Samson and Delilah (Part C)

Pretended to be what he was not all of his life, and I shall become weak, he says to her. He will become weak. He's always been weak before God, now he will be weak before men. And so he ends, and I will be like any other man. Save souls, we're not supposed to be like any, to some degree we are, we're just like everybody else, but on another level, spiritually we're not.

Our opinions, our beliefs, and our behavior are supposed to be aggressively in pursuit of righteousness. And now here's Pastor Rick with his continuing study called Samson and Delilah, in Judges chapter 16. Remember, he's 20 years into his judgeship. Verse 12, Therefore Delilah took new ropes and bound him with them, and said to him, The Philistines are upon you, Samson. The men lying in wait, staying in the room, were lying in wait, staying in the room, but he broke them off of his arms like a thread. Again, it's not dawning on him.

He thinks she can't get to his strength, and no one else can either. He's already given up secrets in the past. I mean, to his wife, there in Timna, told his parents about the lion, he held the secrets for a while, but he couldn't keep them. And that's a good lesson, you know, someone may confide in you.

It's not supposed to be a shelf life on that. Okay, tell me the secret, it'd be good for a year and five days. Once you say it's a secret, it's supposed to be until the other person can tell you okay. You can tell the story or it comes out. And then even if then, you've got to be careful and wise.

You don't want to be a gossiper and join ranks with those who are. I shall become weak like any other man. Verse 13, Delilah said to Samson, Until now you have mocked me and told me lies.

Tell me what you may be bound with. And he said to her, If you weave the seven locks of my head into the web of the loom. I mean, it's just like asking for a headache. It's so stupid.

I would. Well, he's having a grand old time on the way to the slaughter. Up to now you've been trying to destroy me, he should have said.

That's what his reply should have been. But, you know, Samson, tell me how I can afflict you. If you weave the seven locks of my head into the web of the loom. So now he is letting her toy with the emblem of his devotion. Now it's getting serious in the spiritual realm. There is a spiritual warfare.

It's indisputable. Paul makes it clear, Daniel makes it clear, around us are spiritual forces. When we don't understand why God is not doing this or that, it is because there are laws within the spiritual realm of war that we do not know about. And what we do know is that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but spiritual.

Prayer, the word, the fellowship, the communion with Christ. There are things we can do, but they're not guarantees because it is still a war. There are uncertainties as to the results.

But our response to the results are always supposed to be faith-based. And so he jests with her, he jokes with her about the entanglement of his hair. Because he's entangled in pride. I mean these little, quippy little sayings, they work.

He makes them easy. Entangled with the hair, entangled with pride. Because that's what was happening. It's not corny preaching.

It's a fact. Verse 14, so she wove it tightly with the batten of the loom and said to him, the Philistines are upon you Samson. And he awoke from his sleep and pulled out the batten and the web of the loom. So he wrecked the furniture. He wrecked it and just tore it up. I don't know.

Was it worth it from Celila? So by this time, I think, she knows she can get to him. She's still got him on the hook. She's very determined. The fresh bow strings, not yet dried. The new ropes, the seven locks. Verse 15, then she said to him, how can you say I love you when your heart is not with me?

You have mocked me these three times and have not told me where your great strength is. Excuse me, sister. Where is it written that I have to tell you? No, he's not that kind of man with her. He would have been that kind of man with a man.

He would have said, well, who tells you I got to tell you anything? But not with Celila. And anyone who would use love to manipulate or to exploit someone, they don't love you. We don't use love to take advantage. Now, of course, you know, there's some margin in there, human relationships.

I don't want to act to, you know, try to say, you know, figure it out. But certainly not to the harm of the other person. Not to the harm of the other person saying, if you love me, hurt yourself. And of course, Delilah passionately loved herself, as do those who manipulate someone whom they say they love, but of the whole time are doing them damage. When your heart is not with me, that is the trip she's laying on him.

Define what you mean by that. Verse 16, and it came to pass when she pestered him daily with her words and pressed him, so his soul was vexed to death. Again, she's determined to get that money. She's already got it planned what she's going to do with it.

She's going to write a book, bestseller book, you know, how I got the keys from Samson. This, again, being pestered daily, suggests that he is living with her, and also it is a message to us, this is no reason to abandon your principles. It is no reason to depart from what you know is right, being pestered.

The moms might have a little guilt about now if you've got a bunch of little ones, because they will pester you until they get that popsicle or whatever it is they're after. But the principle remains, the lesson is there. That's not reason to give in, and these things aren't easy else the stories wouldn't have to be told to us. No fight against sin is easy.

