[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hey, thanks so much for listening to this message. My name is Jason and I'm one of the ministers here at the Madison Church of Christ. It's our hope and prayer that the teaching you hear today will bless your life and draw you closer to God. If you're ever in the Madison area, we'd love for you to stop by and study the Bible with us on Sundays at 5pm or Wednesdays at 7pm if you have questions about the Bible or want to know more about the Madison Church, you can find us
[email protected] be sure to subscribe to this podcast as well as our Sermons podcast. Madison Church of Christ Sermons. Thanks again for stopping by. I hope this study is a blessing to you.
[00:00:37] Speaker B: Before Jason gets started tonight, I was just going to mention a few things just as reminders. Just a reminder, we will not be in here next Wednesday.
You can, if you want to, you can get in, but the building will be locked. We are sending out. Brandon and Jason are working on recording a video that you can watch next week with your family. So just a reminder about that. Then the following Wednesday, we're gonna have.
[00:01:00] Speaker A: A singing in the auditorium. Not in here, not in here.
[00:01:03] Speaker B: So two weeks in a row, we won't be in here. But the other thing I was going to mention is this Sunday, if you like to read ahead.
[00:01:09] Speaker A: I know some folks do.
[00:01:10] Speaker B: We're going to be in Revelation 4. We're going to conclude our series on the angels this week was as we advertise what we can learn from the angels. And we're going to learn what we can learn about their worship and how we can learn from them in math. So I think it'll be a fun, interesting study. So looking forward to that this week. So that's all I have.
[00:01:32] Speaker A: Alrighty, Gideon Judges, Chapter six. If you want to go ahead and be turning or swiping there, that's where we will be tonight.
And you gave me some big words last week to read. So tonight you got a lot of words.
[00:01:48] Speaker B: Oh, it is a lot of words. All right. The people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. And the Lord gave them into the hand of Midian. Seven years and the hand of Midian overpowered Israel. And because of Midian, the people of Israel made for themselves the dens that are in the mountains and the caves and the strongholds. Whenever the Israelites planted crops, the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people east, people of the east would come up against them. They would encamp against them and devour the produce of the land as far as Gaza and leave no sustenance in Israel, and no sheep or ox or donkey, for they would come up with their livestock and their tents. They would come like locusts in the number, both they and their camels could not be counted. So they laid waste the land as they came in. And Israel was brought very low because of Midian. And the people of Israel cried out for help to the Lord.
[00:02:44] Speaker A: This is a very peaceful beginning to our text tonight. We have just moved on from Deborah in chapter five and now in chapter six here of Judges. We've got kind of the landscape. The people of Midian are not a good people. They are not a friendly people. In fact, they are a lot like this people. If you've seen a Bug's Life, you guys know Hopper. What did Hopper do? What was his relationship to the ants?
Grasshopper. Grasshopper. There you go. That's right. So the grasshoppers would come in, led by Hopper himself, and that is a really angry CGI face of an insect. They would come in and they would swoop up all the food because the ants would work and they would work and they would work, and the grasshoppers would come and say, all right, give us what we want. They would basically plunder and pillage in the animated world of the earth. This is essentially the same thing of what we have going here. The Midianites, God's people, would work the land and they would get a produce and they would get ready to get their harvest. And lo and behold, it was a sort of a seasonal conquering from. From the Midianites. They would come in and they would appropriate. They would go and take what was not theirs from Israel, and they would feast on it, and they would leave it decimated. In fact, the scripture uses the words here, locusts, and it says they would become like locusts in number. Both they and their camels could not be counted. When there was a locust plague or a locust infestation, I mean, it would. It would essentially. It would block your sight. It would be. They would be so thick, they could come in massive quantities, and then they would utterly destroy whatever they chose to eat. When Jesus talks about where moth come in and destroy, right? Well, these locusts would destroy, essentially. It was a seasonal famine brought upon not by natural occurrence, but by a conquering people. And this is the setting in which Gideon is going to be called into God's will and called into service to lead his people. When you think about groups of people, you could look back in the history of our country and just in world history in general and over and over again, there are people that conquer and people that are conquered. Well, right now Israel is in a state of being conquered. They're in a state of injury and insult, in a state of probably depression, anxiety. And we know that because of what we read next. I'll take this one if you want. Are you good?
[00:05:06] Speaker B: I'm good. When the people of Israel cried out to the Lord on account of the Midianites, the Lord sent a prophet to the people of Israel. He said to them, this is what the Lord God of Israel. I brought you up from Egypt and took you out of the place of slavery. I rescued you from Egypt's power and from the power of all who oppressed you. I drove them out before you and gave their land to you. I said to you, I am the Lord your God. Do not worship the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are now living. But you have disobeyed me.
[00:05:38] Speaker A: So God gives us the spiritual context for why they're in this situation. I told you, I told you, I told you, I told you. And yet you didn't do what I told you.
[00:05:50] Speaker B: Now, the angel of the Lord came and sat under the terebinth tree at Ophrah, not Ophrah, which belonged to Joash.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: She comes later. Oh, much later.
