A Great Cloud of Witnesses: Samson

We are continuing our series, “A Great Cloud of Witnesses”. Hebrews 11 has 17 individuals, mentioned by name, that serve as witnesses or testimonies of faith. Several more are referred to by the things they experienced or endured, because of their faith. The great cloud of witnesses in Hebrews 11 testify about the power, love and faithfulness of God.

20 times in the 40 verses of this chapter we are told these witnesses lived “by faith”.

Hebrews 11:1 (NASB)

1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Faith is only as good as its object. These witnesses in Hebrews 11, trusted what God said and trusted Him enough to act out it. And we too are called to live be faith, to trust the Lord Jesus with our lives. Loving, worshipful faith is what God desires from us...

Hebrews 11:6 (NASB)

6 ...without faith it is impossible to please Him...

Faith is pleasing to God. The Great Cloud of Witnesses confirm it. We don’t please God by trying harder or doing better. Instead, by faith, we deny ourselves, trust Jesus and what He did for us on the cross, and follow Him in the strength of the Holy Spirit. That’s faith. That’s what God wants. Faith.

So far we’ve covered the first 27 verses in Hebrews 11, looking at the witnesses found in the book of Genesis, namely, Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph and now we have entered into the book of Exodus and examine the faith of Amram and Jochebed, the mom and dad of Moses, and last week, we took a look at the witness of Moses. This morning is Moses part 2.

Hebrews 11:32–34 (NASB)

32 And what more shall I say? For time will fail me if I tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets, 33 who by faith conquered kingdoms, performed acts of righteousness, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, 34 quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.

Story the story of Samson: Judges 13-16

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Summary:

Proverbs 16:18 (NASB)

18 Pride goes before destruction, And a haughty spirit before stumbling.

What is the object of your faith?

Judges 13:19–22 (NASB)

19 So Manoah took the young goat with the grain offering and offered it on the rock to the Lord, and He performed wonders while Manoah and his wife looked on. 20 For it came about when the flame went up from the altar toward heaven, that the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame of the altar. When Manoah and his wife saw this, they fell on their faces to the ground. 21 Now the angel of the Lord did not appear to Manoah or his wife again. Then Manoah knew that he was the angel of the Lord. 22 So Manoah said to his wife, “We will surely die, for we have seen God.”

Judges 13:3–5 (NASB)

3 Then the angel of the Lord appeared to the woman and said to her, “Behold now, you are barren and have borne no children, but you shall conceive and give birth to a son. 4 “Now therefore, be careful not to drink wine or strong drink, nor eat any unclean thing. 5 “For behold, you shall conceive and give birth to a son, and no razor shall come upon his head, for the boy shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb; and he shall begin to deliver Israel from the hands of the Philistines.”

Judges 13:24–25 (NASB)

24 Then the woman gave birth to a son and named him Samson; and the child grew up and the Lord blessed him. 25 And the Spirit of the Lord began to stir him in Mahaneh-dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.

Judges 14:5–6 (NASB)

5 Then Samson went down to Timnah with his father and mother, and came as far as the vineyards of Timnah; and behold, a young lion came roaring toward him. 6 The Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily, so that he tore him as one tears a young goat though he had nothing in his hand; but he did not tell his father or mother what he had done.

Judges 14:19 (NASB)

19 Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily, and he went down to Ashkelon and killed thirty of them and took their spoil and gave the changes of clothes to those who told the riddle. And his anger burned, and he went up to his father’s house.

Judges 15:14–15 (NASB)

14 When he came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they met him. And the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily so that the ropes that were on his arms were as flax that is burned with fire, and his bonds dropped from his hands. 15 He found a fresh jawbone of a donkey, so he reached out and took it and killed a thousand men with it.

Judges 15:18–20 (NASB)

18 Then he became very thirsty, and he called to the Lord and said, “You have given this great deliverance by the hand of Your servant, and now shall I die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?” 19 But God split the hollow place that is in Lehi so that water came out of it. When he drank, his strength returned and he revived. Therefore he named it En-hakkore, which is in Lehi to this day.

Judges 16:20 (NASB)

20 She said, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” And he awoke from his sleep and said, “I will go out as at other times and shake myself free.” But he did not know that the Lord had departed from him.

John 20:31 (NASB)

31 but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.

Lamentations 3:24 (NASB)

24 “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I have hope in Him.”

Are you prepared to face opposition to your faith?

Judges 2:20–23 (NASB)

20 So the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and He said, “Because this nation has transgressed My covenant which I commanded their fathers and has not listened to My voice, 21 I also will no longer drive out before them any of the nations which Joshua left when he died, 22 in order to test Israel by them, whether they will keep the way of the Lord to walk in it as their fathers did, or not.” 23 So the Lord allowed those nations to remain, not driving them out quickly; and He did not give them into the hand of Joshua.

External Opposition:

Judges 14:5 (NASB)

5 Then Samson went down to Timnah with his father and mother, and came as far as the vineyards of Timnah; and behold, a young lion came roaring toward him.

