Let the Shepherd Lead

Intro:

• Last fall, many lauded individuals in the media culture of our country were ousted as a part of the #MeToo movement.
• This movement encouraged women to speak up if they had been harassed by men or worse.
• While many were accused and stepped away from their positions, the one that really caught my eye was the email apology of Food Network celebrity chef Mario Batali.
  • Like others Batali in a very veiled fashion confessed his wrongdoing and took responsibility.
  • He related the remorse he had over embarrassing and disappointing his family and fans.
  • He lamented losing the privilege of sharing Italian food with others, and included the almost obligatory line “I will work every day to regain your respect and trust.”
  • Then at the end of the email, above a picture of the same, he includes a p.s. ” in case you’re searching for a holiday-inspired breakfast, these pizza dough cinnamon rolls are a fan favorite.”
• Almost immediately everyone quickly recognized that the recipe at the end revealed the hollowness of this apology calling it tone-deaf. http://time.com/5067633/mario-batali-cinnamon-rolls-apology/

Hook:

• No matter what you think about this movement, or this apology, it revealed to us several aspects of our modern culture.
  • Chaos ensues in a world where morality is driven by consent alone.
  • Apologies are hollow exercises when they are viewed as the means to return life to normal.
  • Unless we answer to a Higher Authority we will always do what is right in our own eyes, like adding a tone-deaf recipe to the end of a sexual harassment apology.
• But friends, forgetting that God is in Charge is not merely an activity of our culture.
  • Our culture makes it clear that they do not believe in God, but in the church many act as if God is not in charge of life.
  • Many Christians assume they have such a close and special relationship with God that he does not care how they live.
  • Their relationship gives them the ability do what is right in their eyes, without ever discerning through prayer and Scripture God’s will, and they will receive his pardon without ever confessing sin.
  • Heaven forbid that this be the case with any of us!
• Friends today, I want to remind you that God is in Charge and hopefully convince you of how a believer should live from Judges 14:1-9.

Message Points:

