The Character of Samson — L.E. Maxwell

Samson’s Birth and Nazarite Calling

Now I feel that perhaps God would have us take the character of Samson this morning. The character of Samson. Let us turn to Judges chapter 13 for our first reading. 13 .1 And the children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord delivered them into the hand of the Philistines forty years.

And there was a certain man of Zorah of the family of the Danites whose name was Manoah, and his wife was barren and bare not. And the angel of the Lord appeared unto the woman and said unto her, Behold now thou art barren and barrest not, but thou shalt conceive and barrest son.

Now therefore beware, I pray thee, and drink not wine nor strong drink, and eat not any unclean thing. For lo, thou shalt conceive and barrest son, and no razor shall come on his head. For the child shall be a Nazarite unto God from the womb, and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.

Just that much for now. Here is, here is the promised birth of God's anointed prophet and voice for this dark, dark hour. An hour of backsliding and declension in the history of God's only nation on earth, his great witness-bearing nation.

Here was God's voice to Israel, especially God's witness to the Philistines in his day. Now he was a man sanctified from birth, you and I, from our rebirth, separated unto God, and have not we all in Christ been severed, separated, sanctified unto God in our rebirth?

This man was a Nazarite unto God, God's sanctified, set-apart prophet and deliverer. Similarly, each believer, we are to be his, sanctified and separated, his witnesses to a godless world. We are not of the world, even as Christ was not of the world, and we too have been sanctified in him, separated Godward for service, manward, separated unto God by the immeasurable depths of Calvary, cut off from the world, crucified to the world, and its lusts and passions.

Samson's seven tresses of hair, those seven locks falling down over his shoulders, that uncut on fall, symbolized the drenching of the sevenfold fullness of the Spirit under which he was to minister Samson in his call and anointing.

He is the summary, the summary of power resting. He symbolizes and summarizes to us the power of God resting upon consecrated Christians. He thus symbolizes. As to his character, I'm not going to vouch for everything, but I say he is the summarizing symbol of that on fall and anointing of the Spirit for God's child and witness.

He represents to us in his anointing the children's bread, the children's portion. For certainly, as the Savior is God's gift to the world, so is the gift and power of the Spirit God bread for his children.

Samson’s Anointing and Mighty Acts

Now, Samson was an anointed man, and the story between where I've read, well, turn to the last verse of the chapter I read. And the Spirit of the Lord began to move him at times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Espeon.

And in 14 and 15, you have quite a summary of the feats and marvels of this man. He flew a lion. He routed 3 ,000 and flew 1 ,000 of them. And he carried away the gates of Gaza in the first part of the 16th chapter.

I don't know how many miles, if there's a difference of opinion as to the number of miles. It's been computed from a few miles to 30 miles possibly. Now, what was Samson's weakness? Samson's particular weakness, it certainly was not drink.

That's capturing many today. But it certainly was not weakness, that was not his weakness, for he was a Nazarite. Nothing, nothing of the grape or wine or anything of that kind could he touch. And his weakness was not pride.

It was not pride because he flew a thousand and didn't even save that jawbone for a souvenir. Most of us would have had a glass case and shown every visitor as he came around. But it wasn't pride. Another evidence that it wasn't pride.

When he flew a lion, he didn't even so much as come home and tell father and mother about it. Harken all ye hunters, you wouldn't have come home and said nothing, would you? And even later when he took the honey out of the carcass of the lion, he didn't even tell the folks how it happened that that carcass was there.

You see, he just passed out of his thinking. Those things were small potatoes for him. And as far as we know, his temptation was not money. We have no evidence of it. But it certainly was a several false suspicions.

Delilah’s Repeated Tests of Samson

And we come to the story we want to notice today. We're passing over Rapid Lake 14 and 15 and look in chapter 16, just after he carried the gates of Gazer Way, came to pass afterward that he loved a woman, 16 -4.

