Beware of Spiritual Amnesia, Part 6

Welcome to Leading the Way with Dr. Michael Yusef. Compromise. Compromise will destroy your life, maybe not immediately, but certainly eventually. And in just a moment Dr. Yusef guides you to see a biblical example of compromise and how destruction followed.

Do keep in mind that Leading the Way is listener supported. Learn how you can stand with Dr. Yusef in his new ministry outreach campaign, the Open Door Campaign, when you visit ltw.org, or when you call and speak to a ministry representative at 866-626-4356. Here now is Dr. Michael Yusef with the charge to take a no compromise approach to living for Jesus. Through the years, I have met Christians, believers, who have convinced themselves that God cannot use them simply because of some horrendous sin in their life. A sin of which they've repented long time ago. In fact, I'm not talking about a sin before Christ came into their life.

I'm talking about a sin after Christ had come into their life. And I remember telling one of them, while I admire your spiritual sensitivity, I have to say to you lovingly and in candor, that if you have come to a point in your life where you have said, Lord I know that I've sinned greatly. Lord I know that I've borne the consequences of my sins. Lord I know that you have forgiven me. Lord I know that you have commanded me to forgive myself. Once you have done this, and you're still idle in the kingdom of God, because you have bought into that lie that says once you're a damaged goods, God can never use you again.

Then you are dishonoring the Lord. I remember talking in the early days of this church to a woman who many years earlier had an abortion. And as I walked her through these four steps that I just shared with you, I call them confession, consequences, cleansing and consecration.

The sin has been confessed with bitter tears, consequences of paying some horrendous price, and cleansing with total forgiveness from the hand of God. And then consecration whether her spiritual life has been totally renewed. And she still says God cannot use me. I remember saying to her that God can uniquely use you. God can uniquely use you to minister to other women, to may save some lives. God can uniquely use you to minister to others who are going through this terrible wilderness that you have gone through. For the psalmist said it is the contrite and broken heart that God will not despise.

And you have God's Word on it. While the scar of failures and sin may remain for many years, and in fact it may even remain for a lifetime. But God loves to forgive a repentant sin.

God loves to restore those who have genuinely wanted to be restored. God longs to renew the humble. God only despised those who are arrogant and haughty. Those who are proud and are never willing to humble themselves and confess their sins. Those who have made a habit of rationalizing their sin, of explaining away their sin, of justifying their sin.

They will not experience restoration. I was thinking about this and I remember a story I read long time ago about Oscar Wilde the playwright. Oscar Wilde was known as probably one of the most arrogant people around.

I mean he's known for his ego. And one night he arrived at a dinner party after a dismal performance of one of his least successful plays. And people started asking him how did it go? How did it go? How was the play received? And he said well he said the play was great success.

The audience were a total failure. Talk about arrogance. But God loves to forgive and restores a repentant sinner. God loves to use those who are truly brokenhearted and contrite hard.

God loves to use them in a unique way. And if Samson's life will teach us anything, it will teach us that from the ashes of sins and failure, God can demonstrate his strength. Samson is the last judge or deliverer that we are looking at in this short series of messages.

Beware of spiritual amnesia. In many ways, Samson is really very difficult to preach on. Because the stereotypical of Samson's strength by Hollywood, that people have this image of him that is totally false, that is totally not biblical. And both Christians and non-christians really have that false image of Samson. Because most of them think of the Hollywood actor, super strength. You know perfectly chiseled body.

Many of them think of him as Schwarzenegger on steroids. But that's a false image of Samson and that's why it's difficult to get that image out of your mind. Because Samson's strength did not come from pumping iron ten hours a day. Samson's strength did not come from his perfect physique. Samson's strength was not born in the gymnasiums of Gaza. But his strength was supernatural. His strength was the gift of God. His strength was from the Holy Spirit and his strength was given to him by God to serve God's purpose. And yet ultimately was his sin and failure, which God forgave and overruled many many many times ended up snaring him and ultimately destroying him. In all the years that I've been preaching and I've been preaching for a long time, I have never preached one full sermon on Samson, let alone two, which is today and the next message. And I just have to confess to you, I realize why I avoided him all these years. Because he depresses me.

