Sonlight Devotional

[Printable version]

Omega Message – November 1996

Mark Jantzi

(Message shared at the July 1996 Sonlight Gospel Convention in Champaign, Illinois.)

Turn with me now to Judges 14, and we will read Verses 1-6.

“And Samson went down to Timnath, and saw a woman in Timnath of the daughters of the Philistines.  And he came up, and told his father and his mother, and said, I have seen a woman in Timnath of the daughters of the Philistines: now therefore get her for me to wife.  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.  But his father and his mother knew not that it was of the LORD, that he sought an occasion against the Philistines: for at that time the Philistines had dominion over Israel.  Then went Samson down, and his father and his mother, to Timnath, and came to the vineyards of Timnath: and, behold, a young lion roared against him.  And the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and he rent him as he would have rent a kid, and he had nothing in his hand: but he told not his father or his mother what he had done.”

It is been a long time since I have heard much about Samson.  Ces has been very faithful to tell us about Samson from time to time, but something recently came to my attention from a brother.  He just mentioned one little thing that really struck me when we were up in the Northwest a couple of weeks ago.  I really began to press and look into this thing about Samson again.

Now Samson was a man who was called to a specific purpose.  He was a man who was sanctified.  He was a man who was set aside.  He was a man who had a calling.  He was a man who was meant to fulfill his calling.  He was a man who knew the authority and might of the power of God.  In that sense, he is a man who in type speaks of Christ.  In a spiritual sense, he also speaks of a type of the “sons of God” (those who walk in the power of Christ).

In the natural, physical, Adamic sense, there is much failure in Samson’s life.  So we need to be seeing the spiritual man here, and not focus so much on the natural, except to take heed and take warning that we not follow this man in the natural, but we follow the spiritual thing that God is doing in him.

Samson saw a woman in Timnath.  He went to his father and mother and said, “Get her for me.  She pleases me.”  In the natural sense, he was wrong.  What was he doing looking for a wife among these Philistines?  His mother and father were right in their natural sense in saying, “Are there no daughters of Zion that could please you?  Are there no women, no sisters, among your brethren?”  This is rightly so.  Brethren, I believe that when we seek out a companion, we really need to be seeking from among our brethren.  We really need to be seeking among our own “kind.”  I want you to hear what I am saying.

There are different kinds among man.  I am not saying this just with regards to “world” versus “believers.”  There are different kinds among believers.  There are some believers who will not rise up and who just want to play.  They want to play religion.  They want to play in the market place.  They want to call to one another, and have their little games (Ref. Luke 7:31-32).

There are a lot of young people who are deceived into believing, “Oh, he’s born again,” or, “She’s born again.”  “She’s a good Christian.”  “She comes from a good home.”  I tell you, there is a lot of pain that comes from getting into some of these relationships.  Brethren, I would hesitate to say that just because somebody fellowships among our brethren, that it automatically means that it is someone that you can just go and be married to.  You cannot go and be married to just any one, even if they are brethren.  God, for reasons that please Him, has made differences in us.  Amen!  We need to be very, very careful.

Samson, in the natural, was about to make a big mistake; and yet in Verse 4 it says that there is a spiritual lesson here, and that his parents did not know that God had another purpose in mind in allowing this.  God was going to use this to bring an occasion against the Philistines.  So let us go on to the spiritual man here now.

It says that, “Samson went down to Timnath....”  Now, do not make a big deal of the fact that he was going “down.”  He “went down,” because the elevation was lower than he was.  The word “Timnath” has a very interesting meaning, and this is what caught my whole attention to this passage.  Timnath means: “assigned portion; heritage.”  Therefore, in a spiritual sense here, Samson was going down to claim his heritage.  He was going down to claim something that belonged to him.  He went down to claim his heritage, and a funny thing happened, you could say, on the way to claim his heritage.  The lion rose up against him!

Brethren, what has happened to you on the way to claim your heritage?  Have you encountered a lion?  Did you hear the roar of a lion when you went out to claim the authority and the power that the Lord Jesus said that He gave to you?  He said, “All power and all authority have I given to you (the Church).”  How many believers have claimed all this power and all this authority, and are walking in it and living in it—knowing it intimately on a day by day basis?  Not many of us!  We need to go down to Timnath and lay claim.  I believe that the reason we have not done so is because some of us have met the lion and we have turned back.  We heard the roar of the lion.  Amen!

Now, you see further in this passage of Scripture, how Samson dealt with this lion.  He tore that lion!  Can you imagine the might, the power, and the Spirit of God that would come upon a man to be able to tear a full-grown lion?  This was a young lion.  This was not an old lion that was losing its teeth and that was barely able to get up and walk, and who was really on his way to starvation of some sort.  No, this is not the kind of lion we are talking about.

How much do these grown lions weigh?  Five hundred pounds!  Amen!  I will tell you what, brethren, most of us could not take on a three hundred pound man, much less a five hundred pound lion.

Now, we begin to think about this lion.  This lion speaks of something other than just a natural animal.  There are several things that this lion speaks of.  It speaks of the “beast” nature.  Amen!  Sometimes, this beast nature in us is what prevents us from going down to claim our heritage.

Brethren, I believe we need to be hearing something a little bit “militant” today.  You do not like to hear the word “complacent,” but if we are not militant, and if we are not rising up, and if we are not moving in the things of God, then we are complacent.  If we are not laying claim to that which belongs to us with an assertive and an aggressive manner, then we are complacent.  Amen!

By the way, Samson did not go out for the purpose of picking a fight with a lion.  That was not his intent.  He did not say, “Let me go hunting bare handed now, and see if I can’t encounter a lion somewhere.”  Amen!  You know, we are not always looking for a fight with the devil.  Do you understand?  In this occasion, the devil initiated it.

However, Brethren, I believe that we are going to come to a time when God is going to say, “You go out, and you initiate it!”  Am I unscriptural in saying this?  What did God say to Moses in the days of the Amorites?  In Deuteronomy 2:24, He said, “Go out and contend with them (with Sihon, king of Hebshon and these fellows)—go out and contend with them.”  In other words, He was saying, “Go out and pick a fight with them!  See if you can’t get them mad.  Go ask them something.  See if he will turn you down.”  And that is exactly what Moses did.  Amen!

The lion speaks of the beast nature.  The lion speaks of the devil.  What does Peter say about the devil?  He says that the devil, “…as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8).  So there are two things about this lion.  There is a roar, and there is a capability to devour.  Now, the roar is that which comes out of his mouth, and the roar is the word of the devil.  How many of you have heard the word of the devil that says, “You are unable to go in and possess the land!  You are unworthy!”  It says that you are guilty of something.  It says that you are too weak, and that you are to fear, or it reminds you of something else, and by the roaring of this lion we tremble and we back down, and we say, “Well, maybe not now.  Maybe when I am stronger.” “Maybe when I can get three or four other people to pray with me.  Maybe then I can press on in.”