But he loved a woman in the valley of Thorax whose name was Delilah. Yes, he had met a lion once before, but he never met as subtle a lion as this. And the Lords of the Philistines came up unto her and said unto her, Entice him and see wherein his great strength lies.

And by what means we may prevail against him, that we may bind him to afflict him, and we will give thee every one of us eleven hundred pieces of silver. And Delilah said to Samson, Tell me, I pray thee, wherein thy great strength lies, and wherewith I'll mightest be bound to afflict thee.

Samson said unto her, If they bind me with seven green wisps that were never dried, then shall I be weak and be as another man, or be as one. The margin says be as one. Then the Lords of the Philistines brought up to her seven green wisps, which had not been dried, and she bound him with them.

Now there were men lying in wait, abiding with her in the chambers, and she said unto him, The Philistines be upon thee, Samson. And he breaked the wisp as a thread of toes, broken when it touches a fire.

So his strength was not known. How much time may have elapsed we don't know, but she comes at him again. Temptation, by the way, is relentless. Never forget. And Delilah said unto Samson, Behold, thou hast mocked me, and told me lies.

Now tell me, I pray thee, wherewith I'll mightest be bound. And he said unto her, If they bind me fast with new ropes that never were occupied, then shall I be weak and be as another man. Delilah therefore took new ropes, and bound him therewith, and said unto him, The Philistines be upon thee, Samson.

And there were liars in wait, abiding in the chambers, and he breaked them from off his arms like a thread. And Delilah said unto Samson, Here thereto, thou hast mocked me, and told me lies. Tell me, wherewith I'll mightest be bound.

And he said unto her, If thou weavest the seven locks of my head with the web, the old-fashioned spinning wheel in the kitchen there, or in the chamber, or wherever it was, if only they bind my seven locks to that machine he's skating on thinner ice, who knows that the sharp edges of that spinning wheel might have severed his seven locks.

But when we find ourselves still able to manifest victory in the power of God, we presume, we become presumptuous. He fastened it with the pin, and said unto him, The Philistines be upon thee, Samson.

And he awaked out of his sleep, out of his sleep, and went away with the pin of the beam and with the web, and carries the machine away with his head. And she said unto him, And this is usually the fatal way of catching some evil victim.

She said unto him, How canst thou say I love thee, when thine heart is not with me? Thou hast mocked me these three times, and hast not told me wherein thy great strength lieth. And it came to pass, when she pressed him daily with her words, and heard him so that his soul, the margin says the Hebrew word, his soul was shortened, vexed unto death.

Shortened. She wore him out. That he told her all his heart, and said unto her, There has not come a razor upon mine head, for I have been a Nazarite unto God from my mother's womb. If I be shaven, then my strength will go from me, and I shall become weak, and be like any other man.

And when Delilus saw that he had completely capitulated, that he had told her all his heart, she stands and calls for the Lords of the Philistine, saying, Come up this one, for he has told me all his heart.

And there's a little incidental mentioned here. She knew it, and I think she added another word, You just as well save yourselves a trip, and bring the money with you, because I've got him where I want him.

He's, he's done. They hadn't brought the money hitherto, but it would seem so. Then the Lords of the Philistines came up unto her, and brought money in their hand, and she made him sleep upon her knees, and she called for a man, and she caused him to cut his throat.

Wasn't that what they were wanting to do? And she caused him to shave off the seven locks of his hair, and she began to afflict him, and his strength went from him. And she said, The Philistines be upon thee, Samson.

And he awoke out of his sleep, and said, I will go out as at other times before, and shake myself. And he wished not, he knew not, that the Lord was departed from him. Philistine took him, put out his eyes, brought him down to Gaza, and bound him with fetters of brass, and he did grind in the prison house.

God’s Inadequate Instruments and Advancing Temptation

Isn't that one of the saddest stories you ever heard? Delilah came on the scene, and she plied him with fleas, and apparent love, to discover the secret of his unknown power. For he was no prodigy of power.

