20. The Person of Gideon, the Fifth Judge

The Person of Gideon, the Fifth Judge

"And there came an angel of the Lord, and sat under an oak which was in Ophrah, that pertained unto Joash the Abiezrite: and his son Gideon threshed wheat by the winepress, to hide it from the Midianites. And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him, and said unto him, The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour. And Gideon said unto him, Oh my Lord, if the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where be all his miracles which our fathers told us of, saying, Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? but now the Lord hath forsaken us, and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites. And the Lord looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might, and thou shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites: have not I sent thee? And he said unto him, Oh my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? behold, my family is poor in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house. And the Lord said unto him, Surely I will be with thee, and thou shalt smite the Midianites as one man. And he said unto him, If now I have found grace in thy sight, then show me a sign that thou talkest with me. Depart not hence, I pray thee, until I come unto thee, and bring forth my present, and set it before thee. And he said, I will tarry until thou come again. And Gideon went in, and made ready a kid, and unleavened cakes of an ephah of flour: the flesh he put in a basket, and he put the broth in a pot, and brought it out unto him under the oak, and presented it. And the angel of God said unto him, Take the flesh and the unleavened cakes, and lay them upon this rock, and pour out the broth. And he did so. Then the angel of the Lord put forth the end of the staff that was in his hand, and touched the flesh and the unleavened cakes; and there rose up fire out of the rock, and consumed the flesh and the unleavened cakes. Then the angel of the Lord departed out of his sight. And when Gideon perceived that he was an angel of the Lord, Gideon said, Alas, O Lord God! for because I have seen an angel of the Lord face to face. And the Lord said unto him, Peace be unto thee; fear not: thou shalt not die." (Judges 6:11-23)

It would seem that synchronising with the prophet’s message there was this extremely active man, Gideon, in the secrecy of his father’s home. He was threshing wheat in a winepress. We may think this is a very odd place to be threshing wheat, he ought to be in the threshing floor, well that was the normal place, but then Gideon was living in abnormal times. We have seen already in this book that many abnormal things were done. So here was Gideon threshing wheat in the winepress. One obvious reason for this is that there was no-one to gather in the harvest of the olives for the simple reason that the harvest did not exist, the Midianites had destroyed it; there were no olives to press in order to get the oil, or to be used for other purposes, the Midianites had destroyed all that was available. But there was some wheat, and Gideon was threshing it in order to hide it so that the Midianites might not obtain it. This man was very much concerned about some food being available for the people of God; a very useful kind of man to have in our companies today, a man who was concerned to provide real nourishing food for the people of God. I believe Paul was that kind of man, and he was a man of very great discernment. If the people of God required milk because of their spiritual condition he fed them with milk, if they were capable of partaking of strong food then he fed them with strong food. In spiritual wisdom and discernment he fed them with the food that was convenient for them. We remember that the Lord asked the disciples at one juncture if they had any food, and they had not, they said, "There is a lad here, who hath five barley loaves and two small fishes; but what are they among so many?" (John 6:9). Well it was certainly more than they had, and they were the ’great’ disciples who had been so blessed by the Lord. They had not got anything to give, but the little boy had something, and when the Lord took it into His hands He expanded it so that a large multitude was fed. As one has so aptly said, ’Little is much, if the Lord is in it’. So Gideon was found threshing wheat, he was concerned about food being supplied. Dear brethren, are we concerned about providing something that is nourishing, something that is helpful for the saints in the Bible readings, in the ministry meetings, in addresses if the opportunity arises to address the saints of God? Are we concerned that they might have some real good food? The best food of all, of course, is our Lord Jesus Christ, and if we can minister Him to the hearts of the saints and build up their affections and desires then we are doing a good work. He is the bread from heaven (John 6:30-59), the bread of God. If we want to have the enjoyment of eternal life as presented in John 6:1-71 it means that we feed upon Him, we eat His flesh and drink His blood. We are reminded too that we are to "grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ" (2 Peter 3:18). I believe this involves feeding upon Him, His glories, His Person, His work, everything connected with Him. This is real food, and builds up the affections of the saints. We want to beware of the kind of food that the sons of the prophets provided (2 Kings 4:38-41). It may have seemed a very nourishing meal when it was cooking, it might have been a very large meal, but it was a large meal sprinkled with some very poisonous gourds. There was "death in the pot", and he was the man who could rectify matters by casting in the handful of meal and what was poisonous was made nourishing. Today we have to beware of many sanctimonious statements which are made, but which are liberally sprinkled with quotations from the Scriptures and yet "there is death in the pot". It is not the truth and cannot stand the light of scripture. It is poisonous and evil and will not nourish the people of God.

