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Now, in this chapter, we get the aftermath of the very famous Gideon story in Judges chapter 7, where Gideon takes 300 men, they have the trumpets and the pictures, they cry out the sword of the Lord and of Gideon, and end up routing this innumerable multitude of Midianites. And what we see in this chapter is something that we see a lot in the Bible, which is how stories actually turn out, and the Bible actually is so real about the way it doesn't just show the great victories and the great successes of men of God, but it actually also shows some of the negative things and some of the bad things that happen afterward. And that's one of the great things about the Bible, even just as literature. Of course, we know the Bible is the Word of God without error, and that it's a spiritual book, but even this world acknowledges the fact that the Bible is also great literature. Whereas if you think about really cheap, kind of just cartoonish stories, they pretty much just end with everybody living happily ever after. But that's not really the way that the world works. Even after a great spiritual victory, there's no guarantee that things are going to continue to go well or that God's people are going to continue to succeed and thrive. And in this chapter, we see Gideon's failures a little bit as a leader, and some of his human weakness. He's not a perfect person. But even more so than that, we see the failures and the negative things about the people that are following him, about the Israelites in general. And so this is a pretty negative chapter from start to finish, and there are certain themes that carry through the chapter from start to finish that I'm going to bring out this morning. Now, the first thing we see is in verse number one, under the men of Ephraim, excuse me, chapter eight, verse one. And the men of Ephraim said unto him, Why is thou served us thus, that thou callest us not, when thou winnest the fight with the Midianites, and they did chide with him sharply? Okay, so here Gideon has had this great victory and defeated the Midianites. You'd expect the Israelites to be thankful and to be happy that he has delivered them from this oppressive enemy. But yet instead of thanking him, they attack him and pick him apart. And then let's come back to that. But just go to the last verse of the chapter, and we'll see in verse number 35, Neither showed they kindness to the house of Jerubel, namely Gideon, according to all the goodness which he had showed unto Israel. So again, this is a theme that goes through this chapter, verse one, and the last verse of the chapter are both saying what? The people did not appreciate what Gideon had done for them. And so when we do great works for God, we're not always going to get human recognition for the things that we do. And that's okay, because when we serve God, we should be doing it for the right reasons. We should be serving the Lord. Let's face it, the people of this world are often going to let us down and disappoint us with the fact that they're attacking us for no reason, criticizing us for no reason, negative toward us, not thankful when we do them a favor. Life involves dealing with sinful people. And especially when you're in the ministry, you're going to deal with a lot of problem people and people that are just ungrateful or negative. And that's just that's just part of the job. And so Gideon's dealing with some bad followers in this chapter, because he's got the men of Israel attacking him in verse one. And then all the way at the end of the chapter again, they don't have proper appreciation for what he's done for them. Now what exactly are they saying here in verse number one, you know, why didn't you call us to fight against the Midianites? Now, if we just back up a couple verses, in chapter seven, verse 24, it says, and Gideon sent messengers throughout all Mount what, Ephraim, these are the people that are complaining. He sent messengers throughout all Ephraim saying, come down against the Midianites and take before them the waters under Beth Bara and Jordan. So he did call them but what they're actually mad about is that he didn't call them in the beginning in the initial assault. Now if you remember the story in Judges chapter seven, in the initial assault, he only takes 300 men with him, because God specifically has told him that if he brings too many people with him, then Israel is going to vaunt themselves and take credit for the battle. God wants to get all the glory. So when Gideon initially had 32,000 people, God said, this is too many. They send home the 22,000 that are afraid. There are 10,000 left. God says 10,000 is too many. So God ends up instructing him and guiding him to send home 9,700 people and only to use 300 men in the assault. Now the Ephraimites are getting angry at him saying, well, why weren't we invited? Why weren't we called to come to the battle? Why didn't you call us? Now this is a wicked attitude on the part of the Ephraimites because it shouldn't matter who gets to participate or who gets the credit or the glory. All that should matter to us as Christians is that the work of the Lord gets done. We should just be happy anytime people are being saved, anytime missions are taking place, anytime something great happens for God, we should just be glad that the work's getting done. It's not about who gets to take credit for it or who gets to participate. We are supposed to be a team all working together toward the same cause for the Lord. But these people are desirous of vain glory and they're also probably just desirous of material spoils of just wanting to get the booty and the plunder from the battle. And so these people are wicked in this attitude that they have toward Gideon. So look how Gideon answers them. He said to them, what have I done now in comparison of you? Is not the gleaning of the grapes of Ephraim better than the vintage of Abiezer? God hath delivered into your hands the princes of Midian, Oreb, and Zeb. What he's saying is, look, you guys showed up at the end and you actually got to defeat the princes and you got to actually win this big battle, you know. And he says, what was I able to do in comparison of you? Then their anger was abated toward him when he had said that. So what we see here is that Gideon is practicing the principle of a soft answer turns away wrath. So he actually tells them, look, you guys are a more prosperous nation than where I come from anyway. You guys have a powerful nation and you have all this wealth and everything. And you came in in the most important part