Have you ever wondered about Samson and why it was so devastating when Delilah cut his hair? I have. I mean, I totally understood from the beginning why the Spirit left him, but when I was young the hair thing made no sense to me. Even when I came to understand its significance, I didn’t really get it. I mean, it was just hair, wasn’t it?

No. It wasn’t.

Any happily married woman who has ever lost her wedding ring knows that she didn’t just lose a ring. If it’s her husband who lost his ring, she really knows it’s not just a ring that’s been lost. Their rings are a sign of their covenant, and whether it’s her ring or his that’s lost, she feels the pain. Yes, it’s only a symbol of the thing, but it is a significant symbol, and loss of that symbol can inspire devastation and even guilt, almost as if one has touched the marriage covenant itself.

Samson’s hair was such a symbol. It was a visible representation of his covenant with God. The covenant may have been established by God and his mother before his birth but he had lived under, and reaped the benefits of, that covenant his whole life. What made things worse in Samson’s case was that, unlike our hypothetical wife or husband, Samson didn’t lose his covenant symbol. He gave it away when he told Delilah his secret.

How would the wife feel if she watched her husband remove his wedding ring and give it to another woman, then go to bed with that other woman? Odds are there would be a divorce in that man’s future. And that’s pretty much what happened here.

Samson cheated on God repeatedly, and eventually went so far as to hand over the symbol of the covenant to a woman who was not only not his wife, but was almost certainly a Philistine, an enemy of God and His people.

So yes, it was about a lot more than hair.

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C