Would you open your Bibles with me this evening to the book of Judges, and chapter 15. The book of Judges, chapter 15, we're going to continue our study of the life of Samson. Samson is God's weak, strong man, or God's strong, weak man, however you want to say it. He was a man of Unparalleled strength, but he was also a man of great weakness as well. I say this every so often, but I'm sincere as I say it. It's easy to sit here 3,500 years later and pick apart somebody's life, right? take a portion of their life, not the totality of it, but to take a portion of their life and to overly criticize or only see the good or only see the bad. So as I study these Bible characters and as we make our way through the judges, try to remain balanced. I honestly do. As silly as it may sound, I don't want to get into glory and old Sampson pick me up and body slam me. I'm a pretty good-sized dude, you know what I mean? So no, seriously, I just want to rightly divide the word and give a fair representation of the life of this man. And thank God, I'm telling you, I'm glad my life's not written on a page and people are picking it apart because there'd be plenty to say about me. I guarantee you that. They could find plenty to criticize. And they'd be right in doing so. Joshua, not Joshua, Judges chapter number 15. We're gonna read, and I just bring back to your memory, Samson. What we would say is that Samson was engaged to be married. A contract had been signed, if you will. Everything had been done except for the wedding night had not been consummated. If you will remember our study. the wedding night, the honeymoon never happened. It was interrupted, but I'll bring that back in just a minute. Judges 15 verse one says, 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 into my wife, into the chamber, but her father would not suffer him to go in. And her father said, I barely thought that thou hadst utterly hated her. Therefore I gave her to thy companion. Is not her younger sister fairer than she? Take her, I pray thee, instead of her. 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 300 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 burn up both the shocks and also the standing corn with the vineyards and olives. And then the Philistines said, who hath done this? And they answered, Samson, the son-in-law of the Temnite, 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 Edom. 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 we are come up, to do him as he had done to us. Then 3,000 men of Judah went up to the top of the Rock Edom and said to Samson, knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us? What is this that thou hast done to 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. 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. 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 loose from off his hands. And he found a new jawbone of an ass and put forth his hand and took it and slew a thousand men therewith. And Samson said with the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps with the jawbone of an ass have I slain a thousand men. And it came to pass when he had made an end of speaking that he cast away the jawbone out of his hand and called that place Ramoth-Lehi. And he was sore of thirst and called on the Lord and said, Thou hast given this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant, and now shall I die for thirst and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised? But God claimed a hollow place that was in the jaw, and there came water thereout. And when he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived. Wherefore he called the name thereof in Hachoreh, which is in Lehi unto this day. And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years." Trouble and more trouble. Trouble and more trouble. Many years ago, there were two families who lived on either side of the big sandy river. One lived on the West Virginia side, and the other lived on the Kentucky side. A quarrel broke out between them. One man was killed, Several years later, another was killed, and then someone's hog was killed, and this led into all-out battle. For decades, these two families fought one another in a seemingly endless series of murders or killings. You will probably be familiar with this story. It's well known as the feud between the Hatfields and the McCoys. What started out with a bad decision led to more and more trouble. It is my supposition to you this evening that there was a feud that went back and forth between Sampson and the Philistines. We may side with Samson, and rightly so in some ways, but we have to be reminded, and this is where I have prayed and asked God, please keep me balanced. We have to be reminded that this bloody battles that we're reading about in this 15th chapter of Judges happened because of a very bad decision in Samson's part. Remember last week we discussed the fact that Samson found this nice Philistine girl he wanted to marry. And his parents said to him, Samson, can't you ever find a nice Jewish girl to marry? But he would not listen to them and he said, I want her. She pleases me. Get her for me to marry. And so Samson's father goes to the village and works out an agreement to have his son marry this young Philistine girl. And if you'll remember, Samson ends up killing a young lion and he offers this riddle and tells these men, if you can answer my riddle, I'll give you 30 changes of garment. If you can't, you give me 30 changes of garment. And they threatened Samson's fiancée, if you will. They threatened her to actually burn her with fire in her father's house if she would not get the answer out of Samson. And finally, she presses Samson. Very cautiously, I say, she badgers him enough that she gets the answer out of him. And you