![]() By consuming the food with fire, the angel of the Lord revealed that He was actually God. So Gideon devised a test: he prepared a generous food gift, as if for a sacrifice, and laid it on a rock. The angel gave Gideon a commission that Gideon hesitated to accept. The angel of the Lord sat down under an oak tree next to where Gideon was working. Using a wooden instrument called a flail, Gideon laboriously pounded the grain in his father’s wine press – a pit dug out of rocky ground. Out of fear of the Midianites, however, Gideon threshed his grain in secret. Usually Gideon would have used oxen to thresh wheat on the community threshing floor. Gideon was threshing wheat in a rocky hollow usually used for crushing grapes, trying to keep out of sight of the invaders. ![]() But since God wanted to be recognized as the true deliverer, He chose an insignificant man as His instrument. When the Israelites finally turned to God, He gave them a conqueror. Politically and spiritually weak, the Israelites were no match for the invaders. These dreaded raiders rode on camels and brought their animals to graze on Israelite land in the spring when barley and wheat were growing in the fields. The Midianites were fierce desert nomads who banded together to make raids on the crops and animals of the Israelites. ![]() The Midianites (from southeast of Israel), Amalekites (from the south), and some eastern nomads were annually raiding the Israelites. ![]() Click here for The Book of Judges: The Big Picture ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |