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Context No. 1171 of 4322 · Judges

Context · Reflection

Judges 16:21-31: in context

21The Philistines laid hold on him and put out his eyes; and they brought him down to Gaza and bound him with fetters of bronze; and he ground at the mill in the prison. 22However, the hair of his head began to grow again after he was shaved. 23The lords of the Philistines gathered together to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god, and to rejoice; for they said, “Our god has delivered Samson our enemy into our hand.” 24When the people saw him, they praised their god; for they said, “Our god has delivered our enemy and the destroyer of our country, who has slain many of us, into our hand.” 25When their hearts were merry, they said, “Call for Samson, that he may entertain us.” They called for Samson out of the prison; and he performed before them. They set him between the pillars; 26and Samson said to the boy who held him by the hand, “Allow me to feel the pillars on which the house rests, that I may lean on them.” 27Now the house was full of men and women; and all the lords of the Philistines were there; and there were on the roof about three thousand men and women, who saw while Samson performed. 28Samson called to the LORD, and said, “Lord GOD, remember me, please, and strengthen me, please, only this once, God, that I may be at once avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes.” 29Samson took hold of the two middle pillars on which the house rested and leaned on them, the one with his right hand and the other with his left. 30Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines!” He bowed himself with all his might; and the house fell on the lords, and on all the people who were in it. So the dead that he killed at his death were more than those who he killed in his life. 31Then his brothers and all the house of his father came down and took him, and brought him up and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the burial site of Manoah his father. He judged Israel twenty years.

Samson has told his secret, lost his strength, and been captured. The Philistines gouge out his eyes, bind him in bronze, and set him grinding grain in prison like an animal. But then a quiet, easy-to-miss line: the hair of his head began to grow again after it was shaved. At a great feast for their god Dagon, celebrating that their god has delivered Samson to them, they bring him out to be mocked and to entertain them, and set him between the temple pillars. Samson prays, Lord, remember me and strengthen me just this once, and pushing against the pillars, he brings the whole temple down on himself and thousands of Philistines, killing more in his death than in all his life.

The turning point is the growing hair and the humbled prayer. Samson, who had squandered his gift, presumed on God's strength, and treated his consecration as a game, is now blind, enslaved, and mocked, at the bottom of the ruin his own choices built. And there, in the prison, two things happen. His hair grows back, a quiet sign that God is not finished with him, and he prays, perhaps for the first time in the story with real dependence: remember me, strengthen me, only this once. The strong man who never seemed to need God is finally reduced to asking. It is a sobering and hopeful picture of a wasted life not yet abandoned by grace. Samson's story is mostly a tragedy of gifts abused, and yet God hears the broken prayer of the ruined man and answers it. The New Testament even lists Samson among the heroes of faith, not for his glory days but, it seems, for this final turning to God. Grace reaches all the way down to the prison floor, to the blind man grinding grain who finally prays. It is never too late in a wasted life to turn and say, remember me.

However far a life has been wasted, is it too late to pray Samson's prison prayer, remember me and strengthen me, only this once, to the God whose grace reaches even the ruined?

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