remember, Samson becomes livid. They could answer his riddle, and so he goes down towards the coast to a city and kills 30 Philistine men and takes their clothing from them in order to pay that debt. But if you remember, He never does go back and consummate the marriage. They were engaged, if you will, and during this time period, they were married. In fact, they're called in our text, it's called his wife and his in-laws, but until it is actually the marriage, the marriage is consummated, then it's not really official, but Samson is mad. Samson being the sweet talker he is, you remember what he said? I don't get to say this a lot, so I'm going to say it while I can and then move on. Samson says to the Philistines, if you hadn't plowed with my heifer, you would not have known the answer to my riddle. So he's mad. He's mad at her for giving away the answer. So instead of spending his wedding night with her, he goes home and he's angry. And that's how this 15th chapter begins a little bit later. He cools off, if you would. He was mad and angry with her and mad at the Philistines, but verse 1 begins, it came to pass within a while, Samson says, you know what, I do want to marry this girl. I want to make it official after all. And so he brings her a gift. You know, you ladies today, you'd probably not be all that excited if your fiancé showed up on your front porch with a baby goat as a gift to you. But during that time period, it was a customary gift. He shows up with a kid, a baby goat or a baby lamb, as a peace offering, if you would. I'm sorry, honey. You know, the proverbial buys her a diamond necklace and says, I'm sorry. And so he shows up there at his wife, if you will, he shows up at his wife's house to go in very plainly, he says at the close of verse one, I will go in unto my wife into the chamber. In other words, he's gonna go in and have sexual relations with her, consummate the marriage. But there's a problem. The problem is that on the wedding night, because Samson got mad and stomped off and left, the young girl, I'm sorry, the young girl's father gave her to somebody else. And this begins what I call a bloody tennis match. As you watch a tennis match, it's back and forth, right? And as you read this 15th chapter of the book of Judges, that's what it is. It is a bloody tennis match back and forth between Samson and the Philistines, this feud going back and forth, trouble and more trouble. And just to remind you, it hinges on Sampson's decision to marry a girl he didn't have any business marrying in the first place, refusing to listen to his parents. Too many of us can attest to the fact that one bad decision has cost us a lot more trouble than we ever thought it would. I can say that. Can you agree? One bad decision cost me a lot more than what I ever thought it would. And so Samson here is denied the right to go in unto his wife because his father-in-law, if you will, if you understand that language, his father-in-law gave his daughter to somebody else. Verse 2 says, and her father said, I barely thought that you hated her. You got mad and stomped off and left. And I just assumed that you hated her and didn't want to marry her, so I gave her to your companion." And I tried to bring this in last week. As Samson entered into that village, they gave Samson sort of an entourage, if you will. A marriage party. And assigned Samson a best man. And I'm putting this in today's vernacular. This is going to be the best man for your wedding. If you get into the Hebrew of what is being said right here, this best man at the would-be wedding is the one that the father gives to Samson's wife now to marry. In today's language it would be just like this. The husband and wife just prior to them saying their vows, the husband finds out that his wife slept with the best man last night. And that would be a problem. And that's what happened here. And Sampson is livid. There's some conversation among Bible scholars and theologians as to Samson's stature, whether he was a big, strong-looking guy or more like a Popeye-before-the-spinach-looking guy. I tend to think he was a big, strong man. But then when God moved on him in a supernatural way, he had superhuman strength. But he was already a big, strong man is what I tend to think. But it is apparent to many people that he has a temper. Because in verse 2, her father says, I thought you hated her. I gave her to your companion. I gave her to the best man to marry. And so he tries to assuage Samson's anger by saying, here, take the younger sister and marry her. She's better looking anyway. But Samson won't hear that. He is so angry that he says, I am going to get even. And that's sort of our way of saying it. I, verse 3, Samson said, I will be more blameless than the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure. I'm going to go out and cause great trouble. But I won't be as guilty as what you've just done. I may be wrong for what I do, but it ain't as wrong as what you've done to me." And what he does is, really I think if you're a Bible student at all you've heard this story, but it is very interesting to consider this, to think about this. I don't know where he got this idea, but it was a very interesting idea. Samson in verse 4, in response to this, his anger and his malice towards the way he'd been treated, he goes out in verse 4 and he catches 300 foxes. And I just give you this, you can do whatever you want to with it, but it is thought that this is jackals. In our King James Bibles it says the word foxes and it's the exact same Hebrew word, whether it is a jackal or a fox. And the truth is it doesn't make a whole lot of difference. But the King James translators decided that they were going to use, when that Hebrew word appears, they will translate it every time as fox and not jackal. Every commentator I picked up and read after said that it was probably jackals because they run in packs where foxes will run alone, but same Hebrew word. But either way, however it happened, whether Samson worked alone or whether he had some others, and however long it took him, I'm just one of those people that says that when he went and caught 300 of them, I believe that's what he did. I believe he went and caught 300 of these animals. Whether they're foxes or whether they're jackals, he went and catches them. And what he does would probably send PETA over the edge. Right? I mean PETA would be knocking on Samson's door if they weren't afraid of him. People for the ethical treatment of animals. But Samson takes these 300 foxes or jackals and he takes a firebrand and a firebrand is essentially like a a stick, if you will. We may call it like a rope, but it would burn. But it wouldn't burn fast, it would burn slow. You take a tight-nip rope and he took those foxes and he would tie two of them tail to tail. And I'm of the persuasion that he didn't do this all at once. I think he sort of spread this out around the cornfields and wheat fields of with the Philistines and he tied them tail to tail and then he set that firebrand on fire. And then these 150 pair of foxes or jackals go out running and you can just imagine it, right? There's a fire in between them, it's right on their tail, and one's trying to pull this way and one's trying to pull that way, and I really do think that Samson set some of them loose here and some of them loose there, and I think he caused as much mayhem as he possibly could. And in fact, you see in the text right here that Verse 5 says, and when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines and burn up the shocks, or both the shocks and also the standing corn with the vineyards and the olives. Verse 1 tells us that this took place, verse 1, at the time of the wheat harvest. So this is May or June, late May, early June. It's dry conditions. In fact, this word as we have it, the word shocks, that is given to us in verse number 5. That is what we would call sheaves. When we sing that song, Bringing in the Sheaves, when I was a kid, I didn't even know what that was. I didn't know what a sheave was, but we'd sing that song. But it was a bundle of either corn or wheat or barley or whatever that it was. It was a bundle. They would take a big bunch of it and they'd bundle it together and they would stack it up. And this is what are called shocks in our text right here. And as he turns these animals loose, they're running through the fields of the standing corn, but not just that. They get the ones that's already bound up, the sheaves, if you will, and some of them are set on fire. And the text actually tells us that it spreads beyond the corn, but also to the vineyards and to the olive trees. And if you will realize that in that culture, this was an agrarian society. In other words, they were completely dependent on what they could grow in order to live. You were taking away their means of food for the entire wintertime. Destroying their fields is literally taking food off the table. I don't know where he got this idea, but it worked because it caused all kinds of havoc. And they go through, these wild animals run through and they burn all this stuff down, the sheaves, the stacks, the piles of the corn, the wheat, the barley, all this stuff's burnt down and it hurts them. It hurts them in the future, hurts them financially, hurts them in their security of the families. And how do they respond? How do the Philistines respond? This is a tit-for-tat battle. You do this, I did this. You do this, I do that. A husband and wife would never do that, would they? Siblings would never do that, would they? Church members would never do that, would they? Well, they did this to me, so I did that to them. Well, that ain't no way to be. But anyway, they respond in verse 6, the Philistines says, who has done this? And it didn't take them long to find out it was Samson that had done this, hurt them in agriculture, hurt them deeply in agriculture sense. But it is Samson, the son of the Timnite. And then they say, because. He had taken his wife, this is Samson's father-in-law, took Samson's wife and gave his wife to her companion. And these Philistines don't show any mercy, do they? Close with verse number six. They take what should have been Samson's wife, but ends up being the wife of the companion, or the best friend, and her father, and perhaps even the family also, but at least them, and burn them with fire. If you'll remember, that was the threat that they made against her earlier and said, if you don't find out what this riddle is, we'll burn your house down, and your family will burn it down on top of you. Almost ironic now that even though she finagled and worked and weaseled her way to get the answer out of Samson, she still ends up dying and being burned alive by her own people. You realize that? That's her own people, the Philistines that burned her. And now, if you think Samson was mad before, he is further angry. More mad, more livid, more incensed. And verse 7, and Samson said unto them, though you have done this, yet I will be avenged of you. And after that, I'll quit. But he won't. It's back and forth. It's a bloody tennis match. It's Hatfield-McCoy, Samson, and Philistine, this bloody feud. And Samson says, though you've done this, I will be avenged of you. And verse 8 says, and he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter. And there's not a whole lot of clear understanding as to exactly what this means, that he smoked them hip and thigh. We don't know exactly who them are, other than it's probably the ones who was responsible for burning down his wife and her father. And we don't know how many. We just don't know how many he killed at this time. But we know this much, that how many ever it was, And no matter how big or strong they were, Samson easily defeated them. Some of the commentators actually say that in verse eight where it says, he smote them hip and thigh, some of them actually will say that he ripped them limb from limb, that that would be the Hebrew reading of that. But either way, he destroyed a number of them. And he sort of goes and says, okay, Things are all right, we're even now. But things are not going to be left alone. So the Philistines in response again, verse nine, in response to this, they go up and they enter into the land of Judah. An army of Philistines go up and they enter into the land of Judah and they're marching on Judah as if they're about to make war with Judah. You remember, the Philistines are governing over the land of Israel, maybe not its totalities to the north or across the Jordan. The Philistines' land was primarily on the Mediterranean Sea on the west of Israel. So they may not have had dominance over the entire land, but at least over a good portion of it. And so an army gathers and it marches on Judah. And the men of Judah say in verse number 10, why are you come up against us? And this Philistine army replies by saying, we are come to bind Samson. We're to catch Samson. We're going to catch him alive to capture him if we can. And I want you to notice these words at the close of verse 10, to do to him as he has done to us. And you'll see a little bit more why that's important in just a minute. But I underline those words, to do to him as he had done to us, because there is no telling on God's part how much trouble he's going to cause. Well, I'm going to do to them as I did to me. I'm going to treat them as they treated me. But in verse 11, then 3,000 men of Judah, now this is Samson's own nation. This is the people of Israel, the people of Judah. They go up to the rock, Edom, where Samson is, and they say to Samson, don't you know that the Philistines are rulers over us? What is it that you've done to us? In other words, these men of Judah, they are saying, you're causing us all kinds of trouble, Samson. They rule over us. They have the control over us. And really, this is sad, if you'll stop and contemplate it just a minute. It's sad that rather than this 3,000-man army of Judah, rather than them confronting the Philistines, they're going to go confront Samson. Seems to me like they got things out of order, right? They're not looking at the real enemy. The real enemy is the Philistines who are occupying their land. But they wanna confront Samson rather than confronting the Philistines because I guess they figure they're better off. But they say, what are you doing? You're causing us all kinds of trouble. These Philistines have marched on our land now because of you. And notice the close of verse number 11. And he said unto them, As they did unto me, so have I done unto them. Now if you'll look at the close of verse 10 and the close of verse 11, and you'll see a direct comparison there. Look at the close of verse 10. We're gonna do to him as he's done to us. Close of verse 11, Samson says, as they did to me, I've done unto them. Tit for tat, right? It's almost like Samson is saying, well, they started it. If you're a parent and you've got more than one kid, you've heard them say, well she started it, or he started it. That's almost what Sampson said. They wanted to fight, I gave them a fight. They wanted to start some trouble, I showed them some trouble. And so they say to Sampson, The men of Judah, this 3,000 men of Judah say, look, we've come up here, we're going to bind you, and we're going to deliver you into their hand so that they'll go away and leave us alone. And I will say, with some measure of an understanding of their position, yet they're siding with the enemy against the judge that God has raised up to deliver them. And that's a problem. That's a problem when you're siding with the wrong one, supporting the wrong one. And they say, we're here to bind you that we may deliver you, verse 12, into the hand of the Philistines. And Samson says to them, just swear unto me that you won't try to kill me, that you're not going to follow me. I'll let you bind me. as long as you give me your word that you're not going to try to kill me. And so verse 13, they agree to that. They speak unto him, they say unto him, no, we're not gonna try to kill you, we won't try to slay you, but we'll bind you securely, we'll deliver you into their hand, but then we're done with the thing. Then we're gonna go back and hopefully they'll just leave us alone and they can take you off and do whatever they wanna do with you. And so they take two new boards, And they bring him down from the rock, close verse number 13 says, they take two new cords and they bind him, if you will, they put handcuffs on him by binding him with two new cords. They take him down from the rock, eat him, deliver him over, in verse 14, to the hands of the Philistines. And when he came unto Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him. You can just imagine this. Philistine army, there comes their enemy. The one that has slaughtered them hip and thigh, the one that has burned down half of our land and our cornfields, the one that murdered 30 men and stole their garments. When they see Samson bound and being hand-delivered by his own nation into their control, they're shouting, they're happy, they're excited. But that ain't gonna last long, I can tell you that. They shout against him, but notice in verse 14, and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him. Now, I said this when we began a couple weeks ago in our study of Samson. God was using even Samson's sin, even his wrong