Messy Obedience: Gideon's Story (Part 2)

Well, if we've not met, my name is Josh and I'm glad you're here. I'm glad you're here. Whatever brought you here today, I'm glad you're here. And I want you to know that you just walked into a room full of people who have not figured it all out yet. People who have and recognize that we have sin and brokenness in our lives.

And in fact, that's exactly why we're here. We're here pursuing the only one who is greater than our sin and brokenness, that's Jesus Christ. And so I know this resonates with you because you're a human and all of us have this nagging thing inside of us, this hungry, insatiable thing inside of us. And it is never quenched without Christ. And so I'm glad you're here.

Wherever you are on the spectrum, if you are here, but you've never really connected beyond Sunday morning gathering. I just want to invite you to what I've been calling more, more that God has more in mind than us just showing up and feeding and going home or showing up and doing something and then complaining on the way home. I don't know. Hopefully you don't do that. Nobody does that.

No, church people do that. Right. But there's more. There's community and there's a place for you to share your gifts and what God has blessed you and, and put passions in you for. And so if you're ready to take a next step, whatever that is, the one thing you can do today, it's an easy first step, is to go to the information desk out in the foyer.

Just introduce yourself, let them know that you're ready to take a step and they'll help you do that. Today we're in week two of a three week series looking at a portion of the life of a guy named Gideon. And we see his story and what God is doing in miraculous ways. We're going to see today he's going to use Gideon to miraculously overcome an undefeatable army in an impossible way. And we find his story in the book of judges.

Last week we said judges is this cycle of a story that's just kind of on repeat. God takes care of his people, he blesses them, he fights for them, he provides everything that they need. And in their blessing, they quickly lose sight of him, that he is the one. And they start to look at themselves as the one that who gave them what they have. And then even worse, they start to look at false gods of the people around them.

And as they give into these false gods and they worship their neighbors gods, then things start to decline because God says, if you do not want me as your God, I will give you what you want and you will not have me as your God. And you will taste what it's like to have me against you. And that's what happens. This cycle repeats. And so God's people, God gives the enemy permission to come in and take them captive to oppress them in their oppression.

They cry out to God in humility because things get difficult. And they remind themselves, oh, man, I forgot, God is the only one who can rescue us. And God hears their cries and he sends a deliverer, a judge to come and deliver his people. And so this is also not. And we talked about this last week, it's not just a cycle of man's sin.

This is a cycle of God's grace, God's love, God's redemption. So we find Gideon, the fifth deliverer of the nation of Israel in this cycle, and he's hiding from the Midianites through threshing wheat inside of a wine press. If that means nothing to you, go back and listen to last week's sermon because it sets up this whole idea of Gideon hiding threshing wheat. But we set up this idea of threshing, because God is not just Gideon's not just threshing wheat, God is threshing Gideon. And Gideon steps out onto that threshing floor.

We called ourselves out onto that threshing floor last because that's the place where God wants to strip from us the things that are waste and chaff. And this will continue this week. Now, we noted this threshing. We can't miss that. Excuse me as I choke to death.

And as we get into chapter seven, we'll see God continue threshing and threshing and threshing until there is no doubt that what's left is God. This is what we're going to see as Gideon is operating in God's power and not his own power. So we start chapter seven. Gideon has blown the trumpet, and now the troops are gathered. He has 32,000 troops, and that sounds pretty good until we see what the enemy is.

Judges 7:1. Early in the morning, Jerub Baal. This is Gideon and all his men camped at the spring of Herod. The camp of Midian was north of them in the valley near the hill of Moreh. And I always like to point out when God gives us details like this in the Bible, part of his intent is for us to recognize these are real people in a real place at a real time.

And in fact, if you travel over there today, you can go to these places. They exist. It's so important that we remind ourselves that this is not just a fairytale bedtime story. This is a true story of how a real God dealt with real people in a real time, in a real place. So don't miss that.

So Gideon and his men are gathered at the spring of Herod. And from this elevated position on the hillside, they could look down into the valley, and they would have been able to see the Midianite army, at least 135,000 warriors. Now, I can imagine how demoralizing this would be. You get there and you. And you come over the hill.

You're like, we got 32,000. And you crest the hill and you're like, ooh, this is not good. This is really not good. And so they're outnumbered by at least four to one at this point. And as crazy as those odds sound, God's like, we can do better than that.

He's about to do some threshing. He's about to make this even worse. Odds, for sure. Verse 2. The Lord said to Gideon, you have too many men.

I cannot deliver Midian into their hands, or Israel would boast against me. My own strength has saved me, now announced to the army. Anyone who trembles with fear may turn back and leave Mount Gilead. And if I'm giddy and I'm thinking, okay, God, it was crazy enough that you asked me to do this, by the way. That was crazy.

And then you brought 32,000. I was like, maybe this is going to be okay. But then we crested the hill, and there's 135,000. And now your story is we have too many. Too many?

Are you crazy? This is ridiculous, by the way. Too many. This makes no sense. But God isn't just trying to win a battle.

He's trying to win their hearts. He's got something more in mind than them just trusting in what's in their hands. And he knows human hearts. He knows us. He knows that we are prone to take credit for things that we should not be taking credit for, for we're all guilty of this.

When the glory should belong to God. We pat ourselves on the back for what we've done. See, if they win with 32,000, then Israel is going to strut back to camp and they'll say, look what we did. Look what we did. But if they win, hopelessly outnumbered, God knows All the credit has to go to him.

So it might sound odd that Gideon would allow anyone that's afraid to leave because you need all that you have, right? But this is actually something that goes back to the book of Deuteronomy. In the book of Deuteronomy, God is preparing his people to be a warring nation. And he instructs them, before you go to battle, one of the things that you should do is say, if you're afraid, go home. And we want those guys to go home.

Because in the heat of battle, nobody wants a coward. Nobody wants somebody that's tucking and running because fear is contagious. And God knows that. And so he says, let them go. It works out great because two thirds of them leave.

Verse 3 tells us that 22,000 men pack up their gear and leave. This leaves 10,000 to face the army of 135,000. But God's not done threshing yet. He continues separating the wheat from the chaff. He's removing what's unnecessary, what's weak, what's holding Gideon back.

See, piece by piece, God is stripping away everything Gideon might lean on and take credit for so that what's left is pure, strong, and fully dependent on him. This is what God's trying to do. God says, 10,000 is still too many. Judges 7, 4. But the Lord said to Gideon, there are still too many men.

Take them down to the water, and I will thin them out for you there. Oh, great. Thanks. If I say this one shall go with you, he shall go. But if I say this one shall not go with you, he shall not go.

Now, the Hebrew word here for that word, thin them out, is actually the word to smelt. Smelting is the process. When you take iron ore or you take metal that's mixed with rock or dirt or something like that, and you put intense heat on this. And as that heat heats up the rock and the metal, the metal melts and sinks to the bottom. And all of the extra impurities, they float to the top.

And that stuff is called dross. And that dross is then skimmed off of the top and thrown out. And what you have left is pure metal. In chapter six, God was doing threshing. That was the verb.

Now he's moved to smelting. He's applying intense heat to this situation to purify Gideon even more, to remove more and more of this useless dross and chaff. Let's keep reading. Verse 5. So Gideon took the men down to the water.

Then the Lord told him, separate those who lapped the water with their tongues as a dog laps from those who kneel down to drink. 300 of them drank from cupped hands, lapping like dogs. All the rest got down on their knees to drink. The Lord said to Gideon, with the 300 men that lapped, I will save you and give the Midianites into your hands. Let all the others go home.

Now, commentators have had tons to say about this little scene. I mean, just endless, endless commentaries about why God chose one group over the other. The most consistent argument here is that God was looking for the type of people that were aware and paying attention. See, the argument goes, well, if they went face first down into the water, then they didn't have situational awareness. But the guys who knelt down and pulled the water up to their face, Those are the Seal Team 6 guys.

These are the guys with their head on a swivel, right? God needs that kind of people to do the kind of work that he's looking to do. Except that doesn't make any sense to me at all. Because the whole point of the story is that God's going to keep winnowing and, and winnowing and winnowing, and he's going to do something impossible with an impossible group of people. He doesn't need Seal Team 6 for that.

However, I might be wrong too, and people have been arguing about it for a long time. Either way, the odds are now 450 to 1, which sounds great. God says, that's just right. I can work with that. Now, no doubt this is absolutely impossible at this point, absolutely impossible unless God does something miraculous.

And I bet Gideon's thinking, well, at least we won't have to fight very long because we'll all be dead.

