When Great Strength Cannot Conquer Self - Judges 15:13 - 16:31 (Session 15)

Judges 15–16 completes the tragic story of Samson, a man given extraordinary strength but repeatedly controlled by selfish desires, sexual temptation, anger, and pride.

The session begins with Samson being handed over to the Philistines by his own countrymen. The Spirit of the Lord empowers him to break his bonds, and he kills one thousand Philistines with the jawbone of a donkey. Yet even after this remarkable victory, Samson’s first recorded prayer is motivated primarily by his own thirst rather than a desire for God’s guidance or glory.

Judges 16 then records Samson entering Gaza to visit a prostitute. The Philistines attempt to trap him behind the city gates, but Samson tears the gates, posts, and bars from the wall and carries them away. The act demonstrates his supernatural strength, but it also reveals how consistently he wastes his gift on personal situations rather than leading Israel against its oppressors.

The story then turns to Delilah. The Philistine rulers offer her a large payment to discover the source of Samson’s strength. Although she repeatedly betrays his supposed answers, Samson remains with her and gradually moves closer to revealing the truth.

Samson becomes spiritually blind before the Philistines physically blind him. He ignores the obvious warnings, compromises his Nazirite calling, and finally reveals that his uncut hair represents his dedication to God. When his hair is removed, Scripture records one of the most tragic statements in his story: Samson did not know that the Lord had departed from him.

The Philistines imprison, blind, and publicly humiliate Samson. Yet his hair begins to grow again, and in his final moments he cries out to God for strength. His prayer remains mixed with personal vengeance, but God still answers and uses him to strike a devastating blow against the Philistines.

Samson’s story is both a warning and a message of hope. Great ability cannot replace obedience, but even after serious failure, it is not too late to turn to God and ask Him to use what remains.

Scripture: Judges 15:13–16:31
Series: The Book of Judges — An RTTB Study

Questions discussed in this session:

• When God gives us a gift, what does He expect us to do with it?
• What happens when people try to trap God?
• How could Samson be so blind as to not recognize Delilah for what she was? 
• Can God use us even if we’ve been a failure up to now?  

Download our free Lesson Plans on our website: Reasoning Through the Bible – Straightforward with some Critical Thinking

Transcript

Samson's Strength and Sinful Actions

Speaker 2 0:21

Welcome back to Reasoning Through the Bible . We're working our way through the Book of Judges and we left off last time about the middle part of Chapter 15 and we saw that Samson had got himself in a little bit of a bind . Where we left off . He has retaliated to the Philistines because of them killing his wife and he had burned their crops . The Philistines took out to march against them . Samson's own relatives , tribes from the tribe of Judah have come to him and said you've stirred up a bunch of mess . What are you doing ? Don't you know that the Philistines are rulers over us ? It says there in verse 11 . It shows that the Israelites , or at least the tribe of Judah , they had given up . They weren't looking to God for help or anything . They had given up and weren't looking to God at all . They've come here to bind up Samson so that they could turn them over to the Philistines .

Speaker 1 1:16

They bind Samson in Judges 15 , verse 13 . They tie him up and they deliver him over to the enemy . The next verse , samson breaks the rope . In verse 15 , he picks up the jawbone of a donkey and uses it as a weapon to kill a thousand enemy with it . What I always think of is back in the old King James . It calls it the jawbone of an ass . Samson killed a thousand people with the jawbone of an ass . Now , since then , the jawbone of an ass has killed many more people than that . I think the asses need to learn to keep their jawbones shut and stop causing so much damage . Nevertheless , we will move on through the book of Judges . Samson , at this point , has shown a great gift that God has given him . He has great strength . He has the ability to go out and defeat this evil enemy . These were the people that had all the signs of doing very evil things . We've seen a taste of it here .

Speaker 2 2:12

God gave him a great gift , but so far it's all been used selfishly .