desire, even his wrong desire to marry someone he shouldn't have. God was sovereignly overruling in that to bring this animosity between Samson and the Philistines so that he could use it to help deliver Israel from their bondage. God is so powerful, so wise, that he can even use our stubborn mistakes for his own glory and for the good of others. Now, that doesn't give us the right to go out and make a bunch of bad mistakes and make bad decisions and say, well, God's gonna sovereignly rule through all of it. No, he's given us his spirit to lead us and direct us and give us wisdom and show us in his word to direct us. But God has said, in fact, he told the parents, Samson's parents didn't know that God was working behind the scenes through this. to build this animosity between Samson and the Philistines. And so it is the spirit of the Lord. And I think, I really think that though Samson was a man's man, you know, he was a big strong Schwarzenegger looking guy. I do think he had a supernatural, when the Spirit of God came on him, like it says here, I think he had superhuman strength. We'll study that again in the next chapter to see this. But the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and the cords that were upon his hand became his flags. It's like the wick in a candle and he just snapped it right off. Tore it right off. Has a flax that was burnt with fire and his hands loosed from off of his, or the bands loosed from off of his hands. And in verse 15 he finds the jawbone of an ass, or the jawbone of a donkey. And I wanted to, would you believe, I shopped online for the last three weeks trying to find the jawbone of a donkey to bring to you. But I couldn't find one. But I wanted to bring one in. They're big old dudes. They're about this long. And if it has both sides of the jawbone, they are a mean-looking In fact, go home or pull it up on your phone or look at it, not now, but pull it up on your phone and look at it or online and look at it. It's actually, I didn't know any of this, but people actually use it as a musical instrument. They'll take like a drumstick and they'll rattle it across the teeth and on the side of it and you can actually find YouTube videos of them. See what y'all pay your pastor to do, isn't that phenomenal? watching YouTube videos of people playing music with a donkey's jawbone. But it's really, it is kind of a menacing looking thing. You know, when you're a kid and I'm reading this story, I think, hey, you won't kill a thousand people. But now it's a pretty good sized jawbone, big old donkey's jawbone, and it is a new jawbone. It ain't old and brittle. recently had died. But if you'll pull it up and look at it, it is really pretty neat and you can understand how Samson could with his strength and with the Spirit of God moving upon him. He takes that jawbone and what does he do? Verse 15, he found a new jawbone and put forth his hand and he took it and he slew a thousand men with it. Now that takes some super, I think supernatural strength. one man against a thousand? Most probably, and this is almost a definitive, they would have had swords and spears and bows and arrows and he's got the jawbone of a jackass and kills a thousand men with it. There's something supernatural about that. I remind you The theme of the book of Judges, the theme that we've assigned to the book of Judges is divine intervention from the consequences of sin. And now what we find in Samson's life, a divine intervention from the consequences of sin. Not only Israel's sin, but even his. Verse 16 in Samson says, With the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jawbone of an ass, have I slain a thousand men. And again, this is a Hebrew play on words. And we miss it in our English translation of it. As I've studied Samson's life, he seems to be one of those guys that sort of likes riddles and word plays because he had a riddle for them, this word play riddle for his Entourage, if you will, from last week's study. But then also here, there's this play on words. And I'm going to give you what the NIV, the NIV rendering of this, and I like the way that it says because I think it fits what he is trying to say in verse number 16. Verse 16 in the NIV, Samson says this, With a donkey's jawbone, I have made donkeys of them. With a donkey's jawbone, I have killed a thousand men. And I sort of think that's what he's trying to say, what he's trying to deliver in this little wordplay that he offers. But I want you to take notice of something. There's something missing in what Sampson is saying. And what is missing is him attributing in any way to God's help for the victory. When you read verse 16, Samson's only talking about how great he is, not about how great his God is that would give him this wonderful victory. And that's a problem, friends. It's a problem when any of us are divinely delivered from the consequences of our sin. And God does something wonderful, even supernatural in our lives, and we don't want to give Him the praise for it and give Him the glory for it. That's a problem. Samson says, here's what I have done. And I hope I'm not overly critical. But I think Samson was pretty full of himself. I really do. He was obviously a ladies' man with his long, pretty hair, muscular guy, probably a handsome dude. And I think Samson was just pretty full of himself. But you and I, you know, God's done some wonderful things for us and we shouldn't sit around and brag about how great we are. We ought to brag about how great God is. And verse 17, and it came to pass when he made an end of speaking that he cast away the jawbone out of his hand and called that place Ramoth Lehi. And that just simply means the heel of the jawbone, the heel or mount of the jawbone. That's what that means. And he was thirsty after this battle