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While the assembly was drinking, singing, dancing, and making merriment, a lad who was given the task to lead Samson by the hand from the prison to the temple to perform feats for the people, finally positioned Samson between the two columns supporting the temple so that he could “rest” (Jdg 16:26). Little did the lad know that he was heading to his own demise by taking Samson to the twin pillars. With his hands on the pillars, Samson let out a heartfelt cry to God,
O Lord GOD, remember me, I pray! Strengthen me, I pray, just this once, O God, that I may with one blow
take vengeance on the Philistines for my two eyes (Jdg 16:28, emphasis mine)!
The
people wanted a spectacular feat before his death (Jdg 16:25); they were blindsided by what they got!
Samson robbed them of an easy kill by having the clueless lad position him
between the two load-bearing columns, and placing his left hand on one pillar
and his right hand on the other, he pushed with
all his might, and said,
Let
me die with the Philistines (Jdg 16:30a)! And with that, God brought him on home.
Those
were the last words that this poor lad who led Samson around by the hand ever
heard. They both died when the columns gave way as Samson pushed with all his might (Jdg 16:30b), and the temple
collapsed upon them.
By
the way, where were the praises to Dagon now? If the Philistines really believed
that Dagon delivered Samson into their hands, and they did (Jdg 16:23, 24),
then logically the Philistines would have to conclude that Dagon was the cause
of all the deaths at the temple as a direct result of delivering Samson to them,
but they didn’t. It is either going to be Dagon’s fault or the God of Samson.
This would make someone wanting to know the truth think that Samson’s God was greater
and more powerful than Dagon, right?
We
can see the thick spiritual darkness (cf. 2 Cor 4:4) in the hearts of the people
of Philistia because they continued worshiping the deaf, dumb, and dead idol of
Dagon even after this calamity in Gaza. I don’t know how the priest of Dagon
explained this disaster in light of delivering Samson to them, but they did!
Dagon
worship continued on in the Philistine culture during the days of Eli, Samuel,
and Saul (1 Sam 5:2-7; 1 Chron 10:10) according to the biblical record. The
Philistines praised Dagon for Samson, and they praised Dagon for the head of
Saul. Did you know that Saul’s skull went on an exhibition tour throughout
Philistia (1 Chron 10:9)? Afterwards, they put it on display in the temple of
Dagon (1 Chron 10:10) which definitely enriched the legacy of Saul in the
historical record!
Samson
wound up killing more Philistines by his death than he killed in his lifetime
(Jdg 16:30c). The temple was packed out in large part due to the presence of
Samson (Jdg 16:27a). As mentioned before, there were about 3,000 men and women
on top of the roof alone (Jdg 16:27b).
We
have no way of knowing the number of casualties who were under the roof when
the temple collapsed or the number killed being struck by debris within the
adjacent area around the temple proper. There had to have been a considerable
number of non-life-threatening injuries as well. Overall, Samson was personally
responsible for the deaths of at least 4,030 Philistines in his life/death time!
It was a remarkable feat!
I
am assuming that all five lords of
the Philistines (cf. Jdg 3:3) were in attendance (Jdg 16:27, 30b, the lords). If my assumption is
true, then they all paid 1,100 pieces of silver to the languishing one,
Delilah, as I suggested in Part 1, to find a way to defeat Samson (Jdg 16:5, 18).
After cutting his hair, they made a serious miscalculation in not killing
Samson immediately thereafter. They
delayed that order to get their bang for the buck, in my opinion, by parading
Samson before the people as if providing some kind of psycho-therapy for all
the hurt that he inflicted on the Philistines. They propagandize Dagon their
god before the people and then offered him up to Dagon for delivering Samson to them. This suggested to the people that Dagon was superior to Samson's God.
Unfortunately
for the lords and the people of Philistia, God was not done with Samson; he
would yet strike a lethal blow for the God of Israel to Dagon their god, their leaders,
and all who followed after them. Here is what I find ironic and very
providential. The Philistines apprehended Samson because God not only allowed
it, but he also allowed Samson to be unwise or stupid in divulging to Delilah,
the one who brings low, the secret of his strength. For the record, that was
some powerful concoction of stupid!
He
relented to a determined, heartless woman driven by greed, who pestered,
pressed, and vexed him to death on a daily basis (Jdg 16:16). It has been
observed that the strongest man in the Bible (Samson) and the wisest man in the
Bible5 (Solomon) were both undermined by pagan women.
