Our judge is 13. And Doug, you
lead us in prayer. you Judges 13. I titled this message, A Special
Son. A Special Son. Now in Judges here, we have the
picture or the story of Samson. and how the Lord sent an angel.
And this angel, no doubt, is the Lord Jesus Christ. We will
see that toward the end of the chapter. Now this chapter starts
out with verse one, the children of Israel did evil in the sight
of the Lord. And I put there, again, again,
And this evil, which they were so prone to, was idolatry. They fell into idol worship so
many times. God gave them so many proofs
of being the one and only true God, and yet they fell into idolatry
so many times. When Moses went up on the mount,
And he's up there for 40 days and 40 nights. What did they
do? They made a golden calf and they fell down and worshiped
it. And they rose up to play and worshiped an idol, just an
idol, something that was made by a man's hand, Aaron. And that was their sin that they
were so prone to. And we are too, we are too. It's by God's grace that he keeps
us focused on the Lord Jesus Christ. He has to keep bringing
us back. This is what this service does every week. It enables us
to focus one more time on the Lord Jesus Christ, the only true
and living God. And this sin of idolatry that
they were so prone to shows that they were no better than the
Gentiles. They called the Gentiles dogs. You know how they looked
down on the Gentiles. That was a tag they gave to the
Gentiles. They called them dogs. And yet
they were so prone to the same thing. Same thing. And because of this, for 40 years,
it tells us there in verse one, for 40 years God punished them.
He put them underneath the Philistines. They went into captivity. They
were just, you know, God used the Philistines to punish them
for 40 years because of their idolatry. But God sent an angel,
angel of the Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ. This is one of those
pre-incarnate appearances of the Lord Jesus Christ. And he
sent an angel, a deliverer, One with a message, the one who is
the message. And he appeared to this woman,
this wife of Manoah. He appears to her. And it tells
us here in verse two that she was barren and bare not. She never had any children. She
could not have children. Here's a message. We are barren. We are barren until the Lord
commands life. You know, life is of God. People,
women don't just get pregnant. Life is of God. Every person
that comes into this world, it is written over in John chapter
one, he lighteth every man that cometh into the world. He gives
light, he gives life. He gives us what we have even
naturally. Life is of God. But it says here
that she was barren and she never had conceived before, but he's
gonna tell her that she's going to conceive and she's gonna have
a special son, a special son. You know, there were special
sons in the Old Testament. Isaac was a special son, wasn't
he? Jacob, Jacob have I loved, Esau
have I hated? Think about that. Has God saved
you? That can be said of you. You
can put your name there. Jacob, have I loved? If God has
saved me, he can say, John, have I loved? John, have I loved? That's amazing. John the Baptist was a special
son. He was the forerunner of Christ. But there's one special
son above all of them. The only begotten Son, in whom
all the special sons of God are born. You know, all of you, all
who are born of God are special sons and daughters, but there's
one that's very special, and it's in Him all the sons of God
are begotten. in the Lord Jesus Christ. But
now this angel comes and he tells of this deliverer, this special
son that she's going to have and he's going to be a Nazirite.
He's going to be dedicated to the Lord. You know a Nazirite
under the Hebrew law, he bound himself, and it says a man or
a woman bound themselves over in Numbers 6. In Numbers 6, verses
1 through 21, you can read about the Nazarite. That's a whole
chapter given to the Nazarite, and you can read all about him.
And the Nazarite, it was not to drink wine, because the angel
told her, don't drink wine, don't eat any grapes of the vine, don't
eat anything of the vine. and his hairs to be uncut, a
razor was not to come on his head, and he was to observe various
forms of purification in his service to God. And when this
period was over with, there's going to be an offering made,
a sin offering made, you see it in numbers. The hair was to
be cut and burned, and he's discharged of his vow. But now some who
were Nazarites were Nazarites throughout their whole lifetime.
That's our Lord throughout eternity. He's God's servant. And one of the interesting things
about this, you remember when the apostle Paul shaved his head
with those four men and he went into the temple? to observe this
vow. He said, these men have a vow
on them. It was a Nazarite vow. And Paul
shaved his head, and he went into the temple, because, you
know, it was come up to the end of their vow, and there was to
be a sin offering. Christ is the sin offering, and
God stopped that. Before they offered the sin offering,
God stopped it, and they rushed in, grabbed Paul, and threw him
out of the temple. God stopped that, because there
was only one sin offering. Paul made a It appears that he
made a great error there, but God stopped it. Aren't you glad
that God stops us? God stops us from being what
we could be and doing what we would do if he left us alone. Paul would have went right ahead
and went right with that sin offering and that vow and done
all those things that was required of the Nazarite. And God stopped
it. But that's what he was doing
there in Acts chapter 21, in verse 20 through 26. But this
woman in verse six through eight, this woman, she comes and you
see verse six, then the woman came and told her husband saying,
a man of God came to me and his countenance was like the countenance
of an angel of God, very terrible. And I asked him where he was
from. And she told him, she said, This angel came to me and told me these
things, that I'm going to have a son, he's going to be a Nazirite,
and so on. And Manoah asked God to allow
this man to come back. He says, you know, Manoah entreated
the Lord in verse eight. Manoah entreated the Lord and
said, Oh my Lord, let the man of God, which thou didst sin,
come again to us and teach us what we shall do unto the child
that shall be born. And God answered his prayer.
