Description
JUST LUST
Just This Once
Ed Young
August 24, 2003
They led this muscular guy out into the courtyard. His eyes had been gouged out and people were making fun of him and his God. Thousands of people were crowded into this facility and suddenly, without warning, this man turned his face toward heaven and he said these words. He said, “God remember me just this once.”
Think about that prayer, that little sentence, “God remember me just this once.” “Just this once,” that phrase is a snapshot, it’s a microcosm of the life of Samson — a man we are going to talk about today. As you look at Samson, you begin to see him as a tragedy of what might have been. He was a man who was, literally, leveled by lust.
I’m in the third part of a series called JUST LUST and we have been talking about some principles concerning lust — how all of us deal with it. Today, though, we look at a specific personality and how this personality processed lust. As you look at Samson’s life, you see a man who had so much going for him, who had so much in the showroom, but had very little in the stockroom – if you hear me screaming.
Let’s look at how Samson started his life. The Bible says, in Judges 13:24, “So the woman bore a son and called his name Samson, and the child grew and the Lord blessed him.”
I’ve been saying throughout our time here that God has a great plan, a great agenda, for every life here. If we saw how awesome that plan is, we would blow a fuse.
Let’s look at Judges 13:25. It says, “And the spirit of the Lord began to move upon him (talking about Samson) at Mahaneh Dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.”
Here’s the situation. Samson was from the tribe of Dan. This tribe had just moved into the Promised Land, but they hadn’t actually settled in yet because there were still some people they needed to drive out of the land. Samson, as a kid, began to visit the encampments of his brothers and friends in the area, and that’s when God began to touch his life. I think it’s awesome the way that God uses our personality, heredity, genetics and the rest of our make up to stir within our spirit the purpose that he has in store for us. Think about what you are passionate about and what makes your heart beat fast — that is usually your purpose, the strength that God wants you to tackle with tenacity.
TEMPTATION IS ALL ABOUT GETTING US OFF PURPOSE
Every time you think about temptation, though, you’ve got to think about your purpose. Temptation is all about getting us off purpose. Samson’s purpose was to lead Israel. His purpose was to be a Judge of Israel, and that’s what he did. When the Evil One came against Samson, he came against this strong guy, this he-man, with a she weakness. The evil one used lust to level Samson.
Every time we face temptation, it’s all about getting us off purpose. Think about when Jesus faced the Evil One. The Evil One wanted him to miss his purpose. He did not want Christ to live a sinless life and to die a sacrificial death for your sins and mine. Hoping Christ would miss his purpose was the evil one’s whole motivation behind the temptation. Yet, Jesus emerged from that whole scene unscathed.
I think about many things in my life that try to get me off of my focus, off of my purpose. You can think about many things in your life that tried to get you distracted from what God wanted you to do. The same thing happened with Samson.
You might be asking, “Ed, how was Samson, this powerful man, leveled by lust, specifically?” I’ll get to that.
LUST ALWAYS LOOKS FOR LEVERAGE
I want you to notice one thing about lust right up front. Lust always looks for leverage. It always does. The Bible says in Ephesians 4:27, “Don’t give Satan a toehold.” Don’t give him any kind of leverage because he is a serious climber. Once he gets into your life or mine, once he gets in your family or mine, it is hard to get him down. You can’t push him off the wall. He’s always looking for leverage. And that’s what we see in the life of Samson. Samson had so much potential, he had so much stuff; yet, he is a tragedy of what might have been.
Let’s see what happened to him. Judges 14, let me begin reading, “Now Samson went down to Timnah.” Now, right up front, I want to ask, “What was he thinking? Timnah?” If you know your Bible, then you know that Timnah was a Philistine city. God said to his people in Exodus 34 and Deuteronomy 7, “Don’t hang out, don’t marry, don’t date, don’t run with, don’t buddy up with the ungodly, pagan Philistines. Don’t go there. They will mess you up. Don’t do it.” Samson’s mama knew it. His daddy knew it. Samson knew it — after all, he was going to be the Judge, the Man of Israel. What in the world was he doing in Timnah?
Well, he had a problem with lust. What is lust? This might be your first time here at Fellowship. This might be your first time here for the series. You might be asking, “What is lust?” Lust is when a God-given desire, our sexuality (which is a good thing), goes haywire. Or, it’s when an attraction segues into an illicit action that is mental, physical or emotional. That’s lust.
Samson went down, the Bible says, to Timnah. Say the word “down” with me. 1…2…3…Down. He not only went down geographically, he also went down spiritually. Lust is always going to take you down. The evil one is looking for leverage to take you down. Satan is going to grab you and he will have enough leverage that he’ll just take you down.
Let’s keep reading. “Samson went down to Timnah and saw a woman.” Well, that was his problem — he saw a woman, one of the daughters of the Philistines. If you study history, you’ll find that the Philistine girls dressed more provocatively, more seductively, and more sexually than the plain-Jane Jewish women. Study them. They had temple prostitution. They worshipped gods of fertility and sex and all that stuff. So, it was kind of a wild, wheels-off place. Samson couldn’t say no. He was hanging around in Timnah. And when you go to the wrong places, you will meet the wrong people. And when you go to the wrong places and meet the wrong people, you will end up missing God’s purpose for your life.
Maybe you’re asking, “Some of the time, Ed?” No, all the time.
The plot clots as we keep going. Verse 2, I can’t believe this one. So the biblical body builder, Samson…let me stop for a second and chase a rabbit, as I like to say. Every time I talk about Samson, I think about Arnold Schwarzenegger. Here’s a wild story. I don’t want to belabor this because I didn’t plan to say this. Lisa and I got married 21 years ago. Someone gave us a trip to Hawaii for a gift, and we went there for our honeymoon. Guess who was staying in the same hotel? Arnold. On the second day, I woke up and looked out the window toward the water. There was an aerobics class on the beach, and there was big Arnold in the class.
I said, “Lisa, I am going to be in that class tomorrow.”
So the next day, I was in an aerobics class with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Arnold and I were the only two males in the class. I didn’t really talk to him — I was scared of him. The guy was huge. Seriously, the vein across his bicep was the size of a garden hose. That’s how big the guy was. I can’t believe I went into that story. Let me get back to the message.
GOING TO TIMNAH
So, we see in Verse 2 that Samson went up to tell his father and mother…wait a minute. What’s Samson doing telling his father and mother anything? I guess he’s in charge? I thought they were the parents. Last time I checked, parents were all about being leaders, you know? I guess this was a kid-centric family because Samson said, “Hey, Dad, Mom, I have seen a woman in Timnah.” Those were the first quoted words of Samson in the Bible, “I have seen a woman in Timnah.” Then he said, “Now, therefore, get her for me as a wife.” He is telling his parents what to do. I don’t want to get caught up in too many details, but if you keep reading you see that his parents said, “Hey Samson, come on, how about the Jewish girls? God has said the Jewish girls, so how about the Jewish girls?”
Samson said, “No, get her (the Timnah girl) for me.”
Samson’s mom and dad knew Exodus 34. They knew Deuteronomy 7. But you won’t believe what Scripture says. Samson’s mom and dad went with the biblical body builder to Timnah, to this ungodly Philistine place. They took him to Timnah.
Parents, let me push the pause button and ask you something — just between you and me. Are you taking your kids to Timnah? Be honest with me now. Don’t lie. Are you taking your kids to Timnah? Are you going with them to that ungodly place? Are you modeling immorality?
Maybe you’re saying, “Well, I don’t know what I’m doing.”
If you don’t know what you are doing, then you are taking them to Timnah. We are either taking them to Timnah, or we are taking them toward the Lord. What are you doing as a parent, as a single parent, as a father, as a mother? The words that come out of your mouth, the shows you watch, the places you go, what you wear, how you associate with others, and your integrity all take our kids to one of the two destinations. Are you taking them to Timnah or are you taking them toward the Lord? Those are some serious questions, because as parents we are to lead. As parents, we are to model. As parents, we are to teach. We are to understand who they know, where they go, and what they show. Obviously, Samson’s parents were a little bit clueless. They dropped their guard. They let lust come into their family and lust began to climb on them. Then, lust had a serious grasp and grip on their lives. What happened? Samson went to Timnah, hooked up with this girl and they were going to get married.
THE NAZARITE VOW
Let me tell you something right quick about Samson. Samson was a man devoted to God. He took something called the Nazirite vow. The Nazirite vow was an outward symbolic gesture of an inward commitment. Here’s what a Nazirite vow entails, very quickly. Samson could not touch anything that was dead. He could not partake of any grape products, no grape jelly, no grapes, no grape juice, no Merlot, stuff like that. If you are laughing, you are not Baptist. Also, Samson could not have a razor near his head. He could not get a haircut. He couldn’t go to Toni and Guy or anything like that. He could not do that. Three things he could not do and those were simply outward symbols of an inward heart commitment, the Nazirite Vow. Put that in your frontal lobe.
