Judges 16 Sleeping with the Enemy

Intro:

In 1991 Julia Roberts starred in a movie called Sleeping With Your Enemy

Her marriage was a nightmare

The husband was controlling so she faked her death

He finds out and comes for her

It ends like you would think, but takes you on a roller coaster ride

Tonight we see another version of Sleeping with the Enemy

Samson is infatuated with Delilah

She is in love with money

Delilah is bribed to discover the source of Samson’s strnegth

Because Samson is blinded by his love for her he is seduced into disclosing his secret

Read Judges 16:1-6

I. Samson’s Folly vs. 1-3

The next scene we Samson is in Gaza

Gaza was one of the five major cities of the Philistines.

It is located about twelve miles southeast of Ashkelon about three miles from the Mediterranean.

The 135-acre site is located at the southern entrance to the coastal plain, where it occupies the highest point in the region along the main trade route coming up from Egypt.

While Samson is there he sleeps with a prostitute

Samson was in obvious sin here.

This is a clear example of how a man so used of God can also sin and sin blatantly.

Samson wanted to be used by God, but he also yielded to the deceitfulness of sin.

He kept the external features of his Nazirite vow zealously, while at the same time sinning blatantly with a prostitute.

Samson did what we nearly all do when deceived by sin.

He put his life into categories, and figured that some categories God cared about, and some categories God did not care about.

Understanding that Jesus has claim over our entire life is a radical change of perspective.

Vs. 2 The Gazites here of it and set an ambush at the city gate

They were going to kill him in the morning

Samson thwarts that plan by getting up at midnight

Maybe he did not want to be seen by people in the morning, or maybe the Lord spoke to his spirit

The gates of the city were locked, but Samson proceeded to rip them off, doors, frame, and all

The text mentions three parts of the gate: the gate itself, the posts and the bar.

Two gate doors were generally set into stone sockets buried just under the ground.

The posts flanked the gate on either side. They were made of wood and joined to the wall.

Gate openings of this period were often as much as twelve feet wide, though some are as small as six feet.

Samson carried them towards Hebron

Hebron is nearly forty miles east of Gaza in a continual uphill climb.

He headed off on the road to Hebron and dumped the gates on a hill on the way.

His strength was able to compensate for his weaknesses, but that is coming to an end

Despite his sin, God still gave Samson supernatural strength to escape from the Philistines.

God did this because God’s purpose was bigger than Samson himself, and because God used Samson despite Samson’s sin, not because of it.

II. Samson’s Weakness vs. 4-22

vs. 4-6 Seduce Him

Now we get to the famous story of Samson & Delilah

The Valley of Sorek is the area of most of Samson’s activity. The main valley is about thirteen miles west of Jerusalem

Samson had a thing for Philistine women

Samson fell in love again and fell for a woman completely wrong for him.

She was wrong because Jews were supposed to have any relations outside of Israel

Philistine women were Samson’s weakness

This is another example of the pain and ruin that came into Samson’s life because he did not guard his heart.

vs. 5 Every one of us will give you eleven hundred pieces of silver:

Delilah was also deeply in love; but she was in love with money, not Samson.

The five rulers of the Philistines appear to be equal in authority.

They were probably leaders of the 5 cities that made up Philistia

They bribe Delilah to seduce Samson and find his strength

Eleven hundred shekels of silver is an exorbitant sum—a king’s ransom (see 2 Sam 18:12).

1,100 shekels made up more than 140 pounds (63 kilograms) of silver.

Compare the ten shekels that was the standard annual wage of a laborer and the four to six hundred shekels that was paid for tracts of land.

The 5500 shekels would equal 550 times the average annual wage.

If we took $25,000 as an average annual wage today, that kind of offer would be in the $15 million category.

This shows how desperate the Philistines were to get rid of Samson

The Philistines believed there was a secret to Samson’s great strength that needed to be discovered and that could be exploited to weaken him.

This demonstrates that they considered supernatural or magical elements to be the source of his abilities.

Samson understands this in that he offers magical solutions for binding him.

