me in your Bible to Judges chapter 14. Judges 14. This text arises in part from chapter 10, you'll recall perhaps, how God's people had continued turning away from him and from his ways. And so God raised up the Ammonites and the Philistines to discipline them, to punish them, to bring them back to himself. We saw that in response to the Ammonites, he then raised up the judge Jephthah. And in response to the Philistines on the Western side of the land, he was raising up Samson. That's what we saw last time, how he promised to send Samson to speaking to his parents. Well, now we come to Samson groan. We've kind of fast-forwarded a little bit, and we find him a man. Now, Samson went down to Timnah and saw a woman in Timnah of the daughters of the Philistines. So he went up and told his father and mother, saying, I have seen a woman in Timnah of the daughters of the Philistines. Now, therefore, get her for me as a wife. Then his father and mother said to him, is there no woman among the daughters of your brethren or among all my people that you must go and get a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines? And Samson said to his father, get her for me, for she pleases me well. But his father and mother did not know that it was of the Lord. that he was seeking an occasion to move against the Philistines, for at that time, the Philistines had dominion over Israel. So Samson went down to Timnah with his father and mother and came to the vineyards of Timnah. Now to his surprise, a young lion came roaring against him, and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and he tore the lion apart as one would have torn apart a young goat, though he had nothing in his hand. But he did not tell his father or his mother what he had done. Then he went down and talked with the woman, and she pleased Samson well. After some time, when he returned to get her, he turned aside to see the carcass of the lion, and behold, a swarm of bees and honey were in the carcass of the lion. He took some of it in his hands and went along eating. When he came to his father and mother, he gave some to them, and they also ate, but he did not tell them that he had taken the honey out of the carcass of the lion. So his father went down to the woman, and Samson gave a feast there, for young men used to do so. And it happened when they saw him that they brought 30 companions to be with him. Then Samson said to them, let me pose a riddle to you. If you can correctly solve and explain it to me within the seven days of the feast, then I will give you 30 linen garments and 30 changes of clothing. But if you cannot explain it to me, then you shall give me 30 linen garments and 30 changes of clothing. "'And they said to him, "'Pose your riddle, that we may hear it.' "'So he said to them, "'Out of the eater came something to eat, "'and out of the strong came something sweet.' "'Now for three days they could not explain the riddle. "'But it came to pass on the seventh day "'that they said to Samson's wife, "'Entice your husband, "'that he may explain the riddle to us, "'or else we will burn you "'and your father's house with fire. "'Have you invited us in order to take what is ours? "'Is that not so?' Then Samson's wife wept on him and said, you only hate me. You do not love me. You posed a riddle to the sons of my people, but you've not explained it to me. And he said to her, look, I have not explained it to my father or my mother. So should I explain it to you? Now she had wept on him the seven days while the feast lasted. And it happened on the seventh day that he told her because she pressed him so much. Then she explained the riddle to the sons of her people. So the men of the city said to him on the seventh day before the sun went down, what is sweeter than honey? And what is stronger than a lion? And he said to them, if you had not plowed with my heifer, you would not have solved my riddle. Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily, and he went down to Ashkelon and killed 30 of their men, took their apparel, and gave the changes of clothing to those who had explained the riddle. So his anger was aroused, and he went back up to his father's house, and Samson's wife was given to his companion, who had been his best man." Amen. Beloved people of God, through Christ his Son, How quick are you to judge the situations you encounter? How long do you wait before you start drawing conclusions? If a friend comes to you, tells you about a conflict, do you tend to get fired up about it before he's even stopped talking? Or do you sit back and reserve judgment until you've had time to ponder it a little bit? Or when you hear about a scandal, some politician accused of misusing his power, do you start posting about it online, calling for consequences, or do you wait until you've had time to evaluate a little more? Or again, if you hear that your child or perhaps your friend is unjustly accused of some wrongdoing, Are you inclined to immediately attack those who brought the accusation or are you inclined to ask questions to find out why they brought the accusation? Proverbs 18 verse 17 says, the first one to plead his cause seems right until his neighbor comes and examines him. The first one to plead his cause seems right because that's all the information you have. And obviously that information is given to you so that you will be on that person's side. But then when someone else comes, well sometimes, not always, but sometimes you start hearing things that were initially omitted. You start hearing the facts that were given in something of a different light. And sometimes the words of the one who came first prove to be slanted. biased and perhaps not entirely true. There's a lesson in that that we need to take