When I see how Samson dealt with this lion, it reminds me of several things.  First of all, it reminds me of David.  You remember that David did the same thing—he slew the lion.  David is also a type of the overcomer.  He is a type of one who comes into a special place in God.  However, I find something different about David in his overcoming that even went beyond that of Samson.  He overcame a lion and a bear, and we see that David went on to rule and reign in a place that Samson as a natural man never did.  David actually went to the throne and the Word of God does not talk about Jesus occupying the throne of Samson, but rather the “throne of David” and it talks about the restoration of the “tabernacle of David.”  So, there was an area of overcoming in David that I believe went beyond these exploits of Samson as a man.  Amen!

What is the difference between a lion and a bear?  A lion is one that will crouch.  One that will hide.  One that will stalk you.  One that will leap at you.  The lion is a beast that will come at you with a roar.  I believe that it represents something here in the spiritual that will cause us to tremble and fear.  A bear, however, is a different kind of beast.  A bear, for the most part, is interested in pursuing berries and this type of thing.  However, the thing that I read in the Word particularly about a bear, is where it speaks of an old she bear “robbed of her whelps” (Ref. 2 Samuel 17:8, Proverbs 17:12).  In other words, for the most part, a bear will try to leave you alone; but get between a bear and her cubs, and you have one very mean creature on your hands!  I mean, you cannot run fast enough!  You cannot climb far enough to get away from this thing.  You go up a tree, and she will knock the tree down to try to get at you.

It was Hushai in 2 Samuel 17 who was talking to Absalom about David when they had kicked David out of Jerusalem, and David was on the run from his own son.  He said to Absalom, “Oh, don’t go out against David like that.  He and his men are experienced men of war, and David, right now, is like an old bear that has been robbed of her whelps.  You guys are going to get chewed up if you go out there like that.”

So, there is an overcoming here, and I believe that if we are going to come into the fulness of Sonship, we are going to overcome both the bear and the lion.  Amen!  I believe that God is going to give us more wisdom precisely on what this really means.  I am just saying here that I believe that there are areas of overcoming more than just, “I beat the lion.”

You know, David went on to overcome giants!  There is even more than just the bear and the lion.  He slew Goliath, the Philistine giant. and later it says (in 2 Samuel 21:16-22) that David and his men slew Goliath’s sons who were also giants.  In this passage we are given their names.  These giants had particular names or aspects listed that spoke of the character that they were of.  One of these giants, for instance, had six fingers on each hand (2 Samuel 21:20).  I mean, can you imagine the grip that this thing would get on you?  Think of some of the things that get a grip on our soul, that get a grip on our flesh.  Can you really overcome this thing?  I mean, I know brethren that have been trying for ten, fifteen, twenty years now to overcome nicotine.  This thing has a grip!  I mean, it is like a six-fingered giant!  One of David’s men was able to rise up and slay that thing.  Brethren, I believe we are going to have to rise up and slay these things with the weapons that God has already given us in our hands.  Hallelujah!  We do not need to call for submachine guns and tanks, and this type of thing.  God has given us that which is sufficient to claim our heritage, no matter what stands in our way!  Hallelujah!

God is able to shut the mouth of that lion.  Daniel was thrown into the den of lions—a whole den of hungry lions that had not eaten for days.  Oh, yes!  God shut the mouth of these lions, and not a one of them dared to touch him!  Hallelujah!  Daniel did not have to go and tear these lions one by one.  He was able to stand in the midst of them.  Amen!  You know, David said, “Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of my enemies” (Psalm 23:5).  Daniel could have sat down in that lion’s den and eaten the best steak dinner, and not a lion would dare touch it.  Hallelujah!  Oh yes!

Another verse that comes to me is Isaiah 49:25.  I would like to turn to that.  It is a verse that I keep hearing Pete quote from time to time.

“For, thus saith the Lord, even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered, for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children.”

Brethren, here is another aspect of the lion: the lion comes and tries to lay claim to our children.  The lion comes and tries to lay claim to our grandchildren.  The lion comes and tries to lay claim to our heritage!  Children are the “heritage of the Lord” (Psalm 127:3) and the lion is not going to have mine!  Amen!  Though he be terrible—though he has the thing in his mouth already!  Amen!  He is not going to have mine!  In 1 Samuel 17, let us read Verses 33-37 and see what David did.

“And Saul said to David, Thou art not able to go against this Philistine (Goliath) to fight with him: for thou art but a youth, and he a man of war from his youth.  And David said unto Saul, Thy servant kept his father’s sheep, and there came a lion, and a bear, and took a lamb out of the flock: And I went out after him, and smote him, and delivered it out of his mouth: and when he arose against me, I caught him by his beard, and smote him, and slew him.  Thy servant slew both the lion and the bear: and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be as one of them, seeing he hath defied the armies of the living God.  David said moreover, The LORD that delivered me out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine.”

The lion had the lamb in his mouth, and David said, “No, you don’t!”  Amen!  In other words, it was not just David now that this lion had roared against.  The lion had roared against one of the lambs, and he not only threatened the lamb, but he went ahead to carry out his threat.  This lion had the lamb captive, this little one from the flock, and David said, “You will not!  I am sent here to be a shepherd over this flock.  I will lay my life down, but you will not walk away with this lamb!”  Amen!  Hallelujah!  He took it right out of the lion’s mouth.

It is interesting to read that David did not tell anybody about this until Saul pressed him and asked him, “What right do you have to go out against this Goliath fellow?”  You know, today we would write it all out on our resume.  “What’s on your resume, boy?  Oh, here—‘Killed lion…killed bear…with bare hands.’  Quite an impressive resume, son!  How did you do it?”

David said to Saul, “Well, the lion took one of my lambs, and I went and took the lamb away from him.”  Do you know what else he said?  He said, “And when the lion rose up against me, I had to dispatch him!”  In other words, David was saying, “I would have left him alone.  I just wanted my lamb back, and I was not out looking to kill a lion.  It, however, made the lion mad and he did not like it that I took his lunch away, and he came against me!  Can you imagine?  He came against ME!  So, I had to deal with him.”  Amen!  I think this is great!  I have overlooked this business of David and Samson, how they both slew the lion.

Well, there is a whole lot more about Samson.  Do you know he got in trouble with women?  There were three of them, it was not just Delilah.  Spiritually, what does “woman” speak of in the Bible?  It speaks of a “church,” so there were three churches involved here.  Actually there were four, if we can speak of Samson as a fourth type of a church, but there were three that gave this son of God trouble, and let us look at these three.

We already read of the first one here in Judges 14, where it speaks of Samson going down to Timnath.  She had no name.  In fact, two of the three did not have a record in the Bible of their name.  This first one, however, thought she was going to be the bride.  She had plans on being the bride, and yet there was some kind of flaw in her.

Now, do you remember the parable that Jesus told of the ten virgins in Matthew 25?  Do you realize that all ten of these had the intention of attending this wedding, and as the bride, I believe.  (It is a corporate bride that we are talking about here.)  However, we found that some of them were not ready.  Some of them had a flaw, and the flaw was that they neglected something very important—they neglected the oil!

