The History, Mystery and Tragedy of Samson - Part 5 — Ian Paisley

Samson’s Confrontation With the Enemy

We are continuing our studies and meditation in the history, tragedy, and mystery of Samson. We have learned the lesson of his generation. We have looked at the lesson of his education. We have considered the lesson of his motivation.

We have pondered the lesson of his association. And last Lord's Day, we considered the wonderful subject of his prefiguration. Now we are going to turn to his confrontation, and we're going to learn the lessons of his confrontation.

Turn with me to chapter 15, verses 4 and 5. Samson went and caught 300 boxes and took firebrand, two teal, and put a firebrand in the midst between two teal. And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines and burned up both the shops and also the standing corn with the vineyards and olive.

Attacking the Fruits of Apostasy

I want you to notice that in his confrontation with the enemy, Samson attacked him. In the great battle that is raging today between Christ and the enemy, in the great battle that's raging between the forces of evangelicalism and the forces of ecumenism, our best field has got to be invaded by the swordsmen of the law.

Those places that are bringing or feed of apostasy have got to be destroyed. How many churches are content with a rearguard action? How many churches are content just to defend their own boundaries, to hold to their own bailiwick, to keep their own little territory quiet and peaceful?

And I want to say today, that's not the lesson that we learn from the book. The lesson that we learn from the book is one of the destruction of the fruits of the enemies of the gospel. Turn in the New Testament to the second epistle to the Corinthians, chapter 10, verses 4 and 5.

Mark these verses carefully in your Bible. It says, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. And when I'm talking about attacking the fruits of apostasy, I'm not talking about a physical resistance of those fruits.

I'm talking about a spiritual resistance of those fruits. That silly man, Jim Callaghan, and how silly he can be, said that the free Presbyterians used to sing, fight the good fight of faith, and then they went out and threw stones at Roman Catholics.

Of course, that was a lie from beginning to end. Of course, Jim Callaghan wouldn't know because he's so soaked in apostasy and he's so soaked up in loving potpourri and old Cardinal Hume that he wouldn't know anyway if he tried.

I'm not talking about physical confrontation. I am talking about spiritual confrontation. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling of the strongholds and imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.

Samson’s Unusual Method: The Three Hundred Foxes

Now let me tell you something. The Lord uses the most unusual methods to accomplish His work. And in this book of Judges, we have the most unusual methods used by the Lord. Now I must confess, I like this man, Samson.

I wish that he was around today. I'd like just to go and be his servant while he dealt with the enemies of the gospel. Now the first thing he did, you will notice, he set about a job of catching 300 foxes.

That was some task, wasn't it? To get 300 foxes. And then when he got them together, he set them into two groups, 150 in each group. By the way, could I tell you that 300 is a very important number in the book of Judges?

For when Gideon was going to deliver the children of Israel, he had just 300. Now 300 is a very important number. It has in it the letter 3, which in Scripture is the number of completion. Well he got the 300 foxes and he put 150 on one side and 150 on the other.

And then he took them two by two and he knotted their teals together. There must have been some screams and howls from those foxes when they got their teals knotted together. And he not only did that, but he put it into a non-slip knot so that they couldn't be separated.

So now he had 150 pairs of knotted together foxes. That was bad enough. But then he took a brand and he tied the brand between the teals of the foxes that he had already knotted. So now he had 150 pairs of knotted together foxes with brand.

And then I want you to notice what he did. Now those foxes must have been raring to go when they got their teals tied together. They must have been more raring to go when they got a brand tied between their teals.

But then he lit the brand. He put the heat to them. And I tell you, when those foxes felt the heat at their backsides, they were ready to go. And he let them off and he steered them into the corn of the philistines.

What did he do? He carried them to the ranks of the harvest field of the enemy. If the World Council of Churches hadn't been about, they would have passed a resolution about this bigoted man, Samson, who had no evangelical love.

What a terrible thing to do. He should be reported to the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Society for doing such a thing. And of course you couldn't say he was God's man or had anything to do with God.

But he had everything to do with God. Jimmy Geddes, who had a four-legged stool and threw the stool at the massing priest and hit him in the ear with it, was God's woman. It's about time God's people got away from respectability.

And it's about time they were prepared to use the methods that God puts to their hands. What a hubbub there would have been among the evangelical fish of our day if they had been living in Samson's day.

I know what I would have done. I would have helped them to light the firebranches and I would have sung the doxology as I saw the fire of the philistines' corn go up. I see the corn started to burn. I see the philistines calling out whatever substitutes they had for the fire authority.

But it was no good. At the end of the day, the harvest lay in ruins, charred and burned. Their vineyards were burned. Their olive trees were burned. It was a total and utter incompletion. Samson destroyed them utterly.

Naming and Confronting Apostasy

Get this lesson today. It is the duty of the true man of God to declare war upon the harvest and the fruits of the harvest of apostasy. That's the first thing. Turn to verses 14 to verses 17 of this chapter 15 and you'll find that he then turned on their person.

But he attacked the apostates themselves. Of course we are told that we shouldn't mention anybody when we're denouncing doctrinal errors. We shouldn't name people. Oh, it's all very well to deal with the unbelief of modernism, but don't name a modernist.

It's all very well to deal with the deception of ecumenism, but don't name an ecumenist. It's all very well to deal with the superstition and priestcraft of potpourri, but don't name the protagonist of this antichrist system.

Such a philosophy is completely contrary to God's word. Now there was a young preacher and his name was Timothy. And there was an old man and his name was Paul. And Paul was writing to Timothy and he was warning Timothy about apostates.

Did he name them? Did he deal generally with their doctrinal apostasy or did he name them? Turn over to 1 Timothy and let's look at it. 1 Timothy chapter 1 and verse 20. He says in verse 18, This charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went before on thee, that thou by them mightest war a good warfare.

Now how do you war a good warfare? Holding faith and a good conscience, which some having put away concerning faith have made shipwreck, of whom is Hymenaeus and Alexander. He didn't deal in generalities.

He individualized. And that's what we have got to do. We have got to individualize and deal with the apostasy, which I have delivered unto Satan, that they may learn these two men in a public service and hand them over in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit to the devil.

That's what Paul did. That's the way we need to preach against the persons of apostasy. There was a meeting of the elders of one of the presbyteries in Belfast just a few weeks ago. They were having it up on the Albert Hall, the Shankler Road Mission, and the minister of the mission was telling the elders about the wonderful time he was having in fellowship with Jesuit priests.

And some of the elders got up and made a protest, and rightly so, and left the meeting. But they were severely criticized by some other elders. And yet the amazing thing, these other elders were handing out an invitation to a meeting for the testimony of a converted Roman Catholic.

Isn't it hypocrisy? They object to men standing for God's truth against potpourri. And then they invite people to come and hear the testimony of a converted Roman Catholic. Such is the sadness that apostasy brings.

Paul’s Named Examples of False Teachers

We need to name it. All right, turn to the second chapter. And in the second chapter of 1 Timothy, you will also find that when Paul is speaking here, he tells of Adam and of Eve, and he mentions their great apostasy.

And of course, if you turn then to 2 Timothy chapter 1, he names two more men. Verse 15, 2 Timothy chapter 1, This thou knowest that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me, of whom are Phagellas and Hermogenes.

He names them again. If you turn over to the next chapter, chapter 2, verse 17, he names two others, Hymenas and Philidas. And then if you turn over to chapter 3, he tells you the names that have never been given before of the man and his wife.

But one of these names is the name of a female who opposed Moses down in Egypt. Janice is a man's name and Jimbrice is a woman's name. Now as Janice and Jimbrice withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth.

And then when you come down to the fifth chapter, he names Alexander. He names his occupation, or the fourth chapter rather, 2 Timothy chapter 4 and verse 14, Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil.

