Wisdom International Devotionals

by Seth Davey

  Wednesday (April 30) A Rude Awakening Judges 16:3 But Samson lay till midnight, and at midnight he arose and took hold of the doors of the gate of the city and the two posts, and pulled them up, bar and all, and put them on his shoulders and carried them to the top of the hill that is in front of Hebron.   One of the biggest lies we tell ourselves when we engage in some hidden sin and don’t initially get caught is that God lets us get away with it.     Think of Abraham. Whatever doubts he wrestled through before sleeping with Hagar must’ve been settled as soon as discovered that Hagar was pregnant. “Finally, I’ll be a father!”, he must’ve thought. “I know this isn’t  exactly  what God promised, but hey—He could’ve closed off Hagar’s womb if this wasn’t His will; I’ll take this child as proof that God’s behind this.” Think of Jacob. Whatever words stung his conscience as he fled from Esau’s fury, tearing off the fake arm-hair and course costume his mo...

  Tuesday (April 29) Old Habits Die Hard Judges 16:1-2 a Samson went to Gaza, and there he saw a prostitute, and he went in to her. The Gazites were told, “Samson has come here.” And they surrounded the place and set an ambush for him all night at the gate of the city.   Whether you’re male or female, young or old, a new believer or a seasoned saint, look yourself in the mirror right now, straight in the eyes, point a stern, prophetic finger at your reflection, and say these words—“I am so weak—I am so poor—I am so wretched—I am so unfaithful—I am so incapable of giving God the purity and loyalty and righteousness His love deserves—I need the LORD’s help!” Then say that same thing again tomorrow, and the next day, and two months from now, and twenty years from now, and don’t let up until the good LORD calls you home.    Friend, if we stop preaching the hard truth of our condition to ourselves first, if we convince ourselves that twenty years of spiritual service and ...

  Monday (April 28) Battles Averted Judges 15:20 And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years.   Incredible, isn’t it, that the most meaningful and successful portion of Samson’s public ministry is a season we know nothing of? To think that this generational strong man stood for twenty years like a donkey in Isreal’s countryside, a buffer against the lions and wolves who lurked in the shadows of surrounding forests and salivated over the thought of devouring God’s people—examining every angle of the terrain for an opportunity to catch the flock off guard and seize back the ground they’d given up, but they couldn’t get past  him . As long as he stood in the midst of the sheep, they didn’t dare enter. Yet, I don’t think Samson had to stand there snorting and kicking up his heels and braying menacingly in their direction to ward them off. Oh no—the memory of what he’d done to a thousand of their best fighters was buffer enough. So, picture the devils here...

  Sabbath Psalm (April 26-27) (From Seth Davey’s new hymn, “When My Mind Runs Back”)   When my mind runs back to former sins And I crave forbidden fruit again When the world looks better than this rugged cross When I dig up those old dirty clothes From the grave where they lay decomposed When I trade back all I’ve gained for all I’ve lost   When I question whether You are real When the gospel loses its appeal When my faith gives way to doubts inside my head When I sell You out for thirty cents And embrace a cold indifference When I claim the truth but live a lie instead   When I realize what a fool I’ve been And I long to see Your face again But I’ve squandered the inheritance You gave When I look down at my tattered clothes And I weep over the path I chose But I think, this time, I’m too far gone to save   Then You run through the door And take me back as before And I find the days I’ve wasted have forever been restored I’m a prodigal man Running circles in You...

  Friday (April 25) A River of Life Judges 15:18-19 a And he was very thirsty, and he called upon the LORD and said, “You have granted this great salvation by the hand of your servant, and shall I now die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?” And God split open the hollow place that is at Lehi, and water came out from it. And when he drank, his spirit returned.   Perhaps right now the reviving message your heart needs most from the LORD isn’t that He can empower you to move mountains or defeat armies or accomplish superhuman feats, but that at the end of your toil it’s okay to be thirsty.    Friend, consider the exhaustion of our triumphant Savior if your heart feels feint today. Remember how He cried out at the end of His Passion those very words that symbolize the weakness of our human condition, “I thirst!” Marvel at the mystery that at the very moment a sponge of vinegar touched His parched lips, there in the depths of His excruciating dehydrat...

  Thursday (April 24) A Donkey’s Jaw Judges 15:14-15 When he came to Lehi, the Philistines came shouting to meet him. Then the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, and the ropes that were on his arms became as flax that has caught fire, and his bonds melted off his hands. And he found a fresh jawbone of a donkey … and with it he struck 1,000 men.   As Samson sweeps through the Philistine ranks with a donkey’s jawbone, does it occur to him that this is precisely a picture of what  he is  in the fields of the Good Shepherd?     Brian, my farmer friend from church, is in the process of buying a few more cows for his field along with some goats and possibly a sheep, and he recently explained to me that he’s also searching the market for a good donkey to protect them. Now, I already knew that donkeys serve as vital protective forces for pasturelands, but Brian illumined me on the fact that not  all  donkeys are built for guardianship—some are tempe...

