Year 1, Day 277: Judges 16

Samson Succumbs to Human Passion

Sigh.  We get to see another side of Samson’s self-mongerism today.  Within the first few verses we get to hear of Samson going to a prostitute and then going to Delilah.  Samson seems to be on an absolute tear about getting his own way and being invincible about it.  I often think this is how we as Christians feel with respect to God.  God has given us such an incredible gift in our salvation by grace and so often we take that gift and do whatever we want in life.  Sure, we would openly disagree that we should “sin all the more so grace may abound.”  But we often live like we actually believe that – whether or not we actually confess to believe it or not.

That’s no different than what we see Samson doing here.  Samson knows that God has made him strong – nigh invincible!  So he goes about life taking and taking and taking.  He goes about life on this trip in which his needs are his only concern.  Well, it will eventually catch up with him, but we’ll save that for later.  For now we’ll simply need to be content watching him destroy himself and any meaningful relationship he could be having with God.

Notice that all this time Samson is anything but loyal to the God of his vow.  While he is not loyal to God, he is certainly loyal to the vow – no razor touches his head until the end of the story.  We see that Samson is loyal to what he believes to be the source of his strength but not loyal to the actual strength.  In many respects he is just like us.  We are loyal to what we think is God, or what we think God would have us do, or even how we think God would have us think.  But we are not often truly loyal to God Himself.

God Looks Past Samson’s Obvious Flaws

In many respects, that’s one cool part of the story with Samson that often gets left out.  Notice that while Samson is in many ways disrespectful to God, God is loyal to Samson.  God promises to have Samson as a judge so long as no razor touches his head.  He can be sexually promiscuous.  He can be a tormentor of those around him.  He can be an all-around jerk.  Yet God is still loyal to His word.  That’s really cool, and in many ways it foreshadows the coming of Christ.  Although please don’t get me wrong.  I am not comparing Samson to Christ in any way, shape or form.  But that doesn’t change that humanity can be absolute jerks to one another and absolutely disloyal to God, yet God still sent us the Messiah and still paves the way for salvation.  Our character does not mar God’s character!

Samson Under the Philistines

Then, of course, we have the story of Samson’s defeat.  Delilah uses “love” to get at his secret.  Doesn’t this story go a long way to show how people don’t think right in the midst of lust?  You would think that Samson would learn a good bit about Delilah.  Three times he fools her into believing she has the secret to his strength and three times she proves her desire to do harm to him.  Delilah demonstrates that she is simply not trustworthy!

But does Samson notice?  Does he catch on?  Does he leave the bad situation?  No.  Samson is caught up in lust and he is not thinking.  His lustful desire for Delilah ultimately betrays his vow with God and his hair is shaved.  Samson is more interested in his human passion for Delilah than he is interested in either God or even truth.  This shows us just where the human heart often rests.

Verse 20 is a sad verse that demonstrates what is true in Samson: “Samson did not know that the Lord had left him.”  Samson was not even aware that God was no longer present within him!  With as powerful as God is, you would think that His absence would be felt!  But it just goes to show that in order to feel the absence of something you must first care about it.  Samson just doesn’t care about God.  He only cares about what God can do for him, that is, to make him strong.

God is loyal and quite forgiving, but Samson proves to God where his heart really rests.  Samson’s heart rests in his lust.  Samson’s heart rests in accomplishing his own agenda.  Samson has proven his character one final time and in the shaving of his head Samson shows to God that he really is a self-monger.  The Spirit of God leaves Samson and he doesn’t even know it.  He leaves Samson weak, helpless, and wretched.  He leaves Samson in the perfect place for repentance.

I can’t help but stop and wonder how often this happens in humanity today – or even in the church today?  How often does this actually happen within me?  How often am I convinced that I am doing God’s will as I actually find myself slowly going tangentially away from God’s desire for my life?

Samson’s Repentance?

The question is: does Samson repent?  There is no reason to think he does.  God has proven willing to work through an unrepentant Samson in the past, why should we think God would require Samson’s repentance now to take ultimate vengeance upon the Philistines and their fish-god Dagon?  Clearly God works within Samson all throughout his life without requiring true relationship with Samson.  Nowhere in this story do we see any indication of repentance. 

Maybe God heard a repentant Samson and returned His power to Samson.  If so there is no indication of that in the text.  Maybe God heard a self-monger asking for the opportunity to have the last word with respect to the Philistines.  If so, God could have given the strength Samson needed so this self-monger could accomplish his selfish desire while God could simultaneously accomplish His plan, too.  God is certainly capable of accomplishing His plans through people who don’t even realize what they are doing.

However, that also doesn’t mean Samson didn’t repent.  The proverbial book is truly open on Samson.  Only God truly knows how Samson died.  Only God knows whether Samson finally saw how his self-mongerism ruined his life and whether he repented.  It is not our place to be the final judges of Samson’s character.  If he repented, praise the Lord!  If he didn’t, then his fate rests in the hand of the Lord.  Only God can judge Samson’s heart.

Our job is to learn from Samson.  When we live a life pursuing our own desires we will eventually fall.  When we pursue our lusts – whether actual sexual lust or a lust for something else in life – we are turning our back on God.  When we are the self-monger, God is no longer at the center of life and our character is proven to God.  That is what we can learn from Samson.  My prayer to God is that we learn that lesson today.

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