Speaker 1 2:17

The key concept , I think , at this point in the story , is that God can use us to achieve his sovereign will , even when we fail , because , nevertheless , even with Samson's failures , even with his sin , even with his selfishness , he's been defeating the enemy . Yes , samson had such great potential , could have done much more . Even with his failures , god is sovereignly using him to defeat the enemy or at least begin to defeat the enemy , as the prophecy said . Now , steve , can you read Judges 15 , start at verse 18 and go through 20? .

Speaker 2 2:52

When he this is Samson he became very thirsty and he called to the Lord and said you have given this great deliverance by the hand of your servant , and now shall I die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised . But God split the hollow place that is in Lehi so that the water came out of it . When he drank , his strength returned and he revived . Therefore he named it N Haqqor , which is in Lehi to this day . So he judged Israel 20 years in the days of the Philistines .

Speaker 1 3:26

So here we are , two chapters into Samson at this point and we come to the first prayer that Samson has done . What did he pray for in his first prayer ? He prayed for water . He needed water . Has Samson called on the Lord prior to this ? No , at no point up to this point has he asked for guidance . At no point do we have him praying for wisdom , praying God , help me . What should I do next ? Contrast that with the life of King David . What do you see David do repeatedly ? Lord , should I do such ? And so , lord , what should I do next ? Samson ? Great contrast here .

Speaker 1 4:09

This is the first prayer . This first prayer is motivated by what ? Self , self , physical need , physical thirst . It's really more of a complaint than a prayer . He called to the Lord and said you have given this great deliverance by the hand of your servant and now shall I die of thirst and fall into the hands of the ? So it's really more of a okay , lord , you give you this victory . All right , we'll give Samson that . But the prayer was only motivated because he was thirsty . If he weren't thirsty he wouldn't have said this prayer . It's motivated by his own fleshly desires . Nowhere does Samson pray for guidance . He's been self-centered and sinful man the whole time through . But the good news is God can use people that are self-centered , and thank God because that gives even me places like hope . So here we are in the next chapter , chapter 16 . We learn one of Samson's weaknesses we're gonna find out here Samson is still sinning .

Speaker 2 5:11

So , steve , if you could read Judges 16 , the first three verses , Now Samson went to Gaza and saw a harlot there and went into her . When it was told to the Gazites , saying Samson has come here , they surrounded the place and lay in wait for him all night at the gate of the city . They kept silent all night , saying let us wait until the morning light , then we will kill him . Now Samson lay until midnight and at midnight he arose and took hold of the doors of the city gate , the two posts , and pulled them up along with the bars . Then he put them on his shoulders and carried them up to the top of the mountain which is opposite Hebron .

Speaker 1 5:53

Okay . So in verse one does Samson seem to have a problem with women .

Speaker 2 5:57

Yes .

Speaker 1 5:58

Yes he's going to a prostitute in a Philistine city . Now , if we think back on the life of Samson , I think we can build a case here , especially with this one , that he's got a woman troubles . What were the other times in Samson's life where he had trouble with women ?

Speaker 2 6:15

Going back to his first wife .

Speaker 1 6:18

He saw her . She looks good to me .

Speaker 2 6:21

He wanted her , saw that she would be good for his wife .

Speaker 1 6:24

Then he came back to her only because he wanted to be physically intimate with her , not because of loving her as a person . So here he is with a prostitute in enemy city . We're going to learn in the next chapter . He's going to be destroyed by another woman named Delilah . Samson's got a woman problem .

Speaker 1 6:43

Who else in the Bible has trouble with women ? David had trouble with women . Remember the story back in Genesis with Judah , when his daughter-in-law , Tamar , pretended to be a prostitute , fooled him into having relations with her . Jacob , whose name was chained to Israel , had multiple wives . That created problems among brothers . Solomon , Solomon .

Speaker 1 7:06

Sex has destroyed many people . It will destroy us . Sex is destroying our Western civilization today . It rots us from within because the family unit is the key that holds everything together . Once sex starts destroying the family unit , then there's nothing left of society to hold together , and we see that happening in slow motion here in Western world .