Because he represents a squandered opportunities and he represents a disappointing hope, a flickering light, a misused gifts and unchecked weaknesses and undisciplined potential. Samson was strong with men and animals but he was weak when it came to pagan women. God called him to declare war on the enemies but instead he fraternized with their women.

I think it was Charles Spurgeon who once said, talking about Christians who allow Satan to tempt him and lead them and he said Christians are the only soldiers who fraternize with the enemy. Samson fought the battles of the Lord in the daytime but he disobeyed the Lord at night. Samson's name means sunny. The Hebrew word for sun is Shemesh from which Shemshun or Samson comes.

It means sunny or bright. And yet Samson ended up in the darkness blinded by the very enemies that he's supposed to fight and win and defeat. But there's something very important here I don't want you to miss. I told you in the very beginning of the series of messages that with every successive judge, with every successive deliverer, Israel kept on going in a downward direction, in a downward direction, in a downward direction. And we come here to Samson and we find him to be the reflection of his culture of the day.

To be a reflection of the society of the day. And of his one sentence that summarizes the entire book of Judges, it is that everyone was doing what is right in their own eyes. And Samson represented that attitude. And when I thought of Samson and how he became a reflection of his culture of the day, I thought of how many Christian leaders today who are reflecting the culture instead of correcting it. How many so-called Christian leaders who have become like dead fish floating in the stream of culture. How many Christian leaders who have given in to the pressure of culture and popularity and they are not able to stand against political correctness, against universalism, against the denial of absolute truth, and against sexual immorality and the rest of it. We have become a reflection of the culture instead of standing up against the culture. Israel kept on going in a downward direction so much so that even God's men became part of the sin.

Let me summarize chapter 13. Israel's heart had become so hardened to the point where they actually been occupied by the Philistine, harassed by the Philistines, but they did not cry to God for deliverance from the Philistines. Beloved, that's what you call the bottom of the barrel. When he's seeing all the pain of sin and the and the suffering of sin and the oppression of the Philistines, but they deceased to cry to God. And I thought of our nation and I thought of when we come to a point where we don't even worry about sin, we don't cry to God for deliverance from sin that is so rampant in our culture, then we are really in trouble. And yet God's grace and mercy in his abundance of grace his angel appeared to a barren woman among the Israelites and he promised her a son. The truth is Samson's mother's barrenness was also a reflection of Israel's spiritual barrenness, of Israel emptiness, of Israel fruitfulness. And so the angel promised her a son is going to be a Nazarite. The word Nazir means set aside.

Somebody who set aside for a purpose of God. And in the book of Numbers chapter 16, the law of God tells us all about the Nazarite. And it says that the Nazarite set aside to serve God's special purpose, but they have to do three things, three symbols of their vow. Number one, they are not to touch any wine or the fruit of the grape. I want you to listen carefully to these because you're going to see that Samson broke every one of the three vows.

Two today, one in the next message. Secondly, a Nazarite is not to touch a dead body. He becomes defiled whether it's a human body or a animal body. And thirdly, he is never to cut his hair. While the uncut hair was a symbol of his strength, it was not the secret of his strength.

The secret of his strength was the Holy Spirit of God. The one thing that strikes you about Samson is that he was a loner. He really was a loner. He never rallied the troops. You never see him calling out an army. You never see him seeking counsel from anybody.

You never see him being confronted by anyone for 20 years. He played the champion, but he failed to act as a godly leader. Certainly there is a difference between a strong leader and a godly leader. The two are not synonymous.

And the difference between the two is teachability. Now I want you to turn to chapter 14 where I can begin my sermon. But before I get to the message, I want you to listen carefully.

