God gives us strength

· Wednesday: Gideon (Judges 6-7) God gives us strength.

Have you ever been afraid in your own school or home? Today we are going to talk about being afraid and God giving us strength.

We are going to be talking about Gideon tonight. We are going to be in Judges 6 and 7 tonight. As you read the book of Judges you will see this pattern of God’s people doing what is right in God’s eyes and then years and years of God’s people in disciple by God for doing what was evil in God’s eyes. That is what we see in ch. 6. Israel had been doing evil in God’s eyes and therefore God let the Midian people take over Israel. Then one day this happened.

7 When the people of Israel cried out to the LORD on account of the Midianites, 8 the LORD sent a prophet to the people of Israel. And he said to them, “Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: I led you up from Egypt and brought you out of the house of slavery. 9 And I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of all who oppressed you, and drove them out before you and gave you their land. 10 And I said to you, ‘I am the LORD your God; you shall not fear the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.’ But you have not obeyed my voice.”

God sends someone to remind his people what he had done for his people in the past and would do again for them if they would only follow Him.

Basically, the Midian people were starving the people of Israel. Have you guys ever seen the movie A Bugs Life? There was a colony of Ants and they worked all year to gather food for the colony but they also had to give food to a Gang of grasshoppers. That is what was going on here but the gang was taking all the food.

This is where we meet Gideon. He is beating out wheat down a hole so no one will see he has a supply of food. Then the Bible says an angel of the lord appeared before him and said.

The LORD is with you, O mighty man of valor.

He called Gideon a mighty man of valor, a guy who is hiding in a hole so no one will know he has some food. That doesn’t sound like a mighty man to me.

But Gideon responds back to the Angel with some tough questions. Vs 13

“Please, my lord, if the LORD is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all his wonderful deeds that our fathers recounted to us, saying, ‘Did not the LORD bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the LORD has forsaken us and given us into the hand of Midian.”

I remember one time when I was a kid and I was climbing this really old rope ladder and it was all kinds of unstable. I made it up about three or four feet and the rope broke. I fell flat on my back and all the air came out of me. My head landed on a rock so my head was pounding and my dad came over and asked me if I needed any help. I was like now he asks me… I kinda feel like this is how Gideon feels. Hey Lord I’m glad you are here and all but what have you been doing? Haven’t you seen your people struggling here? I’m so glad you helped us in the past, but we are dying right now.

You have to be pretty low to stand up to the Angle of the Lord this way. Listen to what the angle had to say back.

14 And 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?”

The Lord said I see you are mad, now go and save my people, remember I am your Lord.

So, this guy that has been hiding in a hole trying to not get in trouble is now supposed to go and defeat an army. I’m pretty sure Gideon didn’t see this coming. In fact, he says this back to God.

“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.” 16 And the LORD said to him, “But I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man.”

I love this, Gideon says but I am nothing! And God says but I am with you!

There are a couple of truths I want you to see here.

First, God doesn’t care how other people perceive you or how you perceive yourself. God knows who you are and more important to God he knows who he is and the power he has.

Second, is God calls his shots. Have you heard the story of the old baseball player Babe Ruth? In the third game of the world series, the fans were giving Babe a hard time so in the fourth inning Babe walked up to the plate and pointed into the outfield, and on the next pitch, he hit a home run to the exact spot he pointed to. God does the same thing when he is about to do something in our lives he tells us.

You this pattern throughout the Bible. Think about how Jesus came to Earth. An angel came to both Marry and Joseph and told them that Mary still a virgin was going to have the Son of God.

Before my family moved to California my wife was a teacher. As we were planning on moving we were in constant prayer trying to make sure what we were doing was right. And one day she came up to me and said I think God is telling me to be a stay-at-home mom and not go back to teaching. I thought she was crazy. We were moving from SC to crazy expensive CA. And I didn’t even have a job. I knew that teachers were needed everywhere and she would be able to find a job easily. So I told her I thought she was crazy. She looked at me and said God’s will God’s Bill. Meaning if God wants it then he will make it happen. And he did! Within 1 week of moving to Bakersfield I had a job and I made enough money for her to stay at home and just be a mom.

The third thing is God is patient with us. Sometimes we need a little help to grow our faith. And God is patient with us as our faith grows. And that is what Gideon needs.

So an angel told Gideon that he was going to defeat an entire nation and Gideon was stressed out. He told the Angel to chill while he runs to his house to get some food for him.

19 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 brought them to him under the terebinth and presented them.

Now there were no refrigerators or freezers during this point in history. How long do you think it took Gideon to prepare a young goat? We have a special game tonight. Right over here we have a goat pen and we are going to time you to see how long it takes you to take a live goat and prepare it for dinner… And Go!

So Gideon takes the meal back to the Angel of the Lord and he tells him to place everything on a rock. Then the Angel take his staff and touches the food and poof everything goes up in fire. Then the Angel vanishes. Gideon freaks out and says I have seen the Angel of God and thinks he is going to die. “Mighty Man Of Valor”

God speaks to him and tells him

23 But the LORD said to him, “Peace be to you. Do not fear; you shall not die.”

So After all of that you would think Gideon would be full of faith in God and feel safe. Nope!