  Wednesday (April 23) Blessed Be the Tie That Binds Judges 15:12-13 a And they said to him, “We have come down to bind you, that we may give you into the hands of the Philistines.” And Samson said to them, “Swear to me that you will not attack me yourselves.” They said to him, “No; we will only bind you and give you into their hands. We will surely not kill you.”   This brief exchange between Samson and his fellow Israelites reveals a moral ethic and a standard of brotherhood that far surpasses that of their Philistine counterparts.    Consider how differently this discussion could’ve gone had there not been a level of mutual deference between these parties. These 3,000 men didn’t come to Etam with torches, holding Samson’s parents in custody, threatening to burn them if he didn’t comply. In fact, they utter no fighting words at all. Between the lines, this feels like a Wild West sort of standoff in the center of town between two friends, neither wanting to pull the...

  Tuesday (April 22) Where There’s Smoke There’s Fire Judges 15:11 Then 3,000 men of Judah went down to the cleft of the rock of Etam, and said to Samson, “Do you not know that the Philistines are rulers over us? What then is this that you have done to us?” And he said to them, “As they did to me, so I have done to them.”   This might be the wildest intervention attempt of all time. You’d think Judges 15:11 would instead read, “Then Manoah and his wife went down to the cleft of the rock of Etam,” or “Then the chiefs of Israel, along with the priests, went down to confront Samson,” not  3,000  able-bodied men! And it begs the question: do this many men leave their families and their daily toil behind, travel all the way to Samson’s hideout, because they’re  that  afraid of a coming Philistine retribution (we’ve already seen how unrelenting the Philistine’s can be when they feel aggrieved), or because they’re  that  afraid of Samson? Or are they com...

  Monday (April 21) A Robin Hood Story Judges 15:6-8 Then the Philistines said, “Who has done this?” And they said, “Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because he has taken his wife and given her to his companion.” And the Philistines came up and burned her and her father with fire. And Samson said to them, “If this is what you do, I swear I will be avenged on you, and after that I will quit.” And he struck them hip and thigh with a great blow, and he went down and stayed in the cleft of the rock of Etam.   Our libraries and film catalogues are filled with revenge-thrillers like these, aren’t they? Stories where some victimized soul gets kicked to the curb, but gets back up again to wreak havoc on his perpetrators? As soon as Prince John seizes his brother’s throne, we yearn for a sharp-shooting Robin Hood to make things right. As soon as Odysseus’ home gets infiltrated by backstabbing friends, we’re popping the popcorn for the coming showdown. Truly, had Samson’s story be...

Sabbath Psalm (April 19-20) (From Seth Davey’s new hymn, “Let There be Light”)   Words that echoed through the void without resistance Bringing something out of nothing to existence Creating time and space Holding everything in place A genesis I can’t condense into a sentence A voice that broke through all my sinful inhibitions And woke my soul up from its sleep with one incision That tore the veil in two And bid me come on through A fact my tongue cannot describe with great precision   Heaven smiled Oh my heart went wild When Your voice shattered the night And the same four words that brought forth the world You spoke to me and brought me to life When you said, “Let there be light!”   Oh, there’ve been times I’ve felt defeated Closed the book I knew I needed Found my faith stuck in sinking sand But You were gentle in Your reprimand And You’d tell my heart without condemnation That the highs and lows of my soul’s migration Are lined in the palm of Your hand And then I’d u...

  Friday (April 18) Catching Foxes Judges 15:4-5 So Samson went and caught 300 foxes and took torches. And he turned them tail to tail and put a torch between each pair of tails. And when he had set fire to the torches, he let the foxes go into the standing grain of the Philistines and set fire to the stacked grain and the standing grain, as well as the olive orchards.   In which endeavor would you have a higher probability of success: wrestling a roaring lion with your bare hands, or catching 300 foxes, tying their tails together without getting bitten, and lighting 150 torches between them? Have you ever tried catching  one  fox? Now, let’s assume that Samson’s set up some clever, old-fashioned trapping method employed by shepherds and farmers from ages past. Even so, this feat is still mind-blowing. For one thing, how many miles did he have to travel just to set the traps? I doubt he stumbled across a covert Philistine fox-breeding operation in the back hills and ...

