To return, then to our narrative. The very first words which the Lord spoke to him were the words of grace, “The Lord is with thee.” Taken in connection with Gideon’s trying position and with the covert act in which he was engaged which so strongly marked the trouble he was in, and the fear that possessed him lest all the fruits of his laborious husbandry should be swallowed up by the enemy, and his family, already poor, be brought to actual famine — these were words of sweet and tender sympathy, and like him who uttered them; who loves to “raise up all those that be bowed down,” blessed be his name! Gideon’s answer is worthy of deep consideration: “O 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 ‘?” How much may be conveyed in a few words! First observe that word “us” —already incidentally pointed out to the readers of GOOD NEWS in a former paper. With what spontaneous humility he passes over the word “thee” contained in the salutation of the angel! “The Lord is with thee,” says the angel. “If the Lord be with us,” Gideon replies — his young heart is full of Israel; he ignores himself; he cannot afford to be severed even in thought from his people; nay, he seems so occupied with them as to have forgotten, for the moment, his individuality! for it is evident that he is quite unconscious of that word “thee” having been used at all, and proceeds to comment upon the gracious salutation, as if the angel had said “The Lord is with Israel.” What a beautiful lesson to those who, “members in particular,” too readily forget that they are but “one body.” In Gideon’s ease, the forgetfulness was all the other way! Yes; there were springs of thought and feeling in the heart of this young Israelite, known only to the Lord, and which, responsive to the touch of his divine hand, flowed forth in words that proved, that although engaged about his wheat, he was not occupied with himself, but with the Lord’s people Israel; with whom he will be identified — ruined, degraded, greatly impoverished though they be.
The misery they are in too, is his own as well as theirs. “Why then is all this befallen us?” not simply them. He still had wheat to thresh, but they in the mass had “no sustenance.” He could still find a kid and unleavened cakes to offer as a present to one whom he evidently took to be a prophet; but to them was left “neither goat, nor ox, nor ass.” Oxen too, his family had, wherewith to thresh the wheat; yet “all this” ruin and impoverishment had not simply befallen them, but “us.” He suffers with them; their state is his; and although there was evidently a considerable difference between the actual condition he and his father’s house were in and that of the great majority around them, Gideon sees not any distinction, his eye is on them, and his heart too. That the Lord’s protecting hand was over Gideon’s home, in spite of his father’s idolatry, is evident. One pious member of a household is an unspeakable blessing, and in the desolation that had come upon the land Joash little knew how much he was indebted to the goodness of the Lord in giving him a godly son. Nevertheless to Gideon it was “all this has befallen-us.” Humility and love for the people of the Lord are apparent in Gideon’s reply; and he is evidently all unconscious of it, which makes it the more beautiful to see. There is a naturalness about it all, which is assuredly not natural to the heart of man whether young or old. This marks the source from whence it sprang. It was the work of God. How different this to trying to be or appear something! How utterly unconscious, too, he seems of any difference between himself and the idol worshippers with whom he lived and by whom he was surrounded! No word of reproach about their sinful courses, as the very cause of all the trouble he referred to, and with which he so readily identified himself. No. Too humble to sit in judgment on them, and too conscious, it may well be, of the waywardness of his own heart, he can only mourn over their ruined state and suffer with them. This was true humility indeed, and genuine love.
If you, Christian reader, have unconverted relatives, members of the household you form a part of, do you ever feel tempted by your own heart (so like theirs!) to vaunt even in thought your superiority to them? Learn a lesson from a young Israelite, who had not your advantages by very many. “What hast thou which thou didst not receive?” And as to sitting in judgment on your brethren, how Gideon’s “us” rebukes the thought!
Then further, “If the Lord be with us” —all, the Lord.! bad as we have been in departing from and sinning so grievously against him, worshipping Baal and doing evil — “if the Lord be with us,” he who is so full of grace, “why then is all this befallen us?” Faith in the grace of Jehovah forbade the thought that if HE were with Israel all the misery and wretchedness they, as a people, were in, could possibly have come upon them.