[00:05:59] Speaker B: Wow. Is it the view?
[00:06:00] Speaker A: I did. I'm sorry. Keep going.
[00:06:02] Speaker B: Abi's right. While his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites, and the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, the Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.
[00:06:15] Speaker A: So there's a couple of things that stick out here. First, in verse 11, Gideon is beating out wheat in the winepress. I don't know how many of you are familiar with the wheat process or the winepress process, but they don't usually mix. The winepress was in sort of a cave like structure and it was a stone floor. It was not meant for pressing the wheat. The wheat was supposed to be done outdoors because the chaff would float away with the air. The ox would walk around over and over again and beat out the chaff.
Why is he in the wine press doing this? What's that? He's in hiding. Joel. What did you say? Doesn't get spotted. He's scared. Alright? He's doing this because he knows one. If it's in the wine press, it's not going to be a massive harvest that he's trying to work with here. But two, if he does it out in the open, then he's vulnerable, then someone will likely come and take that from him. So he and his people live in this constant distress. If you watch the news very much and you see what's going on in the Middle east, also in Ukraine, I feel there's a lot of people that relate directly with this particular scenario, that there is an oppressor that seems to always be lurking in the shadows. Not even in the shadows, but just always lurking and ready to attack.
That creates a sense of anxiety that's really hard to let go of when you're constantly in this, like, not even fight, but flight mode. That that's where Gideon is. And I think that's going to give a little bit of context into his responses here. So this verse 12 is our first interaction that we want to look at. Bless you. Verse 12, he is referred to as the almighty man of valor. In verse 12, it says, so the angel of the Lord comes to him in verse 11, sat under the tree, and the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, the Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.
One, we're going to see Gideon's response. He does not see himself as a mighty man of valor. It's possible that this is sarcasm, but I don't think it is.
I think Gideon probably has a little sarcasm. I consider him the original millennial. He says, Gideon says to him, please, sir, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us? Where are all of his wonderful deeds that our fathers recounted to us, saying, did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? Now the Lord has forsaken us and given us into the land of Midian.
First of all, when. When the angel of the Lord comes, he comes with God's will in mind and with God's instructions in mind. And it's very interesting, this interaction, because at this particular point, Gideon refers to him as sir. And some translations have a little bit difference there. You may have a footnote as well. A lot of people believe that this is actually sort of a, I guess, premonition. I don't know if that's the right word for it for Jesus actually coming here in the Old Testament, because he refers to him as sir. But then when he realizes who he is, not just an angel of the Lord, he also calls him Lord. And the Hebrew text there has some nuance where in one context it means sir, and in another it means Lord God, actual Yahweh. And so it's very interesting to think that maybe this is the first glimpse that Gideon gets of Jesus in the Old Testament. We've had some of this throughout Genesis and a little bit in Exodus as well. But all throughout the Old Testament, we're going to see there are multiple points of contact with the Old Testament and the New Testament with Jesus and Israel and the Exodus. The context for Scripture is big picture, not just micro. And so I think it's important for us, as we study through these, to highlight some of these moments and some of these points here. The third thing here that jumps out to me is that one, our faith in God must be bigger than what we see in ourselves. We've seen a little bit of this dialogue and this back and forth with Moses at the burning bush, and we'll get into that in just a little bit. But Gideon seems to have that same response of, what are you talking about here, man? Like, first of all, if God is right here in the midst of us, where are all those great deeds that our ancestors told us about? His first response really is blame of God, not looking to God for help.
When we look at what's actually going on, we look at the challenge of the Israelites, it's not with Midian. We're going to see that their challenge is with themselves, with their obedience or lack thereof.
[00:10:36] Speaker B: Yeah, I was just. It is funny that he calls him a mighty man of valor. And if he's in the winepress for that reason, hiding out, he's being anything but that while he's being called that, which is funny.
[00:10:48] Speaker A: Maybe hiding man of valor, there was something there.
[00:10:51] Speaker B: Yeah, but don't we kind of do that sometimes with maybe our kids or something? Like, oh, man, you're so smart. You're, like, strong. You're good, making good decisions. And you're like, you have made terrible decisions, you know, but maybe he's doing a little bit of that. But the other thing I was thinking, I put some notes down earlier about, you know, when we're faced with something that does feel too big for us, kind of like him, maybe what we'll do is we might hide. And maybe the reason we hide is we will pretend it'll just go away.
Maybe that's the reason. Or we will just hope God will give it to somebody else. Those are the two that I kind of thought of, that I've thought before, is if I kind of go off to the side, if I, you know, don't, you know, put myself in a position to be needed, then I won't be called upon or just hide out and hope he'll use somebody else in the meantime.
[00:11:41] Speaker A: That was the last excuse of Moses, too. It was like, really? Can you just get somebody else?
[00:11:44] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:11:45] Speaker A: And that's true. That's when God finally said, no, Aaron, let's go. Yeah, all right.
Let's look at his response a little bit more. Here it says, Gideon said to him, please, my Lord, if the Lord is with us, then why. Why has all this happened to us? Where is all those wonderful deeds that our fathers recounted to us, saying, did not the Lord bring us out of Egypt, but now the Lord has forsaken and given us into the hand of Midian? The Lord turned to him and said, go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian. Do not I send you anything jump out to you in this response from the angel of the Lord.
Well, at first he said, the Lord is with you. And then he says, if the Lord is with us.
I don't know. It seemed to be a little bit of a difference. Okay, very good.
His response sounds a lot like Moses. Yeah, you know, send somebody else.
I'm not your guy.
[00:12:42] Speaker B: And similar to Moses is, you know, his doubt was what he had done previously. It sounds like he's got some very unresolved doubt with God.
But at the same time, one of the things I was thinking it is it's important that he's willing to express his doubt. I think.
I'm not justifying his doubt.
[00:13:03] Speaker A: I'm just saying I think part of what jumps out to me here in this whole interaction is going to be how God responds to his doubt or to his hesitancy, to Gideon's hesitancy. And the way God, I think, deals with us more often than not is patience kind of prevails the day when it comes to God and his people. There's a certain point where he obviously says, get up and go. But God is unbelievably long suffering towards us, unbelievably patient with us, even in our doubt, even in our hesitancy, even in our insecurity, regardless of our circumstances. There's sort of an earthly rationalization for Gideon here. And that is, well, they've been oppressed now for seven years, which in the grand scheme of oppression in the Bible, seven years is actually really a pretty short term, relatively speaking. Having said that, I'm not oppressed like him for seven years. So kind of easy to say on this side of history, but in his mind, a reasonable response is to hesitate. But we've Talked about this before. An earthly reasonable mind is different from a spiritual reasonableness. Right. For Peter, it was in the moment it seemed unreasonable for him to doubt because the wind and the wave, that seems like a reasonable hesitation. But if Jesus is the one that's called you out of the boat, it's unreasonable then to think that you're going to sink if it's really Jesus. Right. So this is where the gospel worldview comes into play, that things that seem reasonable to the world seem unreasonable to the world are reasonable to God. His ways are not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts.
[00:14:33] Speaker C: It's interesting that he says that the Lord has forsaken us, and it was the complete opposite of that. They had forsaken God.
[00:14:42] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:14:43] Speaker C: So the interesting thing to me is that nowhere in this response does he have any concern for what the people have done.
What's God not doing?
[00:14:54] Speaker A: Exactly. The blame immediately goes to God.
It's very easy, I think, for us to blame God and other people for our mistakes or our decisions, our poor decisions. Oftentimes the response is somehow, sometimes to cast ourselves as the victim, as the default setting. And that's what I hear a little bit in Gideon's responses is, well, we're the ones being oppressed. Where is God when we really need Him? We've been crying out, and they've been crying out because they actually weren't. That's part of the problem, is that God told them. God told them. God told them. God told them. They did not. They did not. They did not. They did not. And so it's directly as a result of their actions, their disobedience, really, their lack of faith in trusting God that they have found themselves where they are. I think it's very important for us. The takeaway here is to look internal first before we start to look external at other people or God in other circumstances, to make sure that our heart is right, to make sure that our motives are pure and innocent. Because it's. Well, it goes back to our very first class of Genesis. To me, that confession in the garden, that God, he drew out confession in Adam first. Where are you? Why were you hiding? Right. Modeling what confession actually leads to. Confession leads to reconciliation. And the complete opposite is true as well. When we refuse to confess, when we refuse to take ownership of our actions and our intentions and our motives, then that drives more and more of a wedge between us and other people, but also between us and God.
[00:16:33] Speaker B: Yeah. And we mentioned in the very beginning to notice patterns throughout this study that you can see consistent Patterns with them throughout scripture and us. And you got Adam and Eve right when God confronted them, Eve said the snake, you know, and he said, the woman you gave me. So he was like a double blessed.
And you know, back to what he said, that's what I think what Satan wants from us, he wants us to be blamers and hiders. God wants confession and repentance. And I think maybe it goes back to the garden. And even here, like Craig said in the garden, Satan was trying to say, oh, have a dependence a little bit on me. And we're going to get to that a little bit here in just a second. But here with. What got them in this thing in the first was their own. Like they got back into that cycle being dependent on someone else, another nation, or on themselves. That is their. Oftentimes their own idolatry that got them.
[00:17:25] Speaker C: In this mess and the oppression that they're undergoing. You know, notice that God allows them to have a harvest, you know, or plant the crops and they grow and then they're taken away.
[00:17:35] Speaker A: He allows this cycle.
[00:17:36] Speaker C: Sometimes we undergo the same cycle. Things are going okay, and then something happens and then we may not realize that it's still our issue that is.
[00:17:46] Speaker A: Causing the problem or even to truly cry out. We don't cry out until we're in pure desperation when we can no longer.