of the battle and defeated Oreb and Zeb. Why don't you just be happy with that? You know, you guys are better than me. What could I even do in comparison of you? And then that placates them and that satisfies them. So I will, on the one hand, give Gideon credit for defusing the situation, being smart about the way that he handled it, and using a soft answer to turn away wrath. However, at the same time, though, this is not really the simplest answer that he could have given them. And it really isn't the most spiritual answer that he could have given them. And what we're going to see here is that this is the beginning of a pattern throughout this chapter of Gideon being less spiritual about the way that he does things and about the way he communicates with people. So right here, wouldn't it have made a lot of sense for him to just tell them, you know what? God told me to only bring 300 people. God did a miracle. You know, this wasn't even my victory. God actually performed a miracle and God specifically told me, obviously it was insane to go there with 300 people. The only reason I did that is because it was God's word that told me to do that. That would have been a better answer. What he did was okay. And he's still following a biblical principle and he's still being humble and he's still fixing the problem. But by using flattery to just tell them, oh, you guys are so great. You guys are so much better than me anyway. You know, this is not really the ideal way of handling the situation because he should have spoken unto them the word of the Lord and actually talked about how it was God that did it and it was God that won the victory for them. But again, the bigger problem is on the side of the Israelites, the Ephraimites specifically for having this wicked, vainglorious, ungrateful, uh, unspiritual attitude. Let's keep going in the chapter here and see how this plays out. In verse number four, Gideon came to Jordan and passed over. He and the 300 men that were with him faint yet pursuing them. And he said unto the men of Succoth, give I pray you loaves of bread unto the people that follow me for they be faint and I'm pursuing after Zeban Zalmana, the kings of Midian. And the princes of Succoth said, are the hands of Zeban Zalmana now in thine hand that we should give bread unto thine army? And Gideon said, therefore, when the Lord had delivered Zeban Zalmana into my hand, then I will tear your flesh with thorns of the wilderness and with briars. And so we see here that the attitude of these people, the Ephraimites had a wicked attitude. Well here's a different wicked attitude, one that is basically again, ungrateful for what Gideon's doing, but also an attitude of, well, I'm not really going to get on the Lord's side until I see how things turn out. You know, maybe the Midianites are going to win and I don't want to make bad blood with the Midianites. And so I don't want to get all in with Gideon and the sword of the Lord and Gideon. You know, I'd rather just kind of see how this plays out and hedge my bets. So these people, they're not getting on the Lord's side. They're basically just kind of being neutral or staying out of it and even talking a little bit of smack toward the people of God. Okay. And so Jesus said in the New Testament, you know, he that is not with me is against me and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad. And so these people should have gotten all in on the Lord's side, been a blessing to the man of God, been a blessing to the people of God that are doing the most work for God and on the front lines serving God. But yet they have this wicked attitude. And then Gideon gives them this answer of, well, you know, when I come back successfully, I'm going to tear your flesh with thorns and briars. I'm going to put you in a world of hurt. Let's keep going. And Gideon went up thence to Penuel and spake unto them likewise and the men of Penuel answered him as the men of Succoth had answered him. And he spake also unto the men of Penuel saying, when I come again at peace, I will break down this tower. Now Zeban and Zalmana were in Carcor and their hosts with them, about 15,000 men, all that were left of all the hosts of the children of east for there fell 120,000 men that drew sword and Gideon went up by the way of them that dwelt in the tents on the east of Noba and Jogbeha and smote the host for the host was secure and when Zeban and Zalmana fled, he pursued after them and took the two kings of Midian, Zeba and Zalmana and discomfited all the hosts. Discomfited means he basically scattered them, confused them, defeated them, and he's able to capture the two kings as their men go fleeing in a bunch of different directions. So Gideon shows himself once again to be a mighty man of valor as God had identified him back in chapter six. He is truly the same person that he was in chapter six. He's still humble. He was humble with the Ephraimites. And then here he's again showing himself to be a mighty man of valor, traveling through the night, chasing after them, even when he's faint, even when he's tired, he keeps on pushing. He wins the battle. He defeats Zeba and Zalmana, says in verse 13, and Gideon, the son of Joash, returned from battle before the sun was up and caught a young man of the men of Succoth and inquired of him. And he described unto him the princes of Succoth and the elders thereof, even three score and ten men. Note that number, three score and ten men, okay? So the princes of Succoth are three score and ten, there's 70 of them, and he came unto the men of Succoth and said, Behold, Zeba and Zalmana, with whom ye did abraid me, saying, are the hands of Zeba and Zalmana now in thine hand, that we should give bread unto thy men that are weary. And he took the elders of the city and thorns of the wilderness and briars, and with them he taught the men of Succoth, and he beat down the tower of Penuel and slew the men of the city. Now what we see here is that Gideon doesn't seem to be taking orders from God anymore or following the Lord's will. He seems to be on his own personal agenda right now of just personal vindictiveness and vengeance because it's one thing to slay the Midianites, it's one thing to slay these enemy combatants that had come into the land, but now he's actually killing his fellow Israelites just for not getting involved in the battle, just for not participating and taking care of them. And so this seems to be going a little too far to just be torturing people with thorns and briars and killing people, and it's his own vindication. He's not talking about spiritual things. He's