God is Faithful Despite Our Flaws

Excerpt taken from Breaking the Spirit of Delilah: Accessing God’s Power to Topple Ancient Strongholds by Andrew Towe.

Chapter 1
What Is the Spirit of Delilah and Why Is it After You?

Did you know that God’s ear is open to your cry, just as it was to Samson’s? Scripture is replete with assurances that God answers when His people call on Him for help:

• “Call unto me, and I will answer thee” (Jeremiah 33:3).
• “Thou art the LORD the God, who … didst see the affliction of our fathers in Egypt, and heardest their cry by the Red sea; and shewedst signs and wonders upon Pharaoh, and on all his ser­vants, and on all the people of his land: for thou knewest that they dealt proudly against them. So didst thou get thee a name, as it is this day. And thou didst divide the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of the sea on the dry land; and their persecutors thou threwest into the deeps, as a stone into the mighty waters” (Nehemiah 9:7, 9-11).
• “But when [Peter] saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him, and said unto him, 0 thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?” (Matthew 14:30-31).

Notice that Samson was “revived” when he drank from God’s fountain. When there is a cry, revival begins. You who are intercessors crying out to God to send rivers of living water, be encouraged. Revival is coming because God has heard your cries. He will show His mercy in miraculous ways.

The Lies Before the Fall

There were other instances of Samson’s, besides the touching of the jawbone of the donkey, when he was lax with the anointing of God upon his life. God did not make these transgressions public before the nation. God, in His great mercy, will always deal with His children privately before exposing them publicly. However, the best-known example of Samson’s failure — which was made public — was his love for Delilah. She would be the catalyst to bring about his fall.

And it came to pass afterward, that he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah. And the lords of the Philistines came up unto her, and said unto her, Entice him, and see wherein his great strength lieth, and by what means we may prevail against him, that we may bind him to afflict him; and we will give thee every one of us eleven hundred pieces of silver (Judges 16:4-5).

The word “entice” is translated from the Hebrew word pathah, defined as “to open, (in a sinister way) to delude, allure, deceive, enlarge, entice, flatter,” and “persuade.”

Although Delilah was indeed a real-life woman, a demonic spirit operated through her to destroy Samson. The demonic spirit of Delilah is still in operation today. It has gripped its claws around the throat of many believers in the church, and its agenda has not changed from Samson’s day. The goal of the Delilah spirit is to entice you away from your kingdom authority and rob you of your strength. How does it do this? It starts with deception. Its ruse is to trick you into believing its lies, starting with your vision.

And Delilah said to Samson, Tell me, I pray thee, wherein thy great strength lieth, and wherewith thou mightest be bound to afflict thee (Judges 16:6).

In the beginning, Samson did not reveal the truth to Delilah when she asked for the secret of his great strength. First, he told her that he would lose his strength if he were bound by seven bow­strings that had never been dried. She tied him up with bowstrings and then screamed, “The Philistines are here to capture you!” (See Judges 16:7-9.) Upon hearing her cry, Samson jumped up and with great ease broke the bowstrings off himself. She realized then that he had not told her the truth.

Again, she asked for his secret, and for the second time he did not tell her the truth. He said to her that if new ropes bound him, he would be as weak as the average man. So she tested his answer, but the new ropes proved not to be the kryptonite to his power.

She was relentless. For a third time, she pleaded with him for the answer to his great strength. Samson replied, ‘If you were to weave the seven braids of my hair into the fabric on your loom and tighten it with the loom shuttle, I would become as weak as anyone else” (Judges 16:13 NLT). Observe how Samson’s resolve to protect his secret and guard his vow to God began to break down. His third answer, although false, was very close to the actual truth. He mentioned his hair, which alluded to the Nazirite vow that spoke of separation unto God.

Take note that you, the reader, benefit from knowing the out­come and recognizing how Delilah was setting Samson up. You might wonder how he could have been so blind. I would challenge you with this question: How many times have you been blinded to the enemy’s attacks when others looking on could see what was happening to you?

We saw a glimpse of the Delilah spirit in the book of Genesis. Potiphar’s wife did to Joseph the same exact thing that Delilah is doing to Samson here, for it was the identical spirit in operation. (See Genesis 39.) This same Delilah spirit works the same way in both stories, but the outcomes are different. In Genesis, Potiphar’s wife did everything she could to seduce Joseph. However, Joseph did not fall into her trap. He would not entertain that spirit; instead, he removed himself from its presence. That’s key: whenever a believer is under an attack from the Delilah spirit, they must not endure its words and continual pressure. If they do, they will eventually surrender to it just to get some relief. That’s the outcome we find in the story of Samson. Scripture tells us that Delilah

pressed him daily with her words, and urged him, so that his soul was vexed unto death; that he told her all his heart, and said unto her, There hath not come to a razor upon mine head; for I have been a Nazarite unto God from my mother’s womb: if I be shaven, then my strength will go from me, and I shall become weak, and be like any other man. And when Delilah saw that he had told her all his heart, she sent and called for the lords of the Philistines, saying, Come up this once, for he hath shewed me all his heart.(Judges 16:l6-l8).

Pay attention to what happened next:

She made him sleep upon her knees; and she called for a man, and she caused him to shave off the seven locks of his head; and she began to afflict him, and his strength went from him. And she said, The Philistines be upon thee, Samson. And he awoke out of his sleep, and said, I will go out as at other times before, and shake myself. And he wist not that the LORD was departed from him (Judges 16:19-20).

While I was reading verse 19, the Holy Spirit spoke to me about breaking the stronghold of the spirit of Delilah. The Scripture says, “She made him sleep upon her knees. If Samson had only awakened and realized what her influence and relationship would cost him, he would have fortified himself against her allure.

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