  Thursday (April 17) The End and the Means Judges 14:19-20 And the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, and he went down to Ashkelon and struck down thirty men of the town and took their spoil and gave the garments to those who told the riddle. In hot anger he went back to his father’s house. And Samson’s wife was given to his companion, who had been his best man.   At first glance the two correlating clauses that make up the opening sentence of Judges 14:19 don’t seem compatible theologically. They seem to imply that the adage, “Two wrongs don’t make a right, but they make it even,” is a standard of justice that God Himself employs, which is emphatically not true. So, what do we make here of the Holy Spirit empowering Samson to murder thirty Philistines in cold blood, steal their clothes, and run back home in hot anger? Well, the answer isn’t a comfortable one for our finite minds, but it’s one we’ll grapple with over and over again throughout the biblical drama: namely, that...

  Wednesday (April 16) Samson’s New Clothes Judges 14:14 b -16 a  & 17 b And in three days they could not solve the riddle. On the fourth day they said to Samson’s wife, “Entice your husband to tell us what the riddle is, lest we burn you and your father’s house with fire. Have you invited us here to impoverish us?” And Samson’s wife wept over him … the seven days that their feast lasted, and on the seventh day he told her, because she pressed him hard.   Just when it seemed like Samson might make  Time Magazine’s  cover for the most self-serving, pompous, erratic man of his era, here come a group of deviant Philistine thugs to take the cake. Next to these baddies, Samson looks like a choir boy.    Parse this debacle out with me, friend, and see if there’s any wisdom in it. Here come friends of the bride, wanting to save their blushes, bursting through the bridal chamber and threatening to burn the girl and her family alive if she fails to get the ...

  Tuesday (April 15) The Gambler Judges 14:12-14 a And Samson said to them, “Let me now put a riddle to you. If you can tell me what it is, within the seven days of the feast, and find it out, then I will give you thirty linen garments and thirty changes of clothes, but if you cannot tell me what it is, then you shall give me thirty linen garments and thirty changes of clothes.” And they said to him, “Put your riddle, that we may hear it.” And he said to them, “Out of the eater came something to eat. Out of the strong came something sweet.”   Samson isn’t off to a great start in either his public ministry or his marriage. In fact, we’ve only witnessed him do four things thus far and each has proven reckless in its own right. First, he desired a Philistine woman and demanding that his parents retrieve her despite their reasonable objections. Second, he ripped a lion to shreds and kept it secret, advertently or inadvertently breaking the Nazirite code. Third, he went back to tha...

  Monday (April 14) A Calling and a Choosing Judges 14:8-9 After some days he returned to take her (his bride). And he turned aside to see the carcass of the lion, and behold, there was a swarm of bees in the body of the lion, and honey. He scraped it out into his hands and went on, eating as he went. He came to his father and mother and gave some to them, and they ate. But he did not tell them that he had scraped the honey from the carcass of the lion.   Go back with me for a moment to Numbers 6, where Moses outlined in detail God’s instructions for Nazirite vowers. Note verse 6:  “All the days that he separates himself to the LORD he shall not go near a dead body. Not even for his father or for his mother … shall he make himself unclean.”  That’s the fourth code that Nazirite vowers must adhere to, along with abstinence from wine, grapes, and haircuts. Well, if Samson’s parents have stringently raised him according to Numbers 6, then it’s safe to assume he knows fu...

  Sabbath Psalm (April 12-13) (From Seth Davey’s new hymn, ‘Stride for Stride’)   From death into life, even life everlasting The Kingdom is drawing near O vanishing world—your pleasures are passing We’re pilgrims and strangers here   In righteousness we stand Upheld by The Father’s hand En route to that Promised Land We progress   Let us fix our eyes upon Jesus Christ He is risen!  Our redemption is secured! Let us cast aside all the doubts we hide We’re forgiven! He has given us His word!   Tuned out from the noise—tuned in to The Spirit In Truth we are sanctified God’s Word is our guide—we trust and revere it And walk with it stride for stride O weary children, rise! Press on to win the prize!  Seek first those blessed skies  That fill our home above We follow in His steps And live without regrets For neither heights nor depths Can separate us from His love

  Friday (April 11) Lion Down Judges 14:5 b -6 And behold, a young lion came toward him roaring. Then the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, and although he had nothing in his hand, he tore the lion in pieces as one tears a young goat. But he did not tell his father or his mother what he had done.   Truth is stranger than fiction, but I’m not sure which truth is stranger here: that a roaring lion suddenly attacks Samson out of nowhere, or that Samson kills it with his bare hands and doesn’t tell anyone.     For one thing, are lions prevalent in this part of the world during these days? Are attacks like this common? Are there signs on all the roads and trails that read, “Watch out for lions!”, like the many bear signs I see on my ventures through the NC mountains? I find it strange that Judges 14:5 is the very first mention of a lion attack in all the Bible. Moses didn’t record a single instance of the Israelites fending off predatory beasts during their forty y...

