What does a man or woman of faith look like? Faith has nothing to do with appearance. Any ordinary man or woman can do fantastic things if he trusts in God, even for a little bit.
Of all the people mentioned in the hall of fame or faith, Gideon is probably the most flawed. Even so, Gideon became for a period of time, one of the judges of Israel, and a man. Gideon is to us both a positive and negative example. We learn as much from his failures as from his success.
We read about Gideon in Judges 6 and 7.
1 The angel of the LORD came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites.
Gideon was from the tribe of Manasseh and the family of Abiezer--not a very distinguished family. His father Joash was not very distinguished, either. Gideon was for his part an undistinguished son.
When we first meet Gideon, he doing something that probably seems odd. He is threshing wheat in a wine press. Threshing was the process of separating the kernels of grain from the wheat stalks. The thresher wraps a sheet around the wheat and pounds it on a rock until the grains separate from the stalks. Then he throws what remains in the air. The wind carries the husks away, leaving only the grain. This is usually done outside where there is a good wind.
A wine press is a circular stone vat. It would not be the best place to thresh wheat, since there would be little wind, and you would probably get grape juice all over your wheat.
So why is Gideon threshing in a wine press? He does not want anyone to see him, lest someone steal his grain. Specifically he is afraid of a people called the Midianites.
At one time, the Midianites were the friends of the Israelites. Now they were their worst enemies. They were desert nomads, who came upon the tribes of Israel like locusts, stealing their crops and goods, and disappearing into the desert again. In Gideon's time, they have become very strong, and deeply feared. No one could stop them, they pillaged wherever they chose.
Then Gideon hears a voice 12 When the angel of the LORD appeared to Gideon , he said, "The LORD is with you, mighty warrior."
Wait a minute. This has to be a mistake. If Gideon were a mighty warrior, he wouldn't be threshing wheat in a wine press. He'd be daring the Midianites to appear. There is no way that anyone would mistake Gideon for a mighty warrior. Yet God sees a mighty warrior in him.
Faith in God doesn't make any practical difference in our lives if we have no faith in ourselves. God may see in us a mighty warrior, but if we do not believe it about ourselves, then we will act like a wimp. The faith to do great things is tied to our faith in ourselves.
This may sound like some new age or positive thinking kind of philosophy, but it is thoroughly based in a Biblical understanding of our nature. It is based upon the sovereignty of God. If God says we are mighty warriors, who are we to doubt His word? If God created us, and if He has promised to give us the strength to endure, then we should also believe that God has in fact given us sufficient gifts to do it, or will give it. To say we are not good enough to do what God says it so call God a liar. We cannot have faith in God without also believing in ourselves.
Immediately, Gideon starts giving God excuses.
First, he says, "God doesn’t care about us.".
13 "But sir," Gideon replied, "if the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our fathers told us about when they said, 'Did not the LORD bring us up out of Egypt?' But now the LORD has abandoned us and put us into the hand of Midian."
Gideon's reaction has been broken in spirit. When thrown into catastrophe our first reaction is to say "God doesn't care about us." Gideon's family had lost most of their crops. The winepress is empty of grapes, because the Midianites took them all. They left some bread, but the took all the joy of the wine with them. What is left is meager and grim.
It is easy to give in to doubt, but it is also the worst thing we can do. Without God, there is no security, not meaning, and no hope. It is also incorrect. God really does still care.
14 The LORD turned to him and said, "Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian's hand. Am I not sending you?"
God in effect said to him. "You say I have abandoned you. I gave you the greatest thing in the world for fixing your problems. I gave you you." Gideon had forgotten that even though he had lost much, he had much, and what he had was sufficient emerge victorious in the crisis.
Gideon was discouraged. Courage is the confidence that we can endure and withstand whatever comes our way. Gideon could only see the obstacles. He had abandoned his goal.
Second, Gideon said "I'm too weak."
15 "But Lord," Gideon asked, "how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family."
16 The LORD answered, "I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites together."
Self doubt equals God doubt. We do not success because we do not believe we can.
