Judges · chapter 6 of 21
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Judges 6 tells how Israel, oppressed by Midian for seven years, cries out to the Lord. The angel of the Lord calls Gideon, a fearful man from the family of Joash in Ophrah, to save Israel. Gideon tears down his father's altar of Baal, the Spirit of the Lord comes on him, and he asks for two signs with a fleece of wool to confirm God's promise.
After forty years of peace following Deborah and Barak, Israel again does evil. Judges 6 opens the longest account of any judge, Gideon, which fills chapters 6 to 8. It is the story of an insecure man whom God calls and strengthens step by step.
Israel does evil, and the Lord gives them into the hand of Midian for seven years. The Midianites, together with the Amalekites and other eastern peoples, invade the land at every harvest, destroy the crops and leave Israel in great poverty, so that the people hide in caves. Israel cries out, and the Lord sends a prophet who reminds them of what God did for them and of their disobedience in worshiping the gods of the Amorites.
The angel of the Lord appears to Gideon, son of Joash the Abiezrite, while he is threshing wheat in a winepress to hide it from Midian. He calls him a mighty man of valor and says that the Lord is with him. Gideon asks why all this has happened, and the Lord commissions him to save Israel. Gideon objects that his clan is the weakest in Manasseh and that he is the least in his family. He asks for a sign, prepares an offering, and the angel makes fire spring from the rock and consume it. Gideon fears he will die, but the Lord gives him peace, and he builds an altar called The Lord Is Peace.
That night, at God's command, Gideon tears down his father's altar of Baal and the Asherah beside it, and offers a bull on a new altar. He does it at night with ten servants because he fears his family and the townspeople. When the town wants to kill him, Joash challenges them to let Baal defend himself, and Gideon is given the name Jerubbaal. Then the Midianites and Amalekites cross the Jordan and camp in the Valley of Jezreel. The Spirit of the Lord clothes Gideon, who summons Abiezer, Manasseh, Asher, Zebulun and Naphtali. Even so, he asks God to confirm his promise with a fleece of wool: first wet with dew while the ground is dry, and then dry while the ground is wet. God does so.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
The angel of the Lord greets Gideon as a mighty man of valor and assures him that the Lord is with him. God sees him for what he will do with God's help, not for the fear that makes him hide.
Gideon answers that his clan is the weakest in Manasseh and that he is the youngest in his house. It is the same excuse many give when God calls them, and the Lord answers it with his presence.
Gideon builds an altar to the Lord there and calls it The Lord Is Peace. After fearing for his life, he discovers that God draws near to give peace, not to destroy him.
The Spirit of the Lord clothes Gideon, who blows the trumpet to gather his clan. His courage does not come from his character but from the power God puts on him.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: Seven years. — Judges 6:1
Answer: He was beating out wheat in a winepress to hide it from the Midianites. — Judges 6:11
Answer: He said his clan was the weakest in Manasseh and that he was the youngest in his father's house. — Judges 6:15
Answer: The Lord Is Peace. — Judges 6:24
Answer: The altar of Baal and the Asherah beside it. — Judges 6:25-26
Answer: That the fleece be dry and the ground around it covered with dew. — Judges 6:39-40
Judges 6 is hopeful for anyone who feels too small. Gideon hides, objects and doubts, and yet God calls him a mighty man of valor and stays with him. In a class or small group we can talk about the difference between feeling inadequate and being without God's presence: only the second is a real lack.
It also matters where Gideon begins: in his own home, tearing down his father's altar. Public obedience starts close by. And the fleece is not a method for deciding; it is a sample of God's patience with a man who already had his word and still wanted more reassurance.
Judges 6 ends with a Gideon strengthened by signs and an army to be gathered. In Judges 7, God will reduce that army from thirty-two thousand to three hundred so that it is clear whose victory it is.
The text does not present it as a method. God had already given him a clear promise, and Gideon asks for proof out of weakness. God is patient, but the Bible encourages us to decide with his Word, prayer and counsel, not by demanding signs.
The text calls him the angel of the Lord and then the Lord himself, and Gideon fears he has seen him face to face. Many Christians see this as an appearance of the Lord before the incarnation; others see a messenger speaking with God's authority.
Wheat was normally threshed in the open, where the wind helped separate the grain. Gideon does it in a winepress, a hidden place, so the Midianites would not steal it, which shows the fear the people lived in.