Samson was going back and forth to Timnah, getting ready for the wedding. Everybody is excited. “Wow, the biblical bodybuilder is marrying a Philistine girl! Unbelievable.”
One day, a lion came after Samson. A lion was no problem for Samson. He took the lion and ripped his jaws apart and threw him by the side of the road. It’s very interesting. It’s the first example we have of road kill in scripture. [Laughter] Later on, he came back and saw the carcass of the lion and noticed that some bees had made a honeycomb inside the carcass of the lion. He knew he wasn’t supposed to touch anything dead. He was by himself, relaxing and probably said, “Well, just this once. It’s no big deal. Just this once.” And he reached in and grabbed the honey and began to eat the honey. The Bible says he took the honey back to his parents and gave them some but, scripture says, he did not tell his parents where he had gotten the honey.
LUST ALWAYS LIES
Lust always looks for leverage. Number two — lust always lies to us. It always lies to us. Samson said, “Just this once, I’ll go to Timnah. Just this once, I’ll lust and flirt with this ungodly woman that God told me to stay away from. You know, just this once, I’ll touch the dead lion. Just this once, I’ll go to the wedding reception,” the Bible says, “and have a little wine and some grapes and stuff.” That’s where he broke the second aspect of the Nazirite Vow. “Just this once,” Samson said.
Lust lies to us. Lust says, “Hey, everything is cool,” like I talked about last weekend. “No big deal. Just think about it. Just turn it over and over again on the rotisserie grill of your mind. It will make you feel like a real man or a real woman. Just this once. It’s just one website. I mean, come on, man. Just this one gentleman’s club. Just this once, this one-night stand. No one will know.”
But, “just this once” turns into another “just this once,” doesn’t it, and another one and another one. A while back, I was having lunch with the guy who was the number one pick in the NBA draft several years ago. I will not mention his name. He’s got a serious drug problem. I looked at him and asked, “How in the world could you turn your back on millions and millions of dollars? How can you work for this thing your entire life and then you just snort it up your nose?” I asked him that. I know this guy pretty well. I asked, “What happened? Where did you go wrong?”
He said, “Ed, I went wrong when I took my first snort of cocaine.” Just this once. Lust is that powerful, friends. It can get a hold of us and it can rule us and dominate us and lead us down a path that we don’t want to go.
The Bible says that Samson continued to mess around with the Philistines. He killed some of them. One time, he caught some foxes, tied them together, lit their tails, let them go, and they destroyed all of the Philistines’ grain. This guy was bad, man. He was something else. But, he was kind of out of control, kind of a free spirit and he kind of prided himself into doing that. Then, the Bible says he busted up the marriage that he almost had with the lady in Timnah and he ruled Israel for several years and pretty much everything lied dormant. Everything was okay.
All of a sudden, in Judges 16, lust comes back. The Bible says, in Judges 16:1, that he saw a prostitute. Now, let’s jump over to Judges 16:4. It says, “After that, it happened that he loved a woman in the Valley of Sorek whose name was Delilah.” You can’t say the name without saying “lie,” can you? De-lie-lah. The Philistines knew that the biblical bodybuilder had this weakness for women. So, they came to Delilah and said, “Delilah, here’s five grand. If you find out Samson’s secret of his strength and power, the money is yours. You can keep it. We’ll even give you more. We’ll take care of you, girl.”
So, she did. Women have that power, don’t they, guys? They know. They are smart. This girl was ungodly. She was conniving and manipulative. Listen to her strategy. In Judges 16:6 Delilah said to Samson, “Please tell me where your great strength lies.” Look at Verse 15, “She said to him, ‘How can you say ‘I love you’ when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times and you have not told me where your great strength lies.”
See, Samson had been messing around with her and saying, “Okay, I’m strong in this way, and if you do this or that, then I will be like any other guy.” But he was just messing around.
Look at Verse 16, “When she pestered him daily with her words and pressed him so that his soul was vexed to death (the word “vexed” in Hebrew is the word “nag”. It really is. Just look it up. I think that’s the Ed Young translation there. You know I’m kidding.) And he told her all that was in his heart.”