Verse 8 so Gideon sent the rest of the Israelites home, but kept the 300 who took over the provisions and trumpets of the others. Now the camp of Midian lay below him in the valley. So God has prepared Gideon through multiple rounds of threshing to remove the chaff in his life. He has now smelted down the army to get rid of all of this dross. He has the number of the fighters that he wants, and Gideon is ready, the army is ready.

And now God is going to do something so gracious and generous and kind for Gideon to give him confidence for the fight. Verse 9 During that night, the Lord said to Gideon, get up, go down against the camp, because I'm going to give it into your hands. If you're afraid to attack, go down to the camp with your servant Purah. And listen to what they're saying. Afterward, you will be encouraged to attack the camp.

So he and Purah, his servant, went down to the outpost of the camp. The Midianites, the Amalekites, and all the other eastern peoples had settled in the valley. Thick as locusts, their camels could no more be counted than the sand on the seashore. Gideon arrived at just as a man was telling a friend his dream. I had a dream, he was saying.

A round loaf of barley bread came tumbling into the Midianite camp. It struck the tent with such force that the tent overturned and collapsed. His friend responded, this can be nothing other than the sword of Gideon, son of Joash the Israelite. God has given the Midianites and the whole camp into his hands. When Gideon heard the dream and its interpretation, and he bowed down and worshiped, he returned to the camp of Israel and called out, get up.

The Lord has given the Midianite camp into our. Into your hands. This is so laughable to me. Like, what a perfect time to walk up on a conversation. And then, I love how descriptive it gets when he goes, well, this can be none other than Gideon.

He's like, my name is Gideon son of Joash. My dad's name is Joash the Israelite. I'm an Israelite. This is about me. Like, he can't deny any of that, right?

And so he says, God says, hey, if you're scared, go down in the camp with your pal here. And I want to encourage you. Well, we know he's scared because he goes, and what an incredible gift this moment is.

But God knows exactly what will strengthen Gideon, and he gives it to him. What a gift. And he provides just that boost that he needs. And I love Gideon's response here. It's such a unique response.

It's the exact opposite of the response that he gave in our last chapter, in chapter six. Do you remember that when the angel of the Lord came and called him mighty warrior? And he said, but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the weakest in the least in my family. I.

My me, me. I, I, me, me, me, me, me. All he can see is himself. All he can see is his weakness. But his response here, what does he do?

He worships. How see through all of this threshing and smelting. After this miraculous encouragement, God has finally burned off Gideon so that what's left is useful.

It's miraculous encouragement. Gideon's eyes are no longer stuck on himself. They're lifted and he's looking at God. In photography and film, they use something called forced perspective. It's the trick that makes Buddy the Elf look giant in the movie.

In reality, he's actually 8 or 10ft closer to the camera than everyone else is. I don't know if you knew that. That's how this works. It's an optical illusion. You maybe have done this yourself, where you took a picture that made it look like you had the Eiffel Tower in your hand or like you were holding the sun between your fingers.

Like this. That's what forced perspective is. And the truth is this. Whatever you hold closest to the camera, always what looks the biggest. But here's the truth.

Under that, nothing ever changes size. Nothing ever changes size. All that matters is what's closest to the lens. Gideon's reality hasn't changed. He is still the same guy that was threshing wheat in a winepress.

He is still called to count a or fight a countless army with only 300 men. But in this moment, suddenly, Gideon's problems and his weakness are in their proper place. Because the only thing he can do is lay them at God's feet. And when you lay stuff at God's feet and you step back, you see them as they are, and you see him as he is. When our problems and weaknesses are held close, they always seem bigger than God.

But when we set them down at his feet, when we step back, we see them as they are the same problems, the same exact problems. They shrink to almost nothing. Because under his feet, he is impossibly greater than all other things. See, in this moment, Gideon's perspective is corrected. There's no more forced perspective.

There's proper perspective. The God who spoke the universe into existence, the one who knows every hair on his head, the same God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Joshua. The one who delivered his people from Egypt, is the same God. This is crazy. Don't miss.

This is the same God who spoke to Gideon through a dream of a nameless, faceless enemy. Who was also translated by another nameless, faceless enemy. If God can do that, what can't he do? What a gift of perspective. And with this new perspective, his response is worship.

