Bible Commentaries

Samson—Light and Shadow

Judges 16:22). Is this real renewal or only apparent? It was not the hair that was in fault, but the soul. We have seen that the strength lay not in the hair, but in the vow which that hair represented and confirmed. If the matter had been one purely of person adornment, the hair might have grown again on the strong and noble head, and covered it as luxuriantly as before; but it was the soul that was shorn of its honour; it was the spirit that parted with its oath. How difficult to renew a broken character! Thank God, it is not impossible. It cannot be done mechanically,—that is to say from the outside, by skilful manipulation, by obedience to tabulated rules and orders,—"Ye must be born again:" it is not enough to renew the profession, to rehabilitate the reputation, to seem to be just as you were before,—"Ye must be born again." Samson's hair comes, the locks are as raven-like as ever, but has the soul been renewed; has the strong man cried mightily unto God for the restoration of his character? That is the vital point, and to trifle with it, pass over it hurriedly, is to lose the wisdom and the music of the occasion. Looking at men outwardly, we say, They seem to be as before; all the outer semblances are excellent, but who are we that we should judge what has taken place within? Outwardly the circumstances may be as before, but the man himself should take care as to what has happened within his soul. He should hold himself in severe and close monologue upon this matter, saying, These people form a good opinion of me; they think now I am a sober, upright, reliable man; I am regular in my church attendances, I keep up with the foremost in the public race, and the general impression seems to be that I have recovered myself,—but have I done so? I will not look at the outer Judges 16:20). All the outer man was there, but it was a temple without a God. The giant was as grand to look at as ever, but his soul was as a banqueting-hall deserted. And Samson knew it not! that is the painful point—the unknown losses of life, the unconscious losses of life: power gone, and the man not aware of it,—is there any irony so humbling, so awful to contemplate? We may be walking skeletons: we may be men without manliness; we may be houses untenanted: yet the eyes are where they always were, and just as bright, the voice is as vibrant as in olden time; and yet the divinity is dead. And for a man not to know it! We have had experience of this in other than merely religious directions. The writer that used to charm thinks he writes as well as ever, and only the readers are conscious that the genius is extinct: the right hand has forgotten its cunning; the writer does not know it; having filled his page, he says, That is as bright as ever: I never wrote with greater facility: in my old age I have become young again;—he wist not that the spirit of genius had departed from him. So with the preacher. He supposes he preaches as energetically and as happily and usefully as ever; he says he longs for his work more than he ever did; and only the hearers are conscious that the man has been outworn by all-claiming, all-dominating time. The statesman, too, has lost his wizardry: he cannot see afar off; yet he supposes himself to be as great as in his most lustrous prime. All these are common incidents, and are referred to simply to show that they point towards the most disastrous effect of all—that a man may have lost the Spirit of God, and not be aware of his loss. Others look on, and pity him. The prayer has lost its pleading tone; the tears which stream from his eyes are but common water; the upward look sees nothing but cloud; the universe has become a great blank space: the stars glitter, but say nothing; the summer comes, but creates no garden in his soul; and the man does not know it. Who dare tell him? This points towards a possible ghastly condition of affairs. The Church is as large as ever, but Ichabod is written upon its door. The old words are all said, one by one with formal pomp and accuracy, but they are only words—no longer bushes that burn and are not consumed. Again and again remember that the point is that the man did not know it. Had he known it, he would have been a better man; had he really felt that the Lord had gone out from him, he might have begun to cry at last like a child, if he could not pray like a priest How is it with us? Put the question right into the very centre of the soul. We may have more words, more dogmas, more points of controversy, more little orthodox idols; but what are we in the heart, the spirit, the purpose of the mind? Seeing that this great danger is before us, there is one sweet prayer which every day should carry to heaven from our pleading soul. A child can pray it; an angel cannot add to it. That deep, high, grand, all-inclusive prayer is—"Take not thy Holy Spirit from me,"—take health, take friends, take happiness, take all the world values as good and necessary, but take not thy Holy Spirit from me! "Holy Spirit, dwell with me."

