| Vol. 11, No. 1, Jan. - Feb. 1982 |
Harry Foster
"Therefore on that day he called him Jerubbaal ...
Then all the Midianites ... assembled themselves ...
But the Spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon;"
Judges 6:32-34
GOD'S command to Gideon was: "Go in this thy might" (Judges 6:14). No-one could have been more surprised than Gideon to hear himself addressed in this way, for he clearly was quite unaware of the fact that he had any might in which to go. And, of course, it is true that in himself he had none. This is in keeping with the other personalities who emerged in those long years of Israel's weakness and confusion when they had no king. The judges who were so greatly used of God from time to time were people who suffered from severe handicaps. They were weak in themselves, like Gideon. They were despised by their fellows, like Jephtha. They were ignoble, like Samson. Indeed their list sounds rather like the description of the Corinthians: they were [10/11]"foolish", the "weak", the "base" and the "despised"; they were "the things that are not". But they were chosen by God (1 Corinthians 1:27-18).
Notice the word "chosen". It was not chance that God had no better instruments. He is not described as having to make the best of poor material because there was nothing else available. No, He chose them because He needed people like that. Gideon's story is a wonderful illustration of the fact that the condition for divine power is human weakness. God found Gideon weak, and He took care to keep him weak. Yet at the same time He told him to go in his might. The reality of that God-given might is quite spectacular. The man who knows that he is without strength to do God's service; the man who sees what strength he thought he had being taken away; the man who nevertheless goes forward in faith; this is the man whom God can use. There are three significant words in the verses quoted above: "Therefore", "Then" and "But".
This first word refers to the breaking down of Baal's altar. When God calls us to venture out in faith, there is often some practical matter which must be dealt with straight away. Gideon was told to throw down his father's altar to Baal. It may well have been the most difficult action which Gideon ever performed, for God has a way of confronting us with a major test at the very beginning of our service for Him. And it was in his own home.
The title 'Baal' simply means lord or master. In Gideon's home there was a shrine to another god, to one who was a rival to the allegiance which should have been reserved alone for Jehovah. Gideon had raised his own private altar, and called it Jehovah-shalom (v.24), but what value can our private altar have if it is contradicted in the eyes of men by subservience to rival claims; He was told, therefore, to erect a public altar "on the top of this stronghold ..." (v.26). The challenge was so great that he was afraid to do it by daytime, so he did it by night. This is in keeping with what we know of the man and of the whole book of Judges, but we need not be too concerned with how or when he did it so long as we realise that faith involves obedience. Gideon might have been what we call a coward (who of us isn't?), but having heard the Lord's voice, he obeyed. "Therefore" all the rest of the victory was made possible.
When the new day dawned, everybody concerned knew what Gideon had done, they knew that here was a man who was deliberately rejecting all other governments but that of Jehovah. Gideon may well have been tempted to by-pass this matter and get on with the task of delivering Israel. Suppose that he had done so, and suppose that the Lord had overlooked his fault and still sent Gideon on to battle and to victory. When it was all over, there would have been a question as to whether Baal or even Gideon himself might have some of the glory. The Lord will not give His glory to any other. Gideon understood this and "therefore ...".
His neighbours wanted the deliverance, but they wanted the grove and the altar of Baal as well. This is always true of human nature. Utterness of committal to the Lord is not a popular matter, so that the man who rejects human ability or human fame, to venture all on the sufficiency of the Lord, is bound to be misunderstood. It is no small thing to make firewood of what has previously been esteemed and to lay everything on the altar of the Lord.
Gideon's first act of obedience brought him a wonderful proof of the faithfulness of God. He did not die. He knew the joy of total committal to the Lord. But what then? Popularity? Comfort and ease? No, for committal to God is no story-book experience of that but rather of further conflict. "Then" -- that is, as soon as he had acquired his new name of victory -- "the Midianites and the Amalekites and the children of the east assembled themselves together". Later on we are told that these hordes "lay along in the valley like locusts for multitude; and their camels were without number ..." (7:12).
It is a spiritual fact that as soon as any man or group of men do what Gideon did, they may expect a big reaction from the kingdom of darkness. In the New Testament language what Gideon had done was to deny himself and take up his cross. This is the only way to spiritual power but it is bound to provoke serious opposition.
Gideon's hostile neighbours now seem as nothing compared with this vast army of enemies. Our deliverances too often do not provide an [11/12] afterwards of ease, but rather still greater testing. This is a most important truth; but the testing is for further and greater victories. Therefore we must not question, doubt or withdraw. We may wonder what is wrong. Well, nothing is wrong. This threat from the enemy is the most logical and necessary part of a movement forward in faith. The Bible gives many instances of similar experiences to this of Gideon's which is introduced by the word "Then".
