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Good Morning Pioneer Baptist!

"Get her for me; for she pleaseth me well."

He was young, and not just strong, but headstrong. He was not Superman, but when the Spirit of the LORD began to move him (Judges 13:25) he “shazammed” into something akin to Captain Marvel, who was, by the way, every bit a match for Superman but with a snazzier outfit!

His name was Samson, and he had a supernatural birth, a supernatural calling (to deliver Israel from the Philistines) and he was to be a Nazarite from birth (no strong drink, no haircut, nothing unclean). This also included no dead bodies, which was tough since he

frequently left the landscape littered with the dead bodies of his enemies, and even tougher were the major problems he had with live, warm bodies, three in particular. And they were all Philistines! They were: the woman at Timnath, the harlot at Gaza, and the infamous Delilah. Our introductory statement was taken from Judges 14:3 (KJV) “Then his father and his mother said unto him, Is there never a woman among the daughters of thy brethren, or among all my people, that thou goest to take a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines? And Samson said unto his father, Get her for me; for she pleaseth me well.”

Samson exercised his free will time and time again (you probably know most of the details) and time and time again, he was able to “bail himself out.” But the time came when he finally disclosed his innermost secret to Delilah, and when she woke him up saying, (Judges 16:20) “….The Philistines be upon thee, Samson,” Samson arose, “ho- hummed” and figured he’d just take care of business as he always had. The same verse tells us that “…he awoke out of his sleep, and said, I will go out as at other times before, and shake myself. And he wist not that the LORD was departed from him.” And that was the beginning of the end! The man who had torn down the gates of Gaza (a couple of tons) and carried them some twenty miles to the top of a hill in Hebron, who had wiped out one-thousand Philistines with the jawbone of an ass, would now suffer the indignity and pain of having his eyes put out and being treated like an animal by the Philistines.

Yes, God did honor his last request, giving him back his strength, and Samson took thousands of the enemy with him in his final act of valor. But it didn’t have to be that way. Samson could have done better. Do I have a point? Yes I do, and here it is. Let’s never allow ourselves to become so confident in our gifts (which God alone has bestowed upon us) that we allow our free will to cause us to forget God’s sovereignty. What God revealed in 1 Corinthians 9:27 applies very nicely, “But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.”

We cannot, through our own free will “Shazam” ourselves out of the Sovereignty of a Holy God! It doesn’t work! It didn't for Samson, and it won't for us!

Love and Prayers to you all,

Pastor

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