Twenty Years of Grace
Samson led Israel for twenty years in the days of the Philistines.
Judges 15:20 (NIV)
Samson's career fits in one line: he led Israel for twenty years in the days of the Philistines. Twenty years. The same impulsive Samson who broke vows, yielded to Delilah, and ended blind at a mill — God still sustained him as a leader for two decades. The Bible hides none of his falls, yet it does not erase the years the Spirit used him to deliver the people. Grace and truth walk together in his story.
This dismantles two opposite errors about God's love. The first says God only uses perfect people — Samson proves otherwise. The second says that if God uses you, sin hardly matters — Samson's end proves otherwise. God's love is patient with the flawed but never partners with the flaw: it sustains, it warns, and when needed, it disciplines. Twenty years of grace were never twenty years of automatic approval.
If you have disqualified yourself over your past, remember Samson: God still writes stories with broken people. And if you have settled into sin because “God uses me anyway,” hear the warning: sustaining grace also confronts. Come back to him — there is work to do and years to live.