God answered his prayer. The angel came back. He came
back to Manoah's wife. Then she ran and told Manoah.
Then Manoah came and he talked to them. And Manoah asked the
man of God to allow him to offer a lamb before him. There in verses
15 through 28, he wanted to offer up a lamb before the angel. And this is important, Manoah
saw him as a man. They knew he was a great man.
His countenance, it says, was, she said there, his countenance
was like something else. It was terrible. And so Manoah,
when he sees him and he asks him these things, he wants to,
give an offering. He didn't know at this time that
this angel was the Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ, Jehovah. He
didn't know. And here's the significance of this. The angel said, if you
would offer a burnt offering, offer it to the Lord. Well this
is the Lord Jesus Christ standing before him. He didn't know that.
It's the same, it's like the man who came to the Lord and
said, good master. And the Lord stopped him and
said, why callest thou me good? There's none good but God. If
I'm good, I'm God. If I'm good, I'm God. And he
tells Manoah here, you know, don't, you don't offer this to
me. You don't offer it to me. Let's see here in verse 15. Let
me start reading in verse 15. And Manoah said unto the angel
of the Lord, I pray thee, let us detain thee until we shall
have made ready a kid. And the angel of the Lord said
to Manoah, Though thou detain me, I will not eat of thy bread.
And if thou wilt offer a burnt offering, thou must offer it
unto the Lord. For Manoah knew not that he was
an angel of the Lord. He was just a man. That would
be creature worship. That would be idol worship. In
Manoah's heart, he'd be worshiping and offering up an offering to
a man. If we do not see Jesus Christ
as the living God, it's idolatry. Because we're just worshiping
a man. That's not God. When we worship
Him, we worship Him first, first as God. As God. The God-man, but He's God. That's
why God said in Hebrews 1, let all the angels of God worship
him. That would not be said if he
were not God, but he's God. And he said, let all the angels
of God worship him. So Manoah, listen, Manoah offered
a kid upon a rock and he offered it unto the Lord. And as the
flames arose, We see here that the angel of
the Lord ascended up in the flames. Let me read on here. And Manoah
said unto the angel of the Lord, what is thy name? That when thy
saints come to pass, we may do the honor. And the angel of the
Lord said unto him, why asketh thus after my name? Seeing it
is secret. Now this is the really the first
one, the first evidence that this is Jesus Christ. If you
look in your margin, that name secret means wonderful. My name
is wonderful. You know, when Gabriel appeared,
he identified himself as what? Gabriel. When Michael appeared,
he identified himself as Michael. This one identifies himself as
wonderful. This is the Lord Jesus Christ.
And Manoah took a kid with a meat offering and offered it upon
a rock unto the Lord, and the angel did wondrously. He did something that they didn't
even expect. They see a man standing there,
and this man, listen, He did wondrously and Manoah and his
wife looked on for it came to pass when the flame went up toward
heaven from off the altar that the angel of the Lord ascended
in the flame of the altar showing his acceptance. Showing this
is the Lord. This is the Lord. This sacrifice
that's being offered represents him. And their sacrifice is accepted. They are accepted. They are accepted. And he went up in the flames. And when he did that, listen,
and Manoah and his wife looked on it and it fell on their faces
to the ground. Boy, they realized they were
in the presence. They were in the presence of
more than a man. They were in the presence of
God. They were in the presence of God. But the angel of the Lord did
no more appear to Manoah and his wife. Then Manoah knew that
he was an angel of the Lord. He's Jehovah. He's Jehovah. And Manoah said unto his wife,
after they saw this, he said to his wife, we shall surely
die because we have seen God. We're going to die. You know why? Because it is said
over in Exodus 33 that no man can see my face. God said no
man can see my face and live. And we've seen the face of God.