See, the Nazirite Vow was not this external thing. Yes, it was kind of external. It showed people your devotion, but it really was about the heart. So, he shared his heart with Delilah. Sadly, he told her, “Delilah, you know, I’ve been a Nazirite and if you cut my hair, I will be weak like any other guy.” She goes, “Whoa!” She could feel it. She could tell it. Then, she caused him to go to sleep on her lap and cut his hair. He got a haircut in a Satanic Salon.
Then Delilah said, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!”
He got up and he had no strength. Talk about a sad verse — look at Judges 16:20. “He did not know that the Lord had departed from him.” He didn’t know it. That’s what lust will do to us. It gets leverage. It lies to us.
LUST ALWAYS LEADS TO DESTRUCTION
Here’s the third thing – lust always leads to destruction. One day, we wake up and go, “Man, I don’t feel. I can’t worship. I can’t really read the Word. I can’t really pray like I use to. I have a hard time going to church and there is something…”
Many people don’t know when God has removed his hand from their lives. That’s the power. That’s the destructive nature of lust. See, lust has some great kicks, but it has some horrendous kickbacks. Lust promises all this stuff, but it delivers destruction. The Philistines took the biblical bodybuilder, the he-man with the she weakness, and the Bible says the Philistines messed him up.
Look at Verse 21, “The Philistines took him and put out his eyes.” Circle the word “eyes.” [The verse continues] “They brought him down to Gaza and bound him.” Circle the word “bound.” [The verse continues] “They bound him with bronze fetters and he became a grinder in prison.” Circle the word “grind.”
LUST BLINDS, BINDS, AND GRINDS
Here’s what lust does. Write this down. Lust blinds, it binds and it grinds. That’s what lust does. It’s fascinating, because what was Samson’s problem? His problem was with the eyes. Remember last time when I talked about having mobile eyes? The eyes are what get us in trouble. Lust is all about the eyes. It’s not the look, it’s the linger, it’s the undressing, and it’s the thought. That’s lust.
Samson’s problem was with the eyes. What happened? His eyes were gouged out. What did Samson pride himself on being? He boasted, “Oh, man, I’m a free spirit. I’m the man. I’m the biblical bodybuilder. I rule Israel. I can go to Israel. I can hang out with my people. Then I can hang out with the Philistine people. That’s not going to bother me. Just this once. Just this once.” Now this free spirit was bound. He couldn’t control his lust for who? For women. He was a he-man with a she- weakness. He couldn’t control it. Now, he was doing a Philistine’s work, specifically the labor of a woman. Samson was grinding grain. Sin blinds, it binds and it grinds. He just spent hour upon hour, day after day, grinding grain, and he couldn’t see a thing.
Don’t you know that he began to cry out to God? He said, “God forgive me. God, I’m sorry. God, what have I done?” He was a tragedy of what might have been. I mean, if Samson’s parents had said “no” to him early on, had Samson said “no,” had Samson run from Delilah or whatever, who knows what would have happened? But what a tragedy.
Maybe you feel like you are like Samson. Maybe you feel like you are in prison, that you are trapped, and that there is no way out. Well, check this next verse out. Verse 22 reads, “However, the hair on his head began to grow again.” We are not talking about Rogaine©. It began to grow again. This, again, is talking about how his heart began to grow for God again. Here is what happened. The Philistines took the biblical bodybuilder out into the courtyard. They were making fun of him as I talked about when I opened up the talk. They were jeering at him and his God. Samson found the pillars of this pagan temple. He knew where they were even in his blindness because he had been there so many times. Thousands were there. He said, “God, remember me – just this once.” And God gave him the strength and the grace and the mercy to collapse the pillars, and he took out thousands of these ungodly, demonic, and pagan people.
Just this once. Just this once. Its been my prayer that many men and women who are caught in the destructive cycle of lust will say, “God, just this once, I want to mean business with you. Just this once, God, I want to give my life to you.”
It’s been my prayer this week that parents will say, “God, just this once, I want to take the Evil One and throw him off the wall of our family and I want to do life your way. Because, God, I want to experience the greatness and the potential and the awesome purpose that you have for my life.” That’s been my prayer.
I want to do something different to conclude today’s talk. I want to bring out my wife. Lisa, would you come out here for a second? Lisa and I have been married for twenty-one years and we are the parents of four children.
[Lisa joins Ed on stage]
Earlier, I kind of skipped over the parental part of Samson’s parents. Now, I want to fire some questions to Lisa about this whole parental thing and about how to deal with lust in the family, because that’s where so many of us are living. Some of the singles are going, “Well, how does that relate to me?” Stats show that most singles end up getting married and have kids.
