And we are in Judges 13. Let's see if I can. And we started down this road last week. And we're going to keep on with this. Let's see if I can get this out of the way. I just saw in an email that the couple that we were praying for, the guy just passed away. So we're praying for Josh, for his family, for Hannah. It's been a family. A five-year-old and a two-year-old. It's Katie's cousin. One of Katie's cousins, Hannah. Her husband, Josh, had cancer. Hey Brian. Hey Brian. I didn't know how loud to be when I walked in there. Everyone's eyes were open so I figured we weren't praying. Okay we are in chapter 13 and I'm going to go ahead and read it and then we're going to have a discussion. As you see up here on this map this is the area in which we are We're talking and talking and I just... Around that Eshel, Hazorah, and this is where we are at the beginning here, where the focus is. So, we'll start off in verse 1, chapter 13. And the people of Israel, again, did what was evil on the side of the Lord. So the Lord gave them into the hand of the Philistines for 40 years. There was a certain man of Zorah of the tribe of Danites, whose name was Manoah, and his wife was barren and had no children. And the angel of Yahweh appeared to the woman and said to her, behold, you are barren and have not born children, but you shall conceive and bear a son. Therefore, be careful and drink no wine, or strong drink, and eat nothing unclean. For behold, you shall conceive and bear a son. No razor shall come upon his head, for the child shall be a Nazarite to God from the womb. And he shall begin to save Israel from the hand of Philistines. Then the woman came and told her husband, A man of God came to me, and his appearance was like the appearance of an angel of God. Very awesome. I did not ask where he was from, and he did not tell me his name. But he said to me, Behold, you shall conceive and bear a son. So then drink no wine, or strong drink, or eat nothing unclean. For the child shall be a Nazarite to God from the womb to the day of his death. Then Manoah prayed to Yahweh and said, O Yahweh, please let the man of God whom you sent come again to us and teach us what we are to do with the child who will be born. And God listened to the voice of Manoah. And the angel of God came again to the woman as she sat in the field. But Manoah, her husband, was not with her. So the woman ran quickly and told her husband, Behold, the man who came to me the other day has appeared to me. And Manoah arose and went after his wife and came to the man and said to him, are you the man who spoke to this woman? And he said, I am. And Manoah said, now when your words come true, what is the child's name, the manner of life, and what is his mission? And the angel of Yahweh said to Manoah, Of all that I said to the woman, let her be careful. She may not eat of anything that comes from the vine. Neither let her drink wine or strong drink or eat any unclean thing. All that I have commanded her, let her observe. Manoah said to the angel of Yahweh, please let us detain you and prepare a young goat for you. And the angel of Yahweh said to Manoah, if you detain me, I will not eat of your food. But if you prepare a burnt offering, then offer it to Yahweh. For Manoah did not know that he was the angel of Yahweh. And Manoah said to the angel of Yahweh, what is your name, so that when your words come true, we may honor you? And the angel of Yahweh said to him, why do you ask my name, seeing it is wonderful? So Manoah took the young goat with the grain offering and offered it on the rock to Yahweh, to the one who works wonders. And Manoah and his wife were watching. And then the flame went up toward heaven from the altar. The angel of Yahweh went up in the flame of the altar. Now Manoah and his wife were watching, and they fell on their faces to the ground. The angel of Yahweh appeared no more to Manoah and to his wife. Then Manoah knew that he was the angel of Yahweh. And Manoah said to his wife, we shall surely die, for we have seen God. But his wife said to him, if Yahweh had meant to kill us, he would not have accepted a burnt offering and a grain offering at our hands. or shown us all these things, or now announce to us each things as these. And the woman bore a son, and called his name Samson. And the young man grew, and Yahweh blessed him. And the spirit of Yahweh began to stir him in Mahana-dan, between Zorah and Eshtoel. Yeah, so let's talk about what what hits you as we were going through that What came off and came off the page to you, but what really? Struck your your heart struck your mind gave you questions and Starting with a 40-year reference, anytime I see a label to a cluster of 40, specifically even 40 years, it makes me think of other 40-year periods. Such as? Richard, can you think of it? Oh, wait, what did you say? Wandering in the wilderness. Okay, wandering in the wilderness. So why the 40s? I don't know, we've done the, why the 40s? Sometimes, you know, this isn't always the case, but a lot of times with these old, ancient writings, they give you like a time, a reference period of time. So it may have been 37, it may have been 43, but just kind of how they kind of collected time, but just a side note on that, but yeah, 40, yeah, I don't know. 40 days, yeah. I mean, you think of like, I mean, pregnancy is 40 weeks in the womb and Jesus