God's weapons in all, God's weapons, wherein he does his real work, are nearly always ridiculously inadequate. That's the only way he can be glorified. Otherwise, human nature would steal him blind. Therefore God has to reduce Gideon's force until it's way down.

Even if it's 13 to 1, it's too strong. They would steal the glory then. So he reduces them, ad infinitum, ridiculously inadequate, and 300, and they don't do the fighting after that either. And then God is really glorified.

So it is God's method to use weapons simply ridiculously silly and inadequate, foolish things, ciphers, rubbed out. And then God gets into the picture. That's God's way. But there are advancing stages of temptation, as we've seen.

Samson grows more daring. He becomes bolder, more perilous, and presumptuous. So without any real alarm, with little or no fear of any kind, and without, we don't read at least of any prayer at all, and without any real care, even though he'd be God's only prophet in God's nation, to a wicked world, and he a prophet to that people, and that people should have been witnesses to the world.

Here he stands as God's, God's special vessel in the world. And what a world it is of decreasing degradation and backsliding. And he stands strategically located and adjointed, and there without alarm or fear or prayer or care, he goes right on.

But let me remind you that every man, each man, is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust. The lust that is peculiar to him. Now what yours is, is likely very different from the person sitting in front of you or beside you.

May possibly be no relation between the two. Each man has a particular place of his weakness and approachability, and the devil is not asleep, and he knows where to get us, where to put him and pry with his creed.

Crucifying the Flesh and Walking by the Spirit

Now, I'm thinking of a text this morning, especially in this connection. Turn with me for a little text on the side, as it were, to Galatians 5, 5, 24 and 25. Here is a text which we often take. This portion will usually take half of it.

Just take the first verse, but the next verse is very important in this connection this morning. 5, 24. They that are Christ's are you and I not peculiarly separated and severed, separated, sanctified unto him?

They that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts, or the passions and lusts. Is that potentially true of every born-again believer? Is it a fact, the moment you're saved, that you have been nailed with Christ to the cross with the passions and lusts?

That's your position. Your position, therefore, is not in Adam, but in Christ. And if in Christ they that are his have crucified the flesh with its passions and lusts, and you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, that's your position.

Notice the next verse. If we live in the Spirit, and we do, that's our place and position. If we live in the Spirit, read it, let us by the Spirit be walking. Do you live there? Stay there, and walk there, and live there.

Samson didn't take that warning. If I am a sanctified, separated, Nazarite unto God, and if I live in the sevenfold on fall of the Spirit, let me by the Spirit be walking, obedient, living, where I should.

No, no, because I can play. I can play with sin, and a power stays still with me. Don't tell me I'm back-bred. Who says so? They can bind me with whips, I'll pop them to pieces. They can bind me with green ropes, and they'll be nothing but thread.

They, I can tie my hair up to the machine, and carry the machine away. No fear. I need have no fear. I've got three evidences behind me that the power stays still with me. What presumption. If we live in the Spirit, let us walk in the Spirit.

Slumbering on the Lap of Temptation

But when we finally come, we see near the middle or close of our story, that Samson comes to slumber, on the lap of his special temptation, until it gets him. And she gets him where she wants him, and I can't refrain from another text in Isaiah.

Will you turn with me to Isaiah 44? Isaiah 44, 20, concerning the idolater, how well it applies to Samson. He feedeth on ashes. A deceived heart hath turned him aside. Oh, his praise, think of it, that he cannot deliver his soul, nor say, Don't I have?

Is there not a lie in my right hand? Now, he doesn't say that. He can't say that. He's slumbering. You and I marvel, don't we, that she made him slumber on her lap. She just obeyed. She just made him come right here and obey and put his head down.

And Samson, you go to sleep now. And he went to sleep. And then you and I, wise achers that we are very often, we know how to blame another. But we'll come to that again. Now, he need not, he need not have been thus overcome as he was.