I always think of it in terms like a movie script. We can no longer write an ending that's favorable, that we say, okay, God, you got it. The whole time God's saying, I've had it the whole time. I just need you to acknowledge that. Right.
[00:18:04] Speaker C: We're trying to fix it in the wine press.
[00:18:06] Speaker A: Exactly, exactly. We have four wonderful children. With that being said, we also have some tomfoolery from time to time. And one of our children in particular sometimes is a little mischievous and is not always forthcoming with their actions. And so one night he. Okay, so that gives you one out of three guesses.
We'll play the odds there. He did. I don't even remember what he did now. And I mean, it was just a series of. What'd you do? Tell me what you did. I know you did something. I actually know what you did. I need you to hear it. Just back and forth, right? And eventually he ran away and he tried to hide. So once I excavated him from his location, we sat down and we talked. And I think my tone surprised him and me, honestly, in the moment. But I told him, in this house or in this family, you will always have forgiveness.
So there is no reason for you to lie and there is no reason for you to run away, and I feel like that is what Israel needs to hear over and over and over from God, is that I am going to offer forgiveness. You need to accept it, you need to come forth and receive forgiveness. But we, out of fear, out of insecurity, out of whatever lack of faith, out of the past, we find ourselves running from God or hiding from God. And that goes directly back to the garden in Genesis.
That may have been the most hurtful part to God in that situation was that they tried to hide from him. You can't hide from God, so it's also pointless. But it is for some reason. It's our human response to spiritual matters. Alright, like we said just a moment ago, Israel's challenge was not the Midianites. It wasn't the physical it, it was them. It was their hardened heart towards God or their inconsistent faithfulness and not fully trusting it was their lack of obedience.
[00:20:03] Speaker B: And he said to him, please, Lord, how can I save Israel? Behold, my clan is the weakest in Manasseh and I am the least in my Father's house. And the Lord said to him, but I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man. And he said to him, if now I have found favor in your eyes, and then show me a sign that it is you who speaks with me. Please do not depart from here until I come to you and bring out my present and set it before you. And he said, I will stay till you return.
[00:20:34] Speaker A: Verse 15. There he says, please, Lord, how can I save Israel? Behold, my clan is the weakest in Manasseh and I am the least in my Father's house. Reminding God of our own weaknesses doesn't really accomplish a lot. It only implies that, that God has sort of made a mistake in assessing our character. Right? Or he's made a mistake in assessing his character. It's really kind of an insult to the character of God in that moment.
However, back to Craig's point, God seems to allow this interaction to take place without any indignation or anger or lightning bolts or anything like that. Again, God has this fatherly, parental patience as he. I think he's trying to lead Gideon to see a bigger picture. Gideon still is not fully aware of exactly, I think, who he's talking about in this moment. So these are just his natural retorts in this conversation. To me, the excuse that we come up with is it always falls short because then it questions God's character. And that's One of the. To me, the most powerful parts of the study that we've been in is each of these encounters reveals another angle of God's character to us. Or more depth maybe is the better way to say that of his character in the midst of these human interactions.
In the midst of that, we go back to Moses, and we've already kind of stated this. Moses doubted himself, and God patiently waited and taught and led Moses to see God in his situation. He's doing the same thing here with Gideon. Gideon doubts himself and God says, again, it's not you, my man, it's me. I am with you.
In Joshua, at the very beginning of Joshua, the book, right before Judges, chapter one, God tells Joshua, I am with you always.
Jesus says, I will be with you always. Even to the ends of the earth. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So God being with his people is a constant guarantee. God doesn't leave his people. His people leave from God, right? They drift from him. We drift from him in our faithlessness. And yet God is still there as that city set upon his people, his church, his kingdom is there for us to see and to come back to.
Just to kind of help with that point. The reason for Moses and Gideon both objecting to God's will was them, their inadequacies. They don't speak real goodly, right? That's what Moses said. I don't speak well. Okay, well, I've got Aaron for you. Gideon says, well, me, I'm the smallest, right? Just from Manasseh. No big deal. Well, we know from the New Testament that God usually takes some of those small, seemingly small groups of people and makes them quite great. Jesus himself and the lineage that he comes from became great.
[00:23:14] Speaker B: And the Lord said to him, but I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man. And he said to him, if now I have found favor in your eyes, then show me a sign that it is you who speaks with me. Please do not depart from him until I come to you and bring out my present and set it before you. And he said, I will stay till.
[00:23:32] Speaker A: You return to me. Immediately went Matthew 14, where Jesus calls Peter out of the boat. But before that, Peter questions. He said, if it is you, Lord, then show me something, right? If it's you, then call me out of the boat in the midst of the storm. Of course, Peter does, and for the most part does okay until he's not okay and he's in the water. This is, to me, very reminiscent of that. If I found Favor. Then show me a sign. He's going to be a sign guy, right? Sign, sign. Everywhere is a sign.