Speaker 1 7:32

We see it here happening with Samson . He shouldn't have been there . He shouldn't have been in that city . He shouldn't have been playing around . He's still playing . He's not thinking correctly . There's nothing here that says he's trying to seek God's guidance , trying to do God's will . None of that . So notice that Samson goes to Gaza for the specific purpose of sinning . When he does , they close the gates and surround him with soldiers trying to kill him . When we sin , we see pleasure and we go to that pleasure , but we shouldn't be surprised if we suddenly find ourselves surrounded and trapped when we go to sin . We'll wake up one day and find out that they've shut the gates . Now I'm trapped . It's a snare . Sin has a way of trapping us and trying to kill us . The devil is a murderer and he's trying to trap us and kill us with sin . Now the city gates . In verse 3 , he tears off the gates and the posts and carries them up the top of the hill or top of the mountain .

Speaker 2 8:34

These gates are massive gates .

Speaker 1 8:36

These gates are massive .

Speaker 2 8:38

These aren't small gates , I mean they're . The whole city is walled traditionally and it's there for protection . Your gates are going to be reinforced .

Speaker 1 8:46

When I visited the British Museum in .

Speaker 1 8:49

London it's a treasure trove of archaeological artifacts . They have a pair of life-size gates there . They found the bars and they reconstructed the wood to be the exact scale . You can look them up . They are the Balawat gates in the British Museum . These gates are 22 feet high . These were Assyrian from a different century but it was near Middle East era . But it wasn't these from Philistine , but nevertheless walled city from roughly the same period in the same region . 22 feet high , probably 10 or 12 feet wide , a foot thick metal bars , giant beams . They would weigh several tons To pick these up and their posts would take a crane because they're so heavy . To carry them up hill would be impossible for any technology of that day To carry them up hill whole .

Speaker 1 9:44

Samson was given a gift of superhuman strength . This was a miracle , as was the lion and the other things in Samson's life . These were superhuman miracles . We don't shy away from that . But God was blessing Samson even though he didn't deserve it . This gives me hope that he might even bless me , because I don't deserve it . Samson was wasting his gift by visiting prostitutes and doing strong mantrics when he should have been out doing . What God wanted to do is just fight the enemy .

Speaker 2 10:15

It still doesn't say anything about him , as , with other judges gathering the soldiers together to drive the Philistines out , he's just operating amongst the Philistines . The Philistines are still there doing what they've always done .

Speaker 1 10:30

Everything in Samson's life is driven by his own personal passions . Think of ripping off the gates . What message does that send to the Philistines ? If you were in the Philistines , what were the symbolism of the gates and the reality of the gates ? Now they've been ripped off .

Speaker 2 10:44

Well , the protection . Now you're vulnerable . You don't have any protection . You can't protect your will . But on that , this guy is somebody that we need to be afraid of . Of course , he's killed them in the past . That's why they want to kill him , but he's got superhuman strength .

Speaker 1 11:00

We've said before that these peoples , they were very aware of who they were fighting against . It wasn't just this man , Samson , it was Samson's God . They were very aware they were fighting against God From their perspective . If you take God and try to wall him up and think I've got God trapped , I figured it out and I've got God in a bind and he can't get out of this one , what does God end up doing ?

Speaker 2 11:27

Pulling up the gates . He's going to rip your doors off .

Speaker 1 11:30

It always happens . He's going to rip your doors off . If you put all your defenses into fighting against God , don't be surprised if you suddenly find your defenses ripped apart and carried away . Many a skeptic , many a critic , has built up a wall against God and they end up with their defenses torn apart . When God gives us a gift , what does he expect us to do with that gift , to put it to use for him ? Samson , at this point is a failure , in my opinion . God saw to include him in Hebrews 11 , the Hall of Faith , as an example , but why ? Everything he's done up to this point has been sinful , selfish , but he's still being used by God . God raised him up from the very beginning and God is working through Samson's failures . Even though I've had , or any of us have had , a spiritual life , that's a failure . Can I still turn to God and beg him to use me ? Oh yeah . Now , steve , could you read Judges 16 , verses 4

Samson's Downfall and Betrayal by Delilah

Speaker 1 12:31

and 5 ?

