Presuming on God's Grace

Good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This morning we're going to be talking about Samson and Delilah. What's up with this dude? What's going on with him? Let's have some coffee, we'll pray, and we'll get into the book of Judges, talking about Samson.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for the opportunity you've given us now to read your word. And we pray that your Holy Spirit would please teach us. Please, Lord, help us to know you, to understand your word, to walk in your ways. Father, we need you to help us as we come to your word. This is a familiar story to many of us. Please let us have fresh eyes, believing hearts, ready minds. In Jesus' name, amen. Here we go. We are at Judges chapter 16.
Now Samson went to Gaza and saw a harlot there and went into her. When the Gazites were told, Samson has come here, they surrounded the place and lay in wait for him all night at the gate of the city. They were quiet all night, saying in the morning, when it is daylight, we will kill him. And Samson lay low till midnight. Then he arose at midnight, took hold of the doors of the gate of the city, and the two gateposts, pulled them up bar and all, put them on his shoulders, and carried them to the top of the hill that faces Hebron. Afterward it happened that he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah. And the lords of the Philistines came up to her and said to her, entice him.
Find out where his great strength lies and by what means we may overpower him, that we may bind him to afflict him. And every one of us will give you 1,100 pieces of silver. So Delilah said to Samson, please tell me where your great strength lies and with what you may be bound to afflict you.
Samson said to her, if they bind me with seven fresh bowstrings not yet dried, then I will become weak and I will be like any other man. So the lords of the Philistines brought up to her seven fresh bowstrings not yet dried, and she bound him with them. Now when the men were laying in wait, staying with her in the room, she said to him, the Philistines are upon you. Samson, he broke the bow strings as a strand of yarn breaks when it touches fire. So the secret of his strength was not known.
Then Delilah said to Samson, look you have mocked me and told lies to me. Now please tell me what you may be bound with. So he said to her, If they bind me securely with new ropes that have never been used, then I shall become weak and be like any other man. Therefore, Delilah took two ropes and bound him with them and said to him, The Philistines are upon you, Samson. And when men were lying in wait, staying in the room, he broke them off his arms like a thread. Then Delilah said to Samson, until now you have mocked me and told me lies.
Tell me what you may be bound with. And he said to her, if you were to weave the seven locks of my head into the web of the loom. So she wove it tightly with the baton of the loom and said to him, the Philistines are upon you, Samson. But he awoke from his sleep and pulled out the baton and the web from the loom.
And she said to him, How can you say I love you when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times and have not told me where your great strength lies. And it came to pass when he pestered him daily with her words and pressed him so that his soul was vexed to death that he told her all his heart and said to her, no razor has ever come upon my head for I have been a Nazarite to God from my mother's womb. If I am shaven, then my strength will leave me, and I will become weak and be like any other man.
When Delilah saw that he had told her all his heart, she sent and called for the lords of the Philistines, saying, Come up once more, for he has told me all his heart. So the lords of the Philistines came up to her and brought the money in their hand. Then she lulled him to sleep on her knees and called for a man and had him shave off seven locks of his head. And she began to torment him and his strength left him. And she said, the Philistines are upon you.
Samson, so he woke from his sleep and said, I will go out as before at other times and shake myself free. But he did not know that the Lord had departed from him. and the Philistines took him, put out his eyes and brought him down to Gaza. They bound him with bronze fetters and he became a grinder in the prison. However, the hair on his head began to grow again after it had been shaven. We'll go ahead and stop there. We need to ask ourselves our three questions.
A. What's this about?
B. What's the best verse to summarize this? And C. What are we called to do? So we really have two different stories here. The first few verses are Samson as he's going down to Gaza and he makes a fool of these guys, right? No, he makes a fool of himself first. He goes down there What's up with this guy, right? I think this is supposed to be the judge, right? Verse 20 of chapter 15, and he judged Israel 25 years in the days of the Philistines. And then verse 1, now Samson went to Gaza and saw a harlot there. He's going to a woman of the streets, a woman of the night. He's going to a Philistine town to have illicit sex, paying for it with a woman. What is wrong with this guy? He's clearly not the type of hero we're expecting. He's not the type of guy that I want my boys to be. And here he is.
Here he is, this man who's indulging in sexual immorality and the men of Gaza know that this is this troubler of the Philistines and they surround the house and they're ready for him to wake up. in the morning so they could destroy him, and at midnight, what's he do?
We may miss this because we're just not used to it, but in the ancient walled cities, they would lock the gates at night, and that was to keep the people inside safe. Actually, there's some fun stories in the Enlightenment period where people got locked out of cities, and they're really afraid about it. I think it was Jean-Jacques Rousseau who had this experience. Anyways, sorry, rabbit trail, big rabbit trail there.
So they lock him in the city, keep everyone safe, but what does he do? Normally city bars, city gates are able to keep out invading armies. But here's Samson, one dude goes to the gates, rips him off, puts him on his shoulder, carries it out. This dude is strong, immensely strong. And he carries it out, plants it on the hill. I don't know what to do about this. So afterwards, verse 4, he goes to the valley of Sorok and he finds that woman of that valley, Delilah. And this is where the plot is.
God had stirred up all of this, allowing Samson to go and do these silly things. Why? because he had beef with the Philistines. The Lord had a plan in all of this. He knew what he was going to do, and so he's allowing this to happen, and there's this back and forth, right?
