This week I was reading the account of Samson in Judges 13-16. Many of us probably remember quite a few details about this particular judge in Israel’s history. Samson is perhaps best known for his incredible strength, evidenced by how he not only defeated thousands of enemies (sometimes even in a single battle!) but also by how he once “took hold of the doors of the gate of the city and the two posts, and pulled them up, bar and all, and put them on his shoulders and carried them to the top of the hill that is in front of Hebron” (Judges 16:3). He was certainly used by God in a mighty way, defeating Israel’s enemies and even giving his life to bring down a pagan temple on top of the Philistines who were worshiping there.
Yet for as many good things we might remember about Samson, we can probably recall as many, well, not-so-good things about the man. He had a terrible temper, which he wasn’t able to control (Judges 14:19, for example). What’s more, he was given to womanizing, including seeking out companions from among the Philistines (his marriage in chapter 14, his time with a prostitute in Gaza in chapter 16, and, of course, Delilah, also in chapter 16). In fact, it was his experience with Delilah that led to his downfall. Many of us probably know the story: Delilah, out of greed, seduces Samson in order to discover the secret of his strength and three times he lies to her. The writer of Judges records what happens next in Judges 16:16-17: “And when she pressed him hard with her words day after day, and urged him, his soul was vexed to death. And he told her all his heart…” I have always been amazed at that account, since it was clear that Delilah had sold Samson out to the Philistines three separate times, and yet he stayed with her.
Now, if I were to ask you what the secret to Samson’s power was, how would you answer? Go ahead, take a moment to think about it and answer the question before moving on. (It’s OK…I’ll wait.) Did you say, “His hair?” Well, that is the answer that Samson gave Delilah, isn’t it? In Judges 16:17, he tells her (after being “vexed to death”), “A razor has never come upon my head, for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. If my head is shaved, then my strength will leave me, and I shall become weak and be like any other man.” However, we see that the real reason Samson loses his power is not because of a haircut, though Delilah did have his head shaved while he slept in her lap. No, to see the real reason why Samson lost his power, we have to look to what is perhaps the saddest statement of the entire Samson account, found at the end of Judges 16:20: “But he did not know that the Lord had left him.”
Why do I say this is the saddest statement? Here was a man whose conscience had become so seared (cf. 1 Timothy 4:2) because of his sinfulness that he could not tell the difference between when the Spirit of the Lord was with him and when the Spirit had departed (remember, the Spirit did not reside permanently with people in the Old Testament period). Such a searing of the conscience is just one of sin’s devastating consequences, interfering with our ability to hear clearly the Spirit of the Lord in our lives. When we allow sin to go unchecked in our lives, it will in turn beget other sin, just as Samson’s life shows us. Indeed, Samson’s life illustrates the truth of the Puritan John Owen’s famous statement: “Be killing sin, or sin will be killing you.” Just something to think about…
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