Speaker 2 12:31

After this it came about that he loved the woman in the valley of Sorek whose name was Delilah . The lords of the Philistines came up to her and said to her entice him and see where his great strength lies and how we may overpower him , that we may bind him to afflict him . Then we will each give you 1,100 pieces of silver . So one thing that strikes me in verse 4 is that he loved a woman . Delilah doesn't say anything about her loving him . Who starts the plot ?

Speaker 1 13:03

against Samson , the lords of the Philistines Philistines do .

Speaker 2 13:07

And what do they tell Delilah to do ? Entice him , get him to tell the secret of his great strength . How ?

Speaker 1 13:13

much were they going to pay her ? 1,100 pieces of silver from each one . It doesn't tell us how many of them there were , but it says each of them was going to pay her 1,100 pieces of silver . That's a lot of money , so she was going to get quite rich by turning over an innocent man Reasoning is is they want to tie him up and afflict him .

Speaker 2 13:33

They don't want to kill him . They get the sense that they want to torture him .

Speaker 1 13:36

So Delilah's main motivation here is what money ? Greed , greed , greed . All of us should ask ourselves whether , if we were offered a bribe to do something wrong , would I take it . If they gave me enough money , would I do something wrong ? If you're a Christian , you can't . You have to follow God . You can't take bribes . Bribes suck the economy out of a country and it will suck the life out of us if we let it .

Speaker 2 14:05

What's the saying ? Everybody has their price , but for a Christian there shouldn't be that price .

Speaker 1 14:10

Shouldn't be that price . We shouldn't be able to be bribed , nor should we give bribes . There's a lot of places in the world where bribery is rampant . As Christians , we have no place for it . So far has Samson been doing anything serious for the Lord ? Not really .

Speaker 2 14:27

A few little things here and there , but again it's been a personal retaliation .

Speaker 1 14:33

So up to this point Samson is seeing this woman , delilah . She's been bribed a tremendous amount of money to try to find out the secret of his strength . So in verses six through 16 , delilah goes through this process or several times where she tries to find the secret of his strength . Please tell me where your great strength is and how you might be bound . It goes through this process . She offers several times and he kind of gives answers and at first he's just kind of playing with her .

Speaker 2 15:04

But after every answer she goes and divulges to the enemy . They come in and get him and he defeats him . So even after the first time you see a pattern that he should recognize she's betraying me .

Speaker 1 15:16

Samson does not seem to realize that Delilah is trying to trick him . He's blinded before he's blinded . He was blind here before they get to poking out his eyes . Samson was blind here with Delilah . It's the only way you can answer it . She has beguiled him . He's only interested in his fleshly passions . He's not thinking . She has blinded him .

Speaker 1 15:41

He is a spiritually blind person doing foolish things and he's playing around because he can't see it . How many times have we seen people around us that are being tricked by somebody else ? It's a hard thing to watch when you can't really stop it . I've seen people give away their life savings to people that we're just trying to trick them and they get taken . It's a really hard thing to watch , especially here . This woman is obviously trying to trick him and probably everybody can see it except him All of us . If we have somebody come to us that's close to us and tell us that other person is trying to get you , we need to stop and think could I be fooled ? Am I blind ? At this point ? I have a good friend telling me I should take this seriously . So he is blinded by the deception of this woman and the sex she's offering . If he had been thinking clearly , he would have realized what she was doing . And the spiritual application is clear Sin will make us blind . Samson was spiritually blind . Because of this , there's not a lot that we can do except watch the crash and burn .

Speaker 1 16:47

She goes through this process and he does it three times . At first he says , oh , if he tie me with seven new bow strings , then that'll tie me . The Philistines are coming . And he breaks the bow strings the next time . Oh , tell me the secret of your great strength . Well , new ropes . So she ties them with the new ropes and calls the Philistines . He breaks those . Then it's well , if you weave my hair into a loom now he's compromising , he's getting closer . Of course that doesn't work . He begins to compromise . Is it okay to compromise just a little ?