Whether you are seven years old or 70, I want you to listen carefully. Wherever you are on the spiritual scale, and we all have different stages. So wherever you are on the spiritual scale, there is a word from the Lord for you here. No matter where you are on the spiritual scale, you will be encouraged today by the graciousness and the overruling power of God. And I pray by the end of this message, not a single person in this room or listening and watching who could say, God cannot use me. Because God specializes in the overruling and in the forgiving and in the restoring. Samson's weakness, Samson failure, summarized in the first four verses. In fact, it's summarized in the first verse of chapter 14. It says, Samson went down to Timna, disaster number one. There he saw a young Philistine woman, disaster number two.

Because that's it. He went to Timna. I don't know where your Timna is. You know it. And I want to speak to you candidly. Be careful of where you go. Be careful whom you see. Be careful what you say to a person of the opposite sex who is not your spouse.

Be very careful. Because for Samson, it's only four miles away. That was a short trip. For some of you, it is a click of the mouse away. For some of you, it's right next door.

For some of you, not very far away. It is easy to rationalize going to the places of temptations and say to yourself, I will never do anything wrong. I am only going to be there for a short time. I'm just going to look around.

I won't do anything wrong. But before you know it, you find yourself hooked by the Philistine. Samson was a man of faith.

Listen to me. Samson was a man of faith but he was not faithful man. You see, there are a lot of church-going people who are men and women, boys and girls of faith. They have some sort of faith but they're not faithful with the Lord. They're not faithful with their time. They're not faithful with their money.

They're not faithful with their resources. They're not faithful in obeying the Word of God. He was not faithful toward his Nazarite vow. He was not faithful in obeying the Word of God.

He was not faithful to his parents' warning and advice. After all, it's only four miles away. It's not very far. Beloved, I've heard single people through the years who have said when they start dating non-believers, they say it was only a date. They say, I'm not going to marry him.

I'm not going to marry him. I'm just going to have a good time. And before you know it, you find yourself deeply in love with that person. I want you to hear me right.

This is important. When the Bible speaks of unequally yoked, it's not just marriage but business relationships. All kinds of relationships when it's unequally yoked is going to bring tears to your eyes and broken hearts. And because, just because God overrules and somebody marries an unbeliever and the Lord brings that non-believing spouse to himself, it does not mean that you need to tempt God. In this case, God's sovereign plan used Samson's foolishness for the good of his people. But tempting God is never a good idea. Jesus said to the devil in the wilderness, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. I'll say more about temptation in the next message, but let me move on. Samson should have been going to war with the enemies of God, but instead he went to a wedding.

Nonetheless, God's sovereign grace still used Samson to defeat the Philistines. Look at verses 5 to 9. Here you find that Samson broke two-thirds of the vows. Two of the three.

The third one is in the next message. Two of the vows. First of all, he went into a vineyard. He's not supposed to go anywhere near a vineyard. For another right to go to a vineyard is like a recovering alcoholic going to a wine tasting party.

You have no business going there. A vineyard is a dangerous place for a man who was not supposed to have anything to do with grapes. And God sends him a lion as a form of warning, but through the power of the Holy Spirit he rips the lion apart. And yet he persists on marching toward an unlawful marriage. He keeps on marching towards sin. A few weeks later when he returns to claim his bride against his parents advice, he goes back to the vineyard.

He goes back again. Probably was trying to see the dead lion and gloat over his victory. When Samson ate the honey out of the dead carcass of the lion, he broke the second vow. He's not supposed to touch a dead body because he's a Nazarite.

Two-thirds of them already broken. If there is a lesson for every one of us, if there is a lesson that we need to pass on to the next generation, it is how to be equipped to lovingly but winsomely but firmly stand up against the enemies of the cross. And so in his bachelor party, and by the way when the Bible says feast, that means there's wine being served. There's alcohol being served.

In his bachelor party, wine was flowing freely. Samson constructs this riddle. And by the way in the Hebrew language it rhymes. I know it doesn't rhyme of course in English, you can't get that to work.

But it's like a poem. He constructs this riddle out of his experience of sin. Instead of weeping over his sin, he made a joke out of it.

