Samson

The last judge listed in Judges is Samson, who was unique not because of his character flaws, but because he had no support from the people of God. He had no army behind him to rout the enemy and “clean up” after his exploits.

Samson’s another guy you couldn’t let speak in church because of his taste for tattooed, pierced, bad Philistine girls. But here’s the weird thing: without that “fatal flaw” for those femme fatales, there would have been no battles, no rushing of the Spirit of the Lord upon him, no mighty exploits. His parents tried to detract him from his evil course, but the text says, “However, his father and mother did not know that it was of the LORD, for He was seeking an occasion against the Philistines.”

Because there was no help from the Hebrew populace, there had to be a point of contact with the Philistines in order for Samson to kill them. If he’d been a law-abiding, clean-shaven nice guy, he wouldn’t have “gone down” to those cities to break the Philistine choke.

Samson was a special guy. He was born to a barren woman. God foretold his coming, like he did other (more admirable) characters. From before his conception, God knew him and designated him for a unique calling, which he fulfilled.

God. Go figure. He’s not going to rain fire from heaven on those Philistines, or send some choice locusts or a famine their way. No. He’s going to have a weird-looking dude go down there and engage in multiple dysfunctional relationships, get him good and pissed off, and then rush into him to strike the enemies of God and deliver the nation.

Even his death was unlike anything else in the Bible.

And this guy, this maverick that no good woman in her right mind would even hardly stand to be around, this fornicating, lecherous creep, is going to be listed in Hebrews 11 because his trust was in the Almighty.