April 4, 2010 Positioned for a breakthrough Judges 16:20-31
There is a familiarity between the life of Samson and the life of a believer, by believer I do not necessarily mean one who wears the ideals or doctrines of their own particular denomination like a badge. By believer I mean you believe Jesus is real, he is love, he died for you, rose again, his blood is able to wash away your sin and he is coming back. You might be weak, you might in trouble, you may be spiritually oppressed, you may not be living like you should you my wear pants, you may not, your life may be spotless it may not, maybe you don’t know the worship songs, maybe you don’t live like such and such , but one thing is for sure you are a believer- are there any believers ut there.
A few things I notice right away, in the era to which Samson was born, was the longest period of oppression that the children of Israel suffered under, throughout the period of the judges. The children of Israel had gone in and out of apostacy throughout the book of judges, but none of it had lasted as long as this- he was born to a specific time with a specific gift(it lasted forty years). He was born to in a time when slavery, bondage and oppression was all they knew. Some of us have found ourselves in circumstances that are sinful yes, but that’s all we knew and now the Lord has called us.
Samson –little sun-little rising sun-small rising sun. But it was under a cloud of his own weakness- a weakness that held him captive and even limited his own potential- he had this thing for strange women, it got so bad that at one point his parents asked him, is there no women among your own people who you would like- the worse thing sometimes is to be gifted, to be anointed , to be called, to have what others only wish they could have and still be limited by your own internal problems, I wish somebody would be real with me, and how many of you reading this have great potential you feel it, you sense it- others have told you, you dream about it- you know that underneath all the drama of your life- there’s some greatness, you know that underneath the fact that you keep choosing the wrong man or hooking up with the wrong woman-there’s some greatness, you sense that underneath your baby daddy drama, underneath the fact that you were molested, the fact that you were abandoned-there’s something awesome – you feel it, that underneath the drug problem, the alcohol problem, the sex problem there’s something great in you that has to come out- and I want to confirm it there’s some great mess in you but there’s some greatness in you too- touch: underneath all this there’s something awesome in me.
This becomes then the realization of your gift- because you really do not become a target until you know who you are.
But this only leads to the enemy’s realization of your gift- when your special and you know it, when you are somebody and you know it this is when the devil, the enemy gets upset, he ain’t trying to get anybody that is already lulled into ignorance, he ain’t trying to destroy anybody who has already decided they have no worth. There’s no need to kill a man who decides he wants to die. You leave him alone and he will do the job for you. But when you begin to understand who and what you are, when you begin to understand that you are precious in the sight of God, when you begin to realize that you survived 400 million sperm because you were dynamic, that you are the head and not the tail that you are the lender not the borrower, that you are the one whose going to bless you children and bless your family and move the mountains and do the impossible the enemy gets mad at you
Then there is the TROUBLE: Here is Samson’s sin- that he joins himself with a harlot and ultimately reveals the source of his god given strength. And this is the problem that many of us face today. It’s not the enemy that has done great evil to us, his greatest strength is deception. Which is less dynamic and more passive. But it is us. Samson betrayed his own strength and paid for it and like Samson. Most of us have done the damage to ourselves , it was not the devil that did it, it was not demons that did it, it was not your mama, it was not your daddy, it was not the white man, the trouble that we find ourselves in for the most part is at the strength of our own hands. We have been delivered from so many things we get delivered from drugs, we get delivered from alcohol, we get delivered from illnesses, but God says I want to do a special work in you- I want to deliver you from you- trust in the lord and lean not to thine own understanding- in all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths. He allows a woman who does not love him and only seeks his destruction to cipher his secret from him once this is done he is captured by the Philistines who are bent on destroying him. They cut off his hair and put out his eyes.
So now he is a prisoner, blinded and his hair cut off and locked in someone’s prisoner- even though he is someone who was born with great potential and power from God- this is where some of us are right now- this has been your position in 2000. it was your position in 2005. it was your position in 2007, in 2008, and in 2009 but the lord is saying in 2010 I’m going to put you in the right position and you are coming out.
They bring him out one final time at a celebration where they praised their Gods that he was in fact captured and they had advantage over him- the bible says that they chose to make sport over him – His hair growing again was also a sign of forgiveness, a sign that God is over it, a sign that God wasn’t holding on to it anymore. So much so that it begin to grow as if it had never been cut-it began to grow as indication not to the Philistines, but samson’s hair began to grow so that Samson might know- that his favour with God has been returned that his place with God has been restored
But the bible says that his hair began to grow back-understand that his hair was not the source of his power, his hair was simply a symbol, the enemy often makes the mistake of attacking the symbol cause he can’t do nothing with the source, the hair was symbolic of his faith, the hair was symbolic of his relationship with and to God, the hair was symbolic of his favour with God, and although they lied and cheated and deceived him although they ambushed him and humiliated him –his hair began to grow back, as we head deeper into 2010-the lord is saying I AM RETURNING MY FAVOR BACK ON YOUR LIFE- im returning my relationship with you again, -look at you –its back, let them keep laughing at you but its back, let them conspire against you, but its back, let them plan their verbal assault, its back, let them say you aint going no where and ain’t gonna never be nothing- what they don’t know is that his favour is baaack—somebody holler ITS BACK!!!. My last trouble was just an interruption, but its back, my last mistake was a distraction but my joy is back, my life is back, my peace is back, my intimacy with God is back, my trust is back, my specialness is back, my power is back my favour is back- my hair is back=ITS BAAAAAACCCKKK!!!
The hair my God the hair was just a symbol of his consecration his strength did not come from his hair but his consecration- to consecrate is to be set apart as unto the lord, to come to him so he can be close to you-
His hair growing again was also a sign of forgiveness, a sign that God is over it, a sign that God wasn’t holding on to it anymore. So much so that it begin to grow as if it had never been cut-it began to grow as indication not to the Philistines, but samsons hair began to grow so that Samson might know- that his favour with God has been returned that his place with God has been restored
His blindness- representative of his faith, he had no sight, because before your big breakout you always get to a place of blindness, a place where you can’t see what’s coming, you can’t see how you’re coming out, you can’t see what you’re doing you don’t know how you gonna make it, it’s a place of absolute faith-his trouble led him to this place of absolute faith-to this place of faith-sometime we ask ourselves why did GOD ALLOW CERTAIN THINGS, WHY DD HE not stop it, before it got outta control, before you went overboard, before you messed everything up,- one of the reasons is that you’re own trouble is going to lead you to a place of absolute faith-they looked at his blindness as a handicap, they thought it put him in an inferior position, they ignored it. But it made him lean on God
Whenever you get to this place- he overcame his victimization you cannot wait for somebody to help you out or get you out.
You have to snap out of it.
He was in the same old place but he was renewed.
Placing him at those pillars was the biggest mistake they could have ever made because they positioned him to fulfill his purpose, they positioned him to fulfill his destiny, they positioned him to do what he was called to do.
It is my sincere hope and belief that while some of us may be struggling yu are in the right position. You may be in the same place but your are positioned at the pillars and yu are going to fulfill your destiny.
Now push!
awordgiver