Gideon was a man who was active, energetic, and was providing something worthwhile for the saints of God. It was to this kind of man that the angel of the Lord appeared and addressed in such a remarkable way, "The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour". Had he done anything outstanding to warrant such a description, a mighty man of valour? All that we know of him is that he was threshing wheat in this winepress. Was this a courageous, valiant thing to do? In the sight of God it was. It is so easy for us to look back and say, ’Oh, this or that servant of the Lord made a mistake. He ought to have been more intelligent. This or that servant of the Lord ought to have gone a little further, he did not know the full scope of the truth’. It is all right to say that when we do not know the circumstances in which these servants were operating. It is all right saying this when we are not aware of the awful conditions that prevailed at the time. It was a courageous, valiant thing to take a step out of the confusion and say something for the Lord.

We often say that the Reformation did not go far enough, that they ought to have gone a few steps further and got rid of many other things that were untrue, but how valiant those men were, how courageous! They risked their lives, their all, in fighting for what they knew to be the truth at that time. Let us think of what we might have done had we been in their position. Would we have risked our lives, our property, our loved ones by standing up for the truth in that day? I do not know if we would have. We have to wait until we are in those circumstances before we can make positive statements as to how we react in them. Gideon was working in a very difficult time, the enemies were out to destroy everything, and he said, ’I am not going to let them. I am going to risk all that belongs to me in order to provide this food’. This is why the Lord said he was "a mighty man of valour". He said something else also, "The Lord is with thee".

If we have the time and look through a concordance and find all the persons who were addressed in this way, "The Lord is with thee", or those of whom it could be said, "The Lord was with them" we will find it an extremely interesting study, and pre-eminently this was so in connection with the Lord Jesus Himself. When Peter was preaching in the home of Cornelius in Acts 10:1-48 he said, "[Jesus] went about doing good..... for God was with him" (v.38). What a wonderful thing that is when God is with anyone; then he can be sure of support and power and blessing and fruitfulness. This always follows in the life of the servant of whom it can be said, "the Lord was with them".

Gideon’s reaction to this was "if the Lord be with us.....". The angel did not say the Lord was with them, he said the Lord was with Gideon, not with the nation, but Gideon took it up as if it were the nation that was being referred to, and said, "If the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us?". ’Why, our fathers have told us of wonderful times and now we are in very, very bad conditions, why has this befallen us?’ The Lord replied, "Go in this thy might, and thou shalt save Israel". What was Gideon’s might? It was the conscious sense that things were not what they ought to be, that things were different from what they used to be, and that there was the desire in his heart to do something to rectify them. You see, dear brethren, if we are conscious that in our own lives, and in the collective testimony, things are not as good as they used to be it will make us inquire why, and once we get to know we will be very much concerned, and prayer and energy will be spent in order to do something to make it better. But if we go along quite complacently saying, ’Well, everything is all right’, and not be much concerned, I do not think things will get better. When we act as Gideon, then things are going to get better because the Lord is going to link up with us in our exercises. This is the kind of thing that He delights to see, and so Gideon is accredited as having strength and power because he actually felt, in a Godlike way, the conditions that prevailed.

Now Gideon replied, "O my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? Behold, my family is poor in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house. And the Lord said unto him, Surely I will be with thee", whether the conditions are good or bad, here is the proper condition for any saint of God. The condition of humility before the Lord. It is easy to say this, but we have a nature in us that can feed on pride and prominence and pre-eminence and anything but humility. But all the men of God who have really done anything for the Lord have been men who have been marked by humility, none more than the Lord Himself. Php 2:5-11, that we so often read at the breaking of bread to describe the Lord coming down, was written by Paul under the guidance of the Holy Spirit to show the saints of God that they should be as He was when He was here in this world, and the two great features that come out in that passage are humility and obedience. He humbled Himself, He came down, made Himself of no reputation, took upon Him the form of a servant, and then became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. The apostle prefaced what he said by the words, "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus". We are to be humble, we are to be obedient; and these are the characteristics for every Christian who wants to be for God. Arrogance, pride and forcefulness, the assertion of our natures, have no place whatsoever in the testimony of any who want to be for the Lord. And so Gideon is described here in this very, very commendable way, as a valiant man, the Lord is with him, and he is marked by humility.