not talking about the Lord anymore. Now it's just, you know, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that, and you know, you upbraided me, you talked smack to me, and now I'm gonna teach you a lesson. And so he's basically just taking revenge on these guys, okay? And he's saying, you know, you said that I couldn't do it, and I did do it, and so now I'm gonna punish you. And here's the thing, you know, in life, there are gonna be people that don't get on board with us, even when we're doing something great for God and we're trying to serve God, and in your personal life, you're trying to win souls, you're trying to lead your family in a godly way. Not everybody's gonna be on your side. Not everybody's gonna support you. Not everybody is going to contribute to the cause. But that doesn't just give you an excuse to just turn around and just slaughter those people, right? And again, going back to what I preached about a week or two ago, this is like when James and John come to the city of the Samaritans, and the Samaritans don't want to help out the ministry of Jesus as he's passing through that area on his way to Jerusalem. They don't want to receive Jesus. They don't want to receive the apostles. They don't want to participate. And James and John say, well, you know, Lord, should we just call down fire from God like Elijah did and just destroy the city? And he said, you know not what manner of spirit you're of, because the Son of Man has not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them. And so when Elijah, in the Old Testament, called down fire from God, it's because soldiers were coming to apprehend him. Soldiers were coming to do violence unto him. And so it was a little more of a defensive act when they're coming to arrest him and apprehend him, and he calls down fire from God to destroy them. Whereas in James and John's situation, it's just a thing of, well, these people didn't participate, these people don't want to help us, these people aren't serving God enough, let's just torch the whole community. Okay, that's the difference there. And it's kind of the same difference here, where Gideon is right to violently deal with the foreign enemy that is coming in and invading Israel to dispatch the Midianites and to kill Ora Ben Zib is the right thing to do. But is killing the men of Penuel the right thing to do? Is torturing the men of Succoth the right thing to do? Okay, guess what? Just because someone Succoth doesn't mean you just torture and kill them. You know, people Succoth. That's just the way life works. And guess what? You're going to have all kinds of people in your life that do you dirty and that are rude to you and that are unkind, unthankful, unhelpful. We need to have an attitude that says, Father, forgive them, they know not what they do. We need to have an attitude that turns the other cheek and that isn't so wrapped up in personal pride or ego or whatever, where we just have to be super vindictive because someone insulted us or hurt us or criticized us or refused to support us. You know, don't hold a grudge against people, right? You know, and let's say you're human, you get mad at somebody, you get angry because they treated you poorly. Let it go. Don't hold a grudge. Don't become bitter about it because he ends up getting bitter and he ends up killing a lot of Israelites when in reality, you know, they're not the enemy. They're lame. They're not supporting him. They're not thankful, but you know what? They're not really the enemy either, are they? And so there are a lot of Christians out there that are pretty lame and they're not doing much for the Lord. They don't do any soul winning and maybe when a pastor gets up and preaches hard and gets in trouble with this world or the media, you know, like some of our friends have recently been attacked by the media and attacked by the world, you know, they should be defending those guys, but they don't. They should be out soul winning, but they're not. But does that give us the right to just slaughter them, to just hate on them or be vindictive toward them? No. We need to try to communicate the word of God and try to turn these people who are enemies, turn them into our friends and try to reach them, reach their heart, inspire them and eventually bring them over to our side. Our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ that are weak or that are lame, you know, we want to try to inspire them and get them over to our side, getting them to do great works for God. We don't want to look at them as our enemies. You know, the Bible even talks about people that are so sinful in the church where they have to be excommunicated from the church, right? You know, or the Bible talks about in second Thessalonians chapter three, that we should withdraw ourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly and not after the tradition which he received from us, says in second Thessalonians three, we have of course the example in first Corinthians five where the Bible says that we should have no fellowship with a brother that's a fornicator or covetous or a railer, an idolater, with such a one known not to eat, right? So there are people that we even need to break fellowship with that are our brothers and sisters in Christ. But you know what the Bible says in second Thessalonians chapter three, it says, withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly and not after the tradition which he received us. Then he says a few verses later, if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man and have no company with him that he may be ashamed. But then he says, yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother. So even the brother who's totally out of line, not following the word of God, he's still a brother though. So if he's a brother, don't count him as an enemy admonish him as a brother. Maybe you might even have to break fellowship and have no company with him with such a one not even to eat. But yet, he's not an enemy. He's our brother. And so therefore, we should not count him as an enemy, we should admonish him as a brother. And so that's what Gideon is is wrong about here. Who's the most wrong? The Ephraimites are the most wrong, the men of Succoth are the most wrong. But then we see Gideon, though, he's not really handling things right either. He doesn't really handle things properly with the Ephraimites, although the soft answer, you know, he gets points for that, flattery isn't the answer. The soft answer is good, but flattery is when the soft answer gets a little too soft. And so he's using flattery, he really should have preached to them a more spiritual message. And then in the second encounter, what do we see again, the people are the ones that are really in the wrong, but yet we see Gideon not being spiritual. Now he's being vindictive. Now he's unforgiving. He's misidentifying who the true enemy is. And so that's what we see with the men of Succoth. Then it says in verse 18, then see thee unto Zebun, Zalmana. What manner of men were they whom you slew at Tabor? And they answered, as thou art, so were they that, you know, they kind of looked a little bit like you. Each one resembled the children of a king and he said, they were my brethren. No wonder they looked like me. No wonder there was a family resemblance, right? He said, they were my brethren, even the sons of my mother, as the Lord liveth. If he had saved them alive, I would not slay you. Now look at what he's saying here. Again, is he doing the Lord's work here or is he on his own agenda here? Because guess what? God's agenda was destroy the Midianites, defeat the Midianites, overthrow the Midianites. Now he's like, well, you know, I'd let you guys live if you hadn't killed my family. But he's not supposed to let them live. He's supposed to defeat them because God said to defeat them. So he's doing the right thing here, but for the wrong reason. Because killing Zebun and Zalmana makes sense. That is the right thing here. But he's saying, well, I'm not doing it because God said to do it. I'm not doing it because they're enemies of the Lord. I'm doing it simply because of what they did to my family. And if they hadn't done that to my family, I would let them live. So what kind of a message do you think he's sending to his followers right now? Right? Like, like even if, even if maybe he's just, you know, speaking in haste and maybe in his heart he's, he was actually going to kill them anyway and he's just kind of blowing off his mouth. He's just kind of messing with them. Here's the, you know, the things that we say matter. Okay. And so what Gideon says in each of these three episodes that we see in the chapter so far, what he says in each of these three episodes is sending the wrong message to his followers. Okay. It's not about God anymore. It's not about doing the work of the Lord. It's more about Gideon's personal agenda. And we need to make sure that we not only have a heart that's right with God, that's always thinking about God's kingdom and not our own personal agenda. We also need to make sure that we communicate that to other people and that what we say reflects that. Okay. And so again, z-bounds almanna are bad. They're the worst. But Gideon's not handling this as well as he could either. In all three cases, the people that Gideon's mad at are more guilty than him, but yet he's not necessarily totally in the right either. Okay. So you can see there's a pattern developing in this chapter, episode after episode after episode. What's the purpose of a chapter like this? You know, God is showing us the human failures that we're all prone to. And the idea is that we learn from this and don't make these mistakes. All these things, the Bible says, are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come so that we don't go down these same roads and make these same mistakes. And the Bible, like I said, is a very real book. This is how real life works. This is how people are in the Bible. Bad characters do good things. Good characters do bad things because the Bible is not a Saturday morning cartoon. It's actually good, complex literature. In addition to being the infallible, perfect, inspired word of God. You know, it's also just a great book to read. Thank God that God, uh, if he's going to require us to read something every day, gives us something so great to read. So interesting, so beautiful, so perfect. And so we see here that he ends up, uh, slaying Zeban Zalmaneh. He said unto Jethur, his firstborn, verse 20, up and slay them, but the youth drew not his sword for he feared because he was a youth, yet a youth. So here again, Gideon's a little disappointed with his followers. You know, he's disappointed by the Ephraimites, he's disappointed by the men of Succoth, uh, and now he's disappointed by his son because he, you know, he wants his son to get in there and fight and do something, but his son is scared, and the Bible is kind of sympathizing with him by saying, you know, he's a youth, he's a young guy, cut him some slack, give him a break, you know, but obviously it's a little disappointing for Gideon, it's a little embarrassing for him when he says, hey, you know, up and slay them, but the youth drew not his sword for he feared because he was yet a youth. Then Zeban Zalmaneh said, rise, that would fall upon us, kill us yourself, they're saying. For as the man is, so is his strength, and Gideon arose and slew Zeban Zalmaneh and took away the ornaments that were on their camel's necks. Then the men of Israel said unto Gideon, rule thou over us, both thou and thy son and thy son's son also, for thou has delivered us from the hand of Midian, and Gideon said unto them, I will not rule over you, neither shall my son rule over you, the Lord shall rule over you. So this is a good answer in the sense that he's giving God the glory once again. It's a pretty spiritual answer, but again, part of the reason why the question's even being asked is because of the fact that he's been putting a lot of emphasis on himself in this chapter, and so people have kind of lost sight of the fact that it was the Lord that delivered them, and now it's like, rule thou over us, you're the one who saved us from the Midianites. So Gideon gives a good answer, but the question really shouldn't have even been asked. So it says in verse 24, and Gideon said unto them, I would desire a request of you, that ye would give me, every man, the earrings of his prey, for they had golden earrings because they were Ishmaelites. Now here's the thing, when they kill the enemy, when they slaughter thousands of the Midianites, they spoil them, and what that means is they take their wallet after they kill them, you know what I mean? They basically take their personal belongings, whatever's on them, whatever precious metals, weapons, armor, anything they have of value, that's kind of how they get paid in a sense for going out and fighting these battles, they spoil the enemy, and one of the components of that spoil, which is probably one of the smaller components, is the golden earrings that are in their ears, because they're Ishmaelites. So wearing earrings is not an Israelite thing for the dudes to wear earrings, but the Ishmaelites