They realized this is God. This person we were speaking
to is Jehovah. And now we're going to die. I
think that's the first reaction of sinners when God awakens them
and they really see the truth. When God gives them a real glimpse
of who he is, what was your first reaction? I'm going to die. I'm going to die. For the first time in your life,
you became afraid of dying for a different reason. You see the
world's afraid of dying because they will exist no more. You
became afraid of dying because you're going to meet God. You're
going to meet God. You're not just gonna die and
leave this world and leave everything behind, your family and your
possessions and all those things you have enjoyed and you've spent
a lifetime building, you're gonna leave all that and you're gonna
go into the unknown. You know you're gonna go into
the known. You're gonna go and face God. Yeah, I think that's one of the
first, it's my first reaction. I'm speaking from experience.
That was my first reaction. When the gospel came to me in
power, I became afraid of dying and meeting God. God became very
real to me. I believed in God. You know,
I grew up going to church. I believed in God since I could
believe in anything. I never believed in evolution.
I never did. I believed God created the heavens
and the earth. as young as I could believe anything. And then one
day, God became very real to me. God became very real. And I became very afraid. But
thank God for my Noah's wife. You know, some of the greatest
testimonies in the Word of God is given by women. Some of the
greatest testimonies. And the word of God is given
by women that know God. There's a book, I haven't read
much of it, I've read some of it, I think Vicki read all of
it, it's the Women of the Old Testament. I can't, I think it
was written by Spurgeon maybe, but anyway, some of the great
testimonies by women. God appeared to women. You're
gonna marry, you're gonna have a son. But now here, and I'll
finish it off with this. But his wife said unto him, If
the Lord were pleased to kill us, he would not have received
a burnt offering and a meat offering at our hands. If God were pleased
to kill us, he wouldn't receive a burnt offering. No, we were
commanded to offer this offering. The Lord said, go ahead and offer
it. And we did. And the Lord showed his approval
by ascending up into the flame of the sacrifice. He would not
have done that if he was going to kill us. If the Lord, if God was going
to kill us, Would Christ have been offered up on Calvary's
tree? Would God kill his son, and then
me too, for whom he died? If he died for me, would God
do that? No, he wouldn't do that. God would be as unjust as the
devil is if he did that. If God crucified his son, and
if God punished his son for my sins, and then I die for my sins,
he would be no different than Satan. He'd be an unjust God. That's true. That's true. He'd be an unjust God. And what
wisdom is in that? If the Lord were pleased to kill
us, He would not have received a burnt offering and a meat offering
at our hands, neither would He show us. You see, not only would
Christ would not have been offered up for our sins if God was going
to kill us. That wouldn't have happened.
He wouldn't have done his son that way. And secondly, he wouldn't have
brought the gospel to us. He wouldn't have sent the gospel
to us. He wouldn't have sent us this good news. He wouldn't
have done so. When God sends the gospel somewhere,
some sinner is going to be saved. There's going to be a sinner
somewhere that God's going to save for whom Christ died. and
that message is gonna be known. God's gonna send his preacher,
and he's gonna preach the gospel, and somebody's gonna hear it.
God's gonna see to it. He's gonna see to it. If the
Lord intended to kill us, would he have told us such wonderful
news? Would he have told us about this special son? Would he have
told us about this deliverer who's gonna deliver us from the
Philistines? Would God have told us about
Jesus Christ, would he have sent the gospel to us? if he were
gonna kill us? Would he send us good news only
to kill us? You remember when Paul was in, when God sent him
to Corinth, he sent him to Corinth, he said, I have much people in
this city. There was a time Paul wanted to go to Asia, if you
remember, Paul was gonna go to Asia, and in a dream, he was
forbidden to go to Asia, and there was a man saying, come
over here and help us. Come over here and help us. And God sent
him, I can't remember the name of the place. I don't know if
it's Thessalonica or one of them. But anyway, you know what Paul
did? He went down to the riverside.
First thing he did, he went down to the riverside and he preached
the gospel to a group of women gathered there by the riverside.
And God opened the heart of Lydia, who was from Asia. She's from
Asia. He said, you're not going to
Asia, but I got one from Asia down there by the riverside.
And he went and he preached to a woman named Lydia from Asia.
And you know, she took the gospel back with her. God wouldn't have sent the gospel
here if he hadn't intended to save somebody, save sinners.
Aren't you special? You are special. All God's sons
and daughters are special. God turned the world, he had
turned the world upside down for you. You know, God said,
back in the Old Testament, he said, I've given Sheba and Seba
for you. I've given nations for you. God'd
kill a nation for one of his elect to get him, if that's what
it took. If that's what it took to get one of his elect, he would
bring down a nation. That's what his children mean
to him. I'm telling you, it does. And then, listen, and these things,
he wouldn't have showed us all these things, nor would, as at
this time, have told us such wonderful things, such things
as these. Or he wouldn't have told us about
a deliverer. He wouldn't have told us, you know, you're gonna
have a son, he's gonna deliver you from the Philistine. He wouldn't
have told us these things. The wonderful, the wonderful gospel,
the wonderful good news would never have came here. That's faith. That's faith. She said, now calm down, honey.
