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Scripture for Sunday, 3/26: Judges 6:11-24
Additional Scripture: The entire Gideon story, Judges 6-9; 2 Corinthians 12:7b-10
Last week found us in Joshua 2, at the beginning of the Israelites' entry into the Promised Land under Joshua's leadership. This week, we pick up the story several generations after Joshua in the book of Judges.
Judges 17:6 summarizes the theme of Judges: "In those days Israel had no king; everyone did what was right in his own eyes."
Judges has a repeating narrative cycle: God's people worship other gods; God gets their attention through enemy oppression; the people repent; God raises up a judge who delivers them; and the people and their land are at peace....until the next time they sin.This week we are listening for God's good news through the account of Gideon. Israel has been suffering for seven years under devastating invasions from the Midianites. It's not too strong to say Midian was terrorizing them and their land. Just as Israel's wheat would ripen, hordes of Midianites would swoop in, carry off the cattle, and pick the land clean.
The Israelites are hungry. And weary. And reduced to stockpiling food in caves. Finally, 6:6 says, they cried out to the Lord for help.
In answer, God sends a prophet who reminds Israel of their covenant to love God only. And God sends his angelic messenger with a military commission for a man named Gideon.
There's Gideon, separating wheat from chaff not on an open threshing floor as usual, but in a winepress. It's harder work down in the confined space of the press, but at least he'll be able to eat.
"The LORD is with you, mighty warrior," the angel calls.
It's almost a joke: Gideon's name means "one who cuts down," and can be used in a military sense. Most often it refers to cutting down idols--one way Gideon will live up to his name to after God sends him.
But at this point, this mighty warrior isn't cutting anything down but the wheat he is trying to save for his family.
"Pardon me, my Lord," Gideon says, "If the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonderful deeds...? He has forsaken us and turned us over to Midian."
Then, in answer to the very problem Gideon just named, the LORD turns to Gideon with a strong command. "Go in your strength; you will deliver Israel from Midian."
Gideon isn't too sure about this plan. "Pardon me, Lord. How will I deliver Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the youngest in my father's house."
The LORD says to him, "I will be with you, and you will defeat Midian as if they are one man."
Gideon's words and actions show his hand. The Midianite raids have had a demoralizing effect on the tribe of Manasseh. Gideon has little confidence his identity as a mighty warrior. As he responds to God's commission, he asks God for sign after reassuring sign: "If it is you, stay here until I come back." "Make the fleece wet and the ground dry." "Make the fleece dry and the ground wet."
Through his forthcoming military career, Gideon walks a teeter-totter between insecurity and pride. He goes in the power of the LORD to defeat Midian; and the LORD makes certain that Gideon and the Israelites will know that it is Yahweh who has delivered them, reducing an army of 32,000 to only 300 fighters (Judges 7:2).
Yet after he finishes the Midianites and the Amalekites, Gideon turns away from the Lord, crafting an golden ephod that ensnares him, his family...and the whole nation.
How does someone live in a place of obedient trust, relying on God's strength and seeing his power firsthand, without being either a) insecure and insignificant; or b) prideful and self-reliant? This is the question that Rev. Jonker will delve into on Sunday.