Let us read on in this 14th Chapter in Judges, starting with Verse 5,

“Then went Samson down, and his father and his mother, to Timnath, and came to the vineyards of Timnath: and, behold, a young lion roared against him.  And the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and he rent him as he would have rent a kid, and he had nothing in his hand: but he told not his father or his mother what he had done.  And he went down, and talked with the woman; and she pleased Samson well.  And after a time he returned to take her, and he turned aside to see the carcase of the lion: and, behold, there was a swarm of bees and honey in the carcase of the lion.  And he took thereof in his hands, and went on eating, and came to his father and mother, and he gave them, and they did eat: but he told not them that he had taken the honey out of the carcase of the lion.  So his father went down unto the woman: and Samson made there a feast; for so used the young men to do.  And it came to pass, when they saw him, that they brought thirty companions to be with him.  And Samson said unto them, I will now put forth a riddle unto you: if ye can certainly declare it me within the seven days of the feast, and find it out, then I will give you thirty sheets and thirty change of garments: But if ye cannot declare it me, then shall ye give me thirty sheets and thirty change of garments.  And they said unto him, Put forth thy riddle, that we may hear it.  And he said unto them, Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness.  And they could not in three days expound the riddle.  And it came to pass on the seventh day, that they said unto Samson’s wife, Entice thy husband, that he may declare unto us the riddle, lest we burn thee and thy father’s house with fire: have ye called us to take that we have?  is it not so?  And Samson’s wife wept before him, and said, Thou dost but hate me, and lovest me not: thou hast put forth a riddle unto the children of my people, and hast not told it me. And he said unto her, Behold, I have not told it my father nor my mother, and shall I tell it thee?  And she wept before him the seven days, while their feast lasted: and it came to pass on the seventh day, that he told her, because she lay sore upon him: and she told the riddle to the children of her people.”

Now, when we read this description of this woman, we see that she had some serious flaws in her.  For one thing, she would not cast her loyalty to Samson.  She cast her loyalty instead to the natural clan that she came from.  She cast her lot to Adam.  When there was a riddle to be solved and the contest was between Samson and her natural family, she threw her lot in with her natural family.  She threw her lot in with the old order and she would not rise up, and she would not put her loyalty with Samson.

The description is that she wailed and she cried for the whole seven days of this wedding feast.  Mourning and plaguing Samson, she begged him to reveal to her the answer to this riddle, so that her people would not be embarrassed.  I mean, can you imagine putting up with this for seven days of a wedding feast with the one that is supposed to be your bride?  Unbelievable!  I am surprised that Samson did not leave before the seventh day!  He waited until the seventh day and then he left.  Let us read on, beginning with Verse 19,

“And the men of the city said unto 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 unto them, If ye had not plowed with my heifer, ye had not found out my riddle.  And the Spirit of the LORD came upon him, and he went down to Ashkelon, and slew thirty men of them, and took their spoil, and gave change of garments unto them which expounded the riddle.  And his anger was kindled, and he went up to his father’s house.  But Samson’s wife was given to his companion, whom he had used as his friend.”

So Samson lost the bet and had to get thirty changes of garments to pay off his bet.  You can see here where he got the thirty changes of garments.  Samson took them from thirty Philistines (they would not need them anymore when he got through with them).  So he paid off what he owed and he left town; and the story of this woman is that she was given to Samson’s companion.  This is another picture of the church that was supposed to be the bride.  The one who was to be the best man was not supposed to take her for his own wife.  We can say, this ministry got in bed with the bride and made her his own wife.  This was corruption on the part of both of them (the ministry and the church)!  They cut Christ right out of the deal here.  Samson here was supposed to be the type of Christ to this bride.

Judges 15, starting at Verse 1,

“But it came to pass within a while after, in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his wife with a kid; and he said, I will go in to my wife into the chamber.  But her father would not suffer him to go in.  And her father said, I verily thought that thou hadst utterly hated her; therefore I gave her to thy companion…  And Samson said concerning them, Now shall I be more blameless than the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure.  And Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took firebrands, and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst between two tails.  And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines, and burnt up both the shocks, and also the standing corn, with the vineyards and olives.  Then the Philistines said, Who hath done this? And they answered, Samson, the son in law of the Timnite, because he had taken his wife, and given her to his companion.  And the Philistines came up, and burnt her and her father with fire.  And Samson said unto them, Though ye have done this, yet will I be avenged of you, and after that I will cease.  And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter: and he went down and dwelt in the top of the rock Etam.”

So Samson, of course, got his revenge by catching three hundred foxes, tying their tails together, putting a burning torch in the midst, and letting them loose in the grain fields. That really got the attention of the Philistines!  He destroyed thousands of acres of their grain.  I mean, three hundred foxes with a torch tied between them could really start a lot of fires!  The Philistines began to inquire, “Where are all these fires coming from?” Samson, of course, intended that the word would get to them that he was the one that did it.

Verses 9-11, “Then the Philistines went up, and pitched in Judah, and spread themselves in Lehi. And the men of Judah said, Why are ye come up against us?  And they answered, To bind Samson are we come up, to do to him as he hath done to us.  Then three thousand men of Judah went to the top of the rock Etam, and said to Samson, Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us?  what is this that thou hast done unto us? And he said unto them, As they did unto me, so have I done unto them.”

Now, wouldn’t you think it would be sufficient that the Philistines would be the ones to go after Samson?  However, who were the first ones to go after him for raising a ruckus?  It was his own people!  Where do you think the persecution is going to come from to the sons of God for stirring up things?  It is going to come from our own people.

They said to Samson, “Don’t you know that these Philistines rule over us?  Don’t you know that we are to stay in our place in some of these matters?  Don’t you know that we are not to stir this up?  Don’t you know that we do not get into this spiritual warfare business?  We do not know how to handle that!  Leave it be!  Don’t you know the devil rules over us? Don’t you know if you start kicking him around, he’s going to start kicking back?”

Samson said, “As they did to me, so I will do to them.”  Amen!  Brethren, what is your posture going to be in these matters of spiritual warfare?  Are you going to lay down and let the enemy kick you around?  Do you know what the real intent of this lion is?  It is not just to make noise?  Lions roar because they are hungry!  They are after blood!  They are after flesh!

Brethren, we are going to have to take on the posture of Samson!  Samson did not say, “Well, I have settled the score now.  I am going to run away, and I am going to hide somewhere; and I do not want any Philistine to ever find me.”  He said, “I did to them as they did to me.”

We are not talking about dealing with natural men, brethren!  We are talking about dealing with spiritual warfare.  Dealing with the enemy!  Amen!  “As he came and tried to rob me of my son!”  “As he comes, and tries to rob me of my granddaughter, so will I go after his camp!”  Amen!  “I am going to see the walls come down!”  Amen!  “I am going to see Philistines (spiritual demons) falling from the top and being crushed!  The day is going to come!”  Hallelujah!  “Give me a chance today, and it will be today!”  Amen!  Samson was going to take the opportunity he had.

Three thousand of his own people (three thousand ministers) came to him, and said, “Cool it, Samson!  You have the devil all riled up now!  You have gotten him mad at us!  Don’t you know that they rule over us?  Don’t you know that we pay tribute to them?  Don’t you know that we walk on eggs when we are around this thing?  We keep our nose clean!”

I remember one time when someone gave me a little book of cartoons.  There was this little cartoon of this old fellow lying in a hospital bed.  You know how they lay there, with their leg all bandaged up, and strings and ropes and pulleys, and everything.  This old preacher says to the guy, “Renounce the devil!”  The old man said, “I’m sorry but I am in no position to pick a fight with anybody right now!”

