Are you keeping up with Samson’s degradations?
Specifically, Samson was to be a “Nazirite.” A Nazirite was someone who dedicated his entire life to the Lord for a specific period of time. Samson was a special Nazirite because he was to be dedicated to the Lord from birth and for life.
The regulations for the Nazirite are found only in Numbers 6. For the duration of the vow, he is to not drink any fermented drink. He must not cut his hair. He must not go near a dead body. He does this again when he selects the fresh jawbone of an ass as a weapon.
For a man devoted to the Lord, his life illustrates anything but devotion. He selects a non-Israelite for a wife (in violation of Deuteronomy 7:3). He demonstrates great disrespect for his parents in ignoring their objections to his choice. He throws a “drinking party” (our English Bibles translate this as “feast”). He spends time with a prostitute. He marries another Philistine woman.
In the end, Samson’s hair is cut, but not by himself. It is cut by the Philistines. They bring to an end his devotion to God.
How fitting!
Their influence was the very thing that kept him from being the devoted man he was called to be. They, the influence of his hypocrisy, brought his hypocrisy to an end.
Samson is but a tool in God’s hands to destroy the Philistines. He has the choice of being a holy tool, or an unholy one. Samson elects to be unholy, but he is God’s tool nonetheless.
Like Samson, God has chosen us, justified us, and anointed us with His Spirit. And yet, our desire to be like the world about us often leads us astray to the extent that eventually, the world robs us of the blessings of our election. Samson remains a tool of God until the very end, but there is nothing about the way he lives his life that is worthy of imitation.