Samson has always reminded me a lot of myself. Not that I’m a beefy muscle-head with hair like Fabio (at least, not anymore). But like Samson, my greatest enemy is not someone else. It’s the guy staring me in the face every morning when I look in the mirror.
Samson’s greatest enemy was himself. And that’s true for us as well. Aren’t there certain chapters in your life that you look back on and think, “What if I had just held my tongue?” Or, “Why couldn’t I have just controlled myself?” Or “What if I had just not returned that call?” One little decision sabotaged everything else.
Samson tells our story. He is a representative of the people of God, and a warning to us that our greatest enemy is never out there, but in here. His life shows us five ways that he sabotages everything from the inside out:
1. Samson is impulsive.
Everything Samson does is driven by some sort of lust. He wants sex, so he visits a prostitute. He wants food, so he eats honey that he’s forbidden to eat. He gets angry, so he picks up a random jawbone and kills 1,000 men. He’s not following anything but his gut, and the result is an ever-escalating cycle of vengeance.
Impulsivity is a cancer that, left unchecked, will wreck your life. It’s just that simple.
I recently read about an extensive, four decade study done in New Zealand, trying to identify factors that impacted life success. The battery of tests was exhaustive, but in the end, the scientists were shocked to find that the one factor that mattered more than any other was impulse-control. Adult health, wealth, and relational maturity were all significantly higher for those kids who learned to say “no” to their desires. It mattered more than their social class, their family of origin, and their IQ.
It reminds me of the proverb: “A person without self-control is like a city with broken-down walls” (Prov 25:28). Without walls, a city would be prey to robbers, wild animals, invading armies. It wouldn’t matter how impressive your buildings were if you didn’t have that outer wall. In the same way, it doesn’t matter what else you have going for you in your life; if you lack self-control, you’re setting yourself up for disaster.
2. Samson is compromising.
It’s interesting (and sad) to see how careless Samson is with his Nazirite vow. Long before Delilah cut his hair, Samson had broken his vow in a dozen other ways. I’m sure he said to himself, “Hey, what can this really hurt?” And when he was able to break one command without immediately experiencing God’s wrath, he must have thought, “It’s never been a problem in the past, so I can probably keep getting away with this.” Until, finally, in one tragic instant, God’s presence left Samson.
What if the harm in your life isn’t just in the consequences of your actions? What if the biggest danger was you driving out the presence of God from your life? A small compromise of integrity to get ahead in your business, a little “harmless” porn habit, a short fling that no one will know about…what if the worst fallout from all this wasn’t whether you got caught, but in slowly hardening your heart toward the voice of God? Do not take the presence of God for granted. It just may leave.
3. Samson is unteachable.
When Samson got an idea into his head, nobody could persuade him otherwise. His parents warned him not to mess around with the Philistines, but he didn’t care. And even after getting burned a few times by women using sex to trick him, he still falls right into Delilah’s trap. The guy just doesn’t learn.
This connects with #4…
4. Samson is a loner.
More than anyone else in the book of Judges, Samson is a one-man show. He’s essentially a human wrecking ball, refusing to listen to anyone, to enlist the aid of others, or to form any kind of alliances. Samson had no one in his life that was close enough—or that he would let be close enough—to tell him, “Bro, this is a bad idea.”
Are people close enough to your life that they can speak into it? Are you correctible? Would those closest to you—your spouse, for instance—say that you are teachable?
Or are there areas in your life that are simply off limits to others? You know the one: it’s that one thing you secretly hope no one finds out about, the one thing that you won’t talk about with anyone else. Whatever that area is, I can guarantee it’s where the Enemy plans to destroy you.
It doesn’t matter how strong you are. If you isolate yourself, you won’t last long. There is no such thing as an isolated Christian. People who get serious about Jesus get serious about his community, the church. Because God doesn’t change us through excellent podcasts and well-written blogs; he changes us through the messy-but-godly community that can see into our daily lives.
5. Samson is proud.
Samson never gives God glory. Instead, he feels entitled to use God’s blessings for his own purposes. And he assumes—wrongly—that he would never lose his strength. He had forgotten that his strength was not his own. It was a sheer gift of grace.
Do you go through life assuming that your gifts are actually your own? Your health, your ability to make money, your relationships—don’t you see that they’re all on loan from God? Don’t make the mistake of taking pride in what you’ve been given. Instead, look to God and ask, “Why did you give me this? What do you want me to do with it?” Ask that question with your money, your career, and your family. And then, instead of following your desires down a spiral of destruction, you can follow the Spirit as He leads you—and others with you—to life.
For more, be sure to listen to the entire message here.
