An enigma arose. A man of immense strength but a weak disposition. A man of power but with no moral fortitude. God used him anyway.
Once again Israel
lapsed, but God was on top of it all. It was time to trim back the Philistines,
partly because they were the darkest influence of Israel.
It must be accepted
that God cast them into a cauldron of contradictions, in which their faith
contended with the competing worldviews of their neighbors.
It is no different for
us, nor was it any easier for the early church. We are in this world, but not
of it, so we will face trials in this age. But Jesus overcame the world.
The story of Samson
began with a barren mother and a righteous father. An angel of God visited
Manoah, Zorah’s wife, and promised her a child, who had to be raised as a Nazarite.
He was not to cut his
hair or take a razor to his head, nor would he touch unclean things or take
strong drink. He would live under oath, dedicated to a high calling, as a deliverer
of Israel.
The angel disappeared in
the sacrificial smoke of Zorah’s offering, but she conceived and
in the years that passed the Spirit of God began to stir in him.
Samson fell for a Philistine woman (chapter 14)
He saw and desired
her, notwithstanding the counsel of his parents, so they went down to Timnath
with him. On the way he slew a lion and went off to tell them.
Later he saw that bees had settled in the carcass, so he took some honey, which made him unclean, to which end he was supposed to make a worthy sacrifice and shave his hair.
The Timnites gave the
woman to him as a wife, but the entire escapade was stirred up by God to provoke a showdown with the Philistines.
Samson made a riddle: "Out
of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness", and challenged the 30 men with the woman, to solve it in 7 days.
Over the week, she badgered him endlessly. When he told her the answer, she told the
30 and so Samson lost out and they gave her to another man.
It was enough to
trigger a cycle of events that would weaken the Philistines.
Samson retaliated (Chapter 15)
Then when he went to
spend time with his wife, he was told that she had been given to another, so he
caught 30 foxes, tied them in pairs and set fire between them, which they
carried into the fields and orchards of the Philistines.
That truly angered
them, so he fled to a rocky outcrop and his Jewish brothers came to him,
arguing that he was provoking the Philistines who ruled over them.
They bound him and
took him back to the Philistines, but he broke the bonds, grabbed the jawbone of
an ass and slew a thousand of them.
The body count was
building up fast and more must have followed, for he judged Israel for 20
years.
A woman-besotted Samson never learnt his lessons
(Chapter 15)
He went to Gaza and
spent the night with a harlot, but though the inhabitants of the city tried to ambush
him, he tore down the city gates and dumped them on a hill.
Then he found Delilah,
another Philistine woman and fell for her too.
The Philistines
shrewdly guided her to expose the secret of his strength. He deceived her a few
times, but each time he recovered and took down more Philistines.
Most of us would have
learned by then not to trust a Delilah, but what Samson had in strength he lacked
in sense.
Finally she wore him
down enough to learn that his long hair was the key to his strength. As he slept they cut it all off and when he work his strength was gone.
Then they pierced out his eyes and cast him into a dark dungeon,
However, the Philistines were also slow to learn. In a great celebration
before their god, Dagon, they had him brought out and tied to the mainstay
pillars of the temple.
By then his hair had
regrown and so at the height of the celebration he ripped down the pillars and
brought down the house, killing more in his death than in his life: thousands.
Parallels to Jesus
Jesus was a Nazarite.
He took the same vow and never cut his hair, in line with the law.
Had the Princes of this world known he was the King of Glory, they would not have crucified him (1 Cor 2:8), which parallels the ignorance of the Philistines in leading Samson to the place of sacrifice.
Only in Jesus, that sacrifice reconciled us to God, when Jesus tore down the pivotal pillars of Satan's realm to destroy his legal pretexts.
In his death, Jesus took down far more than in his life, but he also took the gates of hell
and dumped them on a hill, having claimed the keys of death and hell.
The only difference was
that his lowest moment was his greatest, for he triumphed over death and sat
down on the right hand of God as our Judge and Redeemer.
His greatest
vulnerability was not Delilah, but the bride for whom he died. In
embracing her sins, in death, he ransomed her and set her
apart as the church triumphant.
(c) Peter Missing @ bethelstone.com