Delilah is not an upright lady, and what do they do? They'll pay her. They'll pay her to betray him. She's... not much has changed between her and Judas, right? And so the point is, different times, right? Bow strings, fresh ropes. If you weave my hair into the loom. All these silly different things and each time it happens again and again and again. It seems like this absurd thing that you think Samson would wise up like this woman he shouldn't be hanging out with. Strong man. Not exactly the most wise man, but God's using him for some reason.
So finally, she wears him down. Then she said to him, how can you say I love you when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times. In verse 16, and it came to pass when he pestered him daily. She pesters him daily with her words and pressed him so his soul was vexed to death. Just pester, pester, pester, pester, pester, finally find whatever.
It's because I'm a Nazarite. It's because my hair's never been cut. It's because I'm devoted to the Lord. Ah ha ha, now she knows the truth and she goes and she tells them. Hey, he's telling me the truth now. This is how desperately she wants the money. And the guys are willing to take one last chance to come with the money. It's interesting.
It's almost like, I don't know how much Samson knew about what was going on, whether this was just theater for him or pride. But she didn't just cut it herself. Did you notice what it said? Then Delilah saw that he told her all his heart, right? No. Interesting. Verse 19.
Then she lulled him to sleep on her knees and called for a man and had him shave off the seven locks on his head. Delilah didn't do it. She puts him to sleep on her knees and she calls somebody else. There are other people in the room, right? This is not like what we see in different movies about Samson or whatever. Delilah doesn't cut his hair. Somebody else does. She's coordinating.
How much did Samson know? How suspicious was he? Were the people in the room each time he had broken off the different cords and the Philistines were there? Did he think that God's not going to leave me? What was going through his mind? We don't know. We just don't know.
But the scene is not Delilah and him alone in a room. There's at least somebody with an earshot or with a hand motion to be able to see that, hey, here he is. What's going on? Right. Cuts off his lock, she begins to torment him, she wakes up. She wakes him up. The Philistines are upon you, Samson. And he just thinks it's going to go like every other time. Did you catch that? I will go out as before at other times and shake myself free." But he did not know that the Lord had departed from him. Samson presumed upon God being there with him.
He'd been there with all of his other foolish stuff. He had been there when he went and slept with the harlot. He had been there when he went for the other Philistine gal and he was able to defeat all the people with the jawbone of a donkey. He had done all these things before.
God never departed him, but now he had. We often presume upon God's grace, presume upon his favor. Sometimes we think we've gotten away with sin so long that maybe God just, he'll just approve of us, even though we don't actually repent. Well, they get him. They capture him.
Do you notice how gruesome this is? They pluck out his eyes. Make them blind. Imagine somebody gouging your eyes out. It's quite a vivid illustration that even Jesus tells us, right? If you look with a woman lustfully with your eyes, you're already committed with adultery in your heart. If your right eye caused you to sin, gouge it out. Well, they gouge his eyes out for him. Put him in bronze fetters, right? Put him in bronze handcuffs, essentially. And they put him to slave labor, grinding the wheat. His hair starts growing back.
This is what seems like the tragic fall of the judge of Israel. His indulgence in sexual immorality, presuming upon God's grace. And the Lord departing from him. What's God doing in the story? What's going on? The Lord was provoking the Philistines. We know that. That's what the Lord had told us in a previous chapter. God is doing something in Samson's life, but he's an imperfect guy. We can't whitewash history. I do not want to tell you or explain away or justify or minimize who Samson was. It's who Samson was.
And sometimes God works through people, even people who are not great Christians, and He does miraculous things. Not because of the virtue in them, but because of who He is. So this is what's going on here. God is accomplishing His purposes, and here He let the judge of Israel be captured. He's got a plan for it. So anyways, what's the best verse to summarize all this? We've been doing a lot here. I've got a few things underlined in my Bible.
I have the 1,100 pieces of silver. That's a lot of money, dude. I'll tell you that much. The 1,100 pieces of silver when they tried to bribe Delilah. And I have it up at verse 18. Come once more for he has told me all his heart. And then I have the end of verse 20. But he did not know that the Lord had departed from him. So, I have underlined C, calling. Let's go ahead and talk about calling.
Do not presume upon the grace of Jesus Christ. But nor be disheartened that if you're a sinner that God's not still somehow working in or through your life. That if you've messed up, if you've blown up, if you've just not been a perfect Christian, God can still use you. That does not minimize, justify, whitewash, sweep under the rug your sin and your responsibility to live a holy life. But God uses. sinful people to accomplish his perfect work.
Thank God. Thank God. Because that means that he actually works through pastors. He actually works through elders. He actually works through deacons. He actually works through members. He actually works through parents. He actually works through Christian bosses. He actually works through Christians. Because none of us are ever perfect. In all church history, there has never been a perfect saint. Only a perfect Savior. We're made perfect in Christ, not by ourselves. But don't presume upon God's grace. Don't just think that, oh, it's just gonna go the way it was before, if you're living in open sin.
God may indeed, God may indeed even humble or depart for a time even his saints. So they might see their sin, see their need for God, reform their lives, brought to God. So this is what I want to encourage you. Walk before the Lord. Walk in the ways of Christ. Knowing that God can still use you even though you're imperfect. Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much forgiving us. True stories. Lord, you don't whitewash what's going on here, but we thank you that you have a plan. We thank you for goodness and your grace.
Help us to trust in you and walk in your ways. In Jesus's name, amen. Well, may you be one of those who confess your sins, knowing that God has given you His faithful and just one to cleanse you of all your sins and to forgive you of all your transgressions. And may his peace overwhelm your heart every day. I'll see you next time. Bye.