Speaker 2 17:17

No .

Speaker 1 17:18

Leads to bad things . If we are tempted at this point , he's tempted . What should we do ? Flee , flee , exactly Flee . So Steve Reid started verse 16 and go through 21 .

Speaker 2 17:30

It came about when she pressed him daily with her words and urged him that his soul was annoyed to death . So he told her all that was in his heart and said to her a razor has never come on my head , for I have been a Nazarite to God for my mother's womb . If I am shaved , then my strength will leave me and I will become weak and be like any other man . When Delilah saw that he had told her all that was in his heart , she sent and called the Lords of the Philistines saying come up once more , for he has told me all that's in his heart . Then the Lords of the Philistines came up to her and brought the money in their hands .

Speaker 2 18:10

So she made him sleep on her knees him being Samson on her knees , and called for a man and had him shave off the seven locks of his hair . Then she began to afflict him and his strength left him . She said the Philistines are upon you , samson . He awoke from his sleep and said I will go out as at other times and shake myself free . But he did not know that the Lord had departed from him . Then the Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes and they brought him down to Gaza and bound him with bronze chains and he was a grinder in the prison , so is there anywhere in this passage where Samson asked God for guidance ?

Speaker 2 18:51

No , in fact back in 16 , when she says she pressed him daily with her words that his soul was annoyed to death . So somebody that he thought he loved has now turned out to be a burden to him .

Speaker 1 19:06

He should have left . He should have prayed to God . What should I do ? He didn't do either . He stayed there and it ended in tragedy . She cuts his hair . Is it the hair that caused the lack of strength or is it the violating of the vow ? It's the violating of the vow . It's not magical about the hair . It was the fact that that was a symbol of keeping the vow . He had violated the vow and that's when God left him . Look at the end of verse 20 . To me , this is the bottom of the pit for Samson . The ugliest part of this whole thing is that he says I will go out , as at other times , and shake myself free , but he did not know that the Lord had departed him . This is a horrible situation .

Speaker 2 19:48

Here's a man that the Lord had pulled his blessing back and he didn't know it , living his own lifestyle , he was unaware that the presence of the Lord wasn't with him anymore .

Speaker 1 20:01

Didn't even realize that the Lord had withdrawn his gift . Is it possible for Christians today who start out well , that for all intents and purposes , love the Lord , begin working for the Lord ? Is it possible for a person like that to deviate so far that they don't even know that the Lord's left them or that they've left the Lord ?

Speaker 2 20:24

I think it is .

Speaker 1 20:25

I've seen an entire Christian denominations thank you very much that have deviated so far that there's nothing Christian left . We could go into the details on that , but it's very ugly . There are people and former Christian groups that started out well but they left the Lord and they're so far away that they don't even know that the Lord has pulled back their blessing . It is very possible that this has happened to our country , even that God had removed his blessing . We don't know it and we don't care . Very ugly scene . Look at verses 22 . However , the hair of his head began to grow again after it was shaved off and the lords of the Philistines assembled to offer a great sacrifice , to dig on their God and rejoice , for they said our God has given Samson , our enemy , into our hands . When the people saw him , they praised their God , for they said our God has given our enemy into our hands , even the destroyer of our country who has slain many of us . So to whom did the Philistines give credit ? Dagon , dagon .

Speaker 2 21:33

They're God . They're God , not Yahweh , the Israelite God .

Speaker 1 21:36

They saw . The Philistines saw this as a power struggle between their idol Yahweh , the true God . In reality , was there a power struggle between these two gods ? No , why ?

Speaker 2 21:48

Because God is the most high . He was the creator of everything . There's never any type of a power struggle . He can defeat at whim , at will . Back when they were talking about Jerubal right , change his name . Let Baal contend for himself if he's such a great God . God always contended for himself through other people and through the nation of Israel . He raised people up in order to show who he was .

