Judges 16

Judges 16

"And it was told the Gazites, saying, Samson is come hither. And they compassed him in, and laid wait for him all night in the gate of the city, and were quiet all the night, saying, In the morning, when it is day, we shall kill him.

And Samson lay till midnight, and arose at midnight, and took the doors of the gate of the city, and the two posts, and went away with them, bar and all, and put them upon his shoulders, and carried them up to the top of an that is before Hebron. And it came to pass afterward, that he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah.

And the lords of the Philistines came up unto her, and said unto her, Entice him, and see wherein his great strength lieth, and by what means we may prevail against him, that we may bind him to afflict him: and we will give thee every one of us eleven hundred pieces of silver. And Delilah said to Samson, Tell me, I pray thee, wherein thy great strength lieth, and wherewith thou mightest be bound to afflict thee."

Samson had obviously lost all moral character that he may have had previously. He wasn't doing what the Lord had called him to do. It was as if he couldn't keep it up. He would serve the Lord, and then he would stop. And then he would serve the Lord again, and then he would stop. Samson, however isn't alone here. Like him, so many of us serve the Lord in spurts. It shouldn't be this way.

Samson then goes through a hide-and-seek game with Delilah over where his 'great strength lieth.' He keeps joking around with her. And finally he gives in. He decided for his peace of mind to not give her any more false clues.He informs her that his strength does not reside in new ropes, or in weaving his hair into seven locks, it was in the length of his hair. He gave her that information, and in doing so, he let her destroy him.

As his enemies bound and led him away, he most likely thought of how foolish he had been. There was nothing that he himself could do now. God would have to help him, not in rescuing him, but in defeating more of his enemies than he ever had before.