There's a brand out there that has got our name on it. So do those who nag care about the person that they are nagging? It's a question. She didn't care about him.

It says with words. In other words, she wouldn't shut up. She wouldn't let it alone. You would think, he would say, you know something's wrong with you.

You're just obsessed with this, and I can't take this anymore. No, he has no, as articulate as he is, that does not come into the story. Now Delilah wanted to be taken seriously.

Well that's fine, but not to my destruction. And Proverbs 7 21, with her enticing speech, she caused him to yield. With her flattering lips, she seduced him. And it says, and pressed him. She just kept going.

I'm getting annoyed reading it. I'd like to jump in and say, Sam, let me just handle this, alright? But I want you to sign here that you're not going to hurt me if I put this woman in her place.

For you! That won't happen, because when a man loves a woman, turns his back on his best friend if he puts her down. That's how the song goes, because it's a fact of love life.

He hasn't, it's not the first time he's been down this road. Judges chapter 14 verse 17, speaking of his wife in Timnah. Now she had wept on him seven days while their feast lasted, and it happened on the seventh day that he told her because she pressed him so much.

Then she explained a riddle to the sons of her people. So she pressed him to get it out of him. He couldn't walk away. He probably found something, it was adorable, it was cute. But he's playing with fire, and you can't take fire to your bosom without your garments going up in flames.

And that means you're going with him. So that his soul was vexed to death. If it wasn't such a tragic story, it would be a comedy. He was a fool to subject himself to this. Now back to the question, you know, so this can sound, you know, as though the Bible is, God is saying, only women nag.

That's not so. 2 Kings chapter 2, this is a story when Elijah, the prophet, is being taken up in a chariot of fire. He's gone now. So Elijah, the disciple, comes back, and there's these, the school of the prophets, the students of the prophets, you know, the college students, the seminary students in this case, they couldn't find a place to riot, so, and, you know, to get out of class. All right.

I was rooting for the cops in the 60s, and I'm rooting for them in the 2020s, just the way it is. Anyway, 2 Kings, so Elijah comes back, and they say, where is Elijah? He's gone.

You're not going to find him. Oh, come on. It kept bugging him. So here we go. 2 Kings 2, verse 17, But when they urged him till he was ashamed, he said, Send them.

Therefore they sent fifty men, and they searched for three days, but did not find him. They just, they just made him ashamed. It's like, good night. How many times do I got to tell you? He's gone. Okay, fine. Go.

Go look for him. And they go out for three days. They were obsessed. We can't let, we cannot let Elijah be right. We've got to find Elijah so we can go back.

I can't go back and say, okay, you're right. What a mess. Well, anyway, we need to all guard against that.

You want something too much. It's a problem. Sin did not vex his soul. The nagging woman did. And that is what, another strike for Samson. Some suppose, and I think there's a lot of merit to this, otherwise I wouldn't be bringing it up, that she was withholding herself from him.

And that's where the breakdown really, you know, what do I got to do to get this reversed and use that also. Human nature cannot rule that out. Verse 17, that he told her in all his heart and said to her, No razor has ever come upon my head, for I have been a Nazarite to God from my mother's womb.

If I am shaven, my strength will leave me, and I shall become weak and be like any other man. There's the third time he says it and it seals his fate. What a blessing to have a mom and dad that would lay this out for him. He knew because they told him, they raised him the right way, that he is behaving like a beast. That's on him. That is not on Manoah, Mr. and Mrs. Manoah.

It's totally on Samson. They were good, godly people. And you read that 13th chapter of Judges and you just love those two. You want to know more about them.

Such a little tag team. The way they interact with each other. The way they interacted with the angel of the Lord.

What will be the child's way of life? Manoah, you're wrong. If you see God and die, we'd be dead. I mean, just a dear story.

No, he has no one to blame for himself and he'll be thinking about this. He was not tricked, incidentally, by Delilah. He was just stupid.

That's what it is. And said to her, No razor has ever come upon my head. Now we all know, if we know our Old Testament, we know that there was a law in Israel that no tool, no iron instrument was to be lifted over the altar. In fact, in the building of the temple, when they used the tools to quarry the stone for the temple, you did to do it off site.

When you got to the temple grounds, no tools, no iron tools were to be used. And that altar is to be dedicated to God. The altar that was not victim of iron tools was dedicated to God. And of course, the Nazarite was a man.

It didn't have to be a man, we know that. But an individual dedicated or consecrated to God. So no iron tool, no razor was to touch the head.