Judges 14:15 (NASB)

15 Then it came about on the fourth day that they said to Samson’s wife, “Entice your husband, so that he will tell us the riddle, or we will burn you and your father’s house with fire. Have you invited us to impoverish us? Is this not so?”

Judges 15:9–11 (NASB)

9 Then the Philistines went up and camped in Judah, and spread out in Lehi. 10 The men of Judah said, “Why have you come up against us?” And they said, “We have come up to bind Samson in order to do to him as he did to us.” 11 Then 3,000 men of Judah went down to the cleft of the rock of Etam and said to Samson, “Do you not know that the Philistines are rulers over us? What then is this that you have done to us?” And he said to them, “As they did to me, so I have done to them.”

Judges 15:18 (NASB)

18 Then he became very thirsty, and he called to the Lord and said, “You have given this great deliverance by the hand of Your servant, and now shall I die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?”

Judges 16:2 (NASB)

2 When it was told to the Gazites, saying, “Samson has come here,” they surrounded the place and lay in wait for him all night at the gate of the city. And they kept silent all night, saying, “Let us wait until the morning light, then we will kill him.”

Judges 16:5 (NASB)

5 The lords of the Philistines came up to her and said to her, “Entice him, and see where his great strength lies and how we may overpower him that we may bind him to afflict him. Then we will each give you eleven hundred pieces of silver.”

Judges 16:21 (NASB)

21 Then the Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes; and they brought him down to Gaza and bound him with bronze chains, and he was a grinder in the prison.

Internal Opposition:

Judges 14:1–3 (NASB)

1 Then Samson went down to Timnah and saw a woman in Timnah, one of the daughters of the Philistines. 2 So he came back and told his father and mother, “I saw a woman in Timnah, one of the daughters of the Philistines; now therefore, get her for me as a wife.” 3 Then his father and his mother said to him, “Is there no woman among the daughters of your relatives, or among all our people, that you go to take a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines?” But Samson said to his father, “Get her for me, for she looks good to me.”

Judges 14:19 (NASB)

19 Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily, and he went down to Ashkelon and killed thirty of them and took their spoil and gave the changes of clothes to those who told the riddle. And his anger burned, and he went up to his father’s house.

Judges 16:1 (NASB)

1 Now Samson went to Gaza and saw a harlot there, and went in to her.

Judges 16:4 (NASB)

4 After this it came about that he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah.

Judges 16:15–17 (NASB)

15 Then she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when your heart is not with me? You have deceived me these three times and have not told me where your great strength is.” 16 It came about when she pressed him daily with her words and urged him, that his soul was annoyed to death. 17 So he told her all that was in his heart and said to her, “A razor has never come on my head, for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. If I am shaved, then my strength will leave me and I will become weak and be like any other man.”

Jeremiah 17:9 (NASB)

9 “The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?

Mark 7:21–23 (NASB)

21 “For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, 22 deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness. 23 “All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.”

Romans 7:18–25 (NASB)

18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. 19 For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. 20 But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. 21 I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. 22 For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, 23 but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

Are you prepared to make an offering of faith?

Samson’s parents had to make an offering of faith to the Lord.

Judges 13:2–5 (NASB)

2 There was a certain man of Zorah, of the family of the Danites, whose name was Manoah; and his wife was barren and had borne no children. 3 Then the angel of the Lord appeared to the woman and said to her, “Behold now, you are barren and have borne no children, but you shall conceive and give birth to a son. 4 “Now therefore, be careful not to drink wine or strong drink, nor eat any unclean thing. 5 “For behold, you shall conceive and give birth to a son, and no razor shall come upon his head, for the boy shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb; and he shall begin to deliver Israel from the hands of the Philistines.”

Judges 13:13–14 (NASB)

13 So the angel of the Lord said to Manoah, “Let the woman pay attention to all that I said. 14 “She should not eat anything that comes from the vine nor drink wine or strong drink, nor eat any unclean thing; let her observe all that I commanded.”

Samson eventually made a true offering of his faith to the Lord.

Judges 16:28–30 (NASB)

28 Then Samson called to the Lord and said, “O Lord God, please remember me and please strengthen me just this time, O God, that I may at once be avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes.” 29 Samson grasped the two middle pillars on which the house rested, and braced himself against them, the one with his right hand and the other with his left. 30 And Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines!” And he bent with all his might so that the house fell on the lords and all the people who were in it. So the dead whom he killed at his death were more than those whom he killed in his life.

Romans 10:9 (NASB)

9 that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved;

Romans 12:1 (NASB)

1 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.

Memory Verse of the Week:

Proverbs 16:18 (NASB)

18 Pride goes before destruction, And a haughty spirit before stumbling.

Bible Study Questions:

What does this Scripture teach us about God?

What does this Scripture teach us about man?

What does this Scripture teach us about the world?

Do you see any commands to obey or principles to apply?

Do you see any promises to claim or blessings to enjoy?

Do you see any truths to meditate on or Gospel messages to share?

Did anything else in the passage stick out to you?