This is the Year of Your "JAWBONE HILL"

Your Jawbone Hill

This is our second look at this pericope. My function in this pronouncement is to announce to you that God has anointed you to succeed. God does not anoint anyone to fail. This is the year you walk in your anointing. If he has anointed you and you have not won, you are not finished. God does all things well.

Last week we left off in chapter 14. Let’s review briefly the things we learned about Samson last week.

God had delivered Israel over to their enemy the “Philistines” because “the Israelites did evil in the LORD’s sight”. We learn right away that doing evil in God’s eyes is a good way to lose whatever self-determination you have. As a result they were oppressed.

God announced Samson’s birth by sending an Angel of the LORD. Not just a plain angel but an Angle of the LORD. She was barren but God came with a word. Isn’t it interesting that when you really want something God does not send money, he sends a word. He does send the job, her sends a word. Actually, every important thing you have ever received began with a word. God’s word can create what you cannot buy. Often God waits for us to understand a thing is beyond you, then he sends a word. Once he gives you a word, you soon find that the word of God has power to produce its own resources. You don’t need to be able to fulfill he word, his words has its own power. His words does not need me to be qualified, I just need to submit.

When Manoah realized that they had seen God he feared that they would die. His wife, postulated that this would be out of character. She posited it this way:

Judges 13:23 NLT

But his wife said, “If the Lord were going to kill us, he wouldn’t have accepted our burnt offering and grain offering. He wouldn’t have appeared to us and told us this wonderful thing and done these miracles.”

Judges

When then learned that when Samson was born The LORD Blessed him.

Judges 13:24 KJV 1900

And the woman bare a son, and called his name Samson: and the child grew, and the Lord blessed him.

Judges 113

This was the anchor for much of our examination of the text. I contend it will be today as well. We left off in Chapter 14. In chapter 14, Samson met a girl in Timnah. The girl was a Philistine. The scripture says she “caught his eye”. He goes home and tells his parents, he met a girl in Timnah and he wants to marry her. “Get her for me.” This is where we left off, pretty much. This attraction caused a problem for Samson and his family. His parents objected.

Judges 14:3 NLT

His father and mother objected. “Isn’t there even one woman in our tribe or among all the Israelites you could marry?” they asked. “Why must you go to the pagan Philistines to find a wife?” But Samson told his father, “Get her for me! She looks good to me.”

Here is the problem, the father and mother are right. God has given scripture that speaks to the prohibition of God’s people marrying pagans. Let’s look at this text:

Exodus 34:10–16 NLT

The Lord replied, “Listen, I am making a covenant with you in the presence of all your people. I will perform miracles that have never been performed anywhere in all the earth or in any nation. And all the people around you will see the power of the Lord—the awesome power I will display for you. But listen carefully to everything I command you today. Then I will go ahead of you and drive out the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. “Be very careful never to make a treaty with the people who live in the land where you are going. If you do, you will follow their evil ways and be trapped. Instead, you must break down their pagan altars, smash their sacred pillars, and cut down their Asherah poles. You must worship no other gods, for the Lord, whose very name is Jealous, is a God who is jealous about his relationship with you. “You must not make a treaty of any kind with the people living in the land. They lust after their gods, offering sacrifices to them. They will invite you to join them in their sacrificial meals, and you will go with them. Then you will accept their daughters, who sacrifice to other gods, as wives for your sons. And they will seduce your sons to commit adultery against me by worshiping other gods.

Samson can you not find anyone from within Israel? Why would you attach yourself to the pagan girl? Here is more scripture:

Deuteronomy 7:1–4 NLT

“When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are about to enter and occupy, he will clear away many nations ahead of you: the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. These seven nations are greater and more numerous than you. When the Lord your God hands these nations over to you and you conquer them, you must completely destroy them. Make no treaties with them and show them no mercy. You must not intermarry with them. Do not let your daughters and sons marry their sons and daughters, for they will lead your children away from me to worship other gods. Then the anger of the Lord will burn against you, and he will quickly destroy you.

So it is clear that there is a real concern regarding who one marries. But Samson insist: She looks good to me! When you marry, it is vital that you believe in the same God. Now, we should be clear, we cannot blame the girl. She is not the one pushing for this. It is the blessed one. It is wrong. According to God’s law

3.

What have you