What makes it a joke, is because that is what a lot of Christians believe most of the time.  You do not have to be in a hospital bed with pulleys and things all over to think like this.  I mean, most Christians do not want to go into warfare!

Do you want to go into warfare, sister?  I mean, my wife Janet said to me for so many years, “Oh, ladies are not meant to fight!”  Oh, come on?  Baloney!  Ladies know how to fight.  In the flesh I mean.  No, what we are saying here, Brethren, is you just let someone come and rob you of your whelp, and see if you are not ready to fight—just like that bear!  You are going to change your whole attitude.  Hallelujah!

Beginning again from Verse 11,

“Then three thousand men of Judah went to the top of the rock Etam, and said to Samson, Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us? what is this that thou hast done unto us? And he said unto them, As they did unto me, so have I done unto them.  And they said unto him, We are come down to bind thee, that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines.  And Samson said unto them, Swear unto me, that ye will not fall upon me yourselves.  And they spake unto him, saying, No; but we will bind thee fast, and deliver thee into their hand: but surely we will not kill thee.  And they bound him with two new cords, and brought him up from the rock.”

Well, we read here that Samson agreed to let himself be bound.  These men said to Samson that they had come to bind him and turn him over to the Philistines.  “Oh, you guys want to bind me?  All right, on one condition.  I will let you bind me, but you are not going to kill me.  Swear to me, you will not kill me.”  They said, “Fine!”

Now, Samson had to know something about the power of God in order to make an agreement like this with his brethren.  “I will agree to be bound for a season, but I know that when the power of God comes on me, and it is time for my deliverance, I know that I am coming free!”  Hallelujah!

So they bound him, and the Philistines came and said, “Do you have the prisoner?”  “Oh Yes, sirs!  We have the prisoner for you.  We will be happy to turn him over to you.  We are glad to be rid of him.  Do with him whatever you have to do.”  So, the Philistines took him.  Reading from Verse 14,

“And when he came unto Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him: and the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and the cords that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands loosed from off his hands.”

By the way, do you know that “Lehi” means “jawbone”?  I believe there was a natural rock there that they had named Lehi that looked like and had the shape of a jawbone.  I believe this because later in Verses 18-19, it says that when Samson was thirsty God opened up a place in the middle of this jawbone (Lehi), and the water began to come out; and it says that it is a well to this day.  So it was not the jawbone he was holding in his hand that the water came out of, but I believe it was the water out of this rock formation in the place called Lehi (jawbone).  Believe what you want, it does not matter—God opened it up.

So they came to a place called jawbone, and it says, “…and the Philistines shouted against him.”  Amen!  It sounds like the roar of the lion again, doesn’t it?  Amen?  It sounds like the days of David and Goliath again, in 1 Samuel 17 where Goliath came out and shouted against the people of God.  The enemy brings words.  What do we find in Revelation 12?  In verse 15 it says,

“And the serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood.”

Out of the mouth of the serpent (the Devil) came “water as a flood” (the shouting of the Devil) against the house of God.

Oh, I tell you, sometimes the shouting of this devil stuff really fires me up!  Sometimes, when I go into a restaurant, I have to listen to that horrible devil shouting the music that some of these people play.  It is just about enough to fire me up to get up on the table.  One of these days, Brethren!  One of these days, people that are with me are not going to be happy in that place!  I am usually quiet and discreet to go up to the manager and say, “Do I have to endure this?”  I am polite about it, but Samson was not polite when he heard this shouting against him.  Let me read it again, “…and the spirit of the Lord came MIGHTILY upon him!”  Glory!

Oh, My!  Don’t you want to taste the Spirit of the Lord?  Don’t you want to taste the might, and the power and authority of the Spirit of the Lord?  Brethren, I tell you, whatever the price is, it is going to be worth it!  Hallelujah!  Make up your mind that you are going to be in that place.  Make up your mind that whatever it takes, you are going to be one of those that know the Spirit of God coming upon you and living within you, coming against the strongholds of darkness!

Do you go against the strongholds that are in your soul with the same vigor and with the same hatred as you have for demonic things?  How many, for instance, realize that you have a nasty temper? I mean, that is a stronghold too, isn’t it?  Are we only thinking about the strongholds that are out there?  Well, there are lots of them here within to be overcome, and we need to be just as vigorous with them!  If you are bound by the spirit of lust, or by some spirit of pornography, or nicotine, or whatever, then go after it with the same strength!  Whatever it is, go after it!  Amen!  It will have to come down!  Hallelujah!

Samson was able to tear off and free himself from the bondage.  Amen!  He had been bound.  He had even agreed to be bound, but he was able to get loosed from that bondage when the Spirit of God came upon him!  Hallelujah!  It says,

“…and the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and the cords that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands loosed from off his hands.”

They had his arms and his hands bound!  It says that it was just like flax that had been put in the fire.  It was torn off just like that!  No bondage can stand before the Spirit of the Lord!  It is the anointing that destroys that yoke!  Hallelujah!

Then in Verse 15, speaking of Samson,

“And he found a new jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand, and took it, and slew a thousand men therewith.”

It says that Samson “…found a new jawbone of an ass,” and he “…put forth his hand, and took it.”  He did something!  He did not just sit there and say, “Oh, God!  Now that You have delivered me, cause fire to come down here and destroy all these demonic things that are around me.”  It says that he took up this jawbone of an ass.  I do not know what it represents, but the jawbone speaks of the mouth, and it is through the mouth that the word comes.  Maybe he took up the Word against these things.

It says he slew a thousand of them, and I will tell you what, when he finished it says that he was thirsty.  Brethren, we need the Word of God.  We need to drink of the Word, and God made provision for the Word to quench his thirst when he finished that war.  When we finish fighting, we need the Word of the Lord, don’t we?  Amen!  These brethren who recently went to India faced some very difficult warfare, and I believe that they were happy to have the refreshing of the Spirit of the Lord when that battle was over.  Amen!  Hallelujah!

Let us go on to Chapter 16, and to the second woman that gave him problems.  Again, no name is given.  It just says that she was a harlot.  It says in Verse 1,

“Then went Samson to Gaza and saw there an harlot, and went in unto her.”

It is another kind of church.  Here, there is no pretense.  She does not pretend to be a bride.  She is just a plain harlot church, and Samson got involved with her.  Can you imagine the sons of God getting involved in harlotry?  You know, I am really grieved today at the discouragement that is going on in some of God’s people.  We are looking for a move of God.  Some of us read or remember the great things that God did in the past.  You know, there was a great move of God in the earth back in the late forties and early fifties.  There was a move of God.  I do not remember it like some of the older brethren here do that were in this thing more than I, but one thing that I do remember is that there were tent meetings.  Evangelists would come to these tent meetings.  They would put up a big tent, and the tent would be filled.  It was not just filled with one denomination of people.  People would come if the man had the anointing of God.

The other thing that I remember is that when the word of repentance went out and people would repent!  Do you remember?  Did any of you get involved in any of these tent meetings in the fifties?  People would come in by the hundreds.  They would come and they would repent.  I do not mean like they do today with these television things, like that Billy Graham thing.  People repented!  People came down, and their lives were changed!