But let me go back and run through briefly these one, two, three presumptions of his, and let's, let's just have just a little lesson on them before we come again to this thought concerning slumbering on the lap of temptation.

Beloved, there's no reason in the world why Samson need to have been overcome. Because there is the power of the spirit of life to counteract the power of sin and death. This is a false Keswick conference, and that is the great centrality of Keswick, that there is in the spirit of life in Christ Jesus the all-sufficient counteracting power to counteract the down drag of the law of sin and death.

So that we are debtors, but not to the flesh to live after the flesh. That is not our debtorship. There is the invisible secret power. The world seeth him not, neither knoweth him, but the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus is the all-sufficient, although secret, power unseen by the world.

The Spirit of Life Gives Victory Over Bondage

Tell us wherein thy great strength lies. It's unseen. You must have some little amulet around your hand, or some little something tied around your neck, or you've got some little mysterious power that makes you a prodigy.

A secret prodigy, however, because we can see that you're just an average man. Where is your strength? Wherein is it? Where does it lie? Samson didn't look strong. His power was a mystery. Now he put forth one after another, and he put forth one form of bondage after another, and says, come on, bind me this way.

I'll be an average man then, just an average. They bind him. Pop! Bind him again. Pop! Carries away the machinery, as I said. Therefore, his power is not known. Now, friends, I say this especially for you young folks, because you're going to say something like this.

Here's what you're saying. It's a lesson for us, I think. If I get into circumstances back home, as long as I'm here in Prairie Bible Institute, I'm all right. I get along somehow. But if I get in circumstances back home, or back there in that old society, amidst the crowd, they will put a gag on me, and I'll be bound, and I'll be as weak as any other person.

Oh! Wait a minute. Well, what do you find? Behold, I find that the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus can enable me to be more than a conqueror. And it turns out that it's greater is He that liveth in me than Jesus in the world.

And the world doesn't know my secret, but I have it. I have a real secret. Or, if I should try to break, here's another one, a possible, or imagined, imagined bondage, if I should try to break off those old habits and ways of the world, and oh how they, how they clung to me, and they, they bound me, they held me in.

Well, I'd be too weak. I couldn't break off everything all at once. But behold, I find bondage. Former bondage is snapped, and I'd be free. Wonderful discovery! Or, if I find myself enmeshed amidst a whirly lot of young people, I'll, I'll be bound.

I'll be unable to break forth in testimony. I'll be as weak as I was before I was saved. And oh, before I was saved, I was without strength and ungodly. Oh, how weak! But I'll be just as weak as I ever was.

But behold, it's not so. I find how to perform that which is good. I find in the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, bondage gives place to liberty, and I break forth speaking well for Him.

Amazing! I open my mouth wide, and behold, God filled it. Wonderful! Behold what God said. Well, I, greater is He that's in you than He that's in the world. Now, my friend, if God, young fellow, listen to me, if God could thus use His power, demonstrate His power, manifest His power, in, in the face of a man such as Samson, flirting falsely with sin and the world, playing borderline temptations, clear over the border, could not, could He not much more give the Holy Spirit in power to you, if you will love, serve?

God gives the Holy Ghost to them and obey Him, does He not? He does. You need not be defeated. Thank God there's power. Our sufficiency is of God. We are not sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves, but our sufficiency is of God.

We do have a God anointing, a God given, an ample sufficiency in the spirit of life in Christ Jesus, who frees us from the law of sin and death. Thank God for the truth. But, but, Delilah isn't through.

The Danger of Playing with Borderline Temptation

She finally gets him to sell out. And whatever your form is, you need to be thinking about it as we go along. No person who plays the temptation intends to sell out and sell off. You know what they're finding today in the matter of the drinking world?

They're finding that the chief enemy that, and the chief power that makes alcoholics, he is the moderate drinker who never intends anything else. He never intends to be a drunkard. He's the chief enemy because no man ever intended to be an alcoholic when he started.

