(A) The story of Samson in his final act: real renewed strength in real dependence

“O Lord God, please remember me and please strengthen me only this once, O God.” (Judges 16:28)

The man Samson in the Old Testament as one of the ‘judges’ of Israel is familiar to most of us. He was one God endowed with great physical strength but he lost his strength to the enemy of God’s people because of the betrayal of a woman, Delilah.
The verse above recorded his final prayer and act against the enemy after he lost his strength and was blinded.

As we look at the prayer of Samson at this point in his life, we need to realise that God in his mercy may have to deal with us eventually as he dealt with Samson. The strength that God had given him seemed gone forever; his usefulness as a ‘judge’ of Israel seemed gone as well. In the goodness of God, Samson recovered just enough strength for the final act of his life.

God may need to weaken us and bring us down at the points where we thought we were strong in order that we may become truly strong in real dependence on Him, the Lord. In our life, there may have been times when God has done that before, and He may have to do it again with us. And if He does, there will be mercy in it. It will be God working to make some sense out of the mess we have made in our life that has reached the point where it seems nothing good can come out from it. This happened in Samson’s life; it should encourage us not to give up when we fail God time and time in our life; – the Lord is ever merciful and gracious and does not give up on us His children so easily.

The life of Samson reminds us that God does use us in spite of our flaws. He is a kindly God who uses flawed people as part of His plan to create a people of His own. No matter how conscious and aware we are of our own limitations, shortcomings, and sins, we may look to God to make use of us again when we repent and cry out to Him for His forgiveness and enabling – and in His great mercy, He will.

If there is one thing we can learn from Samson’s life, it is that we need to get and keep our lives in a shape that will glorify God. This is not easy: it means fighting our sins, disciplining our thoughts, changing our attitudes, and critiquing our desires in a way that Samson did not try to do.
Let us trust God who uses flawed human material for His glory, and by faith let us seek strength to serve God in good works and attitudes that at this moment we feel are beyond us.
Scriptures remind us that those who seek find; for Samson’s God, who is also our God, is a God of great patience, long-suffering, and wondrous grace.
And like Apostle Paul, we would learn that when we are weak then we are strong (in the Lord, truly strong in real dependence on God).
God the Father and the Son send us the Holy Spirit for this very purpose – to teach us to depend wholly on Him and to find real renewed strength in real dependence on Him.

I find the following translation of Philippian 2:12 very helpful:
“With the reverence and awe and a true desire to do right, continue exerting the effort necessary for fully developing your own salvation, for God is the Energizer within you, both causing you to want to and to put forth the power to fulfill what pleases Him.” Notice the need for exerting effort; but the One who strengthens us is the Holy Spirit within us – He is the One who causes us to want to, and to put forth the power to fulfill what God desires for us, and what truly pleases Him.

As we depend fully on Him, and exert effort in developing our salvation, God is working to cause us to want to do this. and also release His power in us to fulfill what He desires in us.
We are saved; we are being saved; and we will be fully saved – this is the process our salvation will carry us through – and God who begins it in us would complete and finish it on the day of Jesus Christ. We may fall again and again but as we repent and continue to look up to Him, He is always gracious and merciful to see us through. We need not lose heart; for the Triune God is our God and He is more than able to do in us what we cannot do for ourselves.

(B) Some implied applications from the life of Samson (I)

Samson, at the end of his life, was a spent individual; compared to his previous ‘victories’ over his enemies – then he could defeat multitudes of soldiers alone and he could break free even from his ‘bondage’ by ropes easily. On many occasions, even when he was surprised by sneak ‘attacks’, Samson was able to react and achieve ‘victory’. He could be said to be an awesome warrior in his context.

After he lost his strength and was made blind, he was made a spectacle to the multitude of Philistines. It was at this point that Samson prayed to God for strengthening for the last time.

As believers, we ought to recognise that the basis of our prayers is the acknowledgement of God’s sovereignty. We recognise that God is the author and source of all the good that we have had already, and all the good that we hope for in the future.