went out and fasted for 40 days. Like, there's definitely a significance to the number, but I don't really know. Elijah spends 40 days in the power of one meal. Yeah. Which, I'm not a fan of that. He had good food. He had really good food. Yeah. What about the first three kings of Israel? Each of them reigned for how long? 40 years? And you can also, I guess, kind of think of 40 years as a block. of a generation, you know, God allows or gives time for people to repent. And, you know, I often think, you know, a critique against Christianity could be, well, how could a God who, you know, is benevolent and full of love and omniscient and omnipotent, how could he send a sinner to hell for all of eternity? And the question I guess I would say back is, well, he gives them an entire generation to repent. How long is long enough? If they don't repent in 40 years or 80 years or 120 years, how long is enough? Yes, sir. Right. So to me, along the lines of what you're saying, to me, the saddest thing is it took these people 40 years of realizing they needed to get right with God. I don't think they did. No, not really. Really, but it's like, after 40 years, maybe after 40 years, God says, Okay, your time's up. I'm just gonna do whatever I have to do. Because you people are not cooperating with me one bit. We talked about last week, that was one of the things that there was no outcry. Whereas, as we talked about previous chapters, there was Do you think we're supposed to see a microcosm of Joshua in here? So we had our 40 years of wilderness wandering. and right before a critical time point in Joshua's life, he's visited by the angel of the Lord. And now we're seeing there's been 40 years time passing in the life of the Israelites, and now the angel of the Lord shows up again. I'm trying to connect with whether it was Moses or Joshua. It's likely Joshua. It could have been Joshua, because Joshua was dead. And Moses was dead. Yeah, it had to be Samuel. Well, that doesn't mean it didn't happen. Well, yeah. What about Joshua dies? Well, that settles it. Thanks, guys. Speaking of that, appearing of an angel of Yahweh before a big event, what other judge have we seen something similar like this happen? QDM. OK. And can you think about that one, David? I was just going to mention that. It's also, I don't know if it's strange or not, but you know, the angel appeared to Ramon's wife. But it took, and she believed right away, but it took more, more, how do you say, more? Revelation? Yeah, more revelation for Manoa to actually believe it was true. Well, that's personal. Man, that's the way he's going with this. What's that? Go ahead. I was kind of picking at maybe men are more dented. That's honestly a joke. I just wanted to know where it was going with that. Unfortunately, she was just more spiritually minded than he was. Well, here's another. Was he there? No, he wasn't present, but... Yeah, but God sent the angel to her. He could have sent the angel to him. I think what I'm getting at is how many of us are trust but verified? Could he say in his mind that he was, well, I believe you, but. And how many of us are like that? Well, then I would pose this question. How many of us, if our wife told us something that was, I don't want to say beyond belief, How many of us would believe? Exactly. That's why I'm not, should we jump on? Manoah that hard or should we think about ourselves? That could have been a precursor because God did the same thing with Mary. He didn't tell Joseph straight off. He told Mary first. This angel was telling Manoah's wife to do something prior to or during the conception or prior to the conception of this child. So I was probably like, whoa, angel of the Lord is telling you to do something I know nothing about. So he asked for validation, confirmation. There was a precondition for this to come to fruition. She had to participate in the vows to, how do you say that? Nazirite vow. Huh? It's a Nazirite vow. Yeah, she was the one that was called to enact the practices to engage the Nazirite vow, but he's the one that's going to be the dedication? Just kind of a little... Well, along the same lines, with John the Baptist, it was the same thing with Elizabeth. So, Elizabeth was given instructions. She wasn't supposed to drink any wine or eat any grapes because John the Baptist was actually filled with the Holy Spirit in her womb. So, she would have had to have had the same instruction. Because he was supposed to be filled with the Holy Spirit from his birth. What was John the Baptist's father's name? Zacharias. He was a priest of the Order of Aaron. He was in the priesthood? Yeah. Well, let's go back. We talked about the Nazarite vow. So let's read about that. What is the Nazarite vow? So let's go to Numbers 6. And there's one thing I key in on that, but it might not be keying in. And I'm thinking of both John the Baptist and Samson. But let's read the first four verses. Number six? Yes. This is King James. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When either man or woman shall separate themselves to bow about at Nazareth, to separate themselves unto the Lord, he shall separate himself from wine and strong drink, and shall drink no vinegar of wine or vinegar of strong drink, neither shall he drink any liquor of grapes, nor eat moist grapes or dried. All the days of his separation shall he eat, nothing that is made of the vine tree, from the kernels even to the husk. Thinking of John the Baptist, thinking of Samson, what is the difference that you saw with the Nazarite vow? It jumped out to me, I don't know if it jumps out to you. So we're just in the area of what not to consume, right? Is that, am I tracking directly? Give me a hint, I'm asking for a hint, Jeff. You want a hint? What's the difference between what is stated in these first four verses and Samson's, the Nazarite, Baal-ness? I got one, 13.4, be careful not to drink wine or any other intoxicating drink and do not eat anything ceremonially unclean. I just noticed that when they make a special vow, the Lord commanded her to do this. But this is for someone who volunteers to do it. Can a baby in the womb make a vow on that? No. The vow's being made for them by their parents. Well, actually, God's the one that actually said this child will be a Nazarite. right so god predetermined that before they were born i i just find this because we see this with john the baptist we see this with samson predetermined so look going back to the 40 days to 40 years and everything right the bottom line is god has a timetable And maybe at the end of that four years, God said, I'm going to do this to set the stage for this, to set the stage for this. Because that's all in preparation, really, for David coming. And the whole war between David and the Philistines and Saul would define their kingships. And I'm sure that that was probably in God's, it was all part of God's timing and something God had to do. Because you'd think if he wouldn't have did that, the Philistines would have overrun. all of Israel. So just like God signed with John the Baptist and Jesus, they weren't looking for it. Most Jews weren't looking for it. Most Jews were only worried about the Roman occupation. But when it's God's time to do something, he just does it. Well, the Jews were looking for a messiah. Yeah, they were looking for a political messiah. But the timing was... I think Samson is Israel. period period 40 phenomenal revelation as soon as he thinks he's hot snot he goes for after way down say I'm kill you glorify Sam's like just like yeah was a that Here's a man's life that looks like what you ought to have done to me. That's good. I like where you're going with Samson about the Philistines. And you notice that in verse, let me see. Where does it say that? He begins, he will begin the delivery from the Philistines. Verse 5. Verse 5, yeah. And notice, God already right there is saying, this is the beginning. He's going to begin the liberation from the Philistines. And I'm now going back to John the Baptist. What was he doing? Yeah. Preparing the hearts of the children to turn back to their fathers. And would you say that Samson was preparing also Israel? It's the beginning of the delivery from the Philistines. I'm not even sure. Yeah, that's the language. That's what it says. Yeah, that's what it says. What else do you guys see? One of the things that I noticed, because I think you read it in the ESV, but I was reading it in the King James, and so in verse 12 of chapter 13, Manoah said, how shall we order the child, and how shall we do unto him? Which, when I look at that, I feel like he's saying, How should we raise this child? And how should we bring him up? In the ESV, it says, what is his manner of life and what is his mission? But I think in this version, it sounds like Manoah wanted to do right by his son and he wanted to raise him well. Now, God's sovereignty and all of that, we know that it stems from his already making some decisions that were not supervised, which also God used. to punish the Philistines. But I think that he did want to try to raise his child properly, even if he strayed. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, his child made decisions outside of their leadership. He didn't miss their leadership and made them decisions. He's a full grown man. He shouldn't have to, right? The question is, I'm trying to figure out why would Manoah want to know the name of the angel? What's the significance of that? Well I'm The way I'm looking at this angel of Yahweh, what what is angel? Messenger of Yahweh where else have we seen angel of Yahweh messenger of Yahweh And could this be, again, we said it was seen with Gideon. Who did we say that probably was? Yeah. Well, there's some indications this is Messianic, that this is. Christophany. Yeah, that this could be the. Because he says, what did he say his name is? He says it's secret. Well, but he says something in there. Why do you ask my name when you know it is Wonderful. And I've got a little footnote for wonderful. There's another translation that's possible that says incomprehensible. It could be. Mine's a secret. Secret. King James. Mine's a secret. But he refused to accept the offering. So, if you're a deity, you don't... Wait, you're saying this angel refused it? Yeah. No. No, the angel refused to eat it. He refused to eat it. And he said... And it says, if we go... Going off of words here. Well, she wanted to detain him with bread and offering. But then when she wanted to offer up the offering, he just offered it up to God. He didn't like, wasn't like he was accepting it. It was burned up and kind of received into the, what do you want to call it? I can't remember the language. The heavens, it was