And this man, and neither do you, in playing borderline temptation with sin, you don't intend to sell out. But believe me, sin is just as subtle as it, as booze ever was, and more so. Now, why does this woman want to know his secrets?

Why does she want to know it? Oh, she wants to know it in order that she may share it. Does she? She wants to know it, does she, in order to submit to it? She wants to know it in order to be one with it.

Not a bit in the world. No. Nay, she wants to steal it and destroy it. That's what she's out for. Samson, oh, you say, but Samson didn't know that. I beg your pardon. Thrice, thrice over, she let him know that she was out to get him and steal it and destroy it.

Thrice over. So don't say that he was so utterly oblivious. She makes him next finally to sleep upon her knees. How daring and bold, I say again, without alarm, without fear, without care, and without prayer, and without any self-examination, without any self-distrust, the man boldly goes in, puts his head down on those knees, and goes down their face, kneeling in the face of the temptation.

And now I know I am inclined to think that a lot of you ladies would think, well, if the poor silly man doesn't know any better than that. It just serves him right if he gets taken in like that. If he submits and slumbers and gets shorn so easily, then I don't have any respect or pity for him at all.

Now, listen, you better be careful how you talk because we're going to catch you presently. Don't get too conceited about this thing. And I ask again, why didn't she have the fellow with the sharp razor cut his throat?

He could as easily have slit his throat as cut his hair, but friends, oh, I think this is one of the most awful lessons I know anything about in the Bible. A backslidden, powerless Christian is the devil's best advertisement.

And the devil may be a liar and a murderer, and he's both, and he's out to kill you. In the end, he's out to kill you. He can't tolerate a saint alive, but nevertheless, his present purposes are best realized through a spirit-forsaken backslider.

The name of God is best blasphemed through people who name his name and are not in touch with him. Now, that's a sad, sad thing. A spirit-forsaken backslider can be more valuable to the devil than a dead saint.

Why make a martyr out of him? The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. Don't kill him. Just kill his testimony. Don't kill him outright. Kill his testimony and his witness and power. Now, you know, the Lord says, although Samson didn't have that verse that you and I have, the Lord says, if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out.

If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off. Samson's eye, the lust of the eye, offended him plenty, but he didn't pluck it out. So God used the Philistines to bore both eyes out. If he doesn't have the wisdom to pluck out, God says, I'll hire a man to bore them out.

And that's just what he did. And with a red-hot poker, they bored each eye out. That's the way they used to do it. On the way to prison, the devil's crowd said, listen, on the way to prison, on the way to jail, down in the devil's prison house, on the way there, I can hear the world saying something like this.

We knew it. Our false god is greater. Yeah, we've got him. Yes, sir, our god, the Elzebub is greater. Their Jehovah is a second best. Whatever he is, we've got him. We knew he wouldn't hold out. We knew we'd catch him.

A Backslider as the Devil’s Advertisement

Now, beloved, I want to ask you a serious question because I shared, shall I say, I shared your general disgust with Samson too long. Oh, I have nothing to say. Because what I found is this. May I put it in the form of a question?

On what are you slumbering? Oh, yeah. What is it? What is the sapping seduction that stripped you of power? Now, are you ready to keep on making fun of Samson? Well, but I can't imagine that man lying down right there, putting his head right down there and going sound asleep so obediently to that, that woman that was out to get him.

Listen, I'm asking you. There is that which is a special temptation to you and today and in day after day and days past in perhaps many of your lives, that special seduction, that sapping seduction has been getting you and that thing even until now has said, come here, come, come along, come along, come right here and go to sleep right there.

And you do. Now, I don't know what the particular Delilah may be. It might be, it might be money. There's many a farmer in this country that in this wonderful crop year is putting his head sound asleep on an extra ten thousand dollars that come to his bank account and you won't find him here in the spring at the missionary conference.

