For sermons and additional resources, visit STBARTS.COM.AU

JUDGES: AMAZING GRACE(TALK 4/6: SAMSON PART I)

SMALL GROUP DISCUSSION QUESTIONS CONNECT: How can we show our trust in our salvation and point others to Christ?

WARM-UP Questions 1. Other than Jesus, who is your greatest hero? How are even our greatest heroes still flawed? 2. Do you think it is possible for God to even use our weaknesses to bring about his purposes?

Read Judges 13:1-3 3. What does it mean that the people again did ‘evil in the Lord’s eyes’? How is this gaining momentum as

a downward spiral? 4. How is it evident that people are moving from ‘doing evil in the Lord’s eyes’ to simply ‘doing whatever

they see fit’? Why is this such a dangerous progression? Are we ever at risk of this? 5. Why is it significant that the people have failed to repent? Whilst the Lord is continuing to deliver them,

why will it be essential for them to look to him? 6. How does your life reflect the truth that God’s eyes matter more than your own? 7. What are the things that you spend most of your time thinking about? How could these things become

idols? How could you spot them in advance? 8. What other stories in the Bible remind you of this birth announcement? How does it emphasise that this

is God’s initiative?

Read Judges 13:4-25 9. In what way was Samson being set apart? What was distinctive about his Nazirite vows? 10. What do you make of Manoah’s response to all of this? How about his wife’s response? 11. If you just read chapter 13, in what way would you be hopeful about what could follow?

Read Judges 14 12. What do you make of Samson’s debut as a judge? How is his behaviour symptomatic of all of Israel? 13. If this is what a Saviour looks like when made in the image of a human, what would a Saviour look like

made in God’s likeness? Why do we so desperately need this? 14. In what ways is Jesus greater than Samson could ever be? 15. How does God use the wickedness expressed towards Jesus, as a means to set us free?

APPLY (to this week): Is there anything in your life to which you look, that is in danger of leading you away from what the Lord desires?

PRAY: Almighty Lord, we thank you that you have demonstrated incredible initiative in sending your son, to be set apart, to save us even at the hands of the wicked. Thank you that you use us, even though we are weak, that your purposes might be brought about in the world. Please help us to do what is good in your

eyes – that we might constantly look to you, instead of our own desires. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

For sermons and additional resources, visit STBARTS.COM.AU

JUDGES: AMAZING GRACE(TALK 4/6: SAMSON PART 1)

GOING DEEPER RESOURCES & SUGGESTIONS Potential Next Steps

NEXT STEP IN GROWING: Have you considered coming along to the Alpha Course? Check out our website for more information.

Video & Poster • The Bible Project have an excellent overview of Judges:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOYy8iCfIJ4 • The Bible Project also have an excellent overview poster for Judges:

https://thebibleproject.com/view-resource/219

Talks & Audio • “The foundations of a Godly Man” – by David Jensen

https://mbm.org.au/bible-talks/the-foundations-of-a-godly-man-pm/ • ‘Samson’ – by Peter Baker

http://resources.thegospelcoalition.org/library/samson • You might like to revisit our ‘Joshua’ series from last year as background:

https://stbarts.com.au/joshua-trusting-in-the-promises-of-god • City Summer School Talks on Judges:

http://www.st-helens.org.uk/resources/media-library/src/talk/54523/title/talk-1 • Judges Overview Talk:

http://www.st-helens.org.uk/resources/media-library/src/talk/10119/title/judges-overviewH

Helpful Articles & Books • “Beyond the Lectionary Texts: Judges 13:1-16” by Heidi de Jonge

http://cep.calvinseminary.edu/non-rcl-starters/judges-131-16/ • “Why you need Judges’ – interview with Tim Keller

https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/reviews/why-you-need-judges-tim-keller-on-a-provocative-pivotal-pertinent-book/

• “The Message of Judges” by Michael Wilcock https://www.bookdepository.com/Message-Judges-Michael-Wilcock/9780851109725?ref=grid-view&qid=1524286470469&sr=1-1

