Zero to Hero

One day you pick your kids up and set them down. And never pick them up again.

One of my life goals is to put that day off as long as possible, and so I practice picking up heavy stuff and setting it down.

There was a day 5 years ago where, for about 6 months, I couldn’t pick my kids up, even baby Dylan. I was walking around like Quasimodo due to a massive herniation in my L4-L5 lumbar.

Thank God for surgery.

But afterwards, the worst thing I could do was to do nothing. The doctors recommended building up the muscle all around the spine to protect it.

And so I started looking for coaches. Jono and I went to every Crossfit gym for a 7 mile radius. And we picked two great coaches, Brandon and Courtney, and I placed my physical well-being in their hands.

The idea is: they know how I can get stronger. And they know how I can do it safely, at the right speed, at the right time, the exact right level of challenge.

I remember working on squats, and there’s a 16 year-old girl over there doing squats with 135 lbs… and the coach hands me a long PVC pipe. Start with that. A bit embarrassing, but more embarrassing was how sore I was the next day from “lifting” that half-pound pipe!

I remember

How do I Grow in Faith?

Juggling?

How do I become a hero of faith? What is the process?

And, I learned this from Pastor Rod, to ask boldly in prayer for the true desire of my heart, not to hedge with God or myself in the asking. I maybe be disappointed with the outcome, but I can bring that up with Him too.

Well, today I am going to simplify it down to a two step process which is really just one thing. We see this played out in the life of the great Heroes of Faith - Gideon.

How do I become a hero of faith?

From Zero to Hero

Gideon - One Step At a Time

At the Beginning of the Story

Judges 6:12–13 ESV

And the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, “The Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.” And Gideon said to him, “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.”

Judges 6:10–13 ESV

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.” Now the angel of the Lord came and sat under the terebinth at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, 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.” And Gideon said to him, “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.”

Judges 6:

Gideon has our same question.

Why can’t I be in a great heroic story of God saving his people???

He is… he’s just in the beginning of that story. And here it comes.

Step 1 - The Meal

Gideon starts with what he knows. Stranger in town - give that guy some dinner. And he makes a huge amount of food.

Judges 6:19 ESV

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.

Judges 6:19-

This is a HUGE amount, 40 pounds of flour. And a goat, which was a valuable sacrifice. Gideon goes big… and God receives it as a sacrificial offering. He transforms it.

Judges 6:20 ESV

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.

Judges 6:

Waste the food, fine, Gideon does it.

Judges 6:21 ESV

Then the angel of the Lord reached out the tip of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the unleavened cakes. And fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes. And the angel of the Lord vanished from his sight.

Judges 6:21

The angel does his Gandalf move and vanishes. and then...

Judges 6:22–24 ESV

Then Gideon perceived that he was the angel of the Lord. And Gideon said, “Alas, O Lord God! 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.

The angel disappears… and then the LORD said to him? How does he speak to him? We don’t know, but apparently not through the angel anymore. I think, as we see later, it moves to a subtler form of communication, but the text doesn’t really say.

Step 2 - The Altar

But God wastes no time and gives Gideon his next assignment. He was faithful with the meal thing, will he be faithful in the next?

Judges 6:25–27 ESV

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 Baal that your father has, and cut down the Asherah that is beside it and build an altar to the Lord your God on the 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.” 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.

Judges 6:25-

Baal? Asherah?

Gideon did it. He did it in a safe, kind of sneaky, maybe a little bit cowardly way… but he did it.

The next day all the townspeople freak out and they want to kill Gideon. They search and it would seem Gideon hides in his dad’s house, because it is his dad that defends him. “Baal can contend for himself, I’ll kill you if you try to touch my son!” I like this guy.

Step 3 - the Trumpet

Now all the enemy comes to town. The moment they had feared.

Judges 6:33-

Judges 6:33–35 ESV

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 Asher, Zebulun, and Naphtali, and they went up to meet them.

Gideon is led by the Spirit, empowered by the Spirit of the LORD, and he sounds the trumpet and his whole clan comes out. And he sends the messengers (the beacons are lit, Gondor calls for aid) and the tribes of Israel rally to his banner.

This is hero time. This is the crescendo. The armies have gathered, the hero has proven his worth and now the nation is following him. In three steps we have gone from zero to hero and Gideon has got to be riding so high right now!

But… he’s not. In fact, Gideon gives us such tremendous insight into the heart of a hero here… I love this so much. The armies are gathered, the victory is near. One more march, one more day, and the next day is going to be SO GOOD. They have too much army, it turns out.

But Gideon is not full of unshakeable faith and unending confidence. He, in fact, is still wondering if God is with him. Two days of reassurances:

Judges 6:36–38 ESV

Then Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said, 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.” And it was so. When he rose early next morning and squeezed the fleece, he wrung enough dew from the fleece to fill a bowl with water.

Judges 6:36–40 ESV

Then Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said, 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.” And it was so. When he rose early 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 once more. 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.

That is a pretty good test. How could that happen? That’s a miracle!