have this custom of wearing earrings. And so therefore, because the Midianites and the Ishmaelites are obviously a similar group of people, they're just kind of grouped in as the children of the east in a sense, that group of people has this culture of wearing these golden earrings, and so he says, hey, you know, you keep all the spoil, but I want a portion of the spoil, I just want the golden earrings, just give me all the golden earrings. And obviously, thousands of golden earrings ends up being a lot of gold, because there's just so many of them. And so they're glad to do this for them, they're glad to give them the earrings. They said in verse 25, we will willingly give them, and they spread a garment and did cast therein every man the earrings of his prey. And the weight of the golden earrings that he requested was a thousand and 700 shekels of gold, so there's a gigantic amount of gold. Besides ornaments and collars and purple raiment that was on the kings of Midian, and besides the chains that were about their camels next. So he allows them to keep the spoil of all the thousands that have been killed, he just wants the earrings. But then if you remember, he also took the personal spoil from Zebun Zalmana, because of the fact that remember, it said that he took the ornaments off their horses, they had gold ornaments on their horses, he took their kingly apparel, and stuff like that. So he takes all that plus all the earrings, and he's got all this stuff. And then it says in verse 27, and Gideon made an ephod thereof, and put it in his city, even in Ophrah, and all Israel went thither, a whoring after it, which thing became a snare unto Gideon and to his house. So here's another mistake that Gideon makes, is he makes this ephod. Now what is this ephod? This is a really strange episode here. What happened is that when God gave the law at Mount Sinai, he has them create certain priestly garments for the high priest, and the textile portion of that, a clothing component of that, that is in the upper body, we don't know obviously exactly what this garment is, but it's some kind of a religious priestly garment, and it's called an ephod, right? And this is one of those words where it's kind of just brought directly from Hebrew into English, because we don't really have a word for this. People don't really know exactly what this was. So they kind of just leave it in Hebrew as just ephod, you know, because ephod is not really an English word, right? It's just, that's just what it was called back then in Hebrew. So it's an ephod. What is that? It's this priestly garment, some article of clothing is very ornate and decorative. And it was described in the book of Exodus as something that the high priest is supposed to wear. And so, you know, maybe Gideon's heart is in the right place making this thing. But this is not something that God ever asked for. God didn't say, hey, make me a golden ephod, you know, make this statue of an ephod. Now, first of all, I'm kind of trying to figure out how do you take this incredible amount of gold and turn it into an ephod? You know, so I was trying to picture this. Is this like sort of like a mannequin wearing the ephod? Is this a human figure that's clothed in the ephod and the ephod is just being emphasized? Or is this just like an empty ephod made out of gold? Like it really doesn't make sense, no matter how you look at it. It's either an empty ephod, just this, you know, here's a big metal shirt. This is when modern art was invented, okay? It was a big metal religious shirt. Or is this like a human figure wearing the shirt? And the Bible is just emphasizing the ephod part of it. Who knows? But I don't think that's really the point. Because whatever it is, the children of Israel end up bowing down to it and worshiping it as a god or something. They end up performing idolatry toward this thing. And it becomes something that they go a whoring after, meaning instead of worshiping the Lord and focusing on his word and who he is, they're always looking for some physical object to bow down to. And guess what? This is still human nature to this day. Sinful human nature that wants to have a little shrine in your house that you bow down to, right? You want to have little pictures of the saints and you want to have a little candle that you light and you get to bow down and worship before, you know, La Bierjende Guadalupe or you're going to bow down in front of a little Hindu shrine or a little golden Buddha or whatever. It's like people just want some focus to genuflect in front of and just perform some physical act of obeisance. And this is because they don't actually have communion with the true God. Why do we not have this ephod shaped hole in our heart as Christians? Why do we not have a Buddha shaped hole in our heart that we just can't feel? Why do I not go home and just be like, I just wish I had like some little alcove where I could just get on my knees and burn some incense, you know, like why do I never have the desire to do that? I mean, is this a burning desire for you wishing you had a statue, wishing you had images to kiss and genuflect before and venerate? Do you ever just feel the urge to just, man, I just want to just pour milk on an idol's head and just pour a little honey on it, throw flowers at it? Is that how you feel? Because I never feel that way. And you know what? There's no temptation that has taken me but such as is common to man. And you know, we all get tempted with sin and everything. Why is it that that particular temptation doesn't seem to be very strong among God's people? Why is it that we don't need that? Why is it that we don't desire that? But you know what, I have a suspicion that if we were to get away from the Lord, get away from church, not be reading our Bible, not praying and just get super carnal as Christians, I'll bet that temptation to want to do something easy, like just physically getting on your knees in front of an object and lighting something on fire would actually probably be something that we maybe would be tempted by at that point. Why? Because people, they don't have a real relationship with God. And so they want to just kind of go through emotion, right? Because actual communion with God is maybe more difficult than just getting on your knees and just burning a candle, burning incense. It's a cheap substitute, though, for an actual walk with God, for actual prayer and Bible study and walking with God and doing the work of God. I guess it's just easier to just show up and just kind of, you know, cross yourself a few times and just kind of bow down a