Gideon's excuse was that he came from the weakest tribe in Manasseh, and that he was the least in his family. So what? God was still with him.
It's the mathematics of heaven. If finite power is added to God's infinite power, and that is not enough, then is God’s power really infinite. If we are weak and God is strong, then won’t God’s strength completely cover our weaknesses, with infinite power? God says the one thing that can calm us. "I will be with you."
Gideon's third excuse is "But God, how do I know it's really you?"
17 Gideon replied, "If now I have found favor in your eyes, give me a sign that it is really you talking to me. 18 Please do not go away until I come back and bring my offering and set it before you."
.And the LORD said, "I will wait until you return."
Is this is really an angel? Gideon demands proof before he proceeds.
This argument with God is probably Gideon's most rational. It is , however, the mt dangerous and most devastating. We are paralyzed by doubt not just from doubting God’s existence, but from doubting that a specific word from God is really meant for us. If God sent us a letter, we would probably think the mail carrier put in the wrong mailbox!
But God has prepared a surprise for Gideon.
19 Gideon went in, prepared a young goat, and from an ephah of flour he made bread without yeast. Putting the meat in a basket and its broth in a pot, he brought them out and offered them to him under the oak.
20 The angel of God said to him, "Take the meat and the unleavened bread, place them on this rock, and pour out the broth." And Gideon did so. 21 With the tip of the staff that was in his hand, the angel of the LORD touched the meat and the unleavened bread. Fire flared from the rock, consuming the meat and the bread. And the angel of the LORD disappeared.
Gideon sets up an altar, but he does not burn the meat. The angel touches the rock it is on, and fire comes out.
Think of how many times in the Bible God reveals himself in fire.
• To Moses, God appears in fire from the bush.
• To Israel, He appears in fire from a cloud.
• To Elijah, God appears in fire from the sky.
• To Gideon God appears in fire from a rock.
• In Acts, God appears in fire from the heads of the apostles and prophets.
• On the road to Emmaus, the two disciples who met Jesus said they knew him because their hearts burned within them.
God reveals Himself to us still in fire. He puts the fire of the Spirit in our hearts.
Fourth, Gideon fears God more than he loves Him.
22 When Gideon realized that it was the angel of the LORD, he exclaimed, "Ah, Sovereign LORD! I have seen the angel of the LORD face to face!" 23 But the LORD said to him, "Peace! Do not be afraid. You are not going to die."
Verse 22 sounds like a statement of faith, but look closer. He is afraid to be with God. He is sure that God will kill him.
Many who fear God and are too afraid to approach Him. This is not faith. It is just another kind of self-doubt. If we allow our fear of unworthiness to keep us from approaching God, then we can never effectively serve Him.
When I was a boy, I used to see The Wizard of Oz on television every year. I loved the movie up until the part where they meet the Wizard, and that great floating head appears. It scared me so badly that I would leave the room.
But by the end of the movie, though we see that the Wizard is not scary at all. He is a kind and generous man. The big head just there to frighten away those who did not belong there. The real Wizard welcomed them into his presence.
Many people have much the same reaction to God. God really is great, majestic, and fearsome. But do not think that He is inapproachable. He's also good. If God were truly inapproachable, no one would want to be in his presence. We would serve him in fear, like slaves. But God cares about us, and wants us to love Him back. Being God fearing is not enough. We must also have a relationship with Him. That is impossible if we are too afraid.
Those who are His people, His servants, have nothing to fear from Him. They are the ones who are specially blessed out of the whole world. They are His children.
24 So Gideon built an altar to the LORD there and called it The LORD is Peace. To this day it stands in Ophrah of the Abiezrites.
When he lost all his excuses, he got peace.
I wish I could say that Gideon remained faithful all his life, but he did not. He vacillated all his life between faith and doubt. That is the beauty and the glory of God. In order to receive, God's peace, we don't have to have faith yesterday. We don't even have to have faith tomorrow. We just have to believe today. God can uses even struggling and doubtful Christians.