Wait is it? Which way would it happen naturally? Maybe the fleece would normally stay dry and the ground will be wet, like it ran in a trickle all around the fleece?

… I need to test the opposite.

Judges 6:36-37

Judges 6:39–40 ESV

Then Gideon said to God, “Let not your anger burn against me; let me speak just once more. 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.

Judges 6:

God, let me be sure. How can I be sure? Let me be more sure than I am right now.

This is not a “how-to discover God’s will” passage. Nobody else does this. Seeing all the ways God had already communicated to

How patient God is with Gideon. He knows his fear and insecurity and He answers. He encourages.

Faith as small as a mustard seed. Because faith grows.

Jesus is the author of our faith, and He is the cultivator of our faith. We see him carefully tending the faith of Gideon. Here… do this. This will stretch, this will challenge, this will test.

And Gideon is inconsistent. He shows great promise in generous sacrifice, and hesitant compliance in night-time shenanigans. He shows total doubt two nights in a row, at the very peak of his power, that God is even with Him.

Awesome scene of removing the men.

Then, Gideon seems to be unsure all over again. And we get the final (most subtle) sign that the LORD gives to Gideon.

Judges 7:9–11 ESV

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. And you shall hear what they say, and afterward your hands shall be strengthened to go down against the camp.” Then he went down with Purah his servant to the outposts of the armed men who were in the camp.

Judges 7:9-

Gideon was afraid. If you are afraid, go with Purah. Gideon goes with Purah. Up until the end, he is unsure, he is fearful.

Judges 7:12–14 ESV

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. 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 lay flat.” And his comrade answered, “This is no other than the sword of Gideon the son of Joash, a man of Israel; God has given into his hand Midian and all the camp.”

Judges 7:12-

Now that’s a weird dream. And that’s a weird interpretation of a weird dream. But Gideon is listening and God knew exactly what weird reassurance he needed to hear. Because know he is the bold leader we have been waiting for.

Judges 7:15 ESV

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.”

And he has a cool plan for victory and he leads into triumph.

Hebrews 11:32–33 ESV

And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets— who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,

Hebrews 11:

Hebrews 12:

And yet, again, he is FAMOUS for his faith, a super hero, a name echoing down through the generations. What does that say about faith?

The ingredients of faith:

Faith in God is created within you by God. That is the first spark.

It goes on to say

Hebrews 12:1–2 ESV

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

He is the founder, the author of our faith? Jesus.

Who is the perfecter of our faith? Jesus.

But we do get to participate in that process. God invites us into it. “Laying aside every weight and sin… run with endurance the race that is set before us.”

How did God perfect Gideon’s faith?

One step at a time. And there are more to come, but the “signs” Gideon responds to actually become less impressive, not more. The first one was an angel-wizard with a fire-staff. The second was a wet blanket. The third will be overhearing a dream.

And each time, as Gideon is faithful in testing, then faithful in recognizing God’s answer to prayer, then faithful in obeying God’s command to do the next thing, we see Gideon growing and maturing into the epic leader, the mighty man valor!

God, with patience and perseverance, develops the faith of Gideon from zero to hero. He is the author and perfecter of Gideon’s faith. Gideon participates by bringing his questions to God honestly, recognizing God’s answer and then obeying God’s command.

There is no manual here.

The first sign - not what Gideon was expecting.

The second sign - exactly what Gideon was asking for.

The third sign - weird. Just weird.

The first thing Gideon was asked to do:

But look at how the faith of Gideon has grown.

What was the first thing Gideon was asked to do?

A meal sacrificed on an altar. Sacrifical, but common.

The second task: destroy an altar. Life threatening danger on a small scale.

The third task: Conquer a numberless army with 300 men. Life threatening danger on the national scale, and almost certain defeat after God sent almost everybody home.

How do we grow in faith?

Follow Your Coach

How do you grow your faith from zero to hero? Ultimately, you don’t. Jesus is the author and perfecter of your faith. He is the man with the plan. He is shaping you step by step, and calling you to the right next step.

Your role is, as Gideon, be honest with your doubts and fears. You aren’t fooling Him. You might fool me, but faith is not an exercise in self-delusion.

Be as honest as Gideon with your doubts, your questions, your fears. Bring them to God.

And then, do the thing God has placed in front of you to do.

He is the coach: the author and perfecter of your faith.

Faithful where he has placed you, faithful in what He has called you to do. He knows exactly the right level of discomfort to call you into, exactly the right challenge, exactly the right place and the right time to stretch you the right amount.

Faithful in the large things; faithful in the small things.

He is coaxing you into faith, coaxing you into ministry, coaxing you into LIFE with Him in every aspect and dimension of your life.

It is this simple. What is the next thing you are to do? If you are unsure about it: ask him. Simple and honest.

And then, do it. Even if it’s scary or risky or stretches you.

Follow your coach: Jesus, the author and perfecter of your faith. Setting your eyes on Him, run with endurance the race set out for you.