few times and do some ritual instead of actually just being still and knowing that he's God and just reading your Bible and praying. You know, God always wants emphasis to be on his word. That's how we know him is through his word view. If you want to focus on something, focus on the word of God. And I'm not talking about a physical book. Obviously the physical book is is critical because that's how we get God's word from point A to point B here into our brain. But at the end of the day, though, it's really about meditating upon the words themselves, right? Not like a physical book. None of us is bowing down before this physical book. But we do recognize the words of the book as divine, as deity, right? And so we are getting our worship in and our walk with God in through the word, not through pictures, not through statues. And even if it's whatever it is, you know, there's this ephod, this physical object made of gold. You know, it's not an appropriate object of worship. Plus God gave specific commands, you know, build this tabernacle, build this Ark of the Covenant, build this altar. It didn't include build a giant ephod. You don't want to just make things up and build this great monument, which literally makes no sense. What did an ephod even have to do with this whole story? There's no ephod in chapter six, there's no ephod in chapter seven. Hey, let's build a big ephod, it's stupid, doesn't make any sense. But again, you know what it is? It's just Gideon just doing his own thing. You know, this whole chapter, Gideon's just been doing his own thing. And now he just decides to do his own thing on religion, doing it in the name of the Lord, but again, doing his own thing, and building this thing, and it ends up causing him problems, his family problems, and the children of Israel in general problems, because they went a whoring after it. And it says in verse 28, thus was Midian subdued before the children of Israel, so that they lifted up their heads no more, and the country was in quietness 40 years in the days of Gideon. So that's on the positive side, that at least Midian is subdued, and Israel can be at peace now. Verse 29, and Jerubel, the son of Joash, went and dwelt in his own house. So again, he's not trying to rule as a king or anything, he goes back to his own house. But here's the thing about it though, he kind of starts living a little bit like a king. Even though he says like, no, no, no, I'm not going to be your king, the Lord's going to rule over you. His actions are kind of saying something a little different than the talk that he's talking. So we've got to give him credit for talking the right talk, at least he says like, nope, I'm not going to rule over you, the Lord's going to be your king, and he goes back to his own house. He's like George Washington, where he serves his two terms as president, and then he goes home, right? He's like Cincinnatus, he's the guy who saves the nation, and then he goes home, he doesn't become emperor, he doesn't usurp the power. At the same time, his actions are sending a little bit of a different message than what he has said here. He's not perfect at all. What does he do? Well, it says, Gideon verse 30 had three score and 10 sons of his body be gotten. Now here's the thing, you know, I've been married for 22 years, I got married young, my wife was young, I was young, and we've been having kids every two years, pretty regularly, ever since then, we have 12 kids. There's no way we're going to hit 70. And this is 70 sons, this is not 70 kids, this is 70 sons. There's only one way to have 70 sons, and the Bible explains it in the next phrase, for he had many wives. Now who would you normally think of as having a bunch of wives and 70 sons? It's kind of like a king type thing to do, isn't it? Isn't this the type of thing that kings typically do? Maybe we don't know how many wives he had, the word many itself would imply a minimum of four, but obviously you're not going to get 70 sons from four wives either. And so, you know, we don't know how many wives, but I think we're probably talking on the order of like 10 or 20 wives. Serious number of wives here. Not only that, he's got a little thing on the side as well, because he's got this concubine as well in addition to his many wives. And it says in verse 31, his concubine that was in Shechem, she also bare him a son whose name he called Abimelech. And again, even the name that he calls his son is a little bit of sending of the wrong message because his son's name literally means, my father is king. So it's like, I'm not going to rule over, I'm not going to be your king, but here's my 15 wives and I'm going to name my son, my father's the king, but I'm not going to rule over you, okay? And so the thing is, his actions are sending a little different of a message from what his words are saying, even though he's saying the right things, he's living this wrong lifestyle where he's living a little high on the hog. And you say, well, you know, maybe you're just reading into that a little bit. Yeah, except that his son Abimelech gets the message real loud and clear, because guess what Abimelech is going to do in the next chapter? He's going to kill the 70 sons of Gideon. He's going to kill them, only one's going to escape. So I guess he kills 69 in that sense. But he's going to kill the sons of Gideon, and then he's going to declare himself to be the king. And he's going to rule as a king. You know, we think of, of course, Saul as being the first king of Israel, because obviously he's, you know, the first actual major anointed king of Israel, it makes sense to think of it that way. But in reality, in the book of Judges, you have this guy named Abimelech, who rules Israel as a king for three years. But I wonder if it had to do with the fact that he's looking at dad and getting the wrong message. Okay, Dad, I know you're telling me not to smoke, Dad. But here you are smoking a pack a day, like, you know, don't smoke. Don't be like me. But, you know, a lot of times the kids are going to do what we do if they don't do what we say. Plus, you know, if you stop and think about it, there's a little bit of a justice here in a sense that we see Gideon killing, you know, these 70 nobles earlier in the chapter that were Israelites. These were not the Midianites. But he ends up, you know, did he kill those 70 guys specifically? Well, we know that he taught them with the thorns of briars. So he tortured 70 guys, and then he kills the men of Penuel. But maybe that 70 number is still a little bit symbolic of the fact that, you know, he lashes out against 70 