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"He Went Down" | Samson’s Tragic Descent · Traveler’s Tales

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  There are some places in the Bible where the geography seems to preach
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  its own sermon. There are mountains to climb,
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  valleys to cross, wildernesses to endure,
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  and roads that lead us somewhere. But few
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  places illustrate the direction of a man's life quite
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  like the Sorek Valley. Samson was raised
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  in the hills above the Philistine plain. He had been chosen,
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  empowered, and given a purpose by God. Yet,
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  as you follow his story, one phrase keeps appearing:
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  Samson went down.
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  Long before the Philistines brought Samson down physically,
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  Samson had already been going down spiritually.
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  Welcome to Traveler's Tales produced by Enjoying the Journey. I'm Greg
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  Dowdy. We're grateful for our friend and researcher John Buckner
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  for his help with the historical and geographical background
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  for today's journey. Our destination today is the
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  Sorek Valley, the setting for one of Scripture's most familiar and
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  most tragic stories. Judges 16:4
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  says, and it came to pass afterward that he loved a woman in the valley
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  of Sorek, whose name was Delilah. The Sorek Valley
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  is actually a series of interconnected valleys and
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  ridges stretching westward from the central highlands of Israel toward
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  the Philistine plain. In Bible times, this rugged country formed a
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  natural barrier between Israel in the hills and the Philistines along the coastal
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  plain. This was Samson country. Before Samson
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  was ever born, the angel of the Lord told his mother that he would
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  begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.
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  God placed Samson in exactly the right place at exactly
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  the right time for exactly the right purpose.
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  But Samson had a problem. He was supposed to stand
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  against the influence of the Philistines. Yet he repeatedly
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  found himself attracted to it. Judges 14:1
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  says, and Samson went down to Timnath.
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  That little geographical detail becomes an almost
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  haunting picture of his life. Samson went down
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  from the Israelite hill country toward the Philistine plain, and spiritually
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  his life began moving in the same direction.
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  Now, his parents warned him, they pleaded with him,
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  but Samson insisted on marrying the Philistine woman
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  he had found in Timnath. That relationship ended disastrously.
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  Later, Samson fell in love again. This time,
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  the woman was from the Valley of Sorek. Her name was Delilah.
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  Interestingly, the Bible never actually identifies
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  Delilah as a Philistine. Unlike Samson's early relationships,
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  she appears to have been a local woman from the Sorek borderlands.
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  Her name is Hebrew, and she lived in the same general region
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  as Samson. Perhaps Samson thought he had finally made a better
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  choice. But there is one sobering detail in the biblical account.
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  The Bible tells us that Samson loved Delilah. It never
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  tells us that Delilah loved Samson. The lords of the Philistines
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  came up from the plain and offered Delilah an enormous amount of
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  money to discover the secret of Samson's strength, and she accepted.
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  Slowly and persistently, she wore Samson down
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  until he finally told her all his heart.
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  Samson knew that he was playing with danger. He'd escaped
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  before. He had defeated Philistines before. He had experienced
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  supernatural strength before. And perhaps that was his greatest
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  danger. Samson had become so accustomed to God's power
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  that he began to presume upon God's presence.
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  Judges 16:20 contains some of the saddest words in
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  Samson's story: And he wist not that
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  the Lord was departed from him. The man who had been strong
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  enough to carry away the gates of a city was
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  not strong enough to overcome the sin he refused to
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  surrender. There's a powerful warning here for every believer.
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  Delilah's name carries the idea of being delicate or feeble.
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  Samson's downfall did not begin with something that looked
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  stronger than he was. It came through something attractive,
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  familiar, and seemingly manageable, which is
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  often the way temptation works. The most dangerous sin
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  in your life may not be the one that frightens you. It may be the
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  one you've grown comfortable with. You know, the temptation
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  you think you can control, the habit you keep excusing,
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  that relationship you know is pulling you away from God,
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  that compromise that seems small enough to manage.
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  Sin will always promise you more than it gives
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  and eventually take more than you intended to surrender.
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  Samson thought he could play with temptation and remain strong,
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  but the thing he embraced eventually betrayed him.
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  And notice the direction of Samson's life. Judges 14
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  says Samson went down to Timnath. Judges 16
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  says that after his capture, the Philistines brought him down to Gaza.
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  The man God had raised up to deliver Israel
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  was brought down by the very enemy he had been called
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  to defeat. His eyes were put out. He was bound
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  with fetters of brass. The mighty Samson became
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  a prisoner grinding in the Philistine prison house.
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  But thankfully, Samson's story does not end there.
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  In his final moments, Samson turned again to the Lord.
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  O Lord God, remember me, I pray thee, and strengthen
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  me, I pray thee. Only this once, and God heard
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  him. Now, that does not erase the consequences of
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  Samson's choices, but it does remind us that failure
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  does not have to have the final word. Maybe you
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  recognize that you have been going down spiritually. Your heart
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  is colder than it once was. Your prayer life has weakened.
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  You've tolerated something you once would have resisted. You've drifted
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  closer to the world and farther from the Lord.
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  Don't wait until sin takes you farther down.
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  Turn to God now. Confess what needs to be confessed.
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  Forsake what needs to be forsaken. Stop trusting your own strength
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  and return to dependence upon His. There is one
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  final geographical detail in Samson's story that I love.
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  After Samson died in Gaza, Judges 16:31 says his family
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  came for him. They took his body from Philistine territory and
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  brought him up, up from Gaza, up from
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  the Philistine plain, back into the hills,
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  back home. Samson's life is a
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  sobering reminder that compromise always
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  takes us in the wrong direction, but it is also a reminder
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  that when we have fallen, the answer is not to keep going down Look
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  up. Turn back to the God who called you,
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  the God who loves you, and the God whose strength has always been
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  greater than your own. The Sorek Valley still whispers
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  its warning: never become comfortable with
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  the very thing God has called you to overcome.
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  Thank you for joining us today on Traveler's Tales. If you've enjoyed this
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  episode, I encourage you to visit our website, etj.bible,
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  where you'll find our Journey Through Scripture resources, including Bible
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  overviews, teaching, and preaching from every book of the Bible.
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  All of these resources are provided with the prayer that you
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  will grow in your walk with Christ.