He's been caught and carried away and his power is gone, his prayer is gone. He's gone. And he's gone to sleep on the lap of 1963 luxury. And you know it. When I was down here the other night in the drugstore, a man had just been in.

I think I heard him say it. I think I heard him say, yes, that's, yes, this is it. I think he had expected 20 bushel an acre of flax this year. And instead of that, it's 30 bushels an acre. And it's three dollars a bushel or thereabout.

So that he is getting in. I think the round figure was this. I didn't try to figure it out. I think the round figure of extra money that he hasn't been counting on is 9 ,000 extra dollars this year. How much will God get us?

Not a penny likely. But beloved, I don't know what the thing is. But you know there's many a good Christian man who knows. Now don't say he doesn't know because if I would sit down across the counter and talk with him and ask him, mister, if you keep on in that line and keep playing with that line and go to sleep on that, listen, will that thing kill your power?

Oh, I suppose so. I suppose it will. Oh, I know a person I can't overindulge and still retain or keep the power of God in my life. But uh and and he goes and goes sound asleep and puts his head right on the thing.

Now look, some some of you ladies, some of you ladies, you you pray for the power of God in your life and you go and get down just as a businessman does when he puts his head down to pray. There he is.

And he begins to pray and his head goes sound asleep on the business that he's going to conduct as soon as he gets up from his knees and goes about his business. And most of the time he's on his knees.

He's thinking about the business, the money, and you ladies are thinking about the cleaning and all that. And you're thinking about going down and shopping, whether you're going to make a good deal and so on, so on, so on, so on, so on.

And so you go sound asleep right on the lap of the very Delilah that you condemned Samson for going to sleep on. Now, let me ask you, can you get off? You make a thousand resolutions to get off and you don't.

Deliverance from a Prayerless Life

I never forget hearing one of our fellows that was converted right down here in Okeechobee, Johnny Grant. I heard him in Africa say this at Jock in Nigeria in a testimony meeting among missionaries. And he stood up and with faith beaming.

He said, oh, I had tried a dozen times to get off of the lap. He didn't use that phrase. I'm applying that now because I wasn't taught nonsense as far as I know. I tried a dozen times to get delivered from a prayer-less life.

He couldn't get off of it. He couldn't get off of it. And you have, but he said, in spite of that, I came to the Lord for deliverance and God delivered him. Bless God. His hair began to grow again and the backslider returned.

But he had been jailed for years unable, unable, insufficient. Now friends, I don't know whether it's money or lust or affection or just the things of the world, but those things, whatever that particular thing is that's got you, I reiterate it again, that thing comes to you time after time and says, come here, come here and put your head down.

Even during your prayer time, I'll put you to sleep and you can't get off. Get away from it. You're bound. And that particular form of lust, money, pleasure, dress, the other fellow or the girl or something like that, and that endangers your thinking.

And there you are and even on your knees you go down the street and you can't get off and your power is gone and you suppose you're just as good a Christian as you ever were and you go out to conduct your testimony and you find yourself as weak as any other man and you are a presumptuous flirt with your particular form of temptation.

And you're done. Now you're not going to laugh at Samson again. If you've got any sense you won't. What's the thing that's got you? What's the thing that keeps you powerless? What's the thing that kills your testimony?

What's the thing that makes you as weak as the world? As weak as a drink of water? What's the thing? What's the thing that's got you? What's the thing that kills you being a soul woman? What's the thing?

What is it? You're asleep on it. You're drowsy. Oh, I shall never forget my father, the story he used to tell. Some of you old-timers have heard me tell it. It was, I think it was my grandfather Maxwell who came out the plains of western Kansas in a covered wagon.

And he was going west with a team in a covered wagon. He lay down to sleep that night in the wagon. Tied his horses to the wagon wheels and what a blizzard took place that night. The next morning he wakened up early.

My, what a good night's sleep he had. But he was so, he was so comfortable. He thought, oh, if I could just have another half hour, an hour to get rid of this drowsiness. Just a little sleep, a little folding of the hands to sleep.