people wrongfully. He ends up having a kingly lifestyle, and then his kid grows up and basically kills 70 Israelites, kills Gideon's 70 sons, and also declares himself to be the king. After all, his name's Abimelech, after all. And so you can see here how Gideon is not as spiritual as we want him to be when he's going out and marrying a bunch of wives. And make no mistake about it, God has always commanded that marriage be between one man and one woman. All the way at the beginning, he made them male and female and said, for this cause shall a man leave father and mother in Cleveland to his wife, singular, and they too shall be one flesh. That's what Jesus said. And so therefore, this is not something that God approves of, having all these multitude of wives. And Gideon, the son of Joash, verse 32, died in a good old age, and was buried in the sepulcher of Joash's father and Ophrah of the Abiezrites. And it came to pass, as soon as Gideon was dead, that the children of Israel turned again and went a whoring after Balaam, and made Baal beareth their god. So again, who's the real bad guy in the story? Obviously it's the Israelites who are going and worshiping Baal now. You know, in addition to everything else, let's all go, oh Gideon's dead, let's all go worship Satan now. But even though they're the ones that are doing the worst, it's still a bit of a failure of leadership on Gideon's part as well, okay? We have to acknowledge that Gideon's making some mistakes in this chapter too. Verse 34, the children of Israel remembered not the Lord their God, who had delivered them out of the hands of all their enemies on every side, neither showed they kindness to the house of Jerubel, namely Gideon, according to all the goodness which he had shown unto Israel. And so the moral of the story here is that, you know, people sucketh, okay? They're gonna be people who do you dirty, they let you down. And you know what, I've learned, as I get a little bit older in life, is that this world is a messed up place and I can't fix it. No one can fix it. You say, no, no, we're gonna change the world, we're gonna fix it. You know, I used to feel that way too, okay? That's called being young and not quite understanding how the world works. As you get older, you realize Phoenix is messed up, I can't fix it. Arizona is messed up, I can't fix it. The United States is messed up, I can't fix it. God hasn't called me to fix it. It's not my job to fix it. It's impossible to fix it. No one can fix it. Why? Because people are sinners. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it? I don't care what system of government you come up with, it's not gonna work, okay? There are always gonna be problems with it. So what you do, you try to make things the best that you can and you make do the best you can with the hand that you're dealt. And you know what, I'm here, I live in Phoenix, Arizona. It's 2022, I love God, I'm thankful to live in the United States, I'm thankful to live in the best state, Arizona, sorry visitors from Florida, okay? But I'm just saying, you know, hey, I'm glad to just live the life that God has given me and do the work that God has given me to do. And you know what I'm happy to do is just reach the individual. I'm just happy to win somebody to Christ. I'm just happy to get somebody saved. I'm just happy to be a blessing to whoever I can and just sort of brighten the corner where I am. That's all I can do. And you know what? I believe that God could even use me to do great things for God if I am up, you know, if I yield myself and submit myself to Him and you know, and I believe we can all do great things for God. I believe that every one of you could do something great for God, but you're not gonna change the whole world. You're not gonna win America to Christ, you know, but you can do great things reaching individuals reaching families, reaching towns, you know, doing things that are within our grasp. And so you just have to understand people are like that. People are going to disappoint you. If you're a pastor, church members are going to disappoint you. If you're a parent, they're going to be times when your kids disappoint you. If you're running a business, your employees are going to disappoint you. Government's going to disappoint you. You're going to campaign and get a guy elected. And then when he gets elected, he's not going to do what he said he was going to do. And he's going to disappoint you. People are going to disappoint. But what we don't want to do is just start taking things into our own hands and just lashing out and becoming bitter, becoming vindictive, and just not listening to God. Just kind of say, well, I'm going to do things my way. I'm going to figure things out on my own. You know, we just need to just stay on God's program and just be happy with what God has given us, be happy with what God has called us to do, and don't get too upset when people don't cooperate. Because why does that surprise you? They're people. They're sinners. We're all sinners. You know, Gideon, he's making mistakes too. The people around him are making mistakes. And so here's the thing about throwing out God's word and saying, you know, I'm just going to figure things out myself. I'm going to do things my way. And you end up taking things into your own hands and not following the directives of scripture. It doesn't work. You say, oh, this isn't working serving God, I'm going to just try it the world's way. Folks, is God's way going to work perfectly? Well, we're in a fallen state here, right? We've got sinners all around us. Even if we do things God's way, it doesn't guarantee that all of our followers are going to do right. Everyone around us is going to do right. But God's way is still superior. And if you do things not God's way, things are going to be even worse. I'll put it that way. Hey, if I do marriage the way God says, that mean I'm going to have a perfect marriage? No. Oh, if I'm the, if I do marriage the way God says, my husband's going to treat me perfectly. No, he's not. Oh, if I'm the greatest husband and do everything the Bible says, my wife's going to submit and do everything. No, she's not. Oh, if I'm just the greatest parent and do everything perfectly, my kids are not going to make any mistakes. They're not going to disappoint me. Yes, they will. Because guess what? You could be the perfect pastor, perfect parent, because look, guess who that perfect person that walked this earth was Jesus and his disciples disappointed him. His brothers and sisters disappointed him, right? People around him are disappointing him all the