Don't be fooled by the Devil's lies, or blinded by our own self doubt. God is still capable of using you, if you will only believe Him for today.
Of all the people mentioned in the hall of fame or faith, Gideon is probably the most flawed. Even so, Gideon became for a period of time, one of the judges of Israel, and a man. Gideon is to us both a positive and negative example. We learn as much from his failures as from his success.
We read about Gideon in Judges 6 and 7.
1 The angel of the LORD came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites.
Gideon was from the tribe of Manasseh and the family of Abiezer--not a very distinguished family. His father Joash was not very distinguished, either. Gideon was for his part an undistinguished son.
When we first meet Gideon, he doing something that probably seems odd. He is threshing wheat in a wine press. Threshing was the process of separating the kernels of grain from the wheat stalks. The thresher wraps a sheet around the wheat and pounds it on a rock until the grains separate from the stalks. Then he throws what remains in the air. The wind carries the husks away, leaving only the grain. This is usually done outside where there is a good wind.
A wine press is a circular stone vat. It would not be the best place to thresh wheat, since there would be little wind, and you would probably get grape juice all over your wheat.
So why is Gideon threshing in a wine press? He does not want anyone to see him, lest someone steal his grain. Specifically he is afraid of a people called the Midianites.
At one time, the Midianites were the friends of the Israelites. Now they were their worst enemies. They were desert nomads, who came upon the tribes of Israel like locusts, stealing their crops and goods, and disappearing into the desert again. In Gideon's time, they have become very strong, and deeply feared. No one could stop them, they pillaged wherever they chose.
Then Gideon hears a voice 12 When the angel of the LORD appeared to Gideon , he said, "The LORD is with you, mighty warrior."
Wait a minute. This has to be a mistake. If Gideon were a mighty warrior, he wouldn't be threshing wheat in a wine press. He'd be daring the Midianites to appear. There is no way that anyone would mistake Gideon for a mighty warrior. Yet God sees a mighty warrior in him.
Faith in God doesn't make any practical difference in our lives if we have no faith in ourselves. God may see in us a mighty warrior, but if we do not believe it about ourselves, then we will act like a wimp. The faith to do great things is tied to our faith in ourselves.
This may sound like some new age or positive thinking kind of philosophy, but it is thoroughly based in a Biblical understanding of our nature. It is based upon the sovereignty of God. If God says we are mighty warriors, who are we to doubt His word? If God created us, and if He has promised to give us the strength to endure, then we should also believe that God has in fact given us sufficient gifts to do it, or will give it. To say we are not good enough to do what God says it so call God a liar. We cannot have faith in God without also believing in ourselves.
Immediately, Gideon starts giving God excuses.
First, he says, "God doesn’t care about us.".
13 "But sir," Gideon replied, "if the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our fathers told us about when they said, 'Did not the LORD bring us up out of Egypt?' But now the LORD has abandoned us and put us into the hand of Midian."
Gideon's reaction has been broken in spirit. When thrown into catastrophe our first reaction is to say "God doesn't care about us." Gideon's family had lost most of their crops. The winepress is empty of grapes, because the Midianites took them all. They left some bread, but the took all the joy of the wine with them. What is left is meager and grim.
It is easy to give in to doubt, but it is also the worst thing we can do. Without God, there is no security, not meaning, and no hope. It is also incorrect. God really does still care.
14 The LORD turned to him and said, "Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian's hand. Am I not sending you?"
God in effect said to him. "You say I have abandoned you. I gave you the greatest thing in the world for fixing your problems. I gave you you." Gideon had forgotten that even though he had lost much, he had much, and what he had was sufficient emerge victorious in the crisis.
Gideon was discouraged. Courage is the confidence that we can endure and withstand whatever comes our way. Gideon could only see the obstacles. He had abandoned his goal.
Second, Gideon said "I'm too weak."
15 "But Lord," Gideon asked, "how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family."
16 The LORD answered, "I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites together."
Self doubt equals God doubt. We do not success because we do not believe we can.
Gideon's excuse was that he came from the weakest tribe in Manasseh, and that he was the least in his family. So what? God was still with him.