Read Solomon’s comments on “lady Folly,” “lady Foolishness,” and “lady Madness,”
(Eccl 7:25) I applied my heart to know, to search and seek out
wisdom and the reason of things, to know the wickedness of folly, even
of foolishness and madness.
(Eccl 7:26) And
I find more bitter than death the woman whose heart is snares and nets, whose
hands are fetters. He who pleases God shall escape from her, but the
sinner shall be trapped by her.
Ironically,
these five lords of the Philistines signed their death warrant when they each paid
out silver to capture Samson only to be killed by him (1 Sam 16:30b, the temple fell on the
lords)! Gone
was the festive spirit and the celebration, the drinking, the singing, the
dancing, and the merriment. All that remained was a cloud of dust hovering over
a shocked silence, punctuated by the wailing among the ruins.
Did
Samson have to end his life this way? Yes, for like many believers, he had been
on a trajectory of faith and flesh. Having crossed the Rubicon, he was now more
useful by his death than by his life. You
would have thought that “Little Sun” (Samson) would have shed more light on his
thinking about giving away the secret of his strength to a woman he loved who
never loved him in return (Jdg 16:4, 5)! Delilah sold him out, and it was going
to cost Sam dearly. She became richer for it; he was ruined by it on this side of eternity. On the other side, ultimately, she was ruined by her choices forever, and Samson was rewarded forever.
He had only
himself to blame for his folly (cf. Jdg 16:15-17). It reminds me of Esau
selling his birthright to Jacob for some porridge lest he die; Samson gave away
his life to stop Delilah from driving him crazy! What is wrong with these two
pictures of stupid?
Once
we are spiritually regenerated, it doesn’t take long for us to recognize that faith
(the new life) and flesh (the old life) are always at spiritual odds with one
another and ever will be. We cannot live a dual life, one of faith and one of flesh,
and expect God to be pleased with us (cf. Heb 11:6)! There can be no harmony or
balance between living by faith and being worldly. We are only deceiving ourselves and
will invite all kinds of needless problems into our lives, spiritually and physically,
that could have been avoided!
Truly,
Samson’s life was a strange combination of interjections of faith and outbursts
of flesh. Without a doubt, it got him into trouble and ultimately shortened his
lifespan. This straddling of two worlds today is unsustainable for a follower
of Jesus Christ. Consequences begin to push back. Don’t be unequally yoked,
right!? This doesn’t have to be applied only to marriage! As a believer, mixing
it up with the world can only drag you
down; that’s a modern meaning for Delilah.
You
do realize that Samson lived during a period in Israel where every man did what
was right in his own eyes (Jdg 21:25; contrast Prov 3:7)? What a rollercoaster
of cyclical oppression and deliverance! What a time it was of dark depression
and decisive defeat for the nation of Israel during the time of the Judges! Why? They got hung up on idols (contrast Ex 20:3).
It would be wise of us to learn from Samson’s life; it will spare us a lot of unnecessary
grief (Rom 15:4). Let’s not forget that Samson was listed in Hebrews 11, surprised?
Not one person mentioned in Heb 11:4f was perfect as far as I can tell. They all
did some pretty amazing things in the context of their lives for God, but they
were flawed by sin just as you and I are. Like them, we can turn our ordinary lives into extraordinary living for Yahweh if we choose His will over ours, yes!?
There
is this one thing that sticks out in my mind when reading about Samson in
Judges 13-16; we all do well to remember. Should we ever choose to play with
fire, we will run the risk of setting a spiritual forest ablaze in our lives. In
those times, situations become fluid and fiery. According to Smokey the Bear, “Only
you can prevent forest fires.” It’s
better to be blessed than burnt, yes?
And
that, my friends, puts the consequences squarely back on the shoulders of the
chooser, not the circumstances. It’s not the circumstances that determine our
destiny, but the choices that we make; Samson’s life makes that abundantly
clear. As the old saying goes, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”
But if we choose to ignore the teaching of Scripture, well then, I think we
will begin to smell some smoke! <><
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| End of Series |
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5. I am making a
comparison, apples to apples, of two sinful men. Without a doubt, Jesus was the
wisest sinless man [God-man] on
earth. The first Adam was sinless for an unknown period of time, but he was susceptible
to sin and unwise; Adam sinned in knowledge (cf. Rom 5:12; 1 Tim 2:14).