Brethren, I not ashamed to admit that I repented in a meeting like that.  I had given my heart to the Lord when I was about eleven or twelve, but at seventeen or eighteen years of age I found myself in need of repentance again.  You know the things that can happen to the heart of a seventeen or eighteen year old, and the wrong directions that we can begin to get ourselves going in at that age.  I can still remember what the man of God said.  He said, “There are some of you here who have been a Christian, but there is a need now for you to get things settled again with God!”  Amen!

The word of God spoke to me!  There was a move of God!  The thing that distresses me so is that in this day and age, people will not move.  There is a hardness that has settled in; a hardness that has settled into the house of God!  People have gotten so that all they want to hear is the positive message and prosperity.  “Tell me how I can make more money.”  “Tell me how I can have this, and how I can have that… and what God is going to do for me today.”  I mean, I do not know what it is, but I tell you I am crying for the day when the Word of God will move people again!

You know what?  We cannot create it!  The thing is, I think that people are beginning to sense that this thing is of short supply in the house of God today.  You know, maybe I am only talking about America.  There are places that we go where you do see God moving like this.  However, in my homeland, this thing is in short supply, and I am seeing saints getting discouraged over this thing, and saying, “Well, God isn’t moving any more.  What is the point?  Why even bother to gather any more?”  You know?  “Let’s just hang around at home and wait for the power of God to fall somewhere.”

I will tell you what, with this kind of dryness I think that the harvest has to be getting awfully white!  You know, it has to be dry in the time of harvest?  Do you realize that?  You cannot go out with a combine in pouring rain and expect to get a good harvest.  Your combine is going to mess up!  It is going to gum up.  It just will not work, and when I see the dryness I believe that we are on the threshold.  What was the term that Pete used?  He said that we are on the threshold of the “dispensation of the fulness of times…” (Ephesians 1:10a).  That is why I brought the little story about the cicada locust.  Is this not the threshold of the Day of the Lord?  Amen!  Brethren, we are in this time!  Hallelujah!

Reading again, Judges 16, beginning at Verse 1,

“Then went Samson to Gaza, and saw there an harlot, and went in unto her.  And it was told the Gazites, saying, Samson is come-hither.  And they compassed him in, and laid wait for him all night in the gate of the city, and were quiet all the night, saying, In the morning, when it is day, we shall kill him.  And Samson lay till midnight, and arose at midnight….”

It says here that Samson got out of the harlot’s house at “midnight.”  Why are we going to have to wait until midnight to get out?  There was nothing that prevented him from getting out before then.  In the first place, what was he doing there?  He did not even have to be there!  If, however, you are hearing this word, and that is where you are (in the harlot’s house)—GET OUT!

I am convinced, you are going to hear the bells ring “midnight” any day now.  However, I do not think there is going to be a warning that will come to you saying, “Midnight bell will ring in sixty seconds!”  No!  You are not going to hear a warning like that!  BRETHREN, THE WARNING AND THE CRY IS GOING OUT NOW, AND IT IS SAYING, “BEHOLD, THE BRIDEGROOM COMETH.  GO YE OUT TO MEET HIM!”  THE SERVANTS OF GOD ARE CRYING THAT CRY IN THE LAND NOW!

Some are getting up and trimming their lamps, and getting the flesh put in order.  Some of us are noticing that there is a lack of oil, and are beginning to get concerned about it!  I think that it is good that we are concerned about it, because I think that there is still time to buy.  There is still time to buy, Brethren, but I do not know how much time there still is.

I do not know how long it takes you to buy.  It took me quite a while to buy what I have.  Do you understand?  I am talking against this “event” thing, where:  I get into my car.  I go to the store.  I hand the guy money.  He hands me the merchandise.  I have it!  That’s “event.”  EVENTS DO NOT HAPPEN LIKE THAT IN GOD!  IT TAKES PAYING A PRICE!  IT TAKES A SEASON OF TIME!  IT TAKES TIME!

The word here has been, “Do you know how to hear the voice of God?  Do you hear the voice of God?”  I do not know how many people that I talk to who are saying, “Oh, but I long to hear the voice of God.”  Well, then what are you going to do about it?

About seventeen years ago my natural brother came to me.  I was beginning to hear the voice of God.  It was because I had begun making some very difficult choices in my life, and I began to feel the pain of the fire of that thing.  I had announced to my brother that I had begun to hear the voice of God, and he came to me and he said, “How do you hear the voice of God?  I want to hear this!”

He is a good believer.  He is in the house of God, but I said to him, “Brother, the only thing I can tell you is that there is a certain price that I have paid.  Are you interested in paying that price?”  He looked at what I was going through and he said, “I certainly do not want to go through what you are going through!”  I said, “Well, I am not saying that you are, but are you willing to pay whatever you have to pay to hear the voice of God?”  I do not think I got an answer.  I just left the question there.

I LEAVE YOU WITH A QUESTION.  ARE YOU WILLING TO PAY WHATEVER YOU NEED TO PAY TO GET TO WHERE YOU REALLY WANT TO BE?  BECAUSE, DO YOU KNOW WHAT?  YOU WILL BE WHERE YOU REALLY WANT TO BE.

Let me just talk about that a minute… (You can close your ears for a minute, Ces.)  There is a man among us who leaves us with challenges to come into higher places than we are.  He does not force us into it, but he drops the word on us.  I remember a word that he keeps dropping and that he keeps saying, “Well there is the thing of having the thing available to us, and choosing not to take it.”

You see, not everyone is going to say, “Oh yes!  Hallelujah!  That is the way I want to live!  I want to learn to live in those realms of overcoming!”  Do you see what I am saying?  WE ARE GOING TO BE WHERE WE WANT TO BE, AND THE THING ABOUT WANTING TO BE, IS THAT IT IS NOT ENOUGH JUST MAKING A STATEMENT WITH YOUR MOUTH.  “Oh yes, I would like to do that!  Oh yes!  That sound’s good about Samson!  Oh yes!  I would like to be there!”  THERE IS A PRICE THAT YOU HAVE TO BE WILLING TO PAY.

Let me tell you another little story.  There came an old man from South Africa into our area.  He came with the Full Gospel, but he was in no way owned by these Full Gospel people.  He was a most unusual man.  When he would go somewhere to minister, he would not tell them more than about three days ahead of time when he was coming.  So there was no way that they could send out brochures, and flyers, pictures, and this type of thing.  I began to inquire of the president of the Saratoga Chapter, and I said, “How do you know when this guy is coming?”  He said, “Oh, he never tells us ahead of time.”  I said, “Here is my phone number.  I do not want to miss it the next time this man comes!”  I did not want to miss it when he came again because I had discovered that this was a man who had learned to “live by faith.”

He was called by God to live by faith, and oh, the stories that this man would tell!  His name was Robert Thom.  I do not know if you have ever heard of him.  He was just a man of God.  He was an older man of God.  If it is all right, I would like to tell you a story that I heard him tell.  You like hearing stories, don’t you?

You can hear something like this man’s testimony, and if you are a new believer or a new man in the Spirit of God, you will say, “Oh, I have to go out like this man and do this also!”  Well, you know, “God bless you,” but you may have yet to really realize all that it will cost you.