[00:24:02] Speaker B: So Gideon went into his house and prepared a young goat and unleavened cakes from an ephah of flour. The meat he put in a basket and the broth he put in a pot. And he brought them to him under the terebinth and presented them. And the angel of God said to him, take the meat and the unleavened cakes and put them on this rock and pour the broth over them. And he did so. Then the angel of the Lord reached to the tip of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the unleavened cakes. And the fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes. And the angel of the Lord vanished from his sight.
[00:24:35] Speaker A: This is very interesting to me. There is this miraculous display. Gideon brings back a bunch of ingredients for the science project, the baking project, and the angel of the Lord has a staff with him. So in my mind, there's a figure, shepherd, like his presence. He has his staff that he touches it, and on the rock the fire consumes it, and then he vanishes from his sight.
Okay, seems anticlimactic. But in verse 22, then Gideon perceived.
[00:25:07] Speaker B: That he was the angel of the Lord. And Gideon said, alas, O Lord, for now I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face. But the Lord said to him, peace be to you. Do not fear, you shall not die. Then Gideon built an altar there to the Lord and called it the Lord is Peace. To this day, it still stands at Ophrah, which belongs to the Abiezrites.
[00:25:28] Speaker A: One of the reasons why people believe that this is sort of a pre incarnate, I guess, apparition of Christ or representation of Christ is because he's acknowledged as deity.
It's because when the angel of the Lord appeared to Hagar in Genesis, she gave that angel of the Lord the name. You are the Lord who sees, Right. So gives the name of deity to that angel. Also Moses on Mount Moriah. And then angel of the Lord also appeared to Jacob. So there seemed to be these consistent instances where the person that interacts or encounters the angel of the Lord refers to them not just as an angel, but truly as deity as the Lord as well. And so if you guys will just cover this in your angels, that'd be super.
[00:26:12] Speaker B: Yeah, Brandon will cover it. Okay, good, perfect.
[00:26:14] Speaker A: Put it on his tab.
To me, that's very interesting. And the fact that his Initial response is, oh, no, I've seen the face of the angel of the Lord here. His initial response is, well, now I'm going to die because Moses said no one can see, see the face of God, right, And live. But immediately, I guess now it's just a voice of the Lord comforts him. So there's a transition from seeing this figure to now simply hearing.
And that is, to me, a very interesting swap there. Anybody have any thoughts on that? Any observations on how the switch from seeing to hearing?
[00:26:58] Speaker B: Not necessarily that, but one of the things that this, if you remember when they were getting ready to cross the Jordan, one of the things God got them to do and they did there is they made an altar here. Again, they have fear. They made an altar and we don't have time to get into it now. But I think about this in connection with us in different moments where we have seen God is not forgetting those moments where God delivered. And reminding your families, your kids of those moments is so important. That's why throughout scripture you see altars being placed where there was a time of fear and then there was a time of delivery. And I think one of the greatest faith building exercises is even if it's a hard conversation as a family to say, hey, wasn't it awesome when God did this? You know, you actually don't even remember this before you were even born or when you were little. We went through this, but God did this. And making a point to make those altars, I guess, and to celebrate those things. Sorry, it doesn't have a lot to do with that.
[00:27:58] Speaker A: But no, I think that's excellent. I also think we're going to see here in just a little bit, a few verses, the next chapter, that his response to seeing God's provision and reminder of deliverance and safety is to worship. That's his response to God. And I think when we think of worship, I think we need to think of it in those terms, that it is our response to even the vain worship or the false worship of the soldiers towards Jesus when they were mocking him, right? Mockingly, it was still, that was an acknowledgment. They were mocking the fact that he acknowledged himself as God. So when we understand more deeply who God is, that's how our worship grows deeper. It's not necessarily through the just instruction. It's when that instruction takes root, when the teaching of the Word takes hold of our heart and transforms our heart, that's when our worship is transformative. And I think we'll probably hear more about that.
[00:28:49] Speaker B: Actually, that is just a little commercial for Sunday. When you In Revelation 4, when you start to really think about and slow down and see what they see and why their worship is like, whoa. Is because not like you said it was not because even the instruction God said, I'm about to show you some stuff before that let's worship. And so he'd even tell them to have these responses. But they did because they saw who he was.
[00:29:14] Speaker A: And that's what those altars were was to remind a visual of this is the story of God's faithfulness to his people. Do not forget them.
[00:29:21] Speaker B: And then the danger of not mentioning those altars is you think about judges 2:10. There grew up a nation that did not know the Lord, nor the things he did for Israel. What happened was they stopped telling the stories of what happened there.
So tell stories. Good, bad, mis, all good, bad are redeemed. If God's involved, tell all of them, because those will be things they remember for sure.
That night the Lord said to him, take your father's bull and the second bull, seven years old, and pull down the altar of Bel that your father has and cut down the Asherah that is beside it and build an altar to the Lord your God on top of the stronghold here with stones laid in due order. Then take the second bull and offer it as a burnt offering with the wood of the Asherah that you shall cut down.
[00:30:09] Speaker A: First of all, why a seven year old bull? What do you think?
Perfection. Okay, what else?