Following the "therefore" and the "then", we now come to the "But" of God's answer. This is the might in which Gideon was to go forward: "But the Spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon". At first this may have seemed a very small and inadequate answer to such a gigantic problem, yet the rest of the dramatic story of deliverance and victory was all consequent upon this one simple action by God. He clothed Himself with Gideon (v.34 m.). This was the means by which Gideon was enabled to go forth in his "might". There does not seem to have been any very striking change in the man himself. He appeared to be just as timorous as ever, so much so that one almost loses patience with him in his hesitation and continual request to God for signs and confirmations. It is good to notice that the Lord did not lose patience with him. He gave the requested sign. In response to Gideon's doubts, He gave yet a further sign. And then He added one last and unasked for sign of confirmation in order to encourage His faint-hearted servant. This is typical of our gracious and patient Lord.
Gideon had little enough reason for feeling mighty. A good proportion of the first crowd which rallied to him was thankful enough to be excused and allowed to go home away from the battle. A further substantial number, who were ready to stay on, were judged unsuitable and so had to be rejected. If it had been Gideon's own might which was called for, then this group was pitifully small, but the might was God's rather than his, so he had to be content with the assurance that three hundred were quite sufficient for God.
So victory came, though the means served to stress Gideon's lack of might rather than any special prowess of his. And even after the first resounding triumph, when he was pursuing the foe, nobody would help him because nobody thought that he had a chance of full victory. "Faint but pursuing" (8:4) was the phrase used to describe him. It is an honourable phrase which we might well seek to merit in our own life for God, but it is hardly suggestive of overwhelming might or competence. It is always on the basis of human weakness that the Lord most wonderfully demonstrates His might.
This is our might too -- to know that we are in God's hands and that the issue is His concern.
There are times when all seems impossible -- "But God ...". In this case it is definitely attributed to the Spirit of God and the method of His expression of His victorious power is that He clothed Himself with Gideon. This is very striking. It does not say that Gideon was clothed with the Spirit, but puts it the other way round. If a man clothe himself with a coat, he takes the coat with him wherever he goes, making it a part of his own movements and activities. Very often we would like to use the Holy Spirit in this way, to 'put Him on', as it were, and so to be able to associate Him with our own movements and actions. It was precisely the reverse in Gideon's case: the Lord was the Owner of the clothing while he, Gideon, was but the garment. This is the divine way. The Lord will provide the life. He only needs us as members through whom to operate and express Himself. So it is that we are told to present our members as instruments (or weapons) of righteousness (Romans 6:13).
Gideon illustrates for us the Lord's method of dealing with difficulties, not by removing them but by rising up in new power in our lives as we have to face them. His answer to the foe's "Then" is the "But" of divine power which is more than its match. "When the enemy comes in like a flood, then the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him" (Isaiah 59:19).
This is not only a truth for great leaders, but equally for each single believer. There are reasons for supposing that when Paul wrote to the Corinthians, his mind often reverted to the book of Judges. He wrote of the treasure in earthen vessels, which is surely a reference to the manner by which Gideon defeated the Midianites. He may well have been thinking of the second sign with the fleece when he wrote: "So then death worketh in us, but life in you" (2 Corinthians 4:12). It may well be, then, that his reference to God's use of the weak, foolish and base things made [12/13] at the beginning of the first Letter indicates that any Corinthian believer, yes, and any believer of our time too, can put himself in the place of such as Gideon.
God does not command us to go forward in the spiritual conflict in any might of our own. When He spoke those words to Gideon, He knew, even better than the speaker did, of what poor material he was made. "It cannot be I," the chosen man said, "for I belong to the poorest family and I am least in that family." But it was he. The Lord had given a different slant on him when originally He appeared and said to him: "The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour" (16:12), and that was because the Lord looks on us not as we are in ourselves but in what His grace can make us. Peter is so called, not because there is anything rocklike in him but because of God's ability to transform him. We are told that we are "more than conquerors" not because there is any hope of victory in us as we are in ourselves, but because that is what God does with those who are "in Christ".
As we have already quoted, God deliberately chose people like the Corinthians. He did not just tolerate them. He did not have to put up with them because the mighty and noble refused to let Him use them. No, we are all "chosen" in Christ because God's strength is made perfect in human weakness. If, like Gideon, we feel that God is so strangely reducing even the strength that we thought we had, or if it can be said of us in our circumstances that we are "faint but pursuing", then let us not lose heart but take courage from the story of Gideon; let us build our private altar of Jehovah-shalom, the Lord our Peace, and let us believe that even to such as us the Lord is saying: "Go, in this thy might". We may confidently expect the Spirit to rise up within us and be our sufficiency.
And let us not forget to follow Gideon's example in refusing to take any glory for ourselves. When he was offered a throne, he made the truly spiritual reply: "I will not rule over you, neither shall my sons rule over you; the Lord shall rule over you" (8:23). To Him be all the glory!
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