I think such stories are meant to challenge us.  God wants to challenge us.  In spite of our foolishness, God wants to challenge us.  I think that we need to be challenged, or we are never going to reach out.  We are never going to climb higher unless we have a challenge.

Brother Thom would tell of times that God would tell him to go on a certain boat, or on a certain plane.  He would hear the voice of God and he would simply obey.  God would tell him when to be there, and he would be there.  There were times when he had no money and no ticket, but somebody would hand him an envelope as he came in the door of the station or terminal.  He would say, “Oh, thank you!” and in the envelope would either be the tickets or the money to buy a ticket.  Other times he would go up to the ticket counter and say, “I want to be on thus and thus flight (or boat, or whatever it was),” and he would be asked, “What is your name?”  He would say, “Thom,” and the man would say, “Oh, somebody left an envelope here for you!”  He handed him the envelope, and it would have the tickets in it!  I mean, can you imagine this?

He was telling of the time he came to America (he lived in Kentucky somewhere) and the Lord spoke to him that he was to be on a certain flight.  The Lord gave him the airline, the flight number, the day, and the time of day.  He said, “You are to go to the airport, and you are to get on that flight!”  Well, he did not speak of having a money problem this time, and he arrived all right, but it was a situation where he had no reservation.  So he just walks into the airport and goes up to the counter of this airline, and says, “I am going to buy a ticket now for flight number such and such, to such and such city….”  The lady at the counter said, “Well sir, that flight is full.”  He said, “Oh, no!  I am to be on that flight!” She said, “Well sir, I just said to you that the flight is full.  In fact, it is overbooked.  There are nineteen people on standby ahead of you, and you are number twenty!”  He said, “Oh, I’ll be on that flight!”

As you can imagine, she had a big argument with him; but he stuck to his guns!  He said, “No!  I am going to be on that flight!”  She said, “How do you know that you are going to be on that flight?”  He said, “Because the Lord told me to get on that flight!”  She said, “Well, I am going to tell you today, Sir, you will not be on that flight!”  He said, “Do you mind if I just hang around here and wait?”  She said, “You can hang around here all you want, but you are not going to be on that flight!”

So he hung around and waited.  The airplane filled, and the airplane left the airport.  The airplane went down to the end of the runway, and the airplane took off.  So, she said to him, “Sir, your airplane just left.”  He said, “Oh no, I am going to be on that flight!”  She said, “…Crazy man!”

Well, because the airplane left, the nineteen other people left the airport.  They walked out, and the airplane cleared the takeoff.  It had no more than gotten into the air when one of the passengers became violently ill.  Oh, terribly sick!  So sick, that they immediately turned the airplane around and landed.  They took the passenger off.  The lady said, “Sir, I believe there is one seat left on this airplane.”  He said, “Thank you.  I will get on.”

Hearing things like that can really challenge you.  Now, he had come again to our area and I was able to go and hear him.  When he was done, he began to tell about his walk of faith.  He never had notes.  He would just get up and he would start talking.  He would hold the Bible up, and he would quote the Word and tell about the things that he had experienced in his walk with God.  He finished, and he said, “How many of you would like to have the gift of faith today?  God wants to give the gift of faith to some of you here today.  You come on up, and I will lay my hands on you.”  I said, “Yes!  Yes!  Yes!”

I went up, and I tell you, there came a time later (several years ago) when things in my life were very difficult.  It was about the time I remember myself first being aware of the appearance of that seventeen-year locust.  I began to wonder, “Oh My, is all this difficulty I am experiencing because I let that man lay hands on me?”  “God, what are You doing to me?  Why do I have to go through all this?”

Well, one day the Lord just kind of whispered, “I thought you wanted to walk by faith?”  “Well, I did Lord, but I thought it was going to be a nicer story than this!”  I thought it was just going to be, you know, going to airports and having people hand me a ticket as I come in the door. …[Laughter]

Do you see how the Lord tricked me?  Did He or didn’t He trick me?  What I am saying, you know, is that if it is in your heart you are going to have it, because you are going to want it and you are going to pay the price!  Amen!

Let us go back to where we were reading in Judges 16, beginning again with Verse 1:

“Then went Samson to Gaza, and saw there an harlot, and went in unto her.  And it was told the Gazites, saying, Samson is come hither. And they compassed him in, and laid wait for him all night in the gate of the city, and were quiet all the night, saying, In the morning, when it is day, we shall kill him.  And Samson lay till midnight, and arose at midnight, and took the doors of the gate of the city, and the two posts, and went away with them, bar and all, and put them upon his shoulders, and carried them up to the top of an hill that is before Hebron.”

You know, there came a time when Samson eventually had to pay the price.  He got out of this harlot’s house, but the enemy thought—and the enemy thinks this today, that if he has you in the harlot’s house, he has you and you are as good as dead!  That is what the enemy thinks!  However, by the grace of God, Samson got out.

You know, they did not have the gate open for him at midnight.  The gate was not open.  The gate was shut, and they intended to keep the gate shut until they went through the whole city and until they found him.  Even if he was not in the harlot’s house, they were going to get him.

Do you know how he opened the gate?  He lifted it up.  Do you know what that means?  Have you any idea the size of these gates?  These are not little aluminum decorative gates for your back yard.  These gates were made of solid wood, probably twelve to eighteen inches thick.  I do not know, maybe even twenty-four inches thick.  They were meant to withstand battering-rams.  A battering-ram is a big tree carried by thirty, forty, fifty soldiers that are big, husky, strong, mean looking soldiers.  They carry this thing, and run with all their might with this thing and slam it into the wall.  They back up and they slam it again.  They keep slamming against this thing until they break it!  If that does not work, then they try to burn it down.  That is what these gates were meant to withstand.

Now, imagine the gatepost that would be needed to hold this kind of weight.  We are not talking about a flimsy little Stanley hinge.  These are massive things!  Can you imagine how far down into the ground the posts must have been set in order to prevent them from moving with the swinging of this gate?  I do not know that there is today a crane made that could just whip in there and zip that thing right out of the ground without excavation and jack hammering, and this type of thing.

Do you realize what this is saying?  Do you understand something about the power of God?  This man was not able do this because he had been “pumping iron.”  No amount of pumping iron by a human being could ever accomplish what he did!  This is something that God did!  Do you understand?  God opened the gate for him, because it was shut and Samson needed to get out of town!  We are talking about putting this thing on his shoulders and carrying it off a half mile!  Up a hill!  Not human!  Not human at all!

Now, you would think, wouldn’t you, that Samson had learned by now the kind of woman who was to be the right kind of “bride of Christ.”  However, there was a third woman, and the third woman has a name.  Her name alone should have been the clue to problems.  That is the reason God mentioned her name.  It is not just because “Delilah” was a cute name.

Do you know what her name means?  First of all, let us talk about where she lived.  She lived in “Sorek.”  Do you know what Sorek means?  It means, “grapevine stock yielding purple grapes; the richest variety.”  [It is translated elsewhere in Scripture as the “choicest vine” in the making of wine.]  Now, [because Samson was a Nazarite], he was supposed to be avoiding that intoxicating stuff (Ref. Judges 13:5, Numbers 6:2-4), but here he is going to go down to Sorek to get involved with a woman and be intoxicated by what she has to offer of her charms.