time. His followers are disappointing him. The church is disappointing him. Why? It's life. It's how people are. But guess what? And then say, well, you know, I tried it God's way and things weren't perfect. So I'm just going to do it the world's way. You know? Okay. You're about to find out what not perfect really is like, because when you get away from God's way, it's even worse. Following God. You know what? Things go all right. You get through. Right? And in fact, a lot of times things go great, but they're never going to be perfect. But you know what? When you follow God's way, you're going to get through it. You're going to be a winner. You're going to be a conqueror. You're going to make it to the finish line and you're going to say, Jesus led me all the way. I finished my course. I kept the faith. It's going to be great. Okay. But you're going to go through a lot of disappointments along that path. Whereas when you do things your own way, it's going to be worse. It's going to be harder and you're going to crash and burn. Case in point, Gideon, what are some things that he did that were his own way? I'm going to do things my own way. He makes the stupid Ephod. What's the point of making the stupid Ephod? What's the point of any statue? It's a memorial. It's a remembrance. It's to keep people thinking about something. It's a monument. Okay. But what does the Bible say at the end of the chapter? They didn't remember. So did the monument work? No, it just ended up being something that they went on whoring after. It didn't work. Why? Because it wasn't God's will to make this Ephod. So it didn't work. Okay. You know, building some 900 foot Jesus isn't going to fix anything. And so the thing is, he's doing it his own wisdom, making this Ephod that God didn't command. It doesn't work. Okay. Now there's a little disappointment with his son, right? Jethur is a little disappointing because here Gideon is this mighty man of valor. And then Jethun is a little bit scared and kind of embarrasses him publicly or whatever, because he doesn't go in there and fight. But you know what? So what? Right? You love your son. You keep going. You keep teaching him. You keep training him. You be a better example. You move forward. You realize it's life. We disappoint other people. Other people disappoint us because you're like, oh, people are always disappointed me. Who have you disappointed? We've all disappointed someone, am I right? And so be honest. Gideon is making some mistakes too. So here's the thing. His son's a little bit of a disappointment. So he says, well, you know what? Hey, let's get 69 more in the pipeline. Actually let's just make it 71 kids. And you know what? Why? I guess because he thinks that if he, you know, one of them is eventually going to be the one that he's looking for or what, like, what do you need 70 sons for? That's excessive. Many wives is excessive. Getting married is great. Having a wife is great, but multiplicity of wives is excessive. Eating food is great, but if you eat food to excess, it's not healthy. Okay. It's not going to give you a better life eating twice as much food, twice the living. It doesn't work that way. Double the fun. Three wives, three wives, four wives, yeah, doesn't work. The Ephod doesn't work and you know, Oh, well, you know, Jethir, I don't know if he's going to pan out. Let's have 70. You're not doing things God's way. And so the guy who had his own strength says, well, I'll produce 70 sons. Somebody's going to give me a legacy here. Yeah. And then they all die except the one that's the worst one. And then he dies a couple of years later. Okay. The other guy goes off and dwells in the land of beer or, you know, whatever that means. So the point is, that was a joke. Okay. I understand. I understand that it means something different in that language. I just thought it's funny cause he's talking about wine, cheering the heart of man. He goes and lives in the land of beer, you know, but the point is that if we do things our way and deviate from God's commandments, it's not going to fix our problems. Whatever problem with you have with your son, you know, having a bunch more wives and a bunch more sons, you know? Yeah. One of them is going to pan out. Nope. Because they all die. Okay. Virtually all of them die. You know, think about it. Meanwhile in Israel, there's a guy who's got one wife and say has five or six sons, right? It's a normal guy. One wife has five or six sons and you know what, maybe all five or six of them, they all grow up, they all get married, they all have kids. So who's got more descendants, him or Gideon? Gideon's like, I got 70 sons. No, you got one, okay? Because the rest are all dead. Meanwhile this guy did it right. Maybe he had some problems with his kids, but hey, he's got five, six, seven sons or whatever. But guess what? Chances are they're not going to murder each other. So we don't want to deviate from God's plan. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not under your own understanding. And so Gideon, yes, he's a great hero. I hope I didn't ruin him for you by, but if I did, it wasn't me that ruined it. It was, it was God giving us chapter eight because God's like, okay, let me show you what Gideon's really like. You know, cause you want to just, you want to just walk away like, yay Gideon. But then it's like a next chapter and God does this to us over and over again. Like you just love Jehu, come see my zeal for the Lord. And then, and then at the end, Jehu is worshiping golden calves and you're just like, no, you idiot. Right? You're, you're all excited about Solomon and then Solomon blows it excited about David. Look, this is real life, my friend. You're going to let people down. People are going to let you down, stay with the Lord, obey the Lord, do it his way and don't deviate. Let's borrow this in our word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for this chapter, Lord, that's so raw and so real and showing us the aftermath of a famous story that even after the great victory is won and even after someone does something great for you, Lord, you know, it doesn't necessarily mean that everybody just rides off into the sunset. And so Lord God, I thank you for this chapter as a cautionary tale. Help us not to make the mistakes that the children of Israel made, which were huge mistakes or the mistakes that Gideon himself made, which maybe weren't gigantic mistakes, but they were big enough to cause him some serious problems. Lord, help us to learn from these mistakes and to do right and always stick with your word and in Jesus' name we pray, Amen.