That’s the title of our Sunday School lesson this morning.
It’s about Samson before he was born or even conceived. So it’s really about his parents, and his mother in particular.
She was supposed to restrict her diet because of her yet-unconceived child’s separation to God. (Hers may have been her own body, but that didn’t trump the “tissue mass” soon to be within her!)
This lesson made my mind jump ahead to Samson in later life. He saw a girl not of his people that he wanted for his wife. He disregarded their appeals to select a wife from among their people. He told his folks to get her for him because she pleased him well.
He despised his Nazariteness. He despised his heritage. Did he also despise his parents?
And what were they supposed to do? (I used to look down on them for going along with his demands.)
And did one or both of them treat their parents that way so now they were reaping what they had sown?
Questions with no answers available to us.
Samson — a child from God and for God.
Samson — a vision trampled, a mission botched, a commission abandoned.
Samson — redeemed in the end?
I don’t know that either.