There you go. Seven years of oppression. I think it connects directly with that. God doesn't do anything non deliberately. Right? And it's amazing to me, no matter how many times you read through, especially the Old Testament, little details like that, if there's a seemingly obscure number or random number, it's not random. We just oftentimes don't know on the surface what it connects to. So again, I think that's a direct connection there. Also what jumps out to me here is that night the Lord said to him, go. There wasn't really a lot of waiting. Around time he has this encounter and then he's told to act. And doing the right thing, even when you're afraid, okay to be afraid. That's another little saying that we have in our house, is that it's okay to be afraid. We'll get to that slide here in a second. But it's not okay for that to keep us from doing the right thing.
Fear is a reaction. But fear cannot keep us prevent us from serving God and doing what is right. In his eyes.
[00:31:14] Speaker B: One of the things I was also going to mention is this is kind of a pattern through judges. If you'll notice that anytime God tells them to go in and wipe out an idol, he always tells them to put something in its place, which is an important reminder for us. It's not just to.
I know this is a silly example, but I think about the movie Fireproof, when the guy puts his computer on the trash can and hits it, and then that really doesn't do anything. He removes something, but he didn't put something else in its place. That you can remove all the things. But it's like Galatians 5. You have to depend on the spirit. We have to put someone in its place or it's just going to show back up.
[00:31:56] Speaker A: If you've ever struggled with addiction or know someone that struggles with addiction, just stopping that action is not adequate. You have to replace it with other activity, with other things to fill that space in your life. I also think it's very interesting here that not only does God call Gideon to act immediately, but he tells him to act immediately in his own family.
I think there's an element here of sort of getting your house in order first. And it's really interesting, the response to Gideon's faithfulness, particularly with his father. So. Oh, go ahead.
[00:32:26] Speaker C: Before you leave that it's interesting. I was looking through to. Because I just caught this. What happened to the first bull? That was a question that came up. And I started thinking about something I heard recently about throughout scripture, starting with Cain. Abel was the one that was offered, if you will. Jacob, the second was the one that was God's chosen. Jesus the second. Adam was the one that was offered. I wonder if that has some tie in with the second bull, because I was looking through. I don't see anything that happened to the first.
[00:33:00] Speaker A: Right. Yeah.
[00:33:00] Speaker C: So take your father's bull in the second one.
[00:33:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:03] Speaker C: And what happened to the first? I don't know.
[00:33:08] Speaker A: Yeah, just send him loose and tell your dad. Gotcha. Yeah, I don't know.
That's a really good. Really good observation.
[00:33:16] Speaker B: So Gideon took 10 men of his servants and did as the Lord told him. But because he was too afraid of his family and the men of the town to do it by day, he did it by night.
[00:33:27] Speaker A: I think it's okay to be afraid sometimes. Right.
He was scared and scared for his life, sort of selfishly. Right. Self preservation. However, it didn't prevent him from still obeying God didn't necessarily give a time parameter. I guess. So God allows this to happen, but because he was afraid, the men in the town, he did it by night. And again, this is the phrase that we have in our family is it's okay to be afraid, but it's not okay to let fear keep us from doing the right thing. Fear is not a reasonable excuse to be paralyzed in action. Right? It's okay to acknowledge that you're nervous to do the right thing, but you still do the right thing. We do the right thing because Jesus is truth. Jesus is life. And so we are truth tellers, and we tell the truth even when it's difficult, when it's uncomfortable, when it's painful, when it's dangerous.
The circumstance doesn't change our faithfulness to Him. We do those things because of who he is. And again, so many times in these encounters, we're going to see that action comes when we relinquish back to the character of God. His character is so important because his character is what is right, what is just. And that's why his ways, although seemingly obscure and odd, are right and are what bring about victory for his people.
[00:34:46] Speaker B: And I know we keep mentioning kids, family, but just this pertains to all of us. You know, one of the things Jason talked a lot about in his series on Analog Faith and Digital Babylon was how the one thing that's under attack with our kids is their identity, right?
And it's kind of like a whatever you want kind of thing. But there's a book that's really good that gets back to this in a way, with the doing things when you're afraid. It's called Do Hard Things. And one of the things he talks about in that book a lot is one of the greatest ways for us to discover our identity is by doing something difficult and challenging ourselves. Because if you do everything to where you don't challenge yourself, you don't grow and you don't feel, oh, I can do this. I might even fail in that, but I can still see where growth happened. But anyway, that's a good book. Do Hard things.
[00:35:36] Speaker A: That's what it means when we read that I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I can do difficult things. That's written by a man who had been falsely incarcerated, who had been shipwrecked, who had have been beaten up, who had been lied to. Apostle Paul's got a pretty good rap sheet there, and in that moment says that I can do all things because Christ is the one. He is the center of my strength.
[00:35:55] Speaker D: Well, it really shows you how big God is and how little you are when you actually obey him.
[00:36:01] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:36:02] Speaker D: And I think it's funny that even though Gideon was really afraid of going, and he still went that night, close to it in the same day, but he went at least that night. He Even though the angel of the Lord said that he's not going to die, like it's. You still are nervous and you still.