  Thursday (April 10) Gut Check Judges 14:1-3 Samson went down to Timnah, and at Timnah he saw one of the daughters of the Philistines. Then he came up and told his father and mother, “… Now get her for me as my wife.” But his father and mother said to him, “Is there not a woman among the daughters of your relatives, or among all our people, that you must go to take a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines?” But Samson said to his father, “Get her for me, for she is right in my eyes.”   We’re only a few lines into the introduction to Samson’s biography and already the biblical author gives us a hint at the dichotomous nature of this peculiar judge. Samson is the quintessential anti-hero if such a thing exists. He’s a consecrated man on the outside—circumcised, with long, uncut hair, following a strict dietary regimen, a Nazarite of Nazarites—but totally unconsecrated on the inside. A guy who from birth has been physically marked by a sacred and divine prestige, a man meticulo...

  Wednesday (April 9) Judges 13:24-25 Spiritual Stirrings And the woman bore a son and called his name Samson. And they young man grew, and the LORD blessed him. And the Spirit of the LORD began to stir him in Mahaneh-dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.   Even though we don’t know the significance of this particular moment in Samson’s life, nor how old he is, nor why he’s here in Mahaneh-dan in the first place, nor in what way, shape, or form the LORD seizes upon his countenance, it’s clear that something unique happens here. Some light dawns in his spirit. Some sudden prod awakens his conscience. Some whisper cuts through the indifference, and it marks the end of a former chapter and the beginning of a new one. In fact, if you could’ve asked Samson at the end of his life at what point he realized his God-given vocation, I don’t think he wouldn’t answered you, “Well, my parents told me the story of that divine visit ever since I was old enough to walk, and I’ve had long hair from ...

  Tuesday (April 8) A Beautiful Balance Judges 13:22-23 And Manoah said to his wife, “We shall surely die, for we have seen God.” But his wife said to him, “If the LORD had meant to kill us, he would not have accepted a burnt offering and a grain offering at our hands, or shown us all these things, or now announced to us such things as these.”   It is a man’s virtue to fall prostrate before Almighty God in stupefied submission. It is a woman’s virtue to lift him to his feet again.   Now, I’m not intending to establish a distinction between a man’s responsibility toward God and a woman’s, but only to present a general observation from the biblical record. Think of Moses at the burning bush where he removed his sandals upon recognizing the holiness of the atmosphere, and Isaiah during the vision of Heaven’s throne where he cried out in bewilderment, “Woe is me!”, and Job, when God replied to his litany of accusations with a whirlwind, and Gideon at the Terebinth tree when h...

  Monday (April 7) Up in Smoke Judges 13:20 And when the flame went up toward heaven from the altar, the angel of the LORD went up in the flame of the altar. Now Manoah and his wife were watching, and they fell on their faces to the ground.   Theologians offer numerous linguistic and exegetical reasons for why we should interpret this Angel of the LORD as a preincarnate appearance of Jesus Himself, but there’s a simpler, less academic reason that leaves me with little doubt: the likeness of His coming and going.    Upon seeing this divine Messenger disappear in a flame and then watching Samson’s dumbstruck parents fall to their faces, I found myself raptured from one Testament to another, from Judges 13 all the way to Luke 24, and then landing on a dirt road to Emmaus where two confused disciples have just begun walking with a Stranger. I’m swept up in the conversation, listening intently as this Stranger gives an Old Testament survey of Moses and the Prophets and re...

  Sabbath Psalm (April 5-6) (From Seth Davey’s new hymn “A Glimpse of Who You Are”)   The debt is too great and my hands are too poor To bring You a worthy offering I’m fashioning dust that is already Yours For You are the Source of all things So how can I thank You for all that You’ve done? And what can I lay at the altar? More than the push and the pull from my lungs More than a psalm in a psalter   I lift up my empty hands  And give You a consecrated heart I’ll bring You the whole of me For a chance to see a glimpse of Who You are   But what is my voice to the sound of Your beckon That sung every atom into being? And what are these notes to the music of heaven Sung by the choirs of Seraphim? How do I thank You for all that You are With 88 keys and a dull voice? More than the weak intonations of art More than a dissonant noise   I lift up my empty hands And bring You a consecrated heart I’m giving You all of me For a chance to be a glimpse of Who You are