She's saying, calm down, honey. Just calm down. The Lord wouldn't
have, he wouldn't have, he wouldn't have revealed these things to
us. He wouldn't have received the sacrifice and he wouldn't
have shown us all this, this good news concerning his son. Concerning, you know, which is
a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. And the woman bear a son and
called his name Samson. And the child grew and the Lord
blessed him. And the spirit of the Lord began to move him at
times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Esther. Let me give
you these four things. As Samson, being a picture of
Christ, his birth was a miracle. His birth was a miracle. His
mother was barren and she'd never bear. A virgin shall have a son. Who ever heard of that? How can
that be? Only God can do that. Only God
can make a woman who's a virgin have a son. In that sense, they are alike.
His birth was miraculous. And then his birth was foretold.
Remember, the angel came and told Mary, you're going to have
a son. The angel told Manoah's wife, you're going to have a
son. She was barren, and he said, you're going to have a son. And
she believed him. And Mary believed the angel. And then Samson was sanctified,
that means he was set apart from the womb to be a special person
unto the Lord, a Nazirite. Our Lord was one. Our Lord was
a Nazirite. And he was set apart, listen,
from eternity. The Son of God, the special Son,
the only begotten Son, was set apart in eternity for this work
of redemption. or this work of salvation, or
this work of being a deliverer, Samson was a picture of being
a deliverer from the Philistine, which is a picture of God's people
being delivered from the world. Let's look at dying like this. We're not gonna die, we're being
delivered. Isn't that what death is? We are being delivered from this
world. The scripture says the righteous
die and no man lays it to heart. No man lays it to heart that
the righteous die and no man lays it to heart that he's been
delivered from the evil to come. There is evil coming. God's wrath,
which is not evil, but it's trouble. It's trouble. God's wrath is
coming. And we are delivered from that.
We're delivered from it. That's how we ought to see death.
That's how we ought to see dying. It's a deliverance. It's a deliverance. It's not an end, it's a deliverance.
From sin, from temptation, I'll be thankful. I have no doubt,
I'll be thankful more than I can even be thankful now. Not to
ever be tempted again. Not to ever have a wicked thought
go through my mind. Won't that be something? Never
to have that to happen again. Never to be too tired to come
to worship, never to be too sick to come to worship, never to
be that again. Because we get sick, we get,
we're too tired at times. I mean, I remember, I remember
working, you know, when I worked a full-time job, and there was
plenty of Wednesday nights, I was tired. I was dog tired. But that never happened again.
We're delivered from all that. Delivered from it. And then last of all, Samson,
as we know, was a mighty, mighty man. Wasn't he? When the spirit of the Lord came
upon him, he took the jawbone of an ass. And he slew, was it
1,000 or 10,000 men? It was a bunch. He slew them. You know what makes me feel good
about that? God can take another jawbone
of an ass this morning and slay a bunch of sinners with it. He
can. But he became a mighty, mighty
man. A mighty deliverer. And I think
one of the most beautiful statements in the word of God is this. He
slew more in his death than he did in his life. When Jesus Christ
died, he slew them all. He slew all principalities and
powers, and he ascended on high, just like that angel did when
it went up in the flame. He ascended on high, and he's seated at the
right hand of God. He's not trying to win. He's
already won. It's over. The battle's over,
not for us. You know, we have a battle here,
but it's over for him. He's seated. The victory's won. He got the victory. Our Samson
is seated at God's right hand. He took the gates of Gaza, put
them on his shoulder, took the gates of hell, put them on his
shoulder, and carried it to the top of the mountain, Golgotha.
And there he destroyed the enemy. And he did it by himself. He
put us out of the way, he took the whole elect of God, put him
out of the way, and did it himself. What captain, what captain of
any war ever took all the troops, put them aside, and then take
the whole army on bicep? What captain ever did that? The
captains are always usually in the background calling the war.
They're orchestrating it. Ours steps into the very front
of it and puts us out of the way of harm and does it himself. He fights the battle himself.
The battle's not yours, he said, it's the Lord's. He's our Samson. He's our Samson. You know, Samson was strong when
the spirit of the Lord came upon him. When you read that, you'll
read, that's when he was strong, when the spirit of God came upon
him. The Lord Jesus had the spirit of God without measure. He had
it without measure. Think how strong he is, how mighty
he is. All right.