The weak strong man.
Judges 15:18-20 06/29/05
After Samson had slain 1000 Philistines, he was about to die of thirst. I could certainly see how a man could get thirsty slaying a thousand enemies with his weapon being the jawbone of a donkey. But in this moment of his life of thirst, was probably the best he had performed since we have met him. In his thirst, he sought God for help. This was so unlike Samson. He was not in the habit of asking God for help or giving God the credit for anything he did. So, in this part of his life we have his finest hour recorded. As a matter of fact, had it not been for this incident, I don’t believe we would find Samson in the great faith chapter in Hebrews 11. Because so much of his life was not lived by faith but by lust. But the text we have before us put him on a different level. We could only wish his entire life would have been on that level. Then he could have done so much for his people Israel.
Well the Lord furnished Samson with some water that revived him. The Lord had to furnish Samson with something to refresh his soul to revive him.
Aren’t there times you just need revival? I don’t necessarily mean have a preacher to come in and preach a series of messages, although I find nothing wrong with that. Ann and I use to go to evangelism conferences to get our battery charged. We would leave those conferences refreshed and ready to go back to work in the Lord’s house.
But you know something; I have had some revival and my soul refreshed when I give Lord praise and just worship Him because He is who He is. We ought to take some time each day and just praise God for His blessings. I have found that revival comes with prayer and praise.
Now I want us to see a few lessons in our text that teaches us something about revival. The first point I want to call your attention to is THE PERSON TO BE REVIVED.
They say there are two reasons that a person needs revived. One is weakness and the other is wickedness. When you think of the reason for revival, you most of the time think of the wickedness rule. I don’t know at the times I have heard people say so and so needs revival because they are so backslidden. We tend to think about revival is needed when someone is living away from God.
That is one reason that revival is needed but also there is another reason and that is due to weakness. We seldom ever think of this being a need for revival. There may be times when you are just doing the work of the church and run down. They call that burnout. I have heard of that happening. I will have to say there is very few that need revival because of weakness. Most in our day will rust out before they burnout. So, most will not identify with Samson’s experience as a need for reviving.
We see not only the person to be revived but also THE PRAYER TO BE REVIVED. The Bible says that Samson called on the Lord. He also gave the Lord credit for all the Lord had done in his life. That was different than the last study where he mentioned a few time I killed the enemy, I did this and that. But now he said Lord you are the one who delivered me from my enemies.
Something I want you to notice in our text at this point and that is that God allowed Samson to experience the trial of thirst in order to bring him to the place where he realized he was not self-sufficient. He allowed Samson to experience a trial in order that he may see that he needed God. And did you know that God still works that way? Now Samson had just had a great victory over the enemy. Before he could get the big head, we call it down south, he allowed him to experience a trial that would cause him to look to God. That was the case with Paul after he had the experience of being caught up in heaven. You remember he said he wasn’t allowed to write or tell what he had seen up in heaven. So the Lord allowed Paul to be bothered by a messenger of Satan. Paul understood why; he said that I might not be exalted above measure.
Now we like times of great victory and accomplishment but they are most likely going to be dangerous if you allow yourself to be filled with pride. God will see to it that his children know they are not self-sufficient.
We are talking about revival or being revived. We have seen the person to be revived and the prayer to be revived. Now we want to talk about THE PROVISION FOR BEING REVIVED.
“God clave an hollow place that was in the jaw, and there came out water thereof.” God provided the water that was so desperately needed for Samson to be revived.
God is not limited by circumstances. There was no well in the area but that did not matter to the Lord. He just made a well in the area in a rock; hollow place means mortar, the most difficult place to dig a well. But listen, God doesn’t work a miracle where a miracle is not needed. God worked a miracle to provide the water but He did not pour it down Samson.
Now we want to see lastly, THE PRODUCT OF BEING REVIVED.
After Samson was revived, the next thing said of Samson was that “he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years.” One of the important things you need to understand about revival is that after being revived there should be service. Listen, God does not save us, free us, and revive us to set around doing nothing.
Now let think about something for a moment. From what we have learned from Samson, do you think he would have been a good judge for Israel? Up until this point, I have seen nothing that would indicate he would make a judge for Israel. But after this experience of realizing his need to be revived and God provide what he needed to be revived, now he is ready to judge Israel.
His good character is short lived. As a matter of fact, this is the highlight of the life of Samson. Samson had trouble to stay on the straight and narrow. He found himself being led by the flesh more than he allowed the Spirit of God to direct his paths. But may his experiences cause us to want to be a better servant. We can experience personal revival and be a better servant for the Lord through dedication to His church, commitment to His service for the rest of our lives.