We can talk about this situation here that Samson is in, that it is like being involved with a church that has intoxicating things to offer.  In fact, this is what a lot of churches are offering today—whatever it takes to get people nice and drunk on their intoxicating fumes.  You know, “Whatever you guys want.”  “Children are bored?  Well, we are going to have puppet shows.  Teenagers are bored?  Oh, we’ll bring in some Christian rock groups.  Everybody can have what they want to drink; and you know, we will have clubs for the elderly men and clubs for the elderly women, and we will have a club for everybody.”

These are the kind of programs they have, and you know, some of the saints of God that have come out, they are going back!  It is because they want these things.  They want the intoxication of this kind of wine.  You know, it is the leaven that makes wine an intoxicating drink.  Leaven!  Yeast!  It is what breaks down the sugar and changes it into alcohol.

I do not know if any of you have been through western New York as you are driving between Buffalo and Jamestown.  They have row after row, and field after field of these Concord grapes.  The purpose of Concord grapes, by the way, is to make Concord wine.  This is their purpose.  They are not the eating type.

Samson then, was now going down into Sorek, a place of intoxication.  Let us read the story, beginning with Verse 4 in Judges 14:

“It came to pass afterward, that he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah.” 

This name, Delilah, if you want to look it up, is number 1807 in Strong’s Concordance.  It has a very interesting meaning.  It comes from a Hebrew word that meant: “To slacken or be feeble; to be oppressed.”  It is translated as: “to bring low; dry up; be emptied; to fail; be impoverished; be made thin.”

Now, surely Samson had some understanding of what this word meant.  I mean, he was able to communicate with these people.  He surely knew the language.  He understood what this meant, and yet he gets involved.  What is he doing being involved in something that is destined to take him and rob him of everything that he is?

Here again, Delilah uses the same tactic on him that the first woman used.  Why didn’t he overcome this thing?  She vexes him.  She plagues him.  She pesters him.  Day and night!  Time after time, she vexes him.  It says here in Verse 16,

“And it came to pass, when she pressed him daily with her words, and urged him, so that his soul was vexed unto death.”

Why would a man stay in a situation like that, when it says his soul is being “vexed unto death”?

I had a dream the other night.  It was a very brief one.  I was dreaming that I was in one of those church businesses.  They were coming to me, and plaguing me, and wanting me to be involved in this program and in that program, and I knew in my heart that it had nothing to do with the kingdom of God—absolutely nothing whatsoever!  I remember in the dream, it was like I went up to the deck of a ship, and I was so vexed over this thing in my dream that I began to vomit overboard—this thing was so troubling to me.

And I thought, “My God!  Thank You for delivering me out of that house!  Oh God!  I do not know what I would do today if I were still there.  I would surely have to, by now, rise up and flee from that place.”  It so vexed me that I woke up out of the dream, and the feeling was so strong that I thought I was going to get up out of bed and vomit!  I thought, “My Lord, is this thing in the Spirit so strong?”  Do you have a sensitive enough spirit, that if you were pressed in a situation like that, that it would cause you to rise up and vomit?

Yet, we put up with other spirits, don’t we?  How sensitive do we have to be?  Because, a familiar spirit—we are just familiar with it.  Let me ask you a question.  If somebody (some trusted man or woman of God, or whoever it would take) were to just come up to you and say, “Brother, you know, there is something that I see, that you really need to get a deliverance from,” what would your reaction be?  What would you say?  Would you nod your head and say, “Okay, lets do it!”

Oh, but you are not expecting anybody to do that, are you?  You are just expecting to wait and….  I do not know, but if we are really this late in time, maybe we ought to consider just what our reaction would be in such a situation.  Would you receive it?

Maybe someone is just so pressed with the love of God for you, that they have just been sick night after night in praying for you.  You know, I do not think God is going to show you anything about anyone else unless you love that person so much that you would be willing to lay your life down for that person.  We are not talking about a spirit of criticism.  We are talking about somebody that has such an intense love for you, that, if he thought that you were a lamb in the mouth of a lion, like David he would go and lay his life down before you to save you from the mouth of that lion.  I think it is to that man or to that woman that God is going to reveal these things.

You know, I think the first thing that is going to have to happen, is that we are going to have to start praying before we starting running our mouth.  You start spending three or four weeks in prayer over that issue, before you even open your mouth to another soul, and you are going to have a whole different message that is going to come out of your mouth for that person’s deliverance.  Amen!

What does that have to do with Samson?  Well, he finally revealed to this woman that his secret was his covering; and you know what?  She wasted no time in relieving him of it.  Boy, if that does not display the character of the devil, I do not know what does.  As I said before, the enemy is not just interested in seeing how many people he can make to shake and tremble.  If he had a long enough leash, he would destroy every one of us!  God keeps him on a leash, and he can only get at you what God allows.

Reading from Verse 16, “And it came to pass, when she pressed him daily with her words, and urged him, so that his soul was vexed unto death.  That he told her all his heart, and said unto her, There hath not come a razor upon mine head; for I have been a Nazarite unto God from my mother’s womb: if I be shaven, then my strength will go from me, and I shall become weak, and be like any other man.  And when Delilah saw that he had told her all his heart, she sent and called for the lords of the Philistines, saying, Come up this once, for he hath shewed me all his heart.  Then the lords of the Philistines came up unto her, and brought money in their hand.  And she made him sleep upon her knees; and she called for a man, and she caused him to shave off the seven locks of his head; and she began to afflict him, and his strength went from him.  And she said, The Philistines be upon thee, Samson.  And 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.  But the Philistines took him, and put out his eyes, and brought him down to Gaza, and bound him with fetters of brass; and he did grind in the prison house.”

You remember the whole business of Job.  God lengthened Satan’s leash twice, but He still set a limit.  He said, “You will not take that man’s life.  You can touch him here,” and the second time: “You can touch him there.  I will lengthen your leash a little bit, but here is the limit!”  You know what, I believe that it is the grace of God, and when we talk about coming into a greater measure of warfare against the enemy, then we also have to realize that we are coming into a slight lengthening of the enemy’s leash.  Because, if God is going to give us more power, He is going to let him out just a little bit more.

I remember how the Lord gave Janet and I that prophetic word last spring (and I think that we shared this in Michigan when we were there) that He was going to bring us into a higher realm, and how He said, “You have not yet begun to fight.”  I think of the old famous John Paul Jones quote, “I have not yet begun to fight!”  He was surrounded by thirty British ships, and the British came to him and said, “Do you surrender?”  He said, “I have not started to fight yet!”  Amen!  The Lord has spoken this to us, “You haven’t begun to fight,” and, “I am going to bring you into a higher realm.”

We rejoiced at that word!  I mean, it was a wonderful word!  However, I would not have looked forward to what we had to go through last summer in warfare.  Nevertheless, I will tell you something!  We found out that we could come higher.  We found out that we could take on spirits of a higher dimension than what we had faced before.  We found out that in the power and in the name of God that they too have to buckle under, and they too have to back up, and they too can have egg all over their face!  Hallelujah!  I am referring to the recent court custody case we have been involved with in support of some in our family.  The county had three or four lawyers to our one.  Our lawyer walked right up to them on the day of the trial, and made a statement to them.  He said, “You guys are going to have egg all over your face!  When I get through with you, you are going to be embarrassed!”  I mean, he really laid it on.  He came back, and he smiled and said to us, “That was just leveling the playing field a little bit.”