It's worship. Because when we see God as He is, even in part. Even in part when we see God as He is, we can do nothing else but adore him. And with this proper view of God, this massive army and the ridiculous 450:1 odds, they just fade into the background of the scene. And Gideon says, let's go Boys, God's with us.

And then they do something really crazy. Verse 16. Dividing the 300 men into three companies, he placed trumpets and empty jars in the hands of all of them with torches inside. Watch me, he told them. Follow my lead.

When I get to the edge of camp, do exactly as I do. When I and all who are with me blow our trumpets. Then from all around the camp, blow yours and shout for the Lord and for Gideon. Gideon and the hundred men with him reached the edge of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, just after they had changed the guard, they blew their trumpets and broke the jars that were in their hands. The three companies blew the trumpets and smashed the jars.

Grasping the torches in their left hands and holding in their right hands the trumpets they were to blow. They shouted a sword for the Lord and for Gideon. While each man held his position around the camp, all the Midianites ran, crying out as they fled. When the 300 trumpets sounded, the Lord caused the men throughout the camp to turn on each other with their swords. The army fled to Bethshittah, towards Zeruah, as far as the border of Abel Mahola, near Tabith.

You guys know where those places are? Israelites from Naphtali, Asher, and all of Manasseh, these are tribes of Israel, were called out and they pursued the Midianites. Gideon sent messengers through the hill country of Ephraim, saying, come down against the Midianites and seize the waters of the Jordan ahead of them. And as far as Beth Bara. Now what he means by seize the waters, he sent runners ahead to the people that are all the way to the east.

Because this army of the Midianites had to cross the Jordan river. And that meant that they had to cross it to go back home. And so every safe place to cross, they blocked it so that they could trap them all in and kill all of them. How does God use Gideon and 300 guys with torches and pots and trumpets to defeat an army of 135,000? He does impossible God things.

He sends fear and chaos into the camp. They defeated themselves. Only God can do that. Gideon and his men basically do nothing. Notice it said they just all held their position and they just watched God do his thing.

How awesome is that? They stood firm and they let God do the heavy lifting. The Israelites are rescued from the hand of the Midianites. God blesses them, he restores them. They turn back to him in Gideon's faith.

And what God did that day will be mentioned at least seven more times throughout the Bible. Including the New Testament. And we're standing here today talking about it again. This is one of the most miraculous stories in the Bible, but what does it have to do with us?

I don't know most of your stories, but I would bet some pretty good money you're not calling. You're not being called to fight 135,000 with pots and trumpets and jars. But I do know. I do know this. Every single person sitting in this room and every single person listening online right now has something in their lives right now that they are facing that seems impossible.

All of us, every single person has something in their lives that they are facing right now. Now that seems impossible. And I know some of you are sitting here right now going, josh is talking right to me. But I didn't have to try. This is all of our story.

Maybe it's a broken marriage. Maybe it's a battle with cancer. Maybe it's a job that takes far more from you than it seems to give. Maybe it's a defiant child. Maybe it's a mountain of debt.

Maybe it's an addiction. Maybe it is a sin that you just cannot shake from your life. And if we're honest, we're all more like Gideon, hiding in a wine press, scraping by, hiding out of sight, doing whatever we can to survive, hoping our situation just won't swallow us up. If we could just stay one step ahead of all of this, maybe we can make it. And many of us tell ourselves that life isn't fair.

Maybe God doesn't see us. Maybe God doesn't care. He seems to care about other people, but he doesn't care about me. And so we keep our distance from him. Or worse, we hold all of our hardships against him, reasoning that if he really were good, surely he wouldn't allow this to be happening in my life.

Maybe that's exactly where some of you are today. And just like Gideon, you feel like God just keeps stripping things away, just taking more and taking more and taking more. Opportunities, resources, people that you thought you couldn't live without. And in the moment, I know, I know it can feel like God is taking more than he's giving. But what if the God, the same God who met Gideon in the winepress, is doing the same thing with you?

What if he isn't abandoning you, but he's threshing you? What if he's purposely threshing from you? All of the stuff that keeps allowing you to take credit for every good thing that is in your life while continuing to blame him for every Bad thing that's in your life. What if he's smelting your faith in the furnace of loss? What if he's skimming off the dross so that what remains is faith that's pure and unshakable and usable?

What if what we think is loss is actually preparation?