The altar was not to have iron make contact with it. His unshorn locks spoke of his dedication, the source of his strength. They were signs of devotion. His hair wasn't actually, you know, there was no strength in the hair, nor was there strength in just having long hair, like Absalom. And even in the story, when his hair grows back, he still has to ask for strength.

It doesn't just come. He says, just this one time. That was his prayer as he's blinded, but his hair has grown back. We'll get that, of course, in the next session of the same chapter. He says, for I have been a Nazarite to God from my womb.

Now the story is intensifying. Have you? Have you been a Nazarite from your womb? If we were to charge you with being a Nazarite, Samson, other than your hairdo, what evidence would there be to convict you?

If someone charged you with being a Christian, would there be evidence enough to send you to jail for it? So, he says, from my mother's womb, because the mom who bore him made sure he got the story. A Nazarite from birth, but not in life, not in practice. Now he uses a generic word, Hebrew word, for God, Elohim. Why not Yahweh? Why doesn't he use the covenant name? The Nazarite was in, all about the covenant. That's what the vow, the Nazarite vow, the Nazarite covenant, the pledge, the agreement with God, it was binding. And I think the word, it's a choice word that he uses, and it marks his spiritual detachment from Yahweh.

It is on purpose. Usually the historians will insert Yahweh's name in the story. Even before the name was a covenant name, we read of its usage in Genesis, because the historians are writing about Yahweh was the creator. Even though you didn't have that covenant name as the Jewish people yet, it was Yahweh who said in the beginning, and so they'll do that, but not with Samson here. They didn't insert Yahweh into this verse. We'll get that at the end of the story, in death. That's when we will hear Yahweh's covenant name come from his lips. He says, if I am shaven, then my strength will leave me. And Delilah said, I'm going to be rich.

I'm going to be filthy rich. Did you see her face? She knew. She knew looking at him, hearing his voice, he's telling the truth.

She's got him. And this heartless woman, again, seals the fate of this man that pretended to be what he was not all of his life. And I shall become weak, he says to her. I will become weak. He's always been weak before God.

Now he will be weak before men. And so he ends, and I will be like any other man. Saved souls, we're not supposed to be like any, to some degree we are. We're just like everybody else, but on another level, spiritually, we're not. Our opinions, our beliefs, and our behavior are supposed to be aggressively in pursuit of righteousness. That fourth chapter of Ephesians, it's a beautiful chapter. Paul saying this very thing, we're not like other people. I'll take two verses from Ephesians 4. Verse 17 first, one of my favorites, This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk in the futility of their mind.

Your life is not a waste. You understand what's going on. Spiritually, you get it, and you're supposed to live that way. And then verse 20 of Ephesians 4, But you have not so learned Christ. He's not saying you have not behaved. He is saying this is not how you've been taught. If you're a Christian, you've not been taught to live like the Gentiles.

So he's closing up that section. But you've not learned Christ that way. You've not learned to walk like Gentiles. And you could say that to Samson. You could say, Samson, you are a Nazarite from birth. You have not learned to walk the way you're walking from Yahweh this way.

You're picking this up from somewhere else. Your darkened heart. Verse 18, When Delilah saw that he told her all his heart. In other words, she could see on his face. She sent and called for the lords of the Philistines saying, Come up once more, for he has told me all his heart, and bring the cash. That's not in there, but that's happening. So the lords of the Philistines came up to her and brought the money in their hand.

They were so, it was worth it. This was a business deal. It was like, you know what? We need to get this guy gone. We'll pay whatever it takes to get it.

And we're going to pay you because we don't want word to get out if something like this happens again that we don't pay. It says, When Delilah saw, checkmate, chick-ching, the shock of his life, it was knocking at the door. She sent and called the lords of the Philistines. Of course, the mighty man of self is about to die by the greedy woman of self saying, Come up once more, for he has told me all his heart.

Nothing to add. There was nothing in the heart that he should have been sharing while Yahweh was God and no one else. So the lords of the Philistines, of course, came, and to them it was worth every cent at the moment, but not in the end, because Samson does win. Verse 19, Then she lulled him to sleep on her knees and called for a man and had him shave off the seven locks of his head.

Then she began to torment him, and his strength left him. What if Samson had found a woman like his mother? What would the story have been like? But he did not. And what if he had been obedient like his father? But he was not.