• “Judges for You” by Tim Keller https://www.bookdepository.com/Judges-for-You-Timothy-J-Keller/9781908762900?ref=grid-view&qid=1524286494611&sr=1-2

Talk 1/6 (JUDGES: GOD’S UNFOLDING GRACE): 13/05/18 “Samson Part I”

by the Rev’d Adam Lowe

Bible Passage: Judges 13 & 14

Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord, so the Lord delivered them into the hands of the Philistines for forty years… (Judges 13:1)

If that sounds familiar, then that's because it is! • The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord; they forgot the Lord… (3:7)

Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord… (3:12) Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord… (4:1) The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord… (6:1) Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord… (10:6)

• Now, if you’re a super sleuth, you might be noticing a pattern. • The Israelites - God’s very own people - keep doing evil in the eyes of the Lord. • Twelve cycles of Judges, over hundreds of years, and nothing seems to change.

In fact the only thing that seems to change is that the situation gets worse. • In the struggle to align their lives and agenda with God, each and every generation

diverge more, with the creativity of their wickedness being their only accomplishment. • And so the people turn away from God, they experience oppression as a result of their

disobedience, only then - in light of their suffering - to cry out to God in repentance, for the Lord, full of compassion, to deliver them once again.

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Perhaps after all of these chapters, you’ve found yourself thinking, not only does this seem a bit repetitive, but why doesn’t God do something about it?! • If God knows that the people will keep on turning away,

why doesn’t he just rescue them anyway? Why wouldn’t God just save them? • But therein lies the basic human conundrum:

We want to be delivered, but we just don’t want God. When you can’t be saved, unless you’re connected to the one who does the saving.

• This is the last time in Judges that we will hear that ‘they did evil in the eyes of the Lord’,not because they’re going to experience a dramatic turn around, but because things are going to get dramatically worse.

• That’s what we see in Samson, the last God-appointed judge: in Samson we get a saviour made in the likeness of us,when what we need, is a saviour made in the likeness of God.

• We’re going to take two weeks to look at Samson, because it’s not only in this very broken man that we get a glimpse of the true nature of Israel, but we also get a glimpse of ourselves and how God intervenes. That:

• it is God who takes the INITIATIVE;it is God who SETS APART; and,it is God who has a PURPOSE. //

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#1 GOD TAKES THE INITIATIVE \\ JUDGES 13:1-3

There are two significant indicators, right up front chapter 13, that it is God who takes the INITIATIVE.

• The first clue is what is not said. • In the past, in the cycle of Israel doing evil and then experiencing oppression,

it’s actually in the experience of the mess that they’ve created, that they’re moved to turn to God for help through repentance.

• I wonder if you’ve ever known that to be true? That you persist in doing something your way, even with the offer of help, until you’ve made such a mess of things, that it’s only then that you realise, that you can’t do it on your own.

• That’s what we’ve seen in the Israelites over-and-over again, that it’s only - tragically - when they’re suffering for sometimes decades, that they actually come to realise that they need help.

• But note in chapter 13 what’s missing. In verse 1, we read of the people turning away and therefore experiencing oppression, but without any reference to them repenting, it skips immediately to God’s plan to provide the next judge.

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• This is not an accident, this isn’t just a detail that’s been left out. It’s extraordinary. For not only does it point to God’s phenomenal and proactive mercy, but it also shows us just how bad the situation has progressed.

• They’ve gone from doing evil in God’s eyes, to being completely blind to what they’re doing, meaning they’re on the trajectory of doing whatever they see fit.

• That’s where they’re headed - that’s where the book of Judges will find its conclusion. This is not just the Israelites falling short, but that they have become so compromised, so enmeshed with the cultures amidst them, so forgetful of all that the Lord has done for them, that they can neither see what they are doing, nor the Lord to whom they should call.

BUT God steps in regardless and does something phenomenal.

