May 12, 2019

The second thing God showed me about The Gift if The Holy Spirit through the life of Samson is that we must NURTURE THE GIFT

There is a need for us to nurture the gift of The Holy Spirit in our lives and in this story the nurturing begins, not with Samson, but with his mother.

Again, we see a foreshadowing of the Gift if the Holy Spirit in the New Testament in that the nurturing of the gift in our lives does not begin with us but with the one who gives the Gift – Jesus.  His righteousness is not only our example of how to nurture the Gift of The Holy Spirit, but it is his righteousness that is imparted unto us

So, with that righteousness how do we nurture the Gift if The Holy Spirit that has been given us?\

1.   Daily

The nurture of this gift was to be daily.  The Angel of God didn’t give them instructions that were to be followed only once or only for a short period of time.  These rules were to govern the gift for the entire life of Samson…. “From the womb until the day of his death.”

One of the mistakes we make in nurturing our relationship with Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit is that we don’t do it daily.  Jesus said that we are to take up our cross daily and follow him.  Likewise, we should daily keep in step with the spirit.  We should daily exercise the gifts of the Holy Spirit.  The gift is not for special occasions or one day a week, but for every day of our lives.

Take time each day to believe in the gift, thank Him for the gift, exercise the gift, and rely upon the gift for the power you need to live a life consecrated to God

2.   Details

In a similar way, this passage teaches us that the Nurture of the gift occurs in the details of our lives.

The instructions don’t just pertain to special times of worship of God but to the very details of everyday life.  What he ate, drank, and came into contact with was an important part of nurturing this gift.  His obedience to the instructions of God (what to do and what not to do) was a vital part of the nurturing of this gift.

According to the New Testament it is important for us as well.  And here is where we miss it so many times.  Like Samson, we fail to incorporate the life God wants us to live in every detail of our lives. We tend to see it in the big things of life but not in the everyday details. What we say, what we do, what we allow into our lives, our obedience to the commands of God

John 14:15-17 New International Version (NIV)

15 “If you love me, keep my commands. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.

 Notice that in this passage, Jesus ties the gift of The Holy Spirit into the life of the believer who nurtures the gift in the details of their life by living in obedience

I also want to point out how hungry Samson’s parents were to know the details of how they should live and raise Samson.  I pray that we too we be hungry to know the ways of God as they pertain to the details of our lives.  I pray that we would seek him and ask him how to apply biblical truth and principles to our everyday lives

Which brings us to the third aspect of nurturing the gift found in Judges 13

 3.   Doable

There is nothing in this passage that indicates that the instructions for nurturing the gift were impossible.  No cry of foul by Samson’s parents.  No whining that what God asked of them was too hard.  It was and is DOABLE

Nurturing the gift of The Holy Spirit is doable precisely because the Gift, himself, gives us the power to do what God is asking us to do.