• Ordinarily I preach using the same translation that is in the pews or close to it.
  • But in today’s passage, I believe the NIV obscures the plain meaning of the original language by smoothing over the phrase, “right in my eyes” and “right in Samson’s eyes”.
  • So I will be using the ESV as my translation this morning.
• As we begin reading we find that Samson went down to Timnah so for a minute let’s talk geography.
  • Samson and his family were from Zorah. That town straddled the northern portion of the allotment of the Promised Land for Judah and the southern portion of the original allotment of Dan.
  • Zorah was an Israelite town through and through. Evidently it was surrounded by farms as is evident that the Angel of the Lord came to Samson’s mother in a field (13:9). Further it sat on a wadi or ditch that would fill with water as it rained.
  • Timnah on the other hand was a border town alongside of Philistia towards the Mediterranean Sea on the same wadi. Like all border towns, in Timnah the two cultures began to intertwine and mix. It was a place filled with wine from its vineyards (14:5) and the finer things of life.
• We are not told why Samson went there, but in all likelihood he went with his parent’s blessing, perhaps even on business for them.
  • Maybe he went to Timnah to trade for a Philistine plough or some other similar tool.
  • While in the marketplace bartering he notices the Philistine’s daughter.
  • From that moment on she is all that he can think about.
• As we come to verse 2 he returns to his mother and father and tells them that he wants her has his wife.
  • Samson does not hide the girl’s background, making it plain that she is a Philistine.
  • But notice that Samson breaks all kinds of traditions as well as the fifth commandment by telling his parent to “get her for me as my wife”.
  • He does not honor his parents of show them the respect they deserve.
• Then His father and his mother seek to persuade him differently in verse 3.
  • They remind him that there are others in their own little town. There are others in the whole of Israel. By calling the Philistine’s uncircumcised, they reminded him that the Philistines did not recognize the God of the Bible.
  • And yet his parents relented, perhaps because of their tender hearts, or perhaps because there son was full grown and strong while they were older and weaker than him.
  • Samson makes clear his morality at the end of verse three, “get her for me for she is right in my eyes”.
    • This phrase is so important not only because it conveys Samson’s desire and disregard for God’s will or others advice.
    • This phrase declares that Samson, and those like him are in charge of their lives, not God.
    • It also previews Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 6:22-23. Jesus says, “The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if you eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!”
    • In our social media, Netflix and chill society, how true Jesus’ words ring. When we constantly look at that which is questionable or sinful, we are gradually blinded to biblical morality.
      • The more we look, what God says is wrong becomes acceptable.
      • Then what is acceptable becomes necessary.
      • And before we know it our lives are so dominated by a desire that we cannot see any other options.
• But verse four then reminds us that God was in Charge, in all of this.
  • Notice that the verse implies that his father and mother agreed to Samson’s demand.
  • The verse makes plain that they did so, not because they understood that God was in charge of this situation, but for some other reason.
  • God was not consenting to Samson’s sinful desires, but he certainly could utilize them to bring about His good purpose to free Israel from Philistine bondage.
• Thus we have our 1st point, Even though God utilizes our sinful desires to accomplish His good purpose; He does not give us the freedom to forget that He reigns (14:1-4).
  • Friends, notice that for Samson and his parents, in the moment of desire or crisis they did not remember that God reigns over their lives.
  • While his parents were closer to the mark, they did not encourage the kind of careful and prayerful consideration of what God wanted in this situation.
  • That should be a warning to us! We cannot expect that in the moment of greatest desire or crisis that we will all of a sudden become convicted about our responsibility before God.
    • As a youth pastor, I would teach them not to wait to honor God by setting personal boundaries. Once you are at the party where alcohol and drugs are offered, or on the date with the other person pressuring them to go just a little bit further; you cannot be expected to make a clear and informed choice.
    • But friends, it is no different for us. It is too late to set up a budget when you are in the car dealership. It is too late when you are in the ambulance having a heart attack to lay out what treatments you do and do not want.
  • God redeems us not so that we can have the freedom to forget him, but so that we can have the freedom honor him with the personal boundaries we set.
    • Those accused in the #MeToo scandals of the fall lacked such personal boundaries.
    • When we have a vibrant relationship with God then we will set boundaries to avoid damaging that relationship.
  • So how do we do that?
    • First we must Seek Godly Counsel.
      • We are doing that right now by showing up at church to hear God’s Word.
      • But do not let this be the only time we open God’s Word this week. We need to fill our eyes with God’s Word. We should allow Him to light up our life as Jesus said with the truth in this book.
      • Samson’s life would have been completely different if he had been in the Scriptures and come to his parents struggling with a desire he recognized as wrong.
      • Further, can I share with a very simple shift in our approach
        • Think for a moment, to who do we make demands? Is it parents, employees, doctors, children, or even God?
        • Do any of us like it when people make demands of us?
        • Samson made demands of his parents because he was sure of his desires. What if he had been more concerned about God’s will?
        • If our concern is more about how we will serve God, then we will be better able to come humbly to others and ask, “what do you think God’s will is for my life?”
        • Let’s stop trying to get someone to consent to our desires, and instead concern ourselves with seeking to please God.
    • Second, we must Consent to Honor God.
      • Honoring God in many ways are those personal choices that we make establishing our boundaries.
      • For Samson’s parents, they had such a choice to make. They consented to help Samson marry a foreign woman which was forbidden by God in Deuteronomy 7:3. But did Samson’s parents’ consent to honor God.
      • This question has become commonplace in today’s world. With same sex marriage and gender reassignment, we Christians are dumbfounded when face with these issues.
      • In each of these situations, we should offer to our Christian brothers and sisters much grace.