killing a thousand men with nothing in his hand except for the jawbone of a donkey He was thirsty verse 18. He was sore thirst and he called on the Lord I Really I really I'm not trying to be hard But there's only two times in Samson's life where we find him praying and this is one of them Samson makes his way into Hebrews 11, so I don't want to be overly harsh on him because I'm not sure my name would make it into Hebrews 11. You know what I mean? He makes it into Hebrews 11. He is a man that God uses in spite of all of his flaws. But it is a sad indictment that he doesn't give God the glory for this victory, but now that he thinks he's about to die, he calls out on the name of God. He has to get to the point of death before he reaches out and calls upon God. He was sore thirst. I think he was just completely dehydrated after this physical battle, completely empty. He says, I'm going to die right here. You've given this deliverance into the hand of your servant. Oh, now you want to give God the praise. Now that you need something, Samson, now you want to give God a little bit of praise. And then he says, now I'm going to die for thirst and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised, or the Philistines. So he's obviously parched thirst. He's dehydrated from this battle. And he calls out, and in verse 19, it says, but God claimed in a hollow place that was in the jaw. And here's your options. I said this last week. Here's your options. You can either believe me or you can study it for yourself. That's your options, okay? But this is an unfortunate translation in the King James here where it says, God clave in a hollow place that was in the jaw, because that leads us to think the jawbone of the donkey, but that's not what it's talking about. It's talking about that God clave a hollow place that was in Lehi, or on the mount in which he was. Remember, Ramoth-Gilead means, I'm sorry, Ramoth-Lehi, means, the close of verse 17, Ramoth-Lehi. Lehi means the jawbone, the heel of the jawbone, Ramoth-Lehi. And really verse 19 is just simply, just simply as this, that God split open a rock on the top of that mount, Lehi, Mount Ramoth-Lehi. God split open a rock and out of that he brought water. That's what it means, and you can either take my word for it, or you can call me a heretic, or you can just study it for yourself, but whatever. That's what it means. God claimed in a hollow place a fountain to flow. You really want to get into the Hebrew vernacular. God claimed a fountain out of a rock, and he'd done that before, and it's no problem for him. And there came out water therewith, and Samson drunk, and his spirit came again, and he revived. And then he calls the name of that place, Enhachoree, which is in Lehi. And that's Lehi, the jawbone. Levi, Lehi, which is into this day. The word Enhachoree, or however you pronounce that correctly in the Hebrew, means the fountain of one calling. The fountain of one calling, or the fountain of one imploring. In other words, places were often called by what took place there. Cities, mountains, they were named after what happened there. Or maybe even after someone who did something wonderful there. Samson simply names that place, here is where I called on God for water and he sent a fountain. And that's what this is. In verse number 20, is an anomaly. And I'll tell you why verse 20 is an anomaly. It's an anomaly because almost always, as we've been studying the book of Judges, this verse is not given to us until the very end of their life. Verse 20, and he judged Israel 20 years in the time of the Philistines. In all the other cases before Samson, as we read that particular verse that says, and he judged Israel, or Deborah, she judged Israel, whatever the case is, the next verse almost always, except for here, is, and they died. And they died. But what I want you to see in this is that the writer is now telling us that Samson will continue to lead Israel Not a great, super devout leader, but he will continue to lead Israel for the next 20 years. If you get into the next chapter, you're going to find out Samson still, 20 years later, still got some of the same problems. Isn't that sad? I wish it wasn't so, but there are a lot of God's children that are still fighting some of the same battles. that they were fighting 20 years ago. Still struggling with some of the same addictions they were struggling with 20 years ago. This preacher still struggles with some of the same stuff he struggled with 20 years ago. I think many of us do. You say, God give us victory, right? God, I want victory over it. But Samson here Women problems you remember I preached last week the trouble with girls the trouble with girls 20 years later Samson still got trouble with girls All this simply to say dear friends We need to be super cautious because of that decision his decision he wanted to marry somebody that he should not have married Led to chapter 15 now obviously God is superintending in this yes, and God's blessed in spite of but I'm just going to give you a warning I From somebody who knows one bad decision can cost you more than you ever thought it would. One bad decision could lead to a bloody battle in your future. How many people do you know that struggle with addiction because of one bad decision? How many people do you know that are far away from the will of God because of one bad decision? How many of us are scarred in certain ways because of one bad decision? It's important to make good decisions, is it not? It's important that we don't get away from God's perfect will. Samson, you're a strong man, yeah, but you're a weak man, too. And we may think ourselves strong, but I tell you something, friends, we can find out in a hurry just how weak we are. just how weak we are. God bless you, I love you.