yet in spite of that God uses me as his tool and he hears my prayers. What patient grace! How can I be certain of this blessing? Well just as Samson found honey in an unlikely place: the carcass of a lion, we find sweet forgiveness somewhere as unlikely: in the death of the Lion of Judah, Jesus Christ. May his forgiving love grant us patience to live with fellow chumps. Amen.