        • That said, I can understand that brothers and sisters will draw different lines when faced with these situations.
        • I trust that as believers, we will all agree that we want to please God. That necessarily implies that we will hear and heed his Word.
        • If someone begins to change God’s Word or change its meaning to something contrary to what it plainly says we cannot offer the same grace. But when we agree about what God says and our desire to please Him, the issues we face relate to how we apply God’s Word to our situations.
        • One believing family may decide that they can attend their child’s same sex marriage because they want to demonstrate God’s unconditional love; and another family may choose not to attend because they do not want to consent to what God has called wrong.
        • One believer may decide that he cannot invite a transitioning friend to a gender specific bible study anymore because he wants to communicate that God gives gender not people. Another believer may talk with the bible study group, ask them to begin praying and invite that transitioning friend to show them the authentic goodness of God’s gift of gender.
        • One believing set of parents may welcome their substance abusing child home for rehab and another believing set of parents may seek to send their child to rehab somewhere else.
        • The question is not whether we prefer some of these ways above others. The question is whether these believers consent to honor God with their decisions.
        • In each of these situations, I can see how believers may make different choices, but still be honoring God!
      • That is why verse four is so important. God redeemed us not so that we could be perfect people, but so that we could have the freedom to act as we are led by Him, trusting that He is in control.
      • If God is in charge of our lives and we seek to honor Him above all, he can take our flawed applications of His Word and utilize them for His good purposes.
      • I may not agree with Samson’s parents decision, but I can certainly rest in the assurance that God is able to even utilize all of our flawed decisions.
• Did you notice how I said that I trusted that as believers we agree that we want to please God?
• That leads to our 2nd Point today. Even though God intervenes in our sinful pursuits with amazing grace; He does not give us that freedom to choose sin’s bondage (14:5-9).
  • Christians have traditionally viewed liberty differently that the world.
  • The world sees freedom and liberty as the absence of anyone to tell us what to do. In other words it is the absence of an authority over us.
  • Traditionally in America we viewed our liberty as an ordered liberty with our common consent to the constitution and laws establishing the boundaries and order to our society.
  • In recent decades that sort of ordered liberty has been radically individualized to the point where each person must consent to the order or rule they will follow.
  • But this was not so in the Bible. Galatians 5:1 Paul says, “for freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery.” In verse 13 he continues, “for you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.”
    • Thus freedom biblically is not being bound to the will and law of others or bound to the desires of the flesh.
    • Paul’s admonition was that true freedom was willingly choosing to serve God and serve others in the way you saw fit.
  • In the remainder of our passage today we see…
    • Samson apart from his parents be attacked by a lion.
    • The Holy Spirit comes upon him and he tears the lion apart.
    • He does not tell this to his parents presumably so that they would continue on with him to Timnah.
    • They meet the Philistine family and again we hear that the girl is right in Samson’s eyes.
    • As they return for the marriage, he saw the lion carcass filled with honey.
    • He gives it to his parents but does not tell them where it came from, presumably so that they will not chide him about breaking his Nazarite vow which Numbers 6 tells us forbids him from touching anything that is dead.
  • If we do not set our own boundaries, then we will be bound to someone or something.
    • Whether or not Samson realizes it or not, he was bound to his desires. He chose despite God’s help to conceal the lion’s attack and from where the honey came.
    • Samson’s parents were also bound. They were bound to Samson’s whims. Even though he was not their ultimate ruler, he ruled them.
  • A liberty that ruins our eternity is no freedom at all!
  • Imagine for a moment that you are a throne, perfectly fitted so that Christ can rule and reign in your life.
    • There will be people who try to coerce, intimidate, and ultimate force you to give them control of your life. They are trying to unseat Christ from the throne of your life.
    • But there are also desires that try to take control of your life. They may entice you, make promises, and even give you temporary thrills or relief. They too want to rule in your life. Even good desires become sinful when they seek to take control of your life from Christ.
    • For Samson, his lust for this Philistine woman unseated God from the throne of his life.
    • For his parents, their love and trust for their sun unseated God from the throne of their lives.
    • But friends it does not have to be so for us!
  • How?
    • We must Discern God’s Warning Signs.
      • For Samson, His parents advice was a warning sign. The lion too warning sign was the lion.
      • For us, the warning sign may be something that God supernaturally puts into our path.
      • It may also be just as likely that the thing God uses is as simple as a nagging conviction that we are wrong.
      • Friends do not be like Samson and ignore the trials in your life. When God permits a difficulty, even if he brings you through it take the time to check your relationship with Him.
      • And if a loved one or fellow believer offers you loving counsel or expresses concern, take the time to examine yourself to see if you are in a right relationship with God.
    • We must also Decide to keep our Promises
      • For Samson this was a Nazarite vow.
        • Samson’s vow was one that set him apart for God’s service.
        • This meant that he not only did not have the freedom to pursue foreign women or forbidden honey, by doing so he was breaking a promise to God.
      • For us this is our profession of faith.
        • When we professed our faith, we promised to turn from sin and self to Christ and follow Him.
        • Any time we cling to sin or self, we have broken our promise to God.
      • But there is hope! We can ask for forgiveness and receive it through the atoning work of Jesus Christ.

Conclusion:

• Don’t miss this! The only way that we can truly live a life without the scandals that will mar us for eternity; or recover from the same is not to offer tone-deaf apologies.
• It is to turn to the God who is in charge of our lives and choose to seek his forgiveness; deciding to serve, please, and follow Him.