Right and Wrong Self-Confidence-Part 1

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MW Editor’s Note: Mentoring Warriors welcomes back Wayne Spencer as a guest author. Wayne leads Creation Answers and provides great insights every man needs to hear. This post and next will focus on Biblical examples of right and wrong self-confidence that can impact your life.

As a young man, I was very insecure.  Confidence was hard for me to come by.  We do need to learn how to face life with confidence.  But it is very important not to put our confidence in the wrong things.  As Christians, we must learn to put our confidence in God, not in ourselves or anything in this fallen world.  The Apostle Paul described his own attitude about his life and ministry in 2 Corinthians 3:4-6.  He described Christians in Corinth whom he had discipled as being like letters from Christ, written with the Spirit of the living God (2 Cor. 3:3, NIV).  

Then he says, “Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God.  Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God.  He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant . . . . (NIV 1984)”  The Bible has a lot to say about confidence.  It has both negative and positive examples.  

Samson

We will start with an example of someone who had the wrong kind of confidence, Samson.  Today, we can watch movies of superheroes who do all sorts of feats of superhuman strength.  There seems to be something in our human nature that likes to imagine not having our human limitations.  The account of Samson’s life is in Judges chapters 13-16.  Samson’s father was a man named Manoah.  An angel appeared to Samson’s mother to announce that they would have a son.  Manoah’s wife had been childless until then.  

The angel told them, “See to it that you drink no wine or other fermented drink and that you do not eat anything unclean, because you will conceive and give birth to a son. No razor may be used on his head, because the boy is to be a Nazirite, set apart to God from birth, and he will begin the deliverance of Israel from the hands of the Philistines (Judges 13:4-5).”  Thus, Samson was called by God to be a leader in Israel.  Fighting the Philistines was part of this calling. He was given strength not for his own glory or pleasure, but for God’s purposes.  So it seems Samson had good parents.  

After Samson grew up, he disregarded God’s commands for how the Israelites were to live.  As a young man, Samson was confident but in the wrong way.  He was selfish and didn’t deal well with his responsibility to God.  The Philistines couldn’t beat him in a fight, so they laid a clever trap for him.  They persuaded a woman, Delilah, to find out the source of his strength and how they could subdue him.  Psalm 119:9 is appropriate, though it was not yet written at the time of Samson, “How can a young man keep his way pure?  By living according to your word.”  Unfortunately, by giving in to sin, Samson opened himself to temptation and manipulation by Delilah.  He should not have been with the Philistine women.  Delilah seemed to wear down his resistance.  So, he eventually gave in to Delilah and told her that if his hair were cut, he would be as weak as other men.  Then he was captured and made blind by the Philistines and was set to work pushing a grinding stone in the prison.  Being in prison gave Samson time to think.  So, his attitude toward God changed. 

Then one day, Judges 16:23 says, “the rulers of the Philistines assembled to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to celebrate.”  Samson was brought out of the prison and made to “entertain” the people.  It doesn’t describe what they did to Samson, but you can bet it was humiliating.  They loved to gloat over Samson being their prisoner.  This may have been years later.   We don’t know how long Samson was a prisoner.  But even in a humiliating defeat, God can have a purpose.  Now we should understand the scene of what happens next.  The temple was a large structure. Judges 16:27 says, “the temple was crowded with men and women; all the rulers of the Philistines were there, and on the roof were about three thousand men and women watching Samson perform.”  So this temple was like a stadium, with many people on an upper level.  There was a servant who led Samson by the hand, and Samson asked to be placed where he could feel the central pillars of the temple.  

So now Samson was strategically placed.  So, Samson does something powerful.  He prays to God.  He prays with a different attitude than before.  He says, “O Sovereign LORD, remember me. O God, please strengthen me just once more, and let me with one blow get revenge on the Philistines for my two eyes.”  

Notice that Samson did not ask to be free and no longer be a prisoner.  I think Samson understood that he became a prisoner because of how he failed God.  He had been given a great gift, but disobedience after being given such a gift was costly for him.  Then, when the Philistines gouged out Samson’s eyes, I think this seemed “over the top” to Samson.  So, Samson asks God for “revenge” for his two eyes.  Now the Bible does not approve of us wanting revenge for ourselves.  But it was a unique situation for Samson.  

In Romans 12:19, it says, “’ It is mine to avenge; I will repay,’ says the Lord.”  So, Samson asks the one who had the right to revenge, which was God.  The Philistines had acted against God by what they did to Samson.  Samson wanted his life to count for God’s purpose, though he had failed in the past.  So “revenge” in this case was really God’s revenge, not Samson’s.  I think it was more important to Samson to make his life count for God than for him to live or to see again.  God gave Samson strength, and he brought down the temple on the Philistines, killing many of them.  He realized in the end that God was in control and God was the source of his abilities.  Samson finished well because he died relying on God.  

How Does This Impact You and Me?

Having failed God does not mean God cannot use us for something good in the future.  God may withhold opportunities from us until we learn to have the right attitude toward him.  The time Samson spent in prison was not “wasted time,” it was preparation time.  Samson was being trained in how to be humble before God and acknowledge his dependence on God.  Whatever trouble we face, we must ask ourselves what lessons God has for us in it.  

Warrior On!

MW Editor’s Challenge. Truth is, as a man, you have failed in many ways. In what ways can God use your past failures to bring about something good?