Delilah probably asks Samson while they are in an intimate setting, where Samson is at his weakest

vs. 7-9 First Lie: Bowstrings

The source of Samson’s strength was not obvious.

This means that he probably was not a large, heavily muscled man like a modern-day bodybuilder.

He may have looked small and skinny, and unlikely to have such strength.

Delilah knew that Samson was strong; yet she also knew that he could be bound with something, and this was indeed true of Samson.

One might say that the honest answer to her question would be, “I may be bound with the attention and affection of an ungodly yet attractive woman.”

And she bound him: Samson could have easily seen Delilah’s heart by the way she immediately tried to bind him with what he deceptively said he could be bound with.

The fresh thongs or bow strings were sometimes made of the intestines of cattle.

They were usually laid out to dry before being put to use.

Others have preferred to think of vines being used.

The fact that seven are used also suggests a magical element to the procedure.

The fact that he did not tell her the truth proved that he knew she had a dangerous intention.

vs. 10-12 New Ropes

It would seem that romantic attraction made Samson lose all sense.

There was no good or rational reason Samson continued this relationship with Delilah or entertained her prying into the secret of his strength.

Samson is a good example of how an ungodly relationship can warp thinking.

Delilah accuses him of mocking her

One of the manipulative tactics of deceptive people is to point out your flaws or sins without mentioning theirs

So he tells her to bind him with new ropes

This is ironic because this just happened in Chap 15 and the ropes were like burnt flax

Samson allowed this bondage because he refused to escape the situation.

Many today are in similar places of sin, compromise, and bondage – and refuse to escape the situation.

vs. 13-14 Weave the Dreads

Delilah obviously cared nothing for Samson.

His continued commitment to her is a remarkable testimony to the power of blind, irresponsible love.

How can you say, “I love you,” when your heart is not with me:

Tragically, Samson’s heart was with Delilah.

Her accusation was a manipulative projection of her own heart, which was not with Samson.

Samson feels compassion and tells her to tie his hair to a weavers loom

There were two types of looms used in this period: the horizontal loom and the vertical loom.

From the description given of Delilah’s loom it appears to be the former type.

Four stakes were driven into the ground in a rectangular pattern.

The threads that would make up the warp of the fabric were tied at regular intervals to sticks on both ends, and the sticks were then used to stretch out the threads between the stakes.

Samson has now become quite creative for he is suggesting that his hair be substituted for the thread.

It was typical for men to have seven braids of hair

This would, however, be a logical magical procedure in that the hair was considered to contain one’s life essence and the weaving would be a binding action.

When Samson jumps up, he pulls the whole loom with him, snapping the end sticks off the four stakes between which the fabric was stretched.

vs. 15-17 Pressed Hard

Earlier Samson gave into the nagging of his Philistine wife

Now he yielded to the nagging of Delilah.

She certainly sinned by using such terrible manipulation, but Samson also sinned by yielding to that manipulation.

Her previous complaint was that Samson’s love for her was empty and a hollow protest.

Delilah had no love for him, and she expected Samson to destroy himself and his service for God to “prove” his love for her.

Though Samson may have violated the Nazarite vow on numerous occasions, such circumstances merely required the vow to be renewed.

This was different in that the shaving of the hair was the way to bring the vow to an end

He told her all his heart:

When Samson did this, it was a very sad scene.

He had to know what was to come. He faced the choice between faithfulness to his God and continuing an ungodly relationship.

In this we see the strongest man in the world weak under the power of an ungodly relationship.

Perhaps Samson figured that because he was strong in one area of his life, he was strong in all areas. In this he was desperately wrong.

Then she lulled him to sleep on her knees:

No doubt, Delilah used sweet words to lull Samson to sleep.

Her pretended love for Samson for the sake of money is deeply troubling.

vs. 18-22 Left by the Lord

Then she began to torment him:

This was fitting. We might say that Delilah began to torment Samson long before this.

And his strength left him:

There was nothing magical in Samson’s hair.

We might also say that Samson began breaking his Nazirite vow before this.

Yet there came a time when Samson finally had to reckon with his rejection of God’s mercy.

