Judges 16: Samson (Part 2)

Judges 16:16 "And when she pressed him hard with her words day after day, and urged him, his soul was vexed to death."

This morning we come to the meat of the story of Samson. The story, starting in 16:4, can be summarized as follows:

After his two previous relations with Philistine women, Samson regards that this whole foreign-wife thing is working out, so he finds for himself another Philistine woman by the name of Delilah. However, the masters of the Philistines came to Delilah and convinced her to try to find the secret to Samson's strength so that they might overtake him. Originally, Samson doesn't tell her the secret but deceives her three times in a row. However, after she "pressed him hard with words day after day," Samson unlocked the door to his heart and told her the great secret of his strength, which was the very locks of his hair. That next night, Delilah took her scissors and gave Samson a stylish new dew, leaving him without strength. The Lord's presence left Samson, and the Philistines overtook him.

However, the story doesn't end there. Samson's hair starts growing back, and at a great feast of the Philistines, Samson calls out to the Lord one last time for strength. The Lord hears his plea and answers it. Thus, leaning on the pillars of the great building that Samson and thousands of Philistines were in, Samson broke the foundation of the great meeting place, bringing it down upon itself. The text tells us that "the dead whom [Samson] killed at his death were more than those whom he had killed during his life" (30). In a back-door way, Samson had brought deliverance to Israel from the hand of the Philistines.

But what are we to make out of this story? Well, perhaps a great question to ask in regard to this text is this: How did Samson fall? In other words, what led him to his great moral and spiritual ruin? Firstly, let us observe (as we looked at yesterday), that sin starts small but grows quickly. Friends, our sin doesn't happen in a vacuum. Bitter thoughts quickly turn into angry thoughts, which lead to vengeful actions, which lead to broken relationships. Lustful desires quickly turn to lustful actions, which turn into pornography addictions and adultery. Our sin doesn't happen in a vacuum. Samson didn't wake up one day and decide to tell the secret of his strength to Delilah. His sin started long ago in the dark depths of his heart.

However, there's another note we ought to realize in our study of the story of Samson. We find in the verse quoted above that Samson gave in when Delilah "pressed him hard. . .day after day." I've heard it said before that it's easy to overcome any temptation once, or even twice. But what does it look like to fight temptation day after day, hour after hour, moment after moment? Samson didn't know what that looked like. As soon as Delilah turned up the heat of the flame, Samson gave in. However, God has called his children to "fight the good fight of faith" (1 Tim. 6:12) and to "run with endurance the race that is set before us" (Heb. 12:1-2).

What we ultimately find here is that Samson struggled with passivity. Left untempted, untried, and unpressed, Samson was the manliest man you could imagine. But as soon as the going got tough, Samson didn't get going. As soon as his Philistine girlfriend turned up the flame of temptation, Samson got burned. Although he may have looked like a man on the outside, he was a boy on the inside. True manhood stands up to temptation.

So, what sins are you letting linger in your life because you don't think they're dangerous? As we see in the story of Samson, those sins start small but grow quickly, so how are you persistently fighting them? Your Savior sinned not when he fasted in the desert for 40 days straight. One of the ways he was able to do this is because he quoted scripture. Perhaps doing so would help us avoid temptation.

"Can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned?" Prov. 6:27