That night the Lord told him to his dad’s idols down from his house and build an altar for God. And this is what Gideon did.

27 So Gideon took ten men of his servants and did as the LORD had 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.

I made taking down the idol sound small, but it was a really big deal. You see the Midians believed that doing that was disrespecting their god. And not just the Midians but every nation that touches the land of Israel. So all the nations came into Israel to destroy them.

34 But the Spirit of the LORD clothed Gideon, and he sounded the trumpet, and the Abiezrites were called out to follow him. 35 And he sent messengers throughout all Manasseh, and they too were called out to follow him. And he sent messengers to Asher, Zebulun, and Naphtali, and they went up to meet them.

So God’s Spirit came down on Gideon and had a bunch of tribes of Israel come to help fight the enemies. So at this point, Gideon has to be feeling good, right? The Spirit of God is on him how could he lose? He would have to be out of his mind to be afraid.

Let’s see what Gideon does next.

36 Then Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said, 37 behold, I am laying a fleece of wool on the threshing floor. If there is dew on the fleece alone, and it is dry on all the ground, then I shall know that you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said.” 38 And it was so.

So Gideon is good, right? Nope Gideon is like that could be an accident. Maybe the wool took all the water from the ground. So he asks God to prove himself just one more time. But this time reverse everything. Keep my wool dry but the ground should be wet.

40 And God did so that night; and it was dry on the fleece only, and on all the ground there was dew.

Gideon finally started to trust that God was really with him. Gideon had all these fighting men with him from all the tribes of Judah and they went to find the armies of their enemies.

On the way God told Gideon that there were to many people on Gideon’s army.

2 The LORD said to Gideon, “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.’ 3 Now therefore proclaim in the ears of the people, saying, ‘Whoever is fearful and trembling, let him return home and hurry away from Mount Gilead.’ ” Then 22,000 of the people returned, and 10,000 remained.

When God is with us we don’t need huge armies. God is all we need. God also knows how easy it is for us to get big heads. So God puts us in circumstances that where he shows up and shows everyone how big and mighty he really is. Because there is no other way we could succeed.

I can imagine Gideon being tempted to run back to the hole he was in where God first found him. But because of all the tests that he put God through his faith was Strong.

So Gideon and the 10,000 might men are heading to fight and God says this.

4 And the LORD said to Gideon, “The people are still too many. Take them down to the water, and I will test them for you there, and anyone of whom I say to you, ‘This one shall go with you,’ shall go with you, and anyone of whom I say to you, ‘This one shall not go with you,’ shall not go.” 5 So he brought the people down to the water. And the LORD said to Gideon, “Every one who laps the water with his tongue, as a dog laps, you shall set by himself.

Anyone who laps water like a Dog? If I was Gideon I would be thinking that group is out!

Likewise, every one who kneels down to drink.” 6 And the number of those who lapped, putting their hands to their mouths, was 300 men, but all the rest of the people knelt down to drink water.

Okay 300 people drink water like dogs, they out!

7 And the LORD said to Gideon, “With the 300 men who lapped I will save you and give the Midianites into your hand, and let all the others go every man to his home.”

What!!! You are going to save me and our nation with 300 men who think they are dogs? I would be second-guessing everything at this point. But you see when God gives you strength there is nothing like it. You feel like you can charge the gates of hell with squirt guns and all of hell would be defeated. Like that last battle scene in the Lord of the Rings where the remaining army goes to Mordor and Sauron and his defeated.

This is what they found when they got there.

12 And the Midianites and the Amalekites and all the people of the East lay along the valley like locusts in abundance, and their camels were without number, as the sand that is on the seashore in abundance. 13

When Gideon and his 300 mighty men finally found the enemies they were pumped. God had been giving them dreams of the victory that he was going to give them.

15 As soon as Gideon heard the telling of the dream and its interpretation, he worshiped. And he returned to the camp of Israel and said, “Arise, for the LORD has given the host of Midian into your hand.” 16 And he divided the 300 men into three companies and put trumpets into the hands of all of them and empty jars, with torches inside the jars. 17 And he said to them, “Look at me, and do likewise. When I come to the outskirts of the camp, do as I do. 18 When I blow the trumpet, I and all who are with me, then blow the trumpets also on every side of all the camp and shout, ‘For the LORD and for Gideon.’ ”

What God did next was amazing. All the Midianites and the rest woke on in a daze and confused as to what was happening. They thought the enemy was in the camp with them. They looked around at a sea of torches all around them. So they took out their swords and started killing everyone around them.

The problem for them was they were killing each other and Gideon and all his men were in the hills all around them. By morning all the soldiers had been defeated.

When God is going to do something he calls his shots. He doesn’t always send an angel to tell you. But if you are spending time listening to him he will invite you to join in with him. God will give you opportunities to trust him more and more. And when God calls his shot you have nothing to worry about because God is the one that is going to do it. You just get a front-row seat to watch him do it.

Is God asking you to do anything right now? What steps do you need to take to join in?