A certain man of Zorah, named Manoah, from the clan of the Danites, had a wife who was childless, unable to give birth. The angel of the Lord appeared to her and said, “You are barren and childless, but you are going to become pregnant and give birth to a son. (Judges 13-2-3)

This would be no ordinary son, this is judge appointed by God, even before he was conceived! !5

• Pregnancy announcements from angelic visitors tend to get your attention. • We see God acting in this way time-and-time again throughout the Bible. • There can be no doubt that this is an act of God - it’s God’s doing. • They were unable to give birth, BUT they will have a child. • And as we hear that,

we’re not only meant to have a wonderful joy at the news that Manoah and his wife are to be expecting, but it’s meant to carry a weight of hopeful expectation.

• That by God acting in this way, despite the people’s failure to repent, it’s signalling, that God will draw about his purposes, through this child.

• Despite the perilous history, this birth announcement is full of hope, because God has taken the initiative!

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#2 GOD SETS APART \\ JUDGES 13:4-25

And God does that by, second, SETTING Samson APART.

Now see to it that you drink no wine or other fermented drink and that you do not eat anything unclean. You will become pregnant and have a son whose head is never to be touched by a razor because the boy is to be a Nazirite, dedicated to God from the womb. He will take the lead in delivering Israel from the hands of the Philistines.” (Judges 13:4-5)

The word nazir means set apart.

• And so, a person who would take a Nazirite vow, was literally, being set apart for God’s purposes in a crucial time needing God’s help.

• And as per Numbers 6, individuals could voluntarily choose to take this vow, for a temporary time in order to be set apart for God’s service.

• And just as for all Nazirites, Samson would express this vow in three ways. He would abstain from wine, so that nothing would lead him away from God; He would not cut his hair, as a distinctive reminder of his vow; and He also would not touch a dead body, to remain clean and point him to his living God.

• But Samson being a Nazirite would be quite unique. Because:

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• Instead of just voluntarily choosing, it would be his parents who make the vow. Instead of just temporarily taking up the vow, it would be for the entirety of his life, extending right from the time that he was in the womb.

• Which is all meant to communicate to us, not only that Samson’s life is meant to be set apart for God’s purposes by God, but that Samson can only fulfil his role by remaining connected to God.

• This is man upon whom there are great expectations!

…he will take the lead [or “begin”] in delivering Israel from the hands of the Philistines.”

Finally! God is setting apart a deliverer, dedicated to being unusually, weirdly pure, because if the people are evil, they need a judge who is not. //

• Despite the angel telling all of the requirements to the wife, the husband doesn’t quite believe, and so he asks the angel himself, only to be told that he needs to listen to his wife.

• The man wants to understand. • That’s why he asks the name of the angel and offers food.

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• By knowing someone’s name people thought they would know their character and how to control them. By giving food, they thought someone became obligated to you. But God will have none of that.

• For whilst Manoah is seeking control, this is God’s show. If Manoah wants to raise Samson, he doesn’t need more information, he needs God! If Samson is going to be the judge that the people need, he’s only going to do it, by being a man after God’s own heart.

24 The woman gave birth to a boy and named him Samson. He grew and the Lord blessed him, 25 and the Spirit of the Lord began to stir him while he was in Mahaneh Dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.

• A baby is going to be born by God’s own intervention. They think this baby will be the judge they need. This could be the moment finally when their enemies are overturned.

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#3 GOD HAS A PURPOSE \\ JUDGES 14

But whilst this is the moment in the superhero movie, in which you EXPECT the big rescue and defeat of evil to come about, things just don’t go according to that script. • Samson, surprises us in all the wrong ways,

as he ends up being one weak, strong man. But despite human shortcomings, God’s purposes will not fail. • In parallel to Samson’s debut as judge and unravelling as a man,

God is secretly working out his purposes.

1 Samson went down to Timnah and saw there a young Philistine woman. 2 When he returned, he said to his father and mother, “I have seen a Philistine woman in Timnah; now get her for me as my wife.” 3 His father and mother replied, “Isn’t there an acceptable woman among your relatives or among all our people? Must you go to the uncircumcised Philistines to get a wife? ” But Samson said to his father, “Get her for me. She’s the right one for me.”

