Many people assume that real life begins with marriage, as if single people are incomplete. But the gospel reshapes that assumption. Jesus reminds us that marriage here on earth is temporary. It is a beautiful picture pointing to our forever union with Christ. Singleness in God’s kingdom, then, is not a burden to endure but a gift God uses for his purposes.

Strong, healthy marriages and relationships are constantly under attack from many different directions. In our culture today, lust and pornography permeates our culture, shapes attitudes, and can cause so much hurt and chaos in our marriages. The story of Samson serves as a cautionary tale of what can happen when we just take one small step, and then another, and another, away from God’s plans for our marriages and relationships.

Judges 16:1-9

One day Samson went to Gaza, where he saw a prostitute. He went in to spend the night with her.

The people of Gaza were told, “Samson is here!” So they surrounded the place and lay in wait for him all night at the city gate. They made no move during the night, saying, “At dawn we’ll kill him.”

But Samson lay there only until the middle of the night. Then he got up and took hold of the doors of the city gate, together with the two posts, and tore them loose, bar and all. He lifted them to his shoulders and carried them to the top of the hill that faces Hebron.

Some time later, he fell in love with a woman in the Valley of Sorek whose name was Delilah.

The rulers of the Philistines went to her and said, “See if you can lure him into showing you the secret of his great strength and how we can overpower him so we may tie him up and subdue him. Each one of us will give you eleven hundred shekels of silver.”

So Delilah said to Samson, “Tell me the secret of your great strength and how you can be tied up and subdued.”

Samson answered her, “If anyone ties me with seven fresh bowstrings that have not been dried, I’ll become as weak as any other man.”

Then the rulers of the Philistines brought her seven fresh bowstrings that had not been dried, and she tied him with them.

With men hidden in the room, she called to him, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!” But he snapped the bowstrings as easily as a piece of string snaps when it comes close to a flame. So the secret of his strength was not discovered.

Judges 16:16-19

With such nagging she prodded him day after day until he was sick to death of it.

So he told her everything. “No razor has ever been used on my head,” he said, “because I have been a Nazirite dedicated to God from my mother’s womb. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me, and I would become as weak as any other man.”

When Delilah saw that he had told her everything, she sent word to the rulers of the Philistines, “Come back once more; he has told me everything.” So the rulers of the Philistines returned with the silver in their hands. After putting him to sleep on her lap, she called for someone to shave off the seven braids of his hair, and so began to subdue him. And his strength left him.

Judges 16:22

But the hair on his head began to grow again after it had been shaved.

This Sunday features a Marriage Q & A with Dustin & Lauren, covering various topics related to the series “Making Relationships Work.”