The Lord reward him according to his works. So I want you to notice that the apostates in their persons have got to be attacked. That's what the book says. Not what I think or not what I would like to do or not what is pleasing to the flesh, but what is in obedience to God.

Attacking the Defenses of Apostasy

Then turn with me to chapter 16 verses 1 to 3 and you'll find that he attacks their defenses. He attacks their fronts, their persons and their defenses. And he's down in Gaza there in chapter 16 verses 1 to 3,.

And he lay till midnight and he arose at midnight and took the doors of the gate of the city of the two posts and went away with them. It is our duty to attack the defenses, the gates and the posts of the great apostates, to make a breaking in and entering job into their defenses, to carry the battle not only to the gates, but through the gates into the citadels of apostasy.

God has called us to fight the good fight and to war a good war. So we're in a battle, nothing pleasant about it, nothing easy about it, nothing pleasing to the flesh about it, but it's the way that God would have us go.

Alas, today there are so few of us prepared to bear the reproach, to do the job thoroughly. In the days of the Puritans, there were a branch of the Puritans which were known as the root and branch men.

They believed in rooting out, poopery, root and branch. We need a lot of root and branch men in the church today to really attack the citadels of apostasy and to battle against the hordes of hell, to carry the ramparts of their citadel to break up their doors so that men and women held captive by the devil at his will can be released and know the emancipation and freedom of the gospel.

Samson’s Attack on Dagon’s Temple

And then finally you will notice that Samson's last act was to attack their religion. Chapter 16, verses 32 to 30. The last attack that he made was in the citadel, the shrine, the temple of Dagon. I have to attack the fruits of apostasy.

I have to attack the persons of the apostasy. I have to attack the defenses of apostasy. But I've got to attack the shrine, the inner circle, the very place where the apostate holds his right into the ranks of the enemy.

And I see the mighty Samson with strength renewed, the Spirit of God coming upon him again. And he pushes down the great pillars of the temple and Dagon's temple falls, and great is the fall thereof. There's no discharge in this war.

There's no easy way for any one of us. I must finish the battle the way I commenced it, with the sword out of its scabbard and dripping with the blood of the enemies of those that resist Jesus Christ.

Standing Firm Amid Growing Compromise

And, brethren and sisters, the battle is going to become more difficult in the coming days. The battle for truth in Ulster is going to become more difficult. There's going to be more of a hatred and more of a reproach and more of a bitterness against those that stand.

I see compromise on every hand. That was very evident during the visit of the Pope, but with even Baptists, pastors, in glory of the fact they're evangelicals, writing to the press and saying that the Pope should be welcomed.

I want to tell you, my friend, this is an evil day, but I want to tell you the Lord will fight for us. I was over in Philadelphia reaching on our little outpost. The IRA were on the picket line. They were carrying a poster, Paisley is a murderer.

The man that organized that picket line was 44 years of age. I received a letter from our minister, the Reverend Victor Maxwell, to say God has stepped in, and that man fell dead the other day, just 44 years of age.

He carried in front of the Free Presbyterian Church Ian Paisley is a murderer, but God struck him dead. I want to tell you I could tell you of other men whom God struck dead. I was talking to a businessman some time ago.

He was doing business in England in a large firm. The man behind the table, after they had finished their business, he said, Do you know that rascal Paisley? He said, I wouldn't say he was a rascal. And he said to me, That man started to blaspheme, and he called you unrepeatable names.

And he said, I trembled. And then he said,. Suddenly the man's face went blue. And he said, Call me a doctor. But before the doctor came, the man was dead. I want to tell you, friend, I'm a nobody and a nothing, but don't put your hands against God's work.

Don't stand against those that stand for God. For I tell you, the Lord will fight for us, and we will hold our peace. May God make us strong in these evil days, for Jesus' sake, and everybody's sake. Amen.

Amen.