Judges 14-15

1. Judges 14-15 Old Testament Bible Studies True Love Church of Refuge Prophetess Delisa Lindsey July 8, 2009

2. Salvation by Samuel Twenty Years Judges 14:1-16:31

3. Samson Desires a Wife Judges 14:1-4

4. Judges 14:1 • Samson goes down to Timnath (portion) and spots a Philistine woman there. • To be a physically strong man, he was morally weak to desire a woman from an enemy tribe. Each new generation weakens in their moral choices and social behavior. Samson chose to break the Mosaic law regarding mixed marriages (Ex. 34:16). • Timnath is four miles away from his hometown. Take notice of the striking comparison between his physical and moral descent.

5. Judges 14:2 • He returns back home (up) and inquires (demands) of his parents to obtain this Philistine woman as his wife. • Samson made a poor and impatient choice. He disregarded his parents wishes and the dismissed moral code of the nation he was born to defend. • This woman was a Philistine, a worshipper of Dagon, an enemy to Israel and a menace to the Heavenly society. What could be so appealing about this woman who stood for everything Samson was assigned to destroy.

6. Judges 14:3 • Samson’s parents tried to reason with him. They counseled their son to choose a wife among his family, among his people. Choose someone who looks like you, talks like you, loves your God like you, honors their parents like you do. • You must have compatibility in marriage. Sex and money cannot substitute for compatibility. (2 Cor. 6:14, Amos 3:3) • Dismissing his parents counsel, he tells them to “get her for me, for she pleases me well.”

7. “She Pleaseth Me Well” • How could this woman be a suitable help mate for a man like Samson. Samson had a purpose in life. He had a destiny to fulfill. How could she help him in his ministry of deliverance when the people he would wage war against would be her own? • How can you marry a sinner when you have been called to preach against the very nature of sin? What shall separate you from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus? Shall sex separate you? Shall a fancy car and a dream house separate you? Nothing shall separate you from the love of God which is to obey His Commandments and be not unequally yoked with unbelievers. • Young men don’t be fooled by long hair, long nails, full lips, and curvaceous figures. Make sure she has God in her heart, not in her lips, hips, thighs, and sighs. Young woman don’t be fooled by city slickers. Does he have a job, does he honor his parents, is he filled with the Holy, not unholy Spirit, how stable is he in life? Ask these questions before you start jumping. • This is precisely what happens when we choose a mate based on what our eyes see and what our heart focuses on. Seek godly counsel, and seek parental advice before contemplating marriage. The bible does not declare this woman as a virgin, simply a woman. What does this tell you concerning her loyalty as a wife when she has tasted forbidden fruits? Delilah is called by the same, ‘woman’, compare them to the virgin Mary, and Esther • Although Samson made a huge error in judgment, God was able to intervene to bring accusations against the Philistines.

8. Judges 14:4 • Samson’s parents were grieved over the decision of their son, their only son. What they did not know, however was that God allowed Samson to follow the vain imaginations of his heart to bring about His purpose. • God had ulterior motives. He always has a divine plan in mind, even in the midst of our folly! • Somebody say, Thank you Jesus!

9. Samson Slays a LionThe Riddle Judges 14:5-7

10. Judges 14:5 • Samson is traveling to Timnath with his parents to arrange this forbidden marriage. He becomes separated from them at one point when he encounters a lion. • Notice that separation from his parents caused him to wander in the path of a lion. Children should take precautions to follow their parents instructions to avoid crossing paths with the lion who walketh about seeking whom he may devour. • We should also steer clear of the vicious paths of the vines, extreme drinking which also opens the door to demonic influences.

11. Judges 14:6 • The Spirit of the Lord comes upon Samson in the form of supernatural strength enabling him to tear this young lion in half. • He used his bare hands with ease. • Samson kept this incident to himself, choosing not to share with his parents what had just taken place. • Was this lion a stumbling block to keep Samson from making a mistake?

12. Judges 14:7-9 • After having conquered the lion, he continued on his journey to pursue the woman of Timnath. • Jesus overcame the lion also. He gave us sweet victory just like honey from Samson’s lion. • After he returned to the ‘woman’, he observed bees making honey in the dehydrated carcass of the lion. • Samson broke his Nazirite vow by tasting the honey from within the carcass of the dead lion. • He withheld the source of the honey from his parents as he shared his ‘sweet gift’ with them. Samson may have been able to hide his sins from his parents, but he could never hide them from God.

13. Judges 14:10-11 • Samson made a feast according to Philistine tradition. He broke another of his Nazirite vow by dining on meats and drinking large amounts of strong drinks. • The festivities also took place at the bride’s house, probably because his parents would not agree with the marriage. His mother remained at home during the marriage celebration. • The woman had 30 bodyguards to protect her during this time of feasting. No doubt this stranger with unusually sized biceps caused them to take certain security measures.

14. The Father Went Down to the Woman…. Samson made there a Feast… - Spiritual Observation • The Father of the Bridegroom makes the feast. The marriage of Samson was typical to the marriage of Christ to the church. • The Gospel feast or the continued ministry of the Word is the result of the Father accompanying His Son in obtaining the Woman, the Church, for His Bride. Daniel talked about the seventy weeks of years until the Gentiles have filled their dispensation. Isaiah prophesied also of the “Day of the Lord”.

15. Judges 14:12-13 • The wedding feasts lasts for seven days. Samson gives them a riddle to solve which for seven days would baffle them. • He offers them 30 linen garments and 30 changes of clothes if they could answer the riddle. • If they could not answer the riddle, then they would have to give him 30 linen garments, and 30 changes of clothing. • The men agreed to solve the riddle.

16. Judges 14:14 • The riddle, “out the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness.” • Three days has passed before the men could answer the riddle. • When God brings good out of evil, and when that which has threatened ruin has turned to our advantage, we have sweets from the meat eater.

17. Judges 14:15 • On the seventh day, the men were still clueless. They threatened Samson’s new wife. They would burn her family’s house down with them in it if she did not entice (fool) her husband for the solution to the riddle. • They were afraid of looking stupid in front of the wedding guests and falling into poverty by supplying him with the specific clothing if they could not solve the riddle.

18. Judges 14:16-17 • She wept before Samson and accused him of not loving her and hating her because she didn’t know the answer to the riddle he presented to her people. • He responds that not even his parents knew the answer to his riddle. • She continued her feigned weeping for the seven days until he told her on the seventh day. She literally wore him out with her crying and nagging in the first week of their marriage until the strong man buckled under pressure.

19. Judges 14:18 Armed with the answer to the riddle the men answered Samson by replying “what is sweeter than honey? And what is stronger than a lion? Samson accused them of ‘plowing’ (enslaving) his wife to retrieve the solution to his riddle. He said they plowed her like a heifer to find out the answer.

20. Judges 14:19-20 • Because of his traitorous wife, Samson now owed a significant debt to the Philistines. The Spirit of the Lord came upon him as he went to Ashkelon twenty miles away and took his wrath out on 30 Philistines whom he killed and stole their garments to pay for his riddle. • Samson’s father in- law was upset that he left his daughter in the midst of her wedding celebration and he gave her as a wife to Samson's best (man) friend. • Whether Samson intended this marriage to be a lasting one or not no one knows but he certainly was temperamental enough to leave at the drop of a hat for days at a time without communicating with her.

21. Judges 15:1-7 Samson burns Philistines’ crops

22. Judges 15:1-2 • Samson attempts a conjugal visit with his wife at the beginning of the wheat harvest (May or June). He had appeased his anger and he prepared a young goat as a peace offering to present to his estranged wife. • To his horror, her father had given her away to be the wife of his best friend (best man). • The father offers the woman’s younger sister whom he thought was more beautiful than the older as his new wife. • But Samson was not seeking a trade-in, he wanted his wife.

23. Judges 15:3-5 • Tempers flaring again, Samson decides to exact vengeance on the Philistines. He decides to serve them up a platter of their own insults. • With no army to support him in his endeavors, Samson captures 300 foxes (jackals) and tied their tails together. • He placed torches between their tails sent them scattering through the vineyards, the corn and grain fields and the olive trees which were ready for the harvest setting them on fire.

24. Judges 15:6- • The thing that the woman feared came upon her. When the Philistines discovered t was Samson who burned their fields they immediately accused the father in- law of upsetting Samson and they burned the woman and her family by arson in a house fire. The thing she sought to escape from was the thing that fell upon her. • She should have told Samson about the threats the men imposed on her. Honesty is always the best policy. She lied and manipulated her husband and she received a liar’s reward.