Prayer

Almighty God, our hope is in thy Son; other hope in very deed we have none. We have hewn out unto ourselves cisterns, but we have found them to be cisterns that could hold no water. So by this experience, so sad and deep, we have come to know that there is no help for man but in the living God, the Saviour of all, who will have all men to be saved. We lay down our arms of rebellion, we renounce our various inventions, and we now come to thee, empty-handed, full of sin in the heart, conscious of great and aggravated wickedness, and casting ourselves upon the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, we say each for himself, God be merciful to me a sinner! We know thine answer; it is a reply of love: where sin abounds, grace shall much more abound; wherein we have grieved thee, we shall be mightily brought back again to thy side, to take part in thy praise, and to be active in thy service. May the time that is past more than suffice; may our inquiry be about the few days that remain; with earnestness, simplicity, fidelity, may we gird ourselves to the work that lies before us, and with all-burning zeal, most constant love, may we do thy will gladly, hoping only for a reward in thine own heaven. Help us in all our life. Its necessities are as numerous as its moments. Our life is one crying want. Let our life be turned into a sacred prayer, by being lifted upwards towards the all-hospitable heavens, and no longer left to grope in the earth for that which can never be found there. As for our burdens, we shall forget them if thou dost increase our strength; our sins shall be cast behind thee, our duty shall be our delight, and our whole life a glowing and acceptable sacrifice. Guide men who are in perplexity; soothe the hearts that are overborne by daily distress; save from despair those who think they have tried every gate and beaten upon every door without success or reply: save such from the agony and blackness of despair; at the very last do thou appear, a shining light, a delivering day, wherein men can see what lies about them, and address themselves to their tasks with the help of the sun. Be round about us in business; save us amid a thousand temptations; direct us along a road that is sown with traps, and gins, and snares; take hold of our hand every step of the journey, and in thine own good time bring us to rest, to death—to life. Amen.

"Handfuls of Purpose"

For All Gleaners

"And he wist not that the Lord was departed from him."— Judges 16:20.

This is the saddest of all mental experience.—It has its counterpart even in business and in professional life.—There are men of business who suppose they are as competent and energetic as ever, whilst those who are looking on observe how great is the decay, and how lamentable the weakness.—Men suppose themselves as capable as ever of giving advice in perplexity, yet when they come to counsel the bewildered mind they lose the centre of thought, and miss altogether the purpose which the counsel was intended to serve.—We go away from such men filled with a sense of pity.—Let us apply the same truth to the religious nature.—Note the ghastliness of having a form of godliness without the power thereof.—No irony so distressing.—A man may use the very words of prayer, and yet may not enter into the spirit of fellowship with God.—The picture is that of a man on whose outward appearance no change has been wrought which he himself accounts of any consequence, but within the house of the soul has been stripped of all that was valuable, and is left in emptiness and desolation.—A terrible thing it is to bow down in prayer after God himself has forsaken the altar.—Cut is it possible for a man to have lost fellowship with God, and yet to be unaware of the loss? All history says that it is possible.—Familiarity with certain places and modes and actions may delude the mind into believing that whilst the usage is repeated the spirit is retained.—We grow into a species of self-idolatry sometimes without intention, and often without knowledge.—How are we to know that the Lord is still with us? Always by the simple test of obedience.—But is not obedience itself sometimes a delusive action? Possibly, and therefore we should esteem most highly that obedience which imposes upon us the pain and loss of sacrifice.—How does the Lord depart from a man?—The intellect is apparently as acute as ever, external offices are fulfilled as punctiliously as before, no blemish is found upon the public reputation,—how, then, can God have departed from the man?—The mystery lies in the fact of our composite nature: we are body and soul, flesh and spirit, in us there is both time and eternity, dust of the earth and fire from heaven; and, our life being so complex, we do not instantly know when the very centre of life and thought has been changed—that is, we go on for a little while by a momentum originally received, but which has no power of self-replenishment, and therefore must die when the original inspiration is withdrawn.—Let us not make any religious experiments as Samson did.—He got into a mood of speculation and adventure, saying, If you do this or that, I shall be as other men.—He did not mean at first to tell his secret, but little by little we are led to the giving up of that which is the very mystery and glory of life.—It is infinitely dangerous to tamper with temptation.—There may be a kind of pleasure in taunting the Philistines, misleading them, mocking them, and laughing at them in their disasters, but he should be stronger than ever Samson was who ventures to play with the enemy, and to practise tricks and puzzles for the sake of bewildering and annoying them.—It is impossible to say when the last temptation may come, or how we ourselves may be tempted to try if in reality our strength lay where we supposed it to lie.—The lesson comes back again and again from all quarters, and with a thousand voices—"Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation."