It has become fashionable to describe people as “creatives,” converting the adjective to a noun. I’ve heard the trendy, slangy noun used to describe musicians, artists, marketers, even entrepreneurs.
The Bible records the biography of an interesting “Creative.” He showed up at a party ready to stump the crowd with a riddle he had written. (How many people you know have ever written a riddle?) Even his revenge was creative; it was so complicated and original, it’s a symphony of vengeance. This was not a rash, hurried man: he captured 300 foxes, tied them together in pairs by their tails, mounted a torch between each, and released 150 pairs of foxes all over the Philistine lands, destroying wheat, vineyards, and olive groves.
Next he killed 1,000 men swinging a donkey’s jawbone. He gave God credit for that amazing victory. Then he did another imaginative thing: he took revenge on the city of Gaza not by killing, but by pulling up the city’s gates and posts and carrying them to the top of a mountain, leaving the walled city exposed and unprotected.
Samson was smart, imaginative, and creative. But he had a weakness for women–particularly Philistine women. When his fiancée cried for seven days, he told her the solution to his riddle—which she immediately shared with her Philistine people (who later killed her). Twenty years later Delilah wore him down and he told her the secret of his great strength—which she immediately shared with the Philistines, who then captured and blinded Samson.
But God was in control. When Samson chose a non-believing Philistine fiancée, “his mother and father did not know that this was from the Lord, who was seeking an occasion against the Philistines” Judges 14:4. God continued to use the flawed “Creative,” allowing Samson to judge Israel for 20 years before his capture and dramatic death—in which he killed more Philistines than he had in life.
God was with Samson: He was creative, strong, and flawed. But God’s plan was fulfilled nevertheless.
God, please use us greatly in spite of our weaknesses!
P.S.–I like the picture above because it is the only one I could find–out of hundreds on the web–that shows Samson as something less than a bodybuilder. There is no Biblical support for the idea that Samson was a huge, muscle-bound man. After all, his enemies were always asking about the secret of his great strength. If he were huge, there would be no secret. I like to imagine a film about Samson with someone like David Schwimmer or Ethan Hawke playing the strongman. I got this picture from the website of the Triangle Community Church in North Carolina. https://tcc.org/
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