Speaker 1 22:19

So there's not an arm wrestling match that's going on between these two gods . We're curious to find out who's going to win . It's not a contest of gods , not a contest of gods . Theology to the rescue . God is infinite . He's powerful , so he's infinitely powerful . All other things are created , beings or nothings . There's no contest here . God can sovereignly decide what he's going to allow . But the Philistines saw it as a power struggle between gods . Steve , pick up at verse 25 and read through 31 .

Speaker 2 22:50

It so happened when they were in high spirits that they said Call for Samson that he may amuse us . So they called for Samson from the prison and he entertained them and they made him stand between the pillars . Then Samson said to the boy who was holding his hand Let me feel the pillars on which the house rests , that I may lean against them . Now the house was full of men and women and all the lords of the Philistines were there and about 3000 men and women were on the roof looking on while Samson was amusing them . Then Samson called to the Lord and said oh Lord , god , please remember me and please strengthen me just this time . Oh God , that I may at once be avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes .

Speaker 2 23:34

Samson grasped the two middle pillars on which the house rested and braced himself against them , the one with his right hand and the other with his left . Samson said Let me die with the Philistines . He bent with all his might so that the house fell on the lords and all the people who were in it . So the dead whom he killed at his death were more than those whom he killed in his life . Then his brothers and all his father's household came down , took him , brought him up and buried him between Zora and Eshtahal In the tomb of Manoa , his father . Thus he had judged Israel 20 years .

Speaker 1 24:12

So at the beginning of that verse 25 , samson was supposed to be this great deliverer of Israel , but because of his sin , he'd been reduced to being laughed at and ridiculed . He was the clown that they brought out to laugh at and entertain them . This was the man that had probably the greatest gift of anybody we've seen so far in the Bible . He wasted it and he ended up being laughed at to being a symbol of a joke . He was a failure of lost potential . When Samson is down grinding , you know , when he's lost his strength and his eyesight , what do you think is going through his mind while he's in prison ?

Speaker 2 24:51

It could be . Why have I wasted my life ? Why haven't I done what God has raised me up to do ? Because everything that I have done selfishly has led me down to this point that I am now .

Speaker 1 25:06

If I wake up one day and find out that I've wasted my life and I can make a longer string of failures than Samson here . Is it too late for somebody to cry out to the Lord ? No , Even if they've messed up greatly .

Speaker 2 25:23

No , it's never too late . Never too late , never too late .

Speaker 1 25:27

Even Samson here , with all of his failures , he calls out to the Lord and the Lord still uses him . That's the great message of Samson that gives us hope . Even though I may have failed in my life , I can still cry out to God and he can still use me . But look at the end of verse 28 . What was the motivation for Samson's prayer ? What was the vengeful motivation For his eyes ? For his eyes . So he says there Lord , god , please remember me and strengthen me just this time that I may at once be avenged for the Philistines , for my eyes . Even though he's not praying for God , he's not saying God because of your name , or God because of your holiness , let me go do something good so you get the glory . He's saying no , because of my eyes .

Speaker 1 26:19

Even at the end , his selfishness is creeping in . Even with that , god uses him . Even with that , he's still calling to God , even in his weakness . Book of Romans says that the Holy Spirit helps us because we know not what we ought to cry out for . We are just as weak as Samson . We are just as weak as Samson and we've all messed up , equally bad . The good news is , god can still use us . That's the message of Samson .

Speaker 2 26:46

Samson illustrates people who have power to conquer others , but they can't conquer themselves . The high points of spirituality combined with his low points of carnality is what was his downfall . He had been called to be a Nazarite , but he consistently rebelled against this vow that he had

Samson's Burial and Message of Hope

Speaker 2 27:05

.

Speaker 1 27:05

So wrap up , samson , verse 31, . Samson's family took his body and buried it in the tomb of his father . The Bible always buries the dead , never burns them , never cremates them . They always bury their dead . This verse , at the end of this chapter , tells us exactly where Samson was buried . Who was buried on each side of them . So again , accurate history . It gives detailed historical account , detailed geographical accounts , but the message of Samson is even though great , great sin , we can still cry out to God and still be used by Him . That's the message of hope in Samson . With that we will wrap up and we'll see you next time on Reasoning Through the Bible .