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every foe. Oh, how we ought earnestly pray, "Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me" (Ps. li. 11).

But

(5) Recovery by penitent and believing prayer.—The chastisement was severe, but it was the very one suited to bring Samson's sin to his remembrance. His eyes had been the avenue through which lust had entered his soul; his eyes therefore are given over to destruction. Philistine women had been the objects of his lust, and Philistine men are retributively made the executioners of Divine chastisement upon him. it is infinitefy better to lose the eyes, and save the soul, than keep them, and lose body and soul in hell (Mark ix. 47). Now, when the sight of the body was blinded by his foes, he had enforced leisure to remember how his soul had been blinded by his own lust. He had been "holden with the cords of his sins," and blinded by the god of this world; therefore he is now "holden in cords of affliction" and "fetters of brass." If we would escape the darkness of the second death, we must pray, "Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity" (Ps. cxix. 37). Gaza was the scene of his sin, and Gaza retributively was made the scene of his punishment: he became a captive to the Philistines in the very place where he had yielded himself a captive to lust: where he had been a terror, there he is a laughing-stock: where he had displayed such amazing might, there he appears in abject weakness-a slave, and doing the 'grinding' work of a slave, even as he had been the slave of his passions. Surely the way of transgressors is hard."

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But here also began the turn to a better state. Now that he can no longer see with the eyes, his soul begins to see his sin. No murmur escapes his lips: for through grace he is led to feel God's justice in his suffering; for however unjust on the part of man, it was just on the part of God: so he meekly "accepts the punishment of his iniquity" (Lev. xxvi. 41). Then, simultaneously with his penitent return to God, by God's especial blessing, "the hair of his head began to grow again,” the pledge of his renewed consecration. For "they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength" (Isa. xl. 31). Even a Manasseh, when "in affliction and bound with fetters, he besought the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly before

the God of his fathers, and prayed unto him," was heard and restored (2 Chron. xxxiii. 12, 13). What an encouragement to all backsliders to return to Jehovah! (see Jer. iii. 12, 14, 22). Besides the penitence of Samson, another reason for God's interposition was the blasphemy of the Philistines. Whereas it was Jehovah's displeasure that caused Samson's humiliation, their lords and their people alike ascribed their triumph over Samson to their idol: "Our god hath delivered our enemy into our hand" (ver. 23, 24). Jehovah therefore was jealous for His own honour (Deut. xxxii. 27). Their triumphing was short, and soon turned into the silence of death. Nothing so fills the measure of men's iniquity as robbing God of His honour and mocking His servants; and no means so effectually enlist God on His people's side against their insulting foes as heartfelt prayer. Samson's was necessarily secret prayer, like that of Nehemiah (ii. 4; Isa. xxvi. 16, margin), " O Lord Jehovah," who as such art in covenant with, and fulfillest Thy promise to Thy people, "Remember me, I pray Thee, and strengthen me, I pray Thee (the repetition implies his earnestness) only this once, O God" (Elohim, God of creation, having all the forces of nature and the universe at Thy command). The strength which he had lost by sin, he regains by prayer. He asked to be avenged for his eyes: Providence overruled it so that the Divine honour should be at the same time vindicated upon those who had profaned it by cruelty to His servant, and idolatry against God. His privation of eyesight, had he lived, would have been the perpetual memorial of his unfaithfulness to God, and of the foe's spiritual and bodily triumph over him. The avenging of his eyes was therefore inseparably connected with the avenging of God's cause and the deliverance of Israel; for he was the elect nation's representative both in his faithfulness and his backsliding. Israel, whilst faithful to Jehovah, was invincible; but whenever she yielded to heathen seductions, she was as one blinded, a prey to every foe (Numb. xxv. 1-6, xxxi. 15, 16). When she returned to Jehovah, His honour was engaged to avenge her cause, which was His own. Of all this Samson was the embodied type. He now voluntarily chose death, since this must be the cost of avenging the cause of Israel and of

Jehovah. Jehovah herein showed that Samson's sin and shame were cancelled, the Philistine oppressors crushed, and Israel's wrong redressed. He who was the terror of the Philistines in his life, was the destroyer of their idol-temple in his death, and the vindicator of the honour of Jehovah against Dagon.

All the particulars of this last blow are significant.— Who were the slain? The women who had lured Samson to sin, and the men who bribed Delilah to betray him, with the Philistine lords. They assembled together only to be broken in pieces (Isa. viii. 9), whereas they had met to glory over Samson's misery. God, after chastising His backsliding people, will terribly destroy their persecutors (compare Numb. xxxi. 16; Isa. x. 5-13; 1 Pet. iv. 17). When were they slain? In the midst of carnal security, mirth, and treason against Jehovah, by giving His honour to Dagon (compare Dan. v. 4, &c.; 1 Thess. v. 3, 7). Where were they slain? In the house of their idol, the scene of their sin becoming the scene of their punishment (compare 1 Kings xxi. 19, xxii. 38; 2 Kings ix. 26). How they were slain? By the prayer of Samson, which brought to him the might of Jehovah. This is "the weapon of our warfare, which is mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds" (2 Cor. x. 4).