I thought, “You know, this man knows warfare, and he has never read the book that I’ve read!”  I mean, he simply went up and told the enemy, “You guys are going to lose!”  He said, “This is the way it is going to be, guys, because I have got the goods!”

I tell you, that little act really stirred up Janet!  [Now, when the enemy comes around with his lies and accusations], she goes and she says to the devil, “Listen, you get off my back!  I have eternal life waiting for me, and you have nothing but the lake of fire waiting for you!  If you want to hear about this, just hang around!”  He does not like to hear that.  He leaves.  Amen!  Hallelujah!

Well, one last thing about Samson.  You know the story, and Ces has talked about it, about how they caught him, shaved him, and put his eyes out.  Finally, you know, he was there grinding away there at the mill.  Just grinding away like a beast.  Crying out to God, in that place.  Crying for deliverance.  Crying for restoration.  He lost his vision.  Amen!  In Proverbs 29, it says that when there is no vision, the people perish, and Samson must have felt like he was going to perish.

However, God gave him one more chance!  Amen!  Isn’t it good to know we have a God of a second chance?  Oh, yes!  Cry out to God no matter where you are!  No matter what condition you are in, and no matter how hopeless the grip of the devil is on you!  Amen! God will give you one more chance, if you ask Him for it.  It is because He is a God of a second chance.  Go through the whole Word.  I mean, from Abraham on down… Samson! David!  Second chance!  Second chance!  They had a second chance.

Hallelujah!  Oh, but don’t blow it.  Don’t blow it.  Don’t play with it.  You have a second chance—Don’t ask for a third.  I do not know what He would do; but don’t blow it.

Reading again at Verse 21, “But the Philistines took him, and put out his eyes, and brought him down to Gaza, and bound him with fetters of brass; and he did grind in the prison house.  Howbeit the hair of his head began to grow again after he was shaven.  Then the lords of the Philistines gathered them together for to offer a great sacrifice unto Dagon their god, and to rejoice: for they said, Our god hath delivered Samson our enemy into our hand.  And when the people saw him, they praised their god: for they said, Our god hath delivered into our hands our enemy, and the destroyer of our country, which slew many of us.  And it came to pass, when their hearts were merry, that they said, Call for Samson, that he may make us sport.  And they called for Samson out of the prison house; and he made them sport: and they set him between the pillars.  And Samson said unto the lad that held him by the hand, Suffer me that I may feel the pillars whereupon the house standeth, that I may lean upon them.  Now the house was full of men and women; and all the lords of the Philistines were there; and there were upon the roof about three thousand men and women, that beheld while Samson made sport.  And Samson called unto the LORD, and said, O Lord GOD, remember me, I pray thee, and strengthen me, I pray thee, only this once, O God, that I may be at once avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes.  And Samson took hold of the two middle pillars upon which the house stood, and on which it was borne up, of the one with his right hand, and of the other with his left.  And Samson said, Let me die with the Philistines. And he bowed himself with all his might; and the house fell upon the lords, and upon all the people that were therein.  So the dead which he slew at his death were more than they which he slew in his life.”

Hallelujah!  I can just see that scene with Samson there.  There he is.  They have been making sport of him; making fun of him.  Making a big joke of him.  “Yeah!  There is the big guy that killed a thousand of us with the jawbone of an ass!”  “Oh, yeah!  You are the big guy that lit all our fields on fire one year!  We went hungry that year because of you!”  You know, they made a big joke of him.

So finally, they brought him over to the pillar, and they went to their wine drinking up on top of this thing that was supported by several pillars.  But Samson asked this little boy that was with him, “Take me where the middle pillars are, son.”  “Are these the ones?  Are these the ones right in the middle?”  “Listen!  You seem to be kind of a nice boy.”  (I would tell him that, if I were him.)  “You have been a good boy.  I would like to do something nice for you.  I want you to run now, as fast as you can and as far as you can.  I am going to give you to the count of twenty.  Get out of here and get going!”  I would like to think he did that for the boy; and then he leaned with all his might.

You know, God talks about pillars.  He said, “Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God…” (Revelation 3:12).  Now, what do you suppose these pillars represented in the devil’s house?  It represented two of the chief ones.  The big guys!  The big two!  Samson got them!

He finally got the lion and he got the bear!  He took them down.  He gave his life for it, though, didn’t he?  He said, “I want my eyes back; and I am doing this to take vengeance because they took it away, and I am getting my vision back!”  He got his vision back.  He got his overcoming back.  He got his place back in God.  Amen!

Brethren, when we see that heavenly army, Samson is going to be one of them.  Not because he weighs five hundred pounds, but because he learned.  Amen!  He finally learned!  He had to give his life!  He had to pay a price!  For some reason, he was unable to pay that price, he was unable to overcome that natural flesh in his lifetime.  My God!  GOD GIVES US AN OPPORTUNITY!  WE CAN OVERCOME THE FLESH AND WE CAN WALK IN THAT PLACE NOW!  AMEN!  YOU DO NOT HAVE TO DO IT IN YOUR DEATH LIKE SAMSON DID; AND YET WE ARE GOING TO HAVE TO LAY DOWN OUR LIFE, AND COUNT OUR NATURAL LIFE AS NOUGHT.  HALLELUJAH!  HALLELUJAH!

Brethren, let us just stand for a minute here.  If the Word of God has moved you today, and if you have heard something in this message that you know that God is speaking to you, and you want something of God, then I think that it is time to reach out and tell God what you want.  It is time to tell God that you are going to pay the price, and you are going to have it!

You know, I started by saying that there are differences, even in the house of God.  I said that there are differences among us.  Amen!  One of the reasons that there is a difference is because we do not all come, and we are not all willing to pay the same price, and come into the same place.  There is no reason why any one of us cannot come to the highest place, to the highest office—if you want to use that term.  It is not a scriptural term, but sometimes to speak whatever it takes to jar your understanding.

There is not a reason why any of you cannot walk in faith, in God’s particular way and in the same manner of the witness and the testimony of this man of faith, Brother Thom, whom I made mention of today.  I heard that story, and I said, “I want to walk in faith.  I want to walk in God.  My story is going to be different, but I am going to have a story, and it is going to be a grand story, and it is going to be the glory of God!  There is going to be the might and power of God!  There is going to be the deliverance of God manifested in my life!”

I am just delighted that so many of the people here today are young people.  You have your whole life ahead of you.  You do not have to wait until you are forty years old to get the wisdom, and to get the word and the understanding of the things that we are talking about.  I did not have this understanding when I was twenty years old.  I had to press in.  I had to search for this house of God!

Search for these brethren.  Search for this truth!  You do not have to, for it is right here at your doorstep.  All you have to do is reach out and take it!  Amen!

Lord, I pray that this word would be heard this day among this people.  Lord, that You would cause us to rise up in this place.  Lord, we commit it to You.  Lord, we leave the results to You.  Oh God, that we would respond this day, for Your word does demand of us a response, in this hour and in this day.  In the name of Jesus.  Hallelujah!