[00:36:19] Speaker A: Like you're doing it.
[00:36:20] Speaker D: He's a praying, but he's really trying to push it. I think what I've noticed too, is even reading in Luke a lot this month is seeing that every time an angel appears, God always it's the first thing or something along that part is where he says, do not be afraid. And I think it's just an immediate reaction. But it's so good to have that repetition and reminder to not be afraid, because we're going to have to be out of the comfort zone.
[00:36:47] Speaker A: When you see something so powerful as an angel of the Lord, that's terrifying. Until you realize, I'm here for your good, then it's empowering, right? It's just the opposite.
All right, we are probably going to run out of time, but we'll when.
[00:37:01] Speaker B: The men of the town rose early in the morning, behold the ark altar of BAAL was broken down, and the shira beside it was cut down. And the second bull was offered on the altar that had been built. And they said to one another, who has done this thing? And after they had searched and inquired, they said, gideon, the son of Joash has done this thing. Then the men of the town said to Joash, bring out your son that he may die, for he has broken down the altar of BAAL and cut down their shearer beside it. But Joash said to all who stood against him, will you contend for BAAL or will you save him?
Whoever contends for him shall be put to death by mourning. If he is God, let him contend for himself because his altar has been broken down. Therefore, on that day, Gideon was called Jerubbaal. That is to say, let BAAL contend against him because he broke down his altar.
[00:37:47] Speaker A: We don't get a ton of context about his father and their relationship here, but his dad had altars to BAAL and the Asher Pole. Right. So obviously there was some disobedience to God there at some point.
He's a part of Israel. So in the midst of this crowd are also men of Israel that are saying they need to kill Gideon. Just how to not to always bring up Shawshank, but how obtuse right? As they're thinking there in that moment, that he's cleaning house on behalf of their God, and yet they're saying he's the one that needs to be punished and killed. So doing the right thing sometimes brings dissension from people that are also supposed to be your brothers and sisters in Christ. Sometimes we lose our way. We get a little obtuse in our thinking as well. And for whatever reason, his dad takes up his calls, right, and says, let BAAL fend for baal, right, if he's this great God. So maybe he was feeling this pressure all along that he didn't want to serve baal, but the peer pressure of everybody's doing it, we don't know. That's pure conjecture. But it's a very interesting interaction.
[00:38:56] Speaker B: Now, all the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the east came together and they crossed the Jordan and encamped in the valley of Jezreel. But the Spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon, and he sounded the trumpet, and the Abiezrites were called out to follow him. And he sent messengers throughout all Manasseh. And they too were called out to follow him. And he sent messengers to Asherah, Zebulun and Naphtalah, and they went up to meet them.
[00:39:19] Speaker A: There's one little phrase here that I want to focus on before we keep going. It's verse 34. But the spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon. And my understanding of the literal translation here in the Hebrew is that the Spirit of the Lord clothed himself with Gideon. One illustration I heard on this from one commentator was, if you think about a glove, you put your hand in the glove, right? Your hand does the work, but your glove, your hand is in the glove. The glove is not doing the work, the hand is doing the work. In essence, the Holy Spirit is the hand and we are the glove. So the Holy Spirit clothed himself with Gideon. Here, Gideon is going to be equipped with whatever he needs to do what he needs to do. He's equipped by the Spirit of God.
We also in the New Testament, are equipped with the Spirit of God. Christ left his Spirit here to be a comforter, to be so many things for us, but to bring us into all truth and to equip us for what we need to do to fulfill God's will in our lives and the lives of people around us. So I think this is a. I wish we had more time just to devote on this one. It's just a really interesting phrase here. And typically we tend to shy away sometimes from conversations about the Holy Spirit. But it's all throughout the Scriptures, Old Testament as well as New Testament. He is.
[00:40:35] Speaker B: Then Gideon said to God, if you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said, behold, I am laying fleece of wool on the threshing floor. If there is dew on the fleece alone, and it is on dry ground, then I shall know that you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said. And it was so when he rose early the next morning and squeezed the fleece. He wrung enough dew from the fleece to fill a bowl with water.
Then Gideon said to God, let not your anger burn against me. Let me speak just, just once. Please let me test just once more with the fleece. Please let it be dry on the fleece only, and on all the ground let there be dew. And God did so that night. And it was dry on the fleece only, and on all the ground there was dew.