The prayer of a Christian is not an attempt to force God’s hand, but a humble acknowledgement of helplessness and dependence. When we are on our knees, we know that it is not we who control the world; it is not in our power therefore to supply our needs by our own independent efforts: every good thing that we desire for ourselves and for others must be sought from God, and will come , if it comes at all, as a gift from His hands.

Samson had always thought that his strength was in himself and his ability. Time and again, he assumed this as the truth, for almost on every occasion, his strength was the cause of his victory. But Samson had to learn in a hard way that this was not the case – his strength was endowed by God – and God can give and God can take away. It is only when he was helpless and without strength that he saw the need to cry out to God and to pray. What about us?

Is prayer only resorted to when we are in need; when we are ill, when we encounter difficult circumstances; when all seem ‘lost’ and irreparable??
We must see this clearly: what we do every time we pray is in effect to confess our own impotence and God’s sovereignty. The very fact that a Christian prays is thus proof positive that he/she believes in the lordship of his/her God.

Prayer expresses our position as creatures before the Creator; it acknowledges that God is lord of our lives, and only He can make the difference that matters when we reach ‘the end of our own strength and ability’. Even the very breath we breathe is from Him; and He can take it away immediately.
Is there a continual sense of worship of, and dependence on, the Lord God in our lives as believers individually, as a family, and as a community.?The true quality of our prayers individually and as a church speaks volumes of whether there is such a lack.

(C) Some implied applications from the life of Samson (II)

We have been considering some implied applications as we look at the life of Samson.

We noted how Samson was given exceptional physical strength to fulfil his role as one of the judges of Israel. At the end of his life, he lost his vision and strength and was made a spectacle before the Philistines.

At that point, he cried out to God for enough strength to be restored to carry out his final act against the enemies of God’s people. Samson had to depend on God to regain his strength, and here we see how real dependence on God resulted in renewed strength

In the last sharing, we saw how each time we pray, it is to confess our own impotence and God’s sovereignty and to acknowledge the lordship of the Lord God; it is also a humble acknowledgement of our helplessness and dependence.

In the life of Samson, although he was called to be a Nazirite, dedicated to God, yet in his outworking, Samson did not keep himself apart for God. He was supposed to be ‘holy’ and ‘clean’, yet Samson partook honey from the carcass of a dead lion; he sought to marry a Philistine woman, and subsequently was drawn to a woman of questionable character named Delilah, which led to his downfall.

To be a ‘judge’ and a servant of God, it was mandatory for Samson to be holy and to keep God’s Law and commandments so that he could glorify the Lord.
However, Samson failed miserably in this very area.

The commandments and law of God are important in the following ways:
Firstly they show what sort of people God wants His servants and people to be.
They highlight the prohibitions, telling us what God hates; and the behaviour He desires and loves to see in His people. In other words, God wants us to be persons who are free from evil; persons who actively love God and their neighbours and who refrain from dishonouring God and being unfaithful to Him.

Secondly, the commandments show us what sort of lifestyle is truly natural and good for us – that is, the form of conduct that fully satisfies human nature and makes us truly human, as God intended us to be. To deviate from it would result in unfulfilling consequences.
Samson’s ‘wild life and behaviour’ surely did not please God although he was chosen by God to undertake a certain ministry as a Nazirite. Invariably, it led to his ‘impotence’ and ‘damage’.

This is a solemn reminder that we cannot serve God in the flesh and apart from holiness and reverence for Him. The end does not justify the means; we are to serve HIm in a holy manner and to pursue His honour and glory in all that we undertake for Him as faithful servants. The outward display of power and strength, as in the case of Samson, without God’s approval, in the long run, will not produce results fully pleasing to God. Thankfully, Samson did learn this to a certain extent in his final act for his Master.

Thirdly, God’s commandments actually show what sort of people we are in His eyes; they show us to be lawbreakers under sentence, whose only hope lies in God’s forgiving mercy. When we measure our lives by God’s Law, we find that self-justification and self-satisfaction are truly impossible. The Law actually exposes us to ourselves as those who are spiritually sick and lost; this enables us to appreciate the good news of the gospel in Christ. if we are humble enough to repent and to receive His grace by faith.