25. What went wrong? • Samson was wrong to marry a woman who belonged to his enemies. The lust of his flesh consumed him. • Through the marriage, though Samson was able to see the cruelty of the Philistines. God would use him in this regard to punish the heathens. • The woman should have been honest with Samson and told him that the men were threatening her family instead of trying to trick him remember Esther’s dilemma? She chose honesty over sorcery and she received a honest person’s reward. • The result of her manipulation was that she was destroyed by the very act that she tried to avoid. • The father in law was wrong for giving away Samson’s wife and offering him his younger daughter. The younger girl did not please him he wanted the woman who pleased him well and now she was pleasing his best man!

26. Judges 15:7-8 • The Philistines thought to satisfy Samson’s wrath by murdering the woman and her family but they only made Samson angrier. • He said his anger would not cease until he avenges himself upon them. He was the judge sent to exact divine punshment. • He turned on the men who killed his in-laws by mercilessly murdering the Philistine men by beating them to death. • Fleeing from danger he hid in the cleft of a rock in Etam.

27. Judges 15:9-20 Samson slays a thousand Philistines

28. Judges 15:9-11 • The Philistines dispatched forces to capture Samson. They went up to pitch camp in Judah and spread themselves to Lehi (jawbone). • The men of Judah inquired of the Philistines what they wanted. They wanted to bind Samson they replied. They wanted to do to him what he had done to them. • 3000 Israelites came to Samson criticizing him and scolding him for his acts. • “Don’t you know the Philistines rule over us? What have you done? • He replied I did to them what they to me.

29. Judges 15:12-13 • The frightened men of Israel said we are going to arrest you and turn you over to the Philistines. • Samson was afraid they were going to kill him and he made them promise that they wouldn’t. • They assured him that they were going to bind him and deliver him to the Philistines. • He permitted them to do so and they tied him up securely with two new cords and brought him down from the rock.

30. Judges 15:14 • When he came to Lehi where the Philistines were camped they shouted in anticipatory triumph however, the Spirit of the Lord came upon him endowing him with supernatural strength to destroy his enemies. • He ripped those ‘secured’ cords off of him with the ease of crumpling a sheet of paper and he was loosed from the cords. With his supernatural strength, the new cords were as flimsy as linen which had been burnt. • Where the Spirit of the Lord is liberty.

31. Judges 15:15 • He found a fresh donkey’s jawbone where the vultures had just finished eating the dead animal’s flesh and used it as a weapon against the Philistines. • He slaughtered 1,000 men with a jawbone. (One can chase a thousand!) • God will take the foolish things to confound the wise. The victory to defeat the enemy was not in the bone, but in the power of the living God. • Leave the guns behind and take a bone and Jesus into your battles. David had a sling shot and slew his giant. What do you have in your hand? Use it to the glory of God.

32. Judge 15:16-17 • Although no details are given of the battle, and 1,000 may be an estimate, the others ran to safety. • Samson used a play on words when he said, “heaps upon heaps” have I slain 1,000. • The Hebrew word for ass and heap are both chamorah which means a reddish color. In other words, he is saying that he beat to a bloody pulp the men with the bone colored like a bloody pulp. He beat the men mercilessly and made asses or donkeys out of them in the process by the manner in which he killed them. • Yes, we are still reading the Bible! As Samson finished his speech, he threw the jawbone away and re-named Lehi, Ramath-Lehi, meaning Hill of the Jawbone

33. Judges 15:18 • It was still harvest season and the weather was seasonably hot. Therefore after Samson’s massacre at Ramath-Lehi, he became very thirsty. • He was so thirsty that he thought he would die of dehydration, so he called on the name of the Lord to quench his extreme thirst. God had used him to bring great deliverance to Israel but now he needed deliverance for himself. (Does this scenario sound familiar?) • “I thirst”. • He did not want to faint in the wilderness of thirst and be left in the hands of the Philistines.

34. Where were the 3,000 men of Judah? Surely they had water for Samson to drink. Why weren’t their names mentioned in the previous conflict? Why would they turn their brother over to the hands of the enemy and run? Samson referred to himself as the servant of the Lord. Even though he violated his Nazirite vow again by touching a dead carcass, by using a jawbone. God is teaching us to not rely on our own strengths, not in others either, but in His alone. God answered His servant, the warrior, by splitting a place within the hill, called Jawbone, and provided water for Samson. God provided a spring of water in the cleft of a rock! Look at God!! God revived Samson’s spirit from the “water” and Samson renamed that place, En-hakkore, which means, Spring of One Calling. He judged Israel for 20 years. Judges 15:19-20