[00:41:17] Speaker A: I don't think Gideon is wanting evidence of God's promise here. I think he's wanting confirmation of God's presence. And I think that's oftentimes where we maybe find ourselves as well, is we believe the big promises of God, but we kind of need those, those more intimate reminders of his presence and his proximity to us. And I think that's what's going on here. There's one passage says that a wicked and adulterous nation looks for a sign. I forget what verse that is, but essentially, if he has given us His Holy Spirit to guide us in this life, then he is with us. He is literally with us. And we can have that boldness and confidence that comes with his presence everywhere. In Scripture, when God's presence is near for his people, that is a blessing. For the people that are opposed to him, that is a curse. And I think you see a little bit of that. This is probably the most familiar part of this verse. So we've got like, 10 more slides, so we'll just keep going. Did you have something else to add to that? Chapter seven, a little bit of math here. Gideon starts with 32,000 troops. God whittles that down. There's some interesting ways. The first one is, if you're scared, go home. If you're scared, we don't need you to fight big battles. And so a lot of people go home. And the second, it depends on how you drink as to who gets to stay. So he whittles it down to 300 people. And he does that for a reason. In verse two, it says the people with you are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hand, lest Israel boast over me, saying, my own hand has saved me. There is this consistent danger of Israel taking credit for things that God does. That is a very real and present danger for us as well. And goes back to really what we were saying earlier about pointing the next generation to what God has done. Not what we have done, but what God does through us. When we open ourselves to his will, when we actively pursue his will for our lives, giving credit to God and God alone is really, really important.
I thought this quote was pretty good. Difficulty must always be measured by the capacity of the one doing the work.
So if we measure something difficult by God's capacity to make it happen, it ain't that hard. Because God can do anything. And if we have been given his character, our identity is in Him. We have access to his character to make that our character. Then we can do all things through Christ, who strengthens us. So reminding ourselves of our identity over and over again is also the lesson that God continues to teach us through trials and tribulations. Negative circumstances and negative consequences are not always the end all, be all crisis that we think they are. Oftentimes with distance and time, we see how those moments teach us deeper than anything else in our lives. Sometimes it's really hard to learn when you're comfortable and when you seemingly have everything going on the right way. Right. It's the reverse where we learn those really difficult lessons very quickly. In chapter seven, let's read verses nine through 14.
That same night, the Lord said to him, arise, go down against the camp, for I have given it into your hand. But if you are afraid to go down, go down to the camp with Purah, your servant. You shall hear what they say, and afterwards your hand shall be strengthened to go down against the camp. Moses, if you are nervous, take your brother Gideon, if you are nervous, take Piuh. It is nice. Batman here is Robin, right? And the Midianites and the Amalekites, all the people lay along the valley like locusts in abundance. And their camels were without number, as the sand is on the seashore in abundance. Massive, massive group of people. When Gideon came, behold, a man was telling a dream to his comrade. And he said, behold, I dreamed a dream. And behold, a cake of barley bread tumbled into the camp of Midian and came to the tent and struck it so that it fell and turned it upside down so that the tent may lay flat. That's quite a piece of bread. And his comrade Answered, this is no other than the sword of Gideon, the son of Joash, man of Israel. God has given into his hand Midian and all the camp. The point here is Gideon still needed encouragement. Gideon still was nervous, he was still scared, he was still being obedient, but he was still feeling some timidity there. And God knew that. And so God sent that. He said he gave him this sign as an encouragement. And as soon verse 15, as soon as Gideon heard the telling of the dream and its interpretation, what did he do? He worshiped God because he found peace and joy in the one who was going to bring and deliverance over and over and over again. God brings deliverance to his people and his people worship him. His people relish in God's victory, not their own abilities. To be successful warriors, we have to be good worshipers. We have to be conscious worshipers of God. Any public victory that we get to take part in is a result of private devotion. Four quick takeaways and then we'll will really be done. Regularly reflect on God's provision in your life. Do that with consistency. In fact, we've got a pretty convenient opportunity every Sunday, right? Separate and apart, of course, from giving. But when we take communion, it's an opportunity to reflect. But don't limit it to one day a week. Let past provisions that God has made in your life give you confidence to move forward in faith. Looking back gives us confidence. Looking back at Scripture gives us confidence to move forward. Let God's patience give you the boldness to move forward in faith. He is unrelentingly patient with Gideon here. We have every fleece moment in Scripture to provide us with the courage needed to live faithfully. I think sometimes we get caught up in saying, God, give me a sign.
He's given us a whole lot of them in here. 66 books worth of fleece after fleece after fleece. Ultimately, it requires us to move Forward with courage. Second Timothy 3, 16. All scripture is given, excuse me, is inspired by God. And it's profitable for doctrine, for reproof, correction, for instruction and righteousness that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped. We are equipped. And then Hebrews 11, the hall of Faith, chapter 12, a great cloud of witnesses. We have everything we need. It's on us. God equips us and then we act. And that is a very consistent theme that we see throughout all of these encounters. Anything else to add?
[00:47:17] Speaker B: Yeah, the one thing that he was acting weak in the winepress. Supposedly he was weakest in his family, weakest in manasseh. He kept coming to God over and over again. But it's kind of like his weakness. Yes, he had the weaknesses, but his weakness became a strength. Because of dependence, he learned to depend. And so for all of us, whatever weakness we feel we have, the weakness can be a strength if it leads us to learn to be dependent people and to be depending on God.
[00:47:47] Speaker A: As we stand and sing. Thank you guys for being here tonight. Love you. We'll see you next week, Lord willing.