So shall life. And it suddenly crossed his mind that he was so comfortably freezing, drowsily freezing to death and he's so comfortable in it. It crossed his mind, I am so comfortable because I am border lining death.

And he roused himself and managed to shake himself out. And he went outside, got out of the covered wagon, got out and he found his horses with the cold that couldn't get up. He got some ears of corn and put those ears of corn in front of the mouths of those horses.

And those horses ate some corn and they managed to get enough heat in the system through that corn to get on their feet. And believe me, that grandfather drove like a madman from the regions of death.

He didn't slumber longer. But my friend, if I know anything about the power of temptation, the relentlessness, I say the terrible relentlessness of temptation, it's come to you. It's gotten you a bit presumptuous.

Spiritual Complacency and Lukewarmness

But who says I'm backslidden? I have as good a testimony as any of the other church members. I'm reckoned one of the fine young people of our society. Back home, in fact, they said that the cream of the crop came to prairie.

And I believe it. I didn't have a bit of doubt about it. And I've been slumbering on the lap, I've been slumbering on the lap of attainment and spirituality. They tell me I'm ahead of others and I'm sound asleep on it and I can't get over it.

And I've done. Now if you could wake up, that you're in the regions of slumber land, you're on the doorstep of death and barrenness and dryness and fruitlessness, you're in a terrible condition. And wish it not.

I'm appealing to you. God have mercy upon us that we can slumber on such borderlands without fear, without care, and listen, with very little prayer, just enough prayer to keep you slumbering. What do we need?

Enough prayer to keep you slumbering. There are lots of people who pray just enough to keep from getting under conviction. The lukewarm man is unconvictable and ungettable. Therefore, the Lord says, I would you either cold or hot.

If you will not be hot, I must freeze you to death or freeze you so nearly frozen that you'll awaken and die for life from the regions of death. That's the reason he says, I would you a cold, so you'll wake up.

Prompt Obedience to God

Where are you today? I ask again on the lap of what thing are you slumbering? I'm thinking of a very applicable text. Turn with me to Matthew 5. Matthew chapter 5, 25. Agree with thine adversary. Finally.

Play along for quite a while. Now, if you just think you can do that, just finish off the rest of this text. Agree with thine adversary. How? Quickly. Quickly. I must pause here just a moment. A Salvation Army lady was once asked how it was that she had managed to live such a great, good, godly life from the moment of her conversion.

She thought carefully for a minute. She said, I'll give you the secret in two words. Prompt obedience. Then she explained what she meant. She says, I can't remember the day when I wasn't a drunkard. She said, when I was a babe, my father would take me in his arms as a wee one and dip a cube of sugar in whiskey and put that cube of sugar in my mouth.

I have been a drunkard since I was a babe. And I knew with that history behind me that I would have no chance to live a Christian life unless I promptly obeyed. And every time I came near temptation or it came near me, right now, right now.

But my friend, let me ask you. Is sin not still more powerful than whiskey? And is there any other way but to trust and obey and quickly? Now, what does it mean, agree with an adversary quickly? I'll tell you what it means in proper application to you and to me.

If I will not obey my God promptly, He was turned to be their adversary. And if God becomes your adversary because you will not obey Him quickly and implicitly, look out, look out, you are going to jail.

Now listen, read it. Agree with an adversary quickly while thou art in the way with him. Lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge and the judge deliver thee to the officer and thou be cast into prison.

Verily I say unto thee, thou shalt by no means come out then till thou hast paid the uttermost farthest. Does that picture, Samson, to a perfection? He didn't agree with God quickly. He presumed, presumed presumed and presumed once too often.

Samson’s Repentance and Restoration

He sold himself down the river. He told her all he could. She said, come here and go to sleep. And she went, she put him to sleep. And the devil cheered him. And he wished not that God had departed. And he says, I can still take myself as ever.