note of. Because we always, since we're not God, since we're not omniscient, we always operate with partial information. Only God knows all the details, all the nuances, all the sides of any given situation. And so we need to keep that in mind when we're judging any situation before us, whether it's what our child tells us about school, what our friend tells us about her family, or what we see in a situation that we ourselves are going through. And this text reminds us, this text reminds us that very often What we see is far from the whole picture. On the surface, the situations described in Judges 14 are deeply dysfunctional. There is sin on every side. There is wrongdoing on the part of absolutely everyone who is involved in this story. Rebellion against God and His ways is pervasive. So if we look solely at the people and the actions in this text, there's nothing but hopelessness for Israel, hopelessness for the people of God. But God is kind enough to pull back the curtain, to give us insight beyond what the people in the story are able to see. And when we take into account what he shows us, then not only are we left not being hopeless, But we can see that God is using even this deeply dysfunctional situation, He's using even these deeply sinful people to accomplish His good ends. And that, my friends, is comfort because we live in the midst of sin. We live in the midst of sin's dysfunction. And yet God is still at work. His plan is being unfolded and His ways are always good. And so our theme this morning, a dysfunctional engagement, and by dysfunctional, I don't just mean they made a mistake, I mean there is sin wrapped up in every side here. But that dysfunctional engagement conceals the start of divine deliverance. And we see it first of all in the unholy request that perhaps inadvertently bears divine purpose. As I said, Samson is an adult, and he's been doing a bit of traveling, and he ends up at Timnah. And we don't know why. Maybe he had a job down there. Maybe he was delivering goods for sale. By whatever reason, he ended up at Timnah, which is about six miles from his hometown of Zorah. It's right along the border with Judea and Dan. And he sees a woman. And he comes back all excited and he says to his parents, I found this woman, you need to get her for me as a bride, as a wife. Problem is, she's a Philistine. And to say that they're unhappy with this request, demand really, is an understatement. I mean, she's part of a people that worships false gods. A people that rules Israel with cruelty. The morality of the Philistines was notoriously wicked of all the people for their son to set his sights on. And so they say to him, is there no woman among the daughters of your brethren or among all my people that you must go get a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines? They're like, look at all of the available women among Israel. And you gotta go take a Philistine? And this isn't some xenophobia, this isn't some hatred of the other, some racism, no. They're reflecting what God told His people. In Exodus 32, He warned Israel, if you marry one of the women of the people around you, They will lead you away from me and they will cause you to worship false gods. You must not do this. In Deuteronomy chapter seven. He says to them, when the Lord your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them, nor show mercy to them, nor shall you make marriages with them. You shall not give your daughter to their son, nor take their daughter for your son, for they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods. And so the anger of the Lord will be aroused against you and will destroy you suddenly. And in fact, God had given a bunch of laws to Israel to show them of the danger of this. They weren't allowed to make a garment of two different kinds of fabric. They weren't allowed to plant two different kinds of seed in one field. Why? To show them visibly, very clearly, you are holy to me, you may not join yourself with those who are unholy. So it would be sinfully wrong for Samson to do this. But Samson doesn't care. He repeats the demand that they get her for him as a wife. And notice his reason in verse three. For she pleases me well. You know what that says literally in the Hebrew? For she is right in my eyes. Well, that sounds familiar, doesn't it? We hear that all the time. It's right to me. It's good to me. It's what I judge to be appropriate. Every man is his own judge, his own standard of morality, his own king. That's what Samson's doing, and in doing so, he's manifesting the character of Israel in his time. In fact, he's manifesting the character of rebellious mankind throughout history. God reveals his truth. God reveals what's right and wrong, what's good and bad according to his unchanging standard. But man says, no, I want to sit on the throne. I want to call the shots. I want to determine what's right. That's what Samson is showing here. Young people, please don't miss the point here. Israel, like young Samson, is intent on doing what they want to do. Oh, they're servants of God. They obey the Lord when they judge it right. when they think it's pleasing, but when what God says conflicts with what they want, well, then God's word has to give. Sometimes what God tells us to do seems hard or seems unsatisfying. You meet that girl at work or that young man from the neighborhood and you just seem to click. But he's not a believer or she doesn't ever read the Bible or go to church or care about the Lord. You know what? God hasn't changed. 