“Not that his hair made him strong, but that his hair was the symbol of his consecration, and was the pledge of God’s favor to him. While his hair was untouched he was a consecrated man; as soon as that was cut away, he was no longer perfectly consecrated, and then his strength departed from him.” (Spurgeon)

Samson didn’t know things were different. He lived in compromise for so long that he thought it would never make a difference.

“The story is one to fill the soul with holy fear. The possibility of going on in an attempt to do the work of God after God has withdrawn Himself, is an appalling one.” (Morgan)

This is a tragic example of wasted potential and rejection of God’s warnings. Samson thought he could “get away” with sin and escape its consequences.

He misinterpreted the merciful delay of God’s judgment or correction as a sign that He really didn’t care. He therefore presumed on God’s mercy and continued on in his sin, making things far worse.

He did not know that the LORD had departed from him: Samson’s strength was not in his hair, it was in his relationship with God.

He worked against that relationship to the point where God finally departed from him, in the sense that He no longer blessed Samson with supernatural strength.

Then the Philistines took him and put out his eyes:

It was fitting that Samson was first blinded in his imprisonment.

He was attracted to ungodly relationships through his eyes.

His failure to restrain this attraction to women brought him into bondage.

They bound him with bronze fetters:

Samson didn’t humble himself in obedience before God – he insisted on the “freedom” of doing what he wanted to do. This left him with no freedom at all.

Grinding grain into flour was usually done with millstones and was the job of the lowest members of society.

The hair of his head began to grow again:

God gave Samson hope in the midst of a dungeon. His hair began to return, and we can suppose that his heart also began to return.

III. Samson’s Death vs. 23-31

Our god has delivered into our hands Samson our enemy:

When Samson pursued his ungodly relationships, he might have justified it to himself by thinking that the only harm was done to himself.

Yet here we see that his disobedience led to giving glory to false gods. Samson became a trophy for worshippers of false gods.

When they people saw him, they praised their god:

The message preached by the followers of Dagon was clear.

They said, “Our god is stronger than the God of Israel, because we have conquered Samson.”

Often the disobedience of God’s leaders leads others to deny God.

Samson said to the lad who held him by the hand: The Philistines continued to mock Samson. At this large demonstration, they used a boy to guard him.

This makes us think all the more that Samson was not a muscle-bound man who was naturally strong. His strength was truly supernatural, not natural.

That I may with one blow take vengeance on the Philistines: Samson’s end was both bitter and sweet. God answered his last prayer, and he achieved his greatest victory against the Philistines at the cost of his own life.

In this Samson is a picture of the believer in disobedience.

God used him, but he did not benefit from it. His life ended in personal tragedy, shadowed by the waste of great potential.

Let me die with the Philistines:

This was suicide, but different from suicide in the strict sense in that his purpose really wasn’t to kill himself, but to kill as many Philistines as he could. There is a sense in which Samson was like modern suicide-bombers.

Samson was a hero, even mentioned among the heroes of faith in Hebrews 11 (Hebrews 11:32).

Yet there is no glorification of Samson and his end; he was not a glorious hero to be emulated, as modern suicide bombers are glorified by some. Instead, Samson was a tragic hero, whose life should have ended much differently.

We can also say that Samson’s suicide and killing of others was not sought out; the opportunity came to him tragically.

And he pushed with all his might, and the temple fell on the lords and all the people who were in it:

This could only happen with God supernaturally empowering Samson. This shows that God never forsook Samson, even when he was disobedient.

God’s mercies were there for Samson even in a Philistine prison. All Samson had to do was to turn his heart back towards God and receive them.

We could say that Samson was restored with self-renunciation.

This last great victory came only after he was broken, humiliated, and blind. He could no longer look to himself. Prior to this we don’t see Samson as a man of prayer, but here he prayed. He was humbled enough to allow a little boy to help him.

In summary, Samson shows the danger of underestimating our own sinfulness. He probably figured he had things under control with his own fleshly lusts, but his desire for love, romance, and sex led directly to his destruction. Samson was the great conqueror who never allowed God to properly conquer him.