So, Lisa, as a mom, talk to me a little bit about the responsibility that you feel you have as a parent.
Lisa: I had read the story of Samson since I was a kid and for the first time, this week, you had pointed out the fact of his parent’s lack of leadership. I think it’s an incredible thing to look at how we, as parents, sometimes get thwarted in our purposes for our children and we just decide that it’s a little too much work and it’s a little hard and you know what? Let’s just let them do it. It’s too big of a fight. Let them have their way.
Ed: Let’s just take them to Timnah. It’s easier to do that than lead.
Lisa: So, I am reminded that, here at Fellowship Church, we constantly talk about the vision of Fellowship and the purposes of Fellowship because we all need to be reminded to stay on track, and keep the main thing the main thing. As parents, we also need to be reminded what is the main thing? How do I keep it the main thing? Well, the main thing for parents is found in Deuteronomy 6. Almost every time I get on this stage talking about parenting, we go to this passage of scripture. It’s huge, because in Deuteronomy 6, God outlines the purpose for parents — to lead your children to Christ, to help them understand what that decision means in their day to day living, and then to launch them out into a world where they can be impactful for Christ. That’s it. There is no question about, “Well, God maybe you thought I should do this or be involved in this.” No, he’s very direct, very clear, and gives us a clear purpose. So, why Samson’s parents abandoned that, and led him to Timnah out of the center of God’s will and into the fact that it’s the question of what might have been with his life, perhaps we need to be asking ourselves that question. What are we doing leading our children outside of God’s will? We are focusing on the wrong things. So, that would be a challenge that you and I [speaking to Ed] face and for you [speaking to the congregation] as parents. Society dictates, just as the Philistine culture was luring, society is luring our children to Timnah.
Ed: So, you are saying that we have got to come to a point where we say, “Okay, we take our cues either from the world or from the Lord.” That’s where faith and all this stuff actually intersect with the family. But we have got to stand up here as parents and say…
Lisa: Absolutely. And it goes back to being work. It’s so hard. Raising children is difficult and we tend to forget the boundaries. We want to pick and choose our battles. Ed and I are not trying to be legalistic here, but when it comes down to parenting and understanding who your children know, where they go and what they show, don’t be passive. Be proactive. There is not one element of parenting that’s passive. We are active in this adventure.
Ed: Our goal is not to be their buddy or their best friend. Parents think, “Well, I don’t want to make him mad.” That’s not the goal. That’s not putting the ball through the net, is it?
Lisa: Right. And you and I do select issues. There are core issues in our home, but something like the area of lust in our family, it seeps in and it will manifest itself down a road. That road leads to …
Ed: Like monitoring relationships for example, we orbit our lives around the church. Even when I was not the Senior Pastor of a church, we did that. Because of that, that helps in that relational base as far as who our daughters and our son get to know, who they end up dating and ultimately marrying. That’s a huge thing.
Lisa: Exactly. But you know, as parents, we cannot lead our children where we have not been, and where we don’t go ourselves. You cannot lead your children to an active relationship with Christ if you are not demonstrating it first. You can’t lead them in how to live it out every day unless you are living it out every day. When we talk about areas of lust, let’s look, women, at those my age. I’m 42 years old and I am amazed at how my peers dress. The clothing…
Ed: You are talking about the way women dress.
Lisa: Because we, as women, do not have a clue how the opposite sex perceives that, whether it’s couples and the female is wearing very provocative clothing, how their friends’ husbands see that.
Ed: It’s getting very quiet in here now.
Lisa: It’s a very dangerous road to travel.
Ed: It’s called conviction, conviction, conviction.
Lisa: This is Fellowship Church. We are the church of grace and we want everyone to be welcomed. No matter what you are wearing or what station in life you are in, you are welcome. But for those…
Ed: Let me interrupt, because you know I love to interrupt. You know that.
Lisa: Uh-huh. He’s good at it.
Ed: We don’t expect people to dress like believers until they become believers.
Lisa: Right. I’m speaking to those people who know, who have crossed over the line and who have committed their lives to Christ. Because, remember, once you have given your heart to Christ, your goal is to become more like Christ. Yet, how can that evidence of us becoming more like Christ be there when we are dressing like a Philistine, or we are dressing like Hollywood? There is no differentiation between the two groups. Remember that. Challenge yourself to look at your attire and do an evaluation and let’s have some balance there. Ed and I are not going to go through and say, “Well, you should wear this, not wear this, do this…” Be balanced. God will show you. You pray about it.