Because that's how God often works. You don't have to spend much time in the Bible to find stories like this. He meets us in our weakness, not to crush us, but to shape us. He strips away things so that we can have focus, so that he can strengthen us. He narrows things down so that he can put his power on display instead of allowing us to believe that we are the hands that saved us, and he's waiting for us to take the very thing that feels impossible and lay it at his feet.

Stop keeping it right here in our face and lay it at his feet, so that when we step back, we can see it for what it is, and we can see him for what he is, because all of those things are small and temporary and already defeated in the light of his greatness. Remember Gideon's questions in chapter six? I bet you've asked these questions. If the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? If the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us?

Where are all his wonders our ancestors told us about? Maybe you're asking the same question. If the Lord is with me, Josh, if this is so great, if he is so awesome and so powerful, and why am I going through this? Why can't I sleep at night? Because I'm in so much sorrow and grief, why do I keep going back to that same poisoned well?

If the Lord is with us, what about all the great things that I hear about him doing for everyone else? Why is he not doing this for me? And I want you to know, if you're asking these questions, you are not alone. But it's time for you to change your question. It's time for you to change your question.

If this is what I'm going through, what is God doing in my life right now? If this is what I'm going through, if I'm going through a season of refining and threshing and smelting, then what is it that God wants me to pick my head up and see him instead of gazing at my navel all day and thinking about myself, what is it?

The angel's response to Gideon in chapter six is super simple. He says, go in the strength you have. Go in the strength you have. I don't know about you, but I am constantly worried about the strength I don't have and I'm not paying attention to the strength that I do have. The angel says if God is with you, what else do you need?

If God is for you, who can be against you? Paul says maybe it looks like choosing to pray again over the thing that you've been praying for over a hundred times, except this time when you pray about it again, you actually lay it at his feet. Maybe it looks like opening your Bible tomorrow instead of doom scrolling through your phone first thing in the morning. Maybe it looks like confessing a hidden sin in your life to a trusted friend and asking for them to join you in accountability. Maybe it looks like choosing forgiveness towards someone who wronged you even though bitterness tastes pretty sweet on your tongue right now.

Maybe it looks like having that hard but loving conversation that you've been avoiding. Maybe it looks like choosing to worship God even in your doubt, even through tears, because you believe that he is still worthy. Maybe it's as simple as just showing up here again next week and trying. The truth is that if God can take 300 men with pots and trumpets and torches and he can overcome an enemy of 135,000 warriors, then surely whatever you are facing, he is greater than so I'll ask what if God is actually who the Bible says He is? What if he has actually done what he says he has done?

What if this isn't a fairy tale? Church what if we actually stepped out into this world this afternoon and actually believed what we say we believe that the almighty Creator of the universe is for us. What if we believed this? But church, we don't believe this. We don't live like that.

We have to remind ourselves every day when we get stuck in traffic that God's not with us, let alone when we get a real serious thing that we're facing in our lives. But church, what could it look like? What could it look like for the children that are watching us in our homes? What could it look like for the people around us? What could it look like for this community if we actually stepped out and believed the thing that we say, that we believe that Almighty God is for us and not against us.

And I'm begging you today Church, lift your eyes, lift your eyes. Go put the thing under his feet and let it be the size it actually is, and let him be the size he actually is.

What if he truly is so much greater than our fears and our problems and our sin and our battles?

Judges 7 is about a God who brings salvation in a way that no one else can take credit for. He flips impossible odds on their heads. He takes what looks weak and defeated and finished and dead, and he resurrects it. Our God is in the business of making dead things breathe.

This isn't just Gideon's story. This is the gospel story. Gideon is just a poor reflection in the muddy water of the greatest deliverer who would come. Jesus himself. Jesus who came to this earth.

He humbled himself. He took off all of his heavenly glory. He came as a baby, humbled himself. He lived a perfect life. He died a sinner's death.

And he took our sin and our brokenness and our problems and our sickness to the grave with him. And he killed Death. Death is dead to him.

No one has ever overcome death but Jesus Christ. And if he is for us, who can be against us? Nothing. Jesus is the ultimate deliverer. And one day he will return and he will deliver us all once and for all.

Everyone who is in him will rise with him, and we will be delivered and get to experience the fullness of his kingdom as God wants us to, in full communion with Him. But for now, we're here, and our eyes will always drift and our perspective will always be forced in the wrong direction.