A Nazarite

April 4, 2008

Our verses today look at a part in the story of the life of Sampson. Sampson was to be a Nazarite, one who was dedicated to the lord for a short period of time. Only, the angel of the Lord had told his parents he was to be a Nazarite from birth, he was to dedicate his life to God.

God wanted to use him to deliver the people of Israel from the hands of the Philistines. In order to do that though, God had to do things that would get the Philistines mad at Sampson so that he could go to war with them and defeat them.

Sampson tries to marry a Philistine woman, a mistake to most, but something that God had planned. During the party, Samson makes a bet with the men that they can not answer a riddle that only he knows the answer to. His wife to be comes and wheedles the answer out of him and then tells the men of the city:


Judges 14:18 DRB
(18) And they, on the seventh day before the sun went down, said to him: What is sweeter than honey? and what is stronger than a lion? And he said to them: If you had not ploughed with my heifer, you had not found out my riddle.

An interesting answer that Sampson gave. One that can be applied to today as well. God wants us to be in the world but not of it. If I were to choose to look at porn for example, I may want my wife to act like the woman I see. I have ploughed with another man's horse at that point. Now that is an extreme example but I think that you get the point. If we are desiring anything of the world more that we desire God, then we run into problems. We can not bring our desires from the world in a Godly lifestyle.


Read through the Bible in one year in Historical order
Today
Judges 13:1-15:20
Tomorrow
Judges 16:1-18:31
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