Lesson 19: As Parents in Zion

I know, two posts for the same lesson. Weird huh. Especially after I can go two or three lessons without managing to post anything. I figure in the end it will all average out.

Chapter 2 of Judges seems to be a quick summary, not only of the end of Joshua's life, but also of things to come for the Israelites. We see a pattern start to develop, where the Lord provides a faithful judge who helps to free Israel from oppression, the people repent and are faithful again, the judge dies, and the people return to their old ways.

There was one line that really grabbed me and made me think of a talk Elder Jeffrey R. Holland gave in April 2003 general conference. Judges 2:19 reads,

"And it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they returned, and corrupted themselves more than their fathers, in following other gods to serve them, and to bow down unto them; they ceased not from their own doings, nor from their stubborn way." (emphasis added)

It seems Israel has short-term memory problems. As soon as there is no longer anyone to remind them of what God has done for them, they turn and fall away again, "more than their fathers". I wish the record was more detailed, but the focus of the book of Judges seems to be the military activites as opposed to the spiritual matters. I would like to know what the parents taught their children during the faithful cycles.

One of the things Elder Holland said really jumped out at me:

"...no child in this Church should be left with uncertainty about his or her parents’ devotion to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Restoration of His Church, and the reality of living prophets and apostles...

"I think some parents may not understand that even when they feel secure in their own minds regarding matters of personal testimony, they can nevertheless make that faith too difficult for their children to detect."

I wonder what an Israelite "Family Home Evening" would've looked like. Did the parents teach their children why they believed? Why they offered sacrifices to God? Why the Passover was so important to them? Were the children left to draw their own conclusions as they watched their parents?

Then I wonder, "what about my children? What do they know? Again, from Elder Holland:

"Do our children know that we love the scriptures? Do they see us reading them and marking them and clinging to them in daily life? Have our children ever unexpectedly opened a closed door and found us on our knees in prayer? Have they heard us not only pray with them but also pray for them out of nothing more than sheer parental love? Do our children know we believe in fasting as something more than an obligatory first-Sunday-of-the-month hardship? Do they know that we have fasted for them and for their future on days about which they knew nothing? Do they know we love being in the temple, not least because it provides a bond to them that neither death nor the legions of hell can break? Do they know we love and sustain local and general leaders, imperfect as they are, for their willingness to accept callings they did not seek in order to preserve a standard of righteousness they did not create? Do those children know that we love God with all our heart and that we long to see the face—and fall at the feet—of His Only Begotten Son?"

Children tend to take the direction of their parents and take it a few steps further, regardless of the which way their parents were facing. Where parents faithfully teach their children, we find a stronger generation (like Helaman's stripling warriors who absolutely had no doubt of their parents' conviction). Quoting from Elder Holland's talk again, where parents "flirt with skepticism or cynicism... children expand that flirtation into full-blown romance."

I feel chapter 2 of Judges stands as a caution to parents everywhere. We can't let our children just guess what they think we feel is important. We are accountable before God on how well we (not the primary teachers, not the young men/young women leaders) teach our children the doctrines of faith, repentance, baptism, and the gift of the Holy Ghost (D&C 68: 25).

As I reflect on my own teaching moments with my children, I recognize many opportunities for improvement. As an example, earlier this week I decided to do my lesson preparation upstairs at the table rather than down in my "cave". My son asked me if I had a big talk to do or something because apparently that's the only time he's seen me with my scriptures out and writing notes down on paper. Improvement opportunity, knocking at the door.

Lesson 19: Just a Little Off the Top

The story of Samson used to be one of my favorites as a child, probably because he was really strong and was pretty close to being a super hero. As I got older though, I saw this story as a tragic example of someone who had enormous potential, but didn’t use it.

Israel had been in captivity under Philistine rule for forty years by this time because they had done “evil again in the sight of the Lord” (Judges 13:1). As the Lord often does, He sent a baby to deliver Israel. A barren couple was visited by an angel and told they would have a son who “shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines” (Judges 13:5).