burned and received up unto God and Father Yahweh? It don't matter. One way or another, whether it's just a regular angel or Christophenes, I think the fact that the angel didn't give him a title is because it's just human nature to want to deify and worship anything that's like that. You can follow me. It's the same reason why God didn't want to worship Moses. Let's read what it says. Let's read the verse 17. And Manoah said to the angel of Yahweh, what is your name, so that when your words come true, we may honor you? Now, here's the thing. He didn't say, don't honor me. He said, and the angel of Yahweh said to him, why do you ask my name, seeing it is wonderful? So Manoah took the young goat, with the grain offering and offered it on the rock to Yahweh, the one who works wonders. And he performed miracles. That's the language I got. It just solidifies what we're saying here, that you could anyway. But I go back to this. So if you go back to the beginning, there's the 40 years that have passed. No outcry to the Lord. The Lord presents himself in the way of an angel to Manoah's wife. We don't know where Manoah is with respect to God. And so when he questions, it's like this wouldn't be something out of the ordinary. I'm supposing, to Manoah to ask these questions. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I wouldn't take it out of my mind. When he says, per se, then the angel is, I can only guess this one way, is assuming that he does know and says this thing about the wonderful and all this other stuff. But we don't know that's the case. We go down to 21. The angel of the Lord appeared no more to Manoah and his wife. Then Manoah knew that he was the angel of Yahweh. And Manoah said to his wife, We shall surely die, for we have seen God. I fully believe in my heart this was a Christophany because of what was said before, and he has seen God. It stuck out to me too, verse 11. It said, Then Manoah arose and followed his wife, and when he came to the man, he said to him, Are you the man who spoke to the woman? And he said, I am. Right, and that was another point I was going to make. Yeah, that's not the same people. No. Well, going to the Septuagint, it does say Diego. which is, which, yeah, that would be the translation, but in Hebrew, it's, rather than the Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh, the Tetragrammaton, it's Ani, which is just like, how you would introduce yourself, like I'm Brian, it's not the same, Hebrew is what would be an exodus. Something that did come to mind was that, I just, I wasn't looking, okay, yeah, I'm gonna go ahead, Nick. While we were still sinners, Christ died for you, so while Israel was still unrepented, he delivered Samson for them, so it's just kind of, a parallel kind of practice of God in Yahweh. They're not repentant. They received Samson. Do they deserve Samson? Probably not. Do we deserve Christ? No. God's made it available. Actually, they didn't even help to defend Samson in his fight. They turned him over. They didn't deserve Samson. We don't deserve delivering, do we? He judged Israel for 20 years. Did Samson deserve Samson if we started looking at his life? It does get interesting as well. When they asked what his name was. They almost wonder if that was their question. Which angel are you? Do you have a name? that we get to know, or are you one that we're not going to name? That's an honest question. And that's this other struggle. This is like, oh, they offered food to this, like, well, that was, I mean, standard hospitality. What's your name? Would you like something to eat? I mean, you know, you're a good host. I think it should be noted that just the similarities between just offering food to someone there, and also providing a burnt offering, basically the same thing. So he says, let us prepare a young goat for you. He said, no, if you do, I'm not going to eat it. But if you want to prepare a burnt offering, when he goes to prepare the burnt offering, he prepares the young goat. It's basically the same thing. Yeah, I can't remember what was prescribed. There was something. Never mind. I'm not even going to answer the question. Last one. Yes, last one. You talk about microcosms and pictures of other things. I often think Richard brings up this point of they weren't repentant. God did things without even their consent. He's delivering them and they don't even cry out to him. You see this time and time again, over and over and over and over. Even the first people delivered, the Israelites from the Egyptians, they turn to Moses and they say, and they don't even believe, and they've been delivered. And they say, is it because there are no graves in Israel? that you brought us into the wilderness to die? I mean, talk about gratitude. And so, like, I often think of these pictures of God saving even when we don't want it. I question, well, you know, has it ever changed in this new covenant that we're in? Is it, do we make a contract with God where he says, if you believe, I will save you? Or does he save you and then you believe? Yes. I mean, does it ever change? And I think there are some people who truly believe in the Church that in the New Covenant it changes. But God never changes. He's the same yesterday, today, and forever. Now we've got to discuss tulip and total depravity of man. I'm just kidding. Who would like to close us in prayer?