In the story of the angel of the Lord and Gideon, I think about two questions in relation to you and I in today's world. But first, we find Gideon in Judges 6, and more about his life in some detail on Who was Gideon in the Bible? | GotQuestions.org
The Children of Israel had been released from slavery when God told Moses to go to Pharaoh and tell him that God said he must let them go. But the problem with them was, they weren't really all that happy once they got free. They felt that it might have been better to still be slaves rather then to be in the desert heading for the Promised Land. Even though God was providing all they needed on their journey there. It turned out that they began to worship other gods. This was a 'no-no" of course, where God was concerned, and they paid a price for their disobedience to him. It was so bad at some point later, that the Midianites took to hiding in caves.However, God gave them over to the Midianites who for scven years destroyed their animals and crops. Until finally, they cried out to God for help.Why should God hear them. After all, they had really been disobedient to him for all that time. Still he did. He sent Gideon to their aide.
When the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, he said, "The Lord is with you, mighty warrior." Gideon replied, "Pardon me, my Lord, but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us. Where are all the wonders that our ancestors told us about, whey they said, "Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?" Now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hands of the Midan."
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?"
Gideon was a man of God, but he still did not understand what the people were doing wrong.
And he was not too sure about this thing that the Lord was telling him to do. He asked God how he could do it. He said his clan was the weakest in Manasseh and he was the weakest of his family.
But that didn't stop God, of course. He told him to go and he would be with Gideon who would strike down the enemy, leaving no one alive.
So my question here was two-fold.
1 Have you ever, as a Christian, at some point turned away from God. Maybe not your belief in him. Maybe just interested in other things that have gotten your attention too much. Have your worshiped those things and put them first before God"
I know I have at times. But thankfully God, is always at the ready to forgive us, just as he did the Children of Israel that did when they turned to other gods. Oh, they paid the price. Just as we have to some times. But because we belong to God, we have the same promise of his love and grace that they had.
2, Have you ever felt too weak to deal with a situation in your life. With your own family? Have you ever felt the least of your family? Have you made decisions in your life that was less then popular with your family. Even so far as God and/or your faith is concerned.
Again, I know I have. Many times. I have struggled with these things most of my life even though as I have gotten older, I have done what my sister had said once about another family member, "He needs to grow a backbone."
Indeed I needed to grow a backbone especially for spiritual matters, and for the most part I have done that as I as the years have gone on. In doing that has come having a closer relationship with the Lord. And sometimes my decisions about my faith were not popular within my family.
Gideon's own father worshiped the idol of Baal along with other wooden gods that the people worshiped. And so Gideon and ten other men went into the village to cut down those idols. When they saw this, the people went to Gideon's father and told him they were going to kill him. His father said that if Baal was real, he would punish the one that had done it.
But guess what? Baal wasn't real. He couldn't lay a finger on Gideon or any one else for that matter. When the people saw this, they turned back to the God that was real. The one that loved them enough to save them from their enemies. Your God. My God.
Gideon was afraid of what his father might do, no doubt. He considered himself to be the weakest of his family. But he did what God called him to do and even his family could not fight him on it.
And so Gideon was ready for God to save Israel through him.'
Still he wanted to be sure that the angel of the Lord was really God. And so he asked God for proof of who he was. What was this proof and did God really supply it? He certainly didn't have to prove who he was. . Come back tomorrow for this part of the Gideon's story.
Today's bible reference: Judges 6:1-16, 27-31, 36
September 6, 2019 Promise:And he said, "My presence shall go with you and I shall give you rest." Exodus 33:14
Thanks for coming by today Friends. I hope you will come back tomorrow for more of Gideon's story. God bless!
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