Samson’s mother was told her son was to be a Nazarite (Hebrew meaning ‘set aside’ or ‘consecrated’) from the womb. As such, he was to abstain from wine and strong drink (couldn’t even eat moist grapes), couldn’t cut his hair, and couldn’t come in contact with dead bodies (see Numbers 6:1-8 for more details).

You’d think someone with such potential and great blessings would be faithful and obedient. Angelic announcements seemed to be effective in the other cases (John the Baptist, Christ). You don’t hear about angels coming to tell mothers their child will grow up to be on welfare, or work on the fry line if he really applies himself. This sort of thing seems to be reserved for exceptional circumstances. Sadly, Samson never really seemed to grasp the nature of his calling.

The first record we have of Samson is when he asked his father to set him up with a certain Philistine woman for his wife (Judges 14:1-2). The scripture states “it was of the Lord” (Judges 14:3), but I think that was Samson’s way of trying to rationalize it to himself. He probably had a plan worked out in his mind, much like when King Saul rationalized keeping the flocks of the Amalekites because he intended to use them for a sacrifice (1 Samuel 15:20-22). After the Lord made it very clear how important it was not to marry outside the faith, I find it hard to believe this marriage to a Philistine would be sanctioned, especially when Samson’s specific call was to deliver Israel from the Philistines.

A lesson we can draw here is one many missionaries learn in the field: you can’t do the Lord’s work using Satan’s methods. You can’t convert someone through a “Bible bash”, and you can’t defeat the Philistines by marrying one. That would make for some very awkward moments at family reunions.

At the beginning of the week-long wedding feast, Samson challenged the men to solve his riddle before the seven days were up. After three days, they came to his wife and threatened her so she nagged him until he gave her the answer. Big surprise, she tells the men and Samson loses the bet and has to cough up thirty sheets and thirty outfits (if only someone could’ve seen that coming). He went out, killed thirty Philistines to pay off the wager.

For someone whose call it was to free Israel, Samson only seemed to go against the Philistines when it served his own selfish purposes:

• Killed thirty men to pay off his bet (Judges 14:19)
• Burned the Philistine fields because they gave his wife to his “best man” (Judges 15:4-5). Granted, that had to sting a little...
• Killed 1,000 men who came up against him (Judges 15:15)
• Carried away the gates of the city on his back so he could escape after sleeping with a harlot (Judges 16:3)
• Pulled down the Philistine temple, killing everyone inside so he could be “avenged of the Philistines for [his] two eyes” (Judges 16:28)

Losing his eyes was his own fault, really. He hooked up with Delilah (no mention whether or not they were actually married), who was offered 1100 pieces of silver to find out the source of his strength. She asked Samson, “Tell me, I pray thee, wherein thy great strength lieth, and wherewith thou mightest be bound to afflict thee” (Judges 16:6). Who could resist an offer like that? ‘Tell me how to take your strength away so you can be taken captive.’

He gives her three false answers, and each time the Philistines are waiting to take him. The fact he really didn’t realize the source of his strength is evident when he tells her to cut off his hair. He really expected to be able to shake off his attackers as he had previously, but “he [knew] not that the Lord was departed from him” (Judges 16:20). He really expected to completely disobey the Lord and still receive His promises. Without his God-given strength, he was easily taken captive. The Philistines put out his eyes and forced him to work in the prison house.

The Philistines later offered sacrifices to their god, Dagon, and decided to bring out their trophy for some entertainment. Samson called upon God for one last act of strength, which he used to pull down the support pillars of their temple. “So the dead which he slew at his death were more than they which he slew in his life” (Judges 16:30).

Just imagine how different the story could’ve been if he had stayed faithful, if he could’ve tempered his arrogance with humility, if he let “virtue garnish [his] thoughts unceasingly” (Doct. and Cov 121:45) rather than being led by his appetites. People in all the years since would’ve used him as an example of what could be done in the Lord’s strength, but instead he stands as an example of “don’t try this at home”.