Not yet. Well, he won't have time to act it out, but we know that there is still a victory. This deep sleep, you have to wonder, you know, if I'm sleeping and someone is shaving my hair, I think I'd wake up. Well, I don't think I've ever had seven locks of my hair like this, but you tend to think that there maybe was a substance, you know, maybe he had wine. That would not be out of character with Samson, a fermented drink of some sort, because he seems to really be in a deep sleep, even though he does wake up. And anyway, Samson felt he could get away with all this. He felt that he was untouchable.

Why wouldn't she not just maybe call the guys in and they could stab him in his sleep? I think because they felt that he was invincible, that if they didn't find out where his strength was, he would get angry and kill him again, you know, do damage to them. So they probably felt, you know, and were probably superstitious about the whole thing. The people in those days were very superstitious, and they felt that we need to find the source of his strength. Look, we tried a thousand guys on him once. That didn't work, and so there it is.

A.W. Tozier says it is altogether possible to practice fraud upon our own souls and go deceived into judgment. And that was Samson. He practiced fraud on his own soul, and he went into judgment deceived, thinking that he was still strong when he was not. And so she lulls him to sleep on her knees.

Again, suggestive language. Not, I don't think, intentional by the scribe of judges, but certainly by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit knows we would see this because he would point it out to us. Had he bowed his head and prayed upon his knees, he would never have lost his sight. Had he been on his knees in prayer, his sight would have been very sharp.

But we don't hear this. The only time we have heard him pray so far was when he was thirsty. Satisfy the flesh. Nor sit in the seat of the scornful, we're told in Psalm 1. Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodliest, stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful, nor lies on the lap of the wicked.

It doesn't say that, but you could add that and it would not be a corruption. But whose delight is in the law of the Lord. That was not Samson. And that is part of another lesson we want to pass on to anyone interested in Jesus Christ. To have a delight in Christ.

That's what the singing is supposed to bring out in us, this delight for the Lord. And so he is sheared like a sheep. The man who killed lions, treated like a sheep. And they call in the barber of Sorek and he does him in.

Men, don't let wives choose your barbers. That's the lesson I get out of the whole story. Oh, let's pray, there's nothing else to learn. Verse 20, and she said, The Philistines are upon you, Samson. So he awoke from his sleep and said, I will go out as before at other times and shake myself free, but he did not know that the Lord had departed from him. Your enemies are attacking to take you, Samson. Where is the friend in time of need? Pastor, a friend of mine, sent me a random text today and it said, The Lord is on my side. I will not fear.

What can men do to me? But the part he just sent was, The Lord is on my side. And I texted back, I needed that. And he texted back, so do I. And this pastor friend, we're at the same, we're the same age.

Of course I'm older, I know that because I'm smarter than him, but we're the same age, we've been in ministry the same amount of time, we share the same concerns, and it was just a message from God to me. I took it that way. And this is a friend, you know, when you have a friend, I have friends, believe it or not.

And where was the one for Samson? Be a friend to someone. I think, you know, it's not enough to say, well, me and my wife, we're friends. Well, that's great. That's wonderful.

Nobody wants to take anything away from them. But is there anybody else benefiting from your friendship? And if not, ask the Lord.

You can't fake it and try to do it on your own. Anyway, he awoke from his sleep and said, I will go out as before as at other times. And he would not because he laid his head on the lap of indulgement with an irreverence towards God. It wasn't just that Samson had this temptation, struggle. He was careless about God. On top of all of that, that's the big crime. It wasn't just that he was weak, because then we would read the story in terror.

We'd say, I don't have a chance. Because when I drive, God shows me what's missing in my heart. So that's why I say to God when I'm driving, if you could just not listen for a little while until I get to where I'm going. But it's true. God uses other drivers to remind us that we are sinners, saved by grace, but sinners still. And if you're not going to admit to that, you've just proved my point. Well, anyway, he did not know that his strength, which was devoured by the aliens, there had been so many opportunities for him to not do this. Let's stop there, because I don't want to rush through this.

And since we know the story, it's not a cliffhanger. We'll get it next session. Thanks for tuning in to Cross-Reference Radio for this study in the book of Judges. Cross-Reference Radio is the teaching ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel in Mechanicsville, Virginia. If you'd like more information about this ministry, we invite you to visit our website, crossreferenceradio.com. You'll find additional teachings from Pastor Rick available there, and we encourage you to subscribe to our channel by doing so, you'll be notified of each new edition of Cross-Reference Radio. You can search for Cross-Reference Radio on your favorite podcast app, or just follow the links at crossreferenceradio.com. That's all the time we have for today. Join us next time to continue learning more from the book of Judges, right here on Cross-Reference Radio.