Prayer and action must go together: he first prayed, then "bowed himself with all his might." "Not only beg, but dig' (Prov. ii. 3-5), (Trapp). So the house fell, and in his death he slew more than in his life; not only the 3000 on the roof, but the lords and the many others within the house. Though he died with them, yet not as one of them in his everlasting portion; his was the death of the righteous, theirs was the death of the enemies of God (Numb. xxiii. 10; Prov. xiv. 32).

(6) Samson the type of Messiah, especially in his death.Delilah, the loved one, betrayed Samson for money: the Lord Jesus was betrayed by one whom he called a 'friend' with a kiss, for filthy lucre. As they made sport of Samson, so was Messiah "the song of the drunkards" (Ps. lxix. 12), and "they smote the judge of Israel with a rod upon the cheek" (Mic. v. 1; Matt. xxvii. 30). The seven locks of Samson remind us of the sevenfold fulness of the Holy Spirit resting permanently on

Jesus.

As Samson's arms stretched to the two pillars supporting the house of Dagon; so Jesus' arms, stretched out upon the cross, shook and cast down to its basis the kingdom of darkness, of which the earthquake, the rent rocks, and opened graves (Matt. xxvii. 51, 52) were the sign. "Through death Jesus destroyed him that had the power of death" (Heb. ii. 14, 15); so He obtains our deliverance from the enemy. As Samson voluntarily gave his life for Israel's deliverance, so Jesus freely gave His life a ransom for us (Matt. xx. 28; John x. 17, 18). We were strangers afar off from God, as Samson sought his loved one among the Philistines. But the Antitype infinitely exceeds the type: Samson prayed for vengeance, Christ prayed for the forgiveness of His murderers. Samson died to crush his foes with him; Christ died for His enemies (Rom. v. 6-10), whom He would save from everlasting death, and make friends and sharers of His eternal glory. Samson fell to rise no more; Jesus died to rise again as the Lord of life for evermore. Samson's blow to the Philistines by his death only in part helped Israel: for not till blow after blow was inflicted by Samuel and David and Hezekiah was the victory complete : but Jesus' death issues in the full and final triumph of His saints over the powers of darkness. "He spoiled principalities and powers, and made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it (the cross)" (Col. ii. 15): and He shall put under His and our feet the last Antichrist and Satan himself (Rev. xix., xx.). May we, for whom the Lord of glory has done and will do so great things, love Him with whole-hearted consecration, shrinking from all pollution of flesh and spirit, that we may be presented faultless before His presence with exceeding joy!

CHAPTER XVII.

INTRODUCTION OF IDOLATRY: IDOLATRY BEGINNING FROM THEFT: MICAH, WITH HIS GRAVEN IMAGE-GOD AND LEVITICAL PRIEST, EXPECTS GOOD FROM JEHOVAH.

(1) And there was a man of Mount Ephraim [the hilly country of Ephraim], whose name was Micah [Heb., Micaiyehu; the closing syllables containing the name of JEHOVAH are taken away from the name, when he dishonours Jehovah by idols (ver. 5, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13), Micah. Scripture does not deign to record the name of his father and family, as he was a dishonour to Israel by idolatry]. (2) And he said unto his mother, The eleven hundred (shekels) [a shekel was about 2s. 6d. of our money] of silver [the exact amount of each Philistine's bribe to Delilah for betraying Samson (xvi. 5). The connection, spiritually, is suggestive. Betrayal of the loyalty due to Jehovah is rated at the same price as betrayal of the loyalty due to man (Jer. ix. 3-6; Mic. vii. 5)] that were taken from thee [see Prov. xxviii. 24], about which thou cursedst, and spakest of also in mine ears [i.e., didst so loudly utter thy curse that it reached my ears also, as well as the ears of others (Lev. v. 1): "If a soul sin, and hear the voice of swearing, and is a witness whether he hath seen or known of it; if he do not utter it, then he shall bear his iniquity." Fear of his mother's curse impelled him to confess. See the power of conscience], behold, the silver (is) with me; I took it. And his mother said, Blessed (be thou) of the LORD [JEHOVAH], my son ["Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing" (James iii. 10). Money was the idol of mother and son alike. Therefore the son robbed the mother, and the mother cursed the son. The passion with which she had uttered her curse, indicated the keenness of her love to her money, and her bitterness at its loss. "Old wood

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