2 Corinthians 6 says, you as a believer must not be yoked unequally with one who is not a believer. In any sense, much less in marriage, So will you heed God's command or will you follow Samson and say, but she's right in my eyes? Well, Samson, he's unwilling to be dissuaded to his parents. That's tragic because they know that God gave him with a calling. He was to be holy in all his ways. He was to be uniquely devoted to God because God was going to use him to begin to deliver his people from the Philistines. And here he is, uniting himself to the Philistines. That is tragic. In the eyes of his parents, this had to seem utterly hopeless, a derailing of all that they had longed for. But they don't know what we read in verse 4. Verse four says, his father and mother did not know that this was of the Lord, that he was seeking an occasion to move against the Philistines. Now understand, that is not saying that God was responsible for Samson's sinful actions. Samson was wrong to set his sights on this Philistine woman. It was sinful, it was rebellious. But what this is saying is that our sin isn't greater than God's plan. Our rebellion isn't able to derail God's purposes. God knew exactly how rebellious Samson's heart would be. God knew exactly how focused on the passions of the flesh this young man would prove to be. He took that into account and he determined to use that. for his goals. What an amazing God we serve. And what a comfort we have in his revealing of this. Sin is never to be excused or minimized. Please understand that. We can't simply say, well, you know, I mean, it's part of God's plan, isn't it? Well, yes, but that doesn't make it right. But even when we foolishly fall into sin, Or mom and dad, when you see your child foolishly take a wrong path, that doesn't mean that God's plan has been thwarted. God is greater and he's able to turn that person, he's able to restore you And he's able even amazingly even to use that sin in a way that ultimately will fulfill his purposes. What a comfort that is to know that God is greater. Well, they weren't aware of that and they gave in. And so the next thing we see is them heading down to Timna to meet this Philistine girl. And it's on the way, actually the second time on the way, that they experience an unclean treat, but a treat that discloses divine empowerment. That's the second thing we're going to see here. As I mentioned, Timnah and Zorah, they're not terribly far apart, about six miles, easy walk within a day. And so Samson and his parents head down there, but at some point they get separated. And Samson finds himself walking through the vineyards of Timnah, strange place for a Nazirite to be walking since he wasn't allowed to eat grapes or anything coming from the grapevine, but there he is. And it's at that point that, to his surprise, a young lion came roaring against him. Kids, you got to picture this. A young lion sounds innocuous. It sounds not that big a deal. It's a lion. And young ones are some of the most dangerous ones. Especially the young males, because they've been kicked out of their territory. They're desperate for a fight, because they're really upset about that older lion that kicked them out. But they can't fight him, so they're willing to fight just about anything. They're also hungry. They're on a hair trigger. And this isn't a small kitty cat. Its paws are probably as big as his entire hand, fingers included. with claws on the end that are razor sharp and teeth, jaws that can crush a man. It comes running at him. But at the same time, at the same time, the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him. You see, this wasn't an accident. God sent that lion. And at the same time, God sent the power of his spirit rushing upon Samson so that he tore that lion limb from limb as one would tear apart a young goat. Now, I don't know about you, but I'm thinking it's not terribly easy to tear apart a young goat. That would be impressive enough, but a lion is a ball of muscle and fury. And Samson takes hold of it and dispatches it like that. Immediately, it is dead. It doesn't even know what hit it. And Samson gets a very powerful lesson about the power that God is able to wield through him. But he doesn't tell his parents. I don't think I'd have stopped talking about it for a month, Samson also knows that his parents have been drilling it into him since he was a young child, that he is a Nazirite. You'll recall from last week, that means that he was uniquely devoted to the Lord. He wasn't allowed to have wine or grapes or raisins or anything from the grapevine, but he also was not allowed to eat any unclean food, which was a rule for all of the Israelites, and he was not allowed to touch anything dead. Well, there he was in a vineyard, touching a corpse. So he keeps that to himself. And he goes down to Timnah. And there he and his parents meet the young lady. Again, she is pleasing in his sight. She is right in his eyes. And the wedding is on. He goes back to Zorah to prepare for the wedding. And then at some later point, he comes back. It must have been a while. Probably he had to work enough to be able to gather up a bride price for the young woman's father. And, frankly, to afford the wedding feast. But on his way back down, he makes a detour. He's going to go and relive his victory. And he sees a strange sight. There lies the lion corpse. It has rotted away to most of nothing but bones, but there in its midst a hive of bees and honey. Kids, remember there were no Snickers bars, there weren't a whole lot of sweets back then. You see honey, that's an amazing treat. He grabs some of the honeycomb, and he keeps walking toward Timnah, munching on this sweet treat, and he comes to his parents, and he gives it to them. Now, hold on a minute. Samson is supposed to be holy. He's not supposed to eat anything unclean. Not supposed to touch anything unclean. But he just scooped something out of the corpse of a cat, which is an unclean animal. and he's chowing down on that on the way, and then he shares it with his parents, which makes not only him unclean, but them, but he doesn't tell them. The point to all of that, point number one, is look at how depraved this young man is, how selfish. He has no, he gives no thought to the obligations that God has laid upon him as his unique, set-apart-from-conception servant. God says, be holy. He says, I'll do what I want. God says, don't eat anything from the grapevine. He takes a walk through a vineyard. God says, touch nothing unclean. He touches corpses and unclean animals. And not only that, but he shares that uncleanness with his parents without their knowledge. purely self-centered, purely sinful. But at the same time, look at the power of God that is at work here. When we look at what's on the surface, all we see is hopelessness, all we see is sin, all we see is someone who is not qualified to stand in the presence of God. But behind the scenes, we see God at work, powerfully. preparing this one who will be his deeply imperfect servant. And there's hope in that for us. Because even before a man turns to the Lord, and Samson, by the way, later does turn to the Lord, I think an argument can be made that at this point, he's not there yet. Though he might be. and he's just tremendously immature. But even when God's servants haven't yet turned, when they haven't yet devoted themselves to him, he's still preparing them, he's still equipping them, he's still getting them ready for the work that they will do in his time. And we need to remember that. There's things happening in the background, things happening in secret that we're not privy to, but that God is doing. And so we come to the wedding. Not a wedding day, but a whole week of feasting and drinking and partying. And in the midst of it all, an unfair triumph, which delivers divine incitement. Verse 11, we're told that Samson is given 30 companions. A lot of debate about what these companions are. They're Philistine men, obviously, men of Tymna. Some believe that this was meant to honor Samson, right? You're away from home. You're away from your people. We're going to give you companions who can be at your side, be part of your wedding party. Others think, you know, this was a strong guy. God empowered him, but he was still physically probably a pretty good-looking specimen. These 30 might have been given to keep him in line. Whatever. The point is there's 30 of them. They're there. And Samson decides to have fun with them. He's going to tell them a riddle. It's going to be a contest. Kids, you know what a riddle is, right? It's kind of a word puzzle that sounds really cool, but it has a deeper meaning. And Samson says, I'm going to tell you this riddle, and you have the seven days of the feast to tell me what it means, to tell me the deeper meaning. And if you do that, I'm going to give every one of you a new suit. Basically, the undergarment is the clothing that would have been fine linen, would have been worn closest to the person's skin. And then the change of clothing, that would have been his outer garment. I'll give every one of you a change of clothing, a new suit. But if I win, I get a whole wardrobe. Every one of you gives me a suit." Well, they can't say no. They're young men. They say no, they'll look like wimps. So they say, tell us your riddle. And he tells them, out of the eater came something to eat, and out of the strong came something sweet. Now, we know the answer. We know what he's getting at. But is that fair to them? Well, he did kill the lion in the vineyards of Timna, so it's possible for them to figure out the answer, but it's not going to be easy. And they, to their credit, they give it a try. Three days, they wrestle with it. What could this mean? Out of the eater came something to eat? Oh, maybe talking about a partier who's had a little too much to drink. Out of the strong came something sweet, maybe talking about the child that will come forth from a strong man's marriage. They ponder it, they guess, but they can't get the two to work together. Three days, they end up frustrated. Finally, by the end of it, By the seventh day, they've determined we can't come up with the answer, but we will not lose this bet. So they go to the woman, Samson's wife, and they tell her, you will get the answer for us, or things are going to very literally get very hot for you and your whole family. And they mean it. They mean it. Now listen, this, is unbelievers being unbelievers. People who live in rebellion against God, they put themselves first, and they don't really care, many of them, the consequences of others. Now, they don't, the unbelievers in our world don't all act as wickedly as this, but in many cases, that's just because they don't want to face the consequences of acting like that. But she has been already working on Samson. She knows what they're capable of. She probably anticipated this was coming. She's been begging him, manipulating him, working on him. You hate me. You don't love me. Otherwise, you'd tell me the answer to this riddle. He's like, I haven't even told my parents, but I'm better than your parents. I'm your wife. Finally, after seven days of this, he gives in. You know what? Here's the answer. And she immediately goes and tells the townsman. Now this is by no means the main point, but young people, you marry an unbeliever, there it is. If she had just gone to him and told him what these men had said to her, what they had threatened, Samson was easily able to defend her and her family. But unbelievers aren't trustworthy, and so they don't believe others will be trustworthy. Unbelievers are manipulators, and so they believe others will be manipulators. She takes matters into her own hands and makes his life miserable, which is what he should have expected. But there's also an encouraging lesson here, sort of. Because Samson is giving us just a little glimpse into what our Savior would endure. Throughout his ministry, especially during the last week, Jesus was celebrated. The crowds hailed him as the promised king. The disciples confessed their deep love for him. The apostles said they would go even to death with him. But then at the very end, one of the most trusted of his apostles, the one who carried the money bag, betrayed him for some silver coins. The one who boldly proclaimed him the Christ and said he would suffer and die for him denied him three times during some deepest suffering. And the crowds who had hailed him king called for his destruction. He endured betrayal from the world, but even from those closest to him. Samson's giving us just a little glimpse of that. And understand when Jesus did that, he did that for us. And you know, when Samson endured that, though he couldn't have known it, he was doing it for Israel. Because this betrayal quickly became known. As one would expect, the groomsman quickly used that stolen information. They give the answer. The answer is spot on. Samson has not been cynical enough to give his wife a wrong answer. And so hearing, he acknowledges that the answer is right, but he says, if you had not plowed with my heifer, you would not have solved my riddle. Interesting note. Women 3,000 years ago didn't appreciate being compared to cows either. But by this we can see that Samson is deeply offended. And that was God's plan. Because God was intending to incite, to bring about an attack that would begin divine deliverance. And that's the last thing we see here. Samson's been cheated, but he also made a promise that he would give them each a change of clothing. And so he heads to Ashkelon to get it. Now, most of us don't know the biblical geography here, but Ashkelon's not just the nearest town that has a Walmart. Ashkelon, in fact, is one of the farthest of the Philistine cities from Timna. It's 25 miles, roughly, as the crow flies, and probably half again that much by road, and that's intentional. Because Samson knows what he's going to do, and he doesn't want word to get back to Timnah when he does it. No, he goes to get that change of clothes. Now understand, this is not Samson just being a self-centered thug. The first thing we read in verse 19 is, "...then the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily." Same phrase that we heard when the lion rushed against him. God suddenly empowers Samson. And now he's got to go 30-some miles to get to where he's going. He has plenty of time to cool down and ponder what he's doing and why he's doing it. This is not a rash act of the moment. This is an intentional action. driven by the Spirit of the Lord because God is looking for a reason to begin the attack against Philistia. And that's what he gets. Samson goes down to Ashkelon. He kills 30 men. He takes their clothing. He brings them back and he gives them to the men who had stolen the answer to his riddle. Now listen, if we look at that on the surface, we see a mass murder, in response to manipulation and threats of death, terroristic threats, dysfunction on every side. This is an absolute mess. But if we look deeper, we see that God is beginning to deliver his people from their oppression. So it is in every age. God is at work in the life of his people to deliver them. And so often, the part of that deliverance that we see looks incredibly messy. We see a young man who seems to be going astray, living for the flesh, living for the world. It's terrible. I don't at all recommend that. He's going to suffer for that sin, and yet God is using that to show him how hopeless it is to rest in Him. How empty life will be if he trusts in himself, so that when he turns to the Lord, he will do so wholeheartedly and he will be able to minister to those young men that are about to live life for themselves and on their terms. A young woman or an older woman betrays her husband, acts absolutely foolishly, but in doing so, comes to recognize the hopelessness of trusting in herself, or parents. Parents see their child going astray. They see him making decisions that seem to stand against the Lord. They're filled with grief and hopelessness, but God is at work in the life of that child, and God is preparing that child to act powerfully for his kingdom. The Lord's Supper shows us What on the surface is a tragedy? The two disciples going to Emmaus expressed it well. We thought he was going to deliver us. But he's been killed. It was hopeless. What they saw was hopeless. It was the end of all of their dreams. But what God was actually doing, what they could not yet see, was that that suffering, And that dying and that burial was absolutely necessary for the life that he was to bring to us. So often what we see looks hopeless, but we need to remember, and this is the key lesson, my friends. We need to remember that God is always at work, that his ways are infinitely beyond our ways, that his purpose will not be thwarted, and that his purpose is always, always, always good. So trust him. rely on him, rest in him, and know that he will do what is good. Amen. Let's pray. Father, we thank you that you are at work in the lives of your people, individually and corporately, that you bring about the goal, the purpose that is good, and that brings about salvation. Teach us to trust you. Teach us to rest with confidence in your sovereign care. And thank you, Lord, that you sent your son, Jesus, to suffer all that we deserved, that we might receive the salvation and the reconciliation and the life that only he could obtain. In Jesus' name we pray it, amen.