Ed: We are not talking about wearing burlap sacks. I think you can dress with style and still not dress provocatively.
Lisa: We like to dress cool and hip. But you can do it and do it with class and not let everything out. I have to tell the story. You know, you think this is a new thing. But when I was in junior high, like 1972, we didn’t call them low-rise jeans, we called them boy cut jeans. I had a pair of boy cut jeans and one day, I came out of the bedroom, walked down the hallway, entered the kitchen where my mom was standing at the sink washing dishes, and I was headed to school. She looked at me and sized me up. Without saying a word, she took her hand out of that soapy water, bubbles dripping off, and she just looked at me and went… [Lisa flips her hand to show how her mother motioned her, without saying a word, back to her room to change clothes] There was about that much skin between the shirt and the top of the jeans. [Lisa indicates with her fingers that there was about two inches between her shirt and her jeans] She looked at me and there didn’t have to be a word said. I knew. You know what? I really knew before I walked out the bedroom door because the lines in our family were clearly drawn. It wasn’t something my parents scrambled to make decisions at the last minute. It was in place. So, parents, get it in place. You talk to your children. I am not a huge shopper, but I took LeeBeth and the twins, Laurie and Landra, …
Ed: I like to shop a lot more than Lisa does.
Lisa: …to the mall. Ed is a much bigger shopper than I am. If I am at Super Target, that’s where I am going to do my shopping. So we just kind of have our differences there. Anyway, back to the mall. We were at the mall shopping at a local store. I could not believe the sayings on the shirts. They were cute. I mean, real hip with old diners and stuff on them, precious. But things like “Make Out Queen.” Now if you think for second LeeBeth Young is going to have on a shirt that says “Make Out Queen,” forget it. But somebody is buying it and I want to know who the parents are that are allowing their children to wear such things. I’m getting a little riled up here, but we have gotten lazy in our choices of saying, “This is where the line is and you may not do this.” We have got to know what our children are showing. Nowadays, what we use to wear under clothes, like slips, that is a dress now. So, just think about it. Just think. That’s all we are asking you to do.
Ed: And pray about it.
Lisa: And pray.
Ed: And lead in it.
Lisa: Come to Fellowship, but just think about it and let God show you, “Man, I’ve crossed the line. I’m working toward the goal of being more like Christ.” When you go, like your movie choices, where they are going. Be selective. Watch out, parents. Don’t be lazy. Don’t be too lazy to get a babysitter so that you are not taking your children in to see movies that are not appropriate while you are, in your mind, rationalizing and saying, “Well, they don’t really understand what’s going on.” Hogwash. They know what’s going on. They know the images that are put before them, on the Internet and television. Think. Just because, and especially because, the media tells us it’s okay for your child at age thirteen, that’s not something we should just take and accept. It’s very scary what our children are being exposed to and the bottom line is that it goes back to us. What road are we walking down?
Ed: You’re on a roll, Lisa.
Lisa: I know. I’m getting a little fired up.
Ed: What else would you say…?
Lisa: I don’t want to appear prudish or hard-line, but those of us who have crossed over the line and given our lives to Christ, we better be getting serious about this decision and we better be getting serious about how we are leading our children. Because, again, it’s not about whether we give the coolest birthday parties, whether or not we go on the best vacations, or whatever is occupying parents’ time. It’s about leading our children in a relationship with the Lord.
Ed: That’s why I am so excited about Fellowship Church, Lisa, because our church highlights and underlines those transcendent values that we are talking about. They should be taught primarily in the home and then, secondarily, in the church.
Lisa: And you know our home is not immune. Our children face the same thing. We’ve had to make decisions on the Internet with taking the Internet away from the younger kids because things were coming up and we were not able to screen them no matter how many parent controls or things we downloaded. We were not able to prevent it. So, we had to take it away. And boy, do you think E.J. is excited that he can’t go look at trading cards on the Internet? He can’t do it anymore unless Ed or I are with him. The problem is that so many of us get too busy and we won’t take the time to parent and be with them. We let the Internet and the movies and TV baby-sit our kids.
Ed: So, Lisa, again, this is such great stuff and it goes back to Samson’s life that just this once, just this one compromise can lead us down a very destructive road. That’s what we want to guard from in our marriage, in our home, and also we want to share that with you guys as well. I want to have a closing prayer. Let’s just bow our hearts as we close out this time of teaching and then we will move into the offering. Let’s pray together.