How low can you get? The Philistines, who of course could not solve the riddle, turned on his wife-to-be before the wedding was consummated. They have seven days of celebration and then the marriage gets consummated. And they turned to her and said either you find the answer will kill you and your family. And so she said to Samson, if you really want to consummate this marriage, you better tell me the secret.

Give me the answer to the riddle. And Samson proved to be no match for a nagging pagan woman. She first enticed him, then she controlled him, and finally she betrayed him. But I want to submit to you that that's exactly what the world does to a compromising Christian.

You might not see it right away, you might not experience the pain right away, but you will. Someone said that Samson could kill a lion, break a rope, but he could not overcome the power of the tears of a Philistine. And the wedding turned into a funeral for 30 people. The joy turned into sorrow. And Samson never got to consummate his marriage, and in fact his bride was given to his best man.

And the celebration turned into mourning. For that's exactly what sin of compromise will do, even if it's not immediate. Had the marriage went through, God's purpose for Samson would have been tattered. God would have done something else, but he overruled.

Please hear me right. I'm telling you this experientially. There is much sorrow that results from disobeying the Word of God. There is much sorrow that results from not seeking the mind of the Lord. There is much sorrow when you insist on your agenda and not God's.

You're listening to Leading the Way Audio with Atlanta pastor and international Bible teacher Dr. Michael Yusef. Growing up I became pretty active as a Jehovah's Witness and my entire family is in the church very zealous. I did quite a bit myself. I had a lot of time spent in the door-to-door ministry. The problems that I had with the religion really began to develop as time went on. I had a lot of problems and issues with the legalism, the culture within the church, my viewpoint of who God was.

He sat up in heaven making rules for us just to make life difficult. It quickly soured any idea of having a personal relationship with Jehovah. It was during that time period that I started to really reevaluate my life and I thought this was my opportunity to really actually see for myself what is actually out there. And so the very first stop that I did was the Mormons because they were similar to Jehovah's Witnesses.

I saw them going door-to-door. I really couldn't get on board with their theology ultimately. Then at that point I thought well maybe I'll go back to Jehovah's Witnesses just to have my family back.

Right off the bat when I got back with them those feelings instantly came back. I started feeling the legalism. I couldn't really make any spiritual progress. I felt like I was just stuck. I began to have feelings of anger towards God.

Lasted for a couple years. And then through Christian radio sometimes I'd be driving and the channel would come on and I started getting exposed to Christianity but from a totally new fresh approach. There were great preachers on there and Dr. Michael Yusuf's sermons were very helpful. And then I started going to YouTube and watching these sermons from leading the way. That's been a great way for me to study and grow spiritually is by listening. I would listen to sermons as I would work during the day.

And then also to and from work. I've had to really from the ground up rebuild my theology and what I believe. I really respect and appreciate that Dr. Yusuf values the entire Word of God and he teaches the entire Bible to be true. And what I also love is Dr. Yusuf expanded context.

I have learned a ton from him. I spent a lot of time watching church of the apostles and Dr. Yusuf through leading the way but I thought it would be fun to actually go down and visit in person. Maybe meet some of the people that I've actually seen on the screen. Got to meet some new musicians. Got to meet Dr. Yusuf and that's just a great blessing to me to be able to come in person. So I get a lot of joy in my new Christian walk.

I'll take a drive. I'll look at God's creation even through the work that I'm doing or the music that I'm enjoying. My viewpoint of God is different. He's not in a box anymore. I have this relationship with him and it's just awesome.

It's vibrant. It's totally different life. It's totally a rebirth and I'm so grateful for God for blessing me in that way. If leading the way has impacted your life in a special way, Dr. Yusuf would love to hear about it. Call our special testimony line at 877-941-7934. Just follow the prompts.

Let us know your story. Again that number is 877-941-7934 and learn more about Dr. Yusuf and the worldwide impact of this ministry by visiting us. We're at ltw.org. ltw.org. This program is furnished by leading the way with Dr. Michael Yusuf.