It's the mathematics of heaven. If finite power is added to God's infinite power, and that is not enough, then is God’s power really infinite. If we are weak and God is strong, then won’t God’s strength completely cover our weaknesses, with infinite power? God says the one thing that can calm us. "I will be with you."
Gideon's third excuse is "But God, how do I know it's really you?"
17 Gideon replied, "If now I have found favor in your eyes, give me a sign that it is really you talking to me. 18 Please do not go away until I come back and bring my offering and set it before you."
.And the LORD said, "I will wait until you return."
Is this is really an angel? Gideon demands proof before he proceeds.
This argument with God is probably Gideon's most rational. It is , however, the mt dangerous and most devastating. We are paralyzed by doubt not just from doubting God’s existence, but from doubting that a specific word from God is really meant for us. If God sent us a letter, we would probably think the mail carrier put in the wrong mailbox!
But God has prepared a surprise for Gideon.
19 Gideon went in, prepared a young goat, and from an ephah of flour he made bread without yeast. Putting the meat in a basket and its broth in a pot, he brought them out and offered them to him under the oak.
20 The angel of God said to him, "Take the meat and the unleavened bread, place them on this rock, and pour out the broth." And Gideon did so. 21 With the tip of the staff that was in his hand, the angel of the LORD touched the meat and the unleavened bread. Fire flared from the rock, consuming the meat and the bread. And the angel of the LORD disappeared.
Gideon sets up an altar, but he does not burn the meat. The angel touches the rock it is on, and fire comes out.
Think of how many times in the Bible God reveals himself in fire.
• To Moses, God appears in fire from the bush.
• To Israel, He appears in fire from a cloud.
• To Elijah, God appears in fire from the sky.
• To Gideon God appears in fire from a rock.
• In Acts, God appears in fire from the heads of the apostles and prophets.
• On the road to Emmaus, the two disciples who met Jesus said they knew him because their hearts burned within them.
God reveals Himself to us still in fire. He puts the fire of the Spirit in our hearts.
Fourth, Gideon fears God more than he loves Him.
22 When Gideon realized that it was the angel of the LORD, he exclaimed, "Ah, Sovereign LORD! I have seen the angel of the LORD face to face!" 23 But the LORD said to him, "Peace! Do not be afraid. You are not going to die."
Verse 22 sounds like a statement of faith, but look closer. He is afraid to be with God. He is sure that God will kill him.
Many who fear God and are too afraid to approach Him. This is not faith. It is just another kind of self-doubt. If we allow our fear of unworthiness to keep us from approaching God, then we can never effectively serve Him.
When I was a boy, I used to see The Wizard of Oz on television every year. I loved the movie up until the part where they meet the Wizard, and that great floating head appears. It scared me so badly that I would leave the room.
But by the end of the movie, though we see that the Wizard is not scary at all. He is a kind and generous man. The big head just there to frighten away those who did not belong there. The real Wizard welcomed them into his presence.
Many people have much the same reaction to God. God really is great, majestic, and fearsome. But do not think that He is inapproachable. He's also good. If God were truly inapproachable, no one would want to be in his presence. We would serve him in fear, like slaves. But God cares about us, and wants us to love Him back. Being God fearing is not enough. We must also have a relationship with Him. That is impossible if we are too afraid.
Those who are His people, His servants, have nothing to fear from Him. They are the ones who are specially blessed out of the whole world. They are His children.
24 So Gideon built an altar to the LORD there and called it The LORD is Peace. To this day it stands in Ophrah of the Abiezrites.
When he lost all his excuses, he got peace.
I wish I could say that Gideon remained faithful all his life, but he did not. He vacillated all his life between faith and doubt. That is the beauty and the glory of God. In order to receive, God's peace, we don't have to have faith yesterday. We don't even have to have faith tomorrow. We just have to believe today. God can uses even struggling and doubtful Christians.
Don't be fooled by the Devil's lies, or blinded by our own self doubt. God is still capable of using you, if you will only believe Him for today.
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