The resistance of Samson’s parents, wasn’t because of racism.

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• they objected because it was against God’s law, they objected because the Philistines were their greatest enemy. Samson was meant to be defeating the Philistines, not marrying them! In the most of heartbreaking of ways, despite the great expectations that preceded him,we’re being shown that Samson is actually just as bad as anyone else.

• Note that when we read v.4 “His parents did not know that this was from the Lord”, it’s not to say that Samson is doing this in response to God’s prompting… No. It’s a signal to say that as disastrous as this looks, God will use it. //

• When Samson spots the woman, saying “she pleases me”, he’s literally saying, “she’s pleasing with my eyes”.

• People might feel outraged at Samson, but Samson, is merely the embodiment of Israel, concerned not with how the Lord sees things, but doing exactly as he sees fit.

• That’s further evidenced in the events that follows as he breaks two of his Nazirite vows.

5 Samson went down to Timnah together with his father and mother. As they approached the vineyards of Timnah, suddenly a young lion came roaring toward him. 6 The Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon him so that he tore the lion apart with his bare hands as he might have torn a young goat. But he told neither his father nor his mother what he had done. 7 Then he went down and talked with the woman, and he liked her. (Judges 14:5-7)

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Note, the subtle detail of where he is: he’s in a vineyard, and the language of the wedding feast that follows suggest that this is an alcohol-laden party.

• And if that wasn’t bad enough, that when he encounters the dead Lion later, despite his vow not to touch a corpse, he scoops the honey, eats it, gives it to his parents, and conveniently forgets to tell them where it came from.

• He sees, he desires, he takes. That’s the pattern of Samson’s life. Concerned with what he wants, he’s disregarded what God wants.

• And so continuing that line, sharing a feast with the people who are meant to be his enemies, he challenges them to a riddle:

“Out of the eater, something to eat; out of the strong, something sweet.” (14:14)

It’s a complete hustle, no one can possibly answer it other than him, he thinks it is a ‘sure thing’ but through his weakness he let’s slip to his wife, in a manner of coercion that will only come back to haunt him again later.

• The result? They win the bet and in order to pay up, Samson, driven by personal vengeance and embarrassment, goes and kills 30 men, strips them of their clothes, and gives them to the ones who won the bet.

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• Despite being a victory over their enemies, it feels weak, because instead of being driven by God’s purposes, his motivation seems to be personal vengeance.

• This is not a rescuer, it’s someone getting even. • If you have ever wondered what it looks like to only do as you see fit, this is it. • This is what it looks like to have a deliverer made in human likeness,

when what we need is a deliverer made in the likeness of God. //

Yet, despite Samson’s brokenness, God would use his weakness to fulfil his promises. • We won’t see the fullness of that until next week, but that’s exactly what God is doing. • That feels challenging, that can really unsettle us, probably because,

even though heart-of-hearts we know that God uses our weaknesses too,how we would prefer that we might have some obedience for God to work with too!

• But it’s also encouraging for us, that despite our failure, God’s plans will not fail. • For God takes the initiative, God sets apart, and God achieves his purposes. //

Centuries later, there would be another impossible birth.

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• God would take the initiative once again, but this time as he set apart a deliverer, it would be the one who once and for all would set things right.

• He would be perfect, he would be holy, he would be the deliverer that we long for, he would be the deliverer that we need.

• A deliverer not made in human likeness, but a deliverer made in the likeness of God.

• He would be the one in whom we could find no disappointment, no flaw, no parallel, no selfish ambition, no comparison.

• Yes, he would be the ultimate judge, motivated not by personal vengeance, but only godly obedience.

• And whilst there would be no wickedness in him, God would use the wickedness of those who sent him to the cross, in order that the world could be free from wicked choices.

• He would be the one who despite being strong, would become weak on the cross, so that the world could be saved.

• Jesus is the deliverer to whom Samson points. Jesus is the deliverer that we need.

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