To what extent Gideon may have understood grace, we cannot say; but he appears to have seen something of that which Moses saw in the mount (Ex. 34), when because Israel was so stiff-necked he bought the Lord to go among them. Wonderful thought! The very sinfulness of a people pleaded as a reason for God’s presence in grace to overcome the evil — to bring good out of it — to save them from the sad consequences of their own willfulness. Well may we read, “He made known his ways unto Moses.” That this young Israelite knew something of the Lord’s grace, and knew also in consequence how to show grace towards others, we shall see as we go on.
“If the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us, and where be all his miracles that our fathers told us of?” The Midianites may be as grasshoppers for multitude, Israel prostrate before them, greatly impoverished, scattered to the winds, hidden away in caves and strongholds, reduced by famine and defeat to a condition of such abject hopelessness as to have no means, no prospect whatever of deliverance; yet “if the Lord be with us,” why then before his miracles of delivering power all this would be as nothing.
Nor is even this all that Gideon’s reply conveys. “Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?” This was REDEMPTION. But redemption is the basis of everything, of every blessing Jehovah can bestow.
Redeemed by blood, brought up from Egypt (up rom — how much these simple words convey!) to HIMSELF — they were his own, and being so, God was for them, and if only with them now in grace, Gideon felt that he could count upon him for them, whatever their condition, and therefore asks, “Why then is all this befallen us?”
Reader, do you know anything of redemption? I do not mean that outline which some have got mapped out in human words and call a “plan.” Do you know, what it is to be redeemed by blood? If not, you have no right or title to count upon the Lord for anything, and therefore are emphatically as one “having no hope, and without God in the world!” This may not trouble you while all things are smooth, but wait a little. I have just come from the deathbed side of one who by his own confession has been all his life in your condition, and never till now concerned about it. He is sitting propped up by pillows — to lie down would be instant suffocation. Reason wavers, sight and sense are failing, life itself is fast ebbing out, and he knows he is not saved, and lacks the power to believe in HIM of whom he often heard in days now gone forever. Would that you could realize such a state of things, as if it were your own! It may be you would be aroused at last to some conception of what it is to be “without God in the world” when on the point of leaving it for JUDGMENT. But how widely different was Gideon’s state. Faith in Jehovah as the God of redemption, which includes everything — grace, love, omnipotence — love for and oneness with the Lord’s people, and genuine humility are all implied in his memorable answer, and at once explain the words which follow: “Go in this thy might, and thou shalt save Israel from the Midianites; have not I sent thee?” “Ah, I see!” you will exclaim, “Gideon was not a mighty man of valor in himself at all, but in the Lord.” Yes: “The Lord looked on him,” and saw that which man could not see. “Man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart!” and there he saw FAITH in himself — faith which once in exercise could bring the God of redemption into the midst of the scene of ruin. This was Gideon’s “might.” There, too, he saw LOVE — love which would identify itself with HIS people, though in the dust. This would make him “valorous” for them. And mingled with it all a LOWLINESS that made nothing of self and everything of that which pertained to Jehovah — this would keep him dependent. Here, then, hidden by the wine-press, in the recesses of a vineyard, where to human eyes was nothing but a timid youth stealthily engaged in laboriously trampling out the wheat that was perchance to save his house from famine, the Lord found a fitting instrument for his gracious purposes towards his people; fitting, but not yet fitted.
No. Faith, love, lowliness, were there indeed, but visible only to him who looked on him in grace. “O my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel?” Wherewith indeed! Even Gideon himself is unconscious of possessing aught that could make him mighty and valorous. Only grace, blessed grace, could see it! And when we remember how keen our self-love is to detect, how gladly it finds, how tenaciously it holds, how readily it vaunts anything good in self; even though finer than the gossamer thread of a spider’s web, this fact, that grace saw and owned what the young man himself could not see, cloth sweetly exalt the blessed ways of grace. How dear to the believer’s soul the thought that he has to do with one who ALWAYS beholds him in grace! Yes, fellow believer, lot this truth give you “boldness and access with confidence,” for even under sense of failure you may still draw near, and looking upward meet an eye that still and evermore looks upon you in grace. Faith was there, but not yet in exercise; love existed, but was not active, could not do or dare aught for its object, sincerely as it bemoaned and identified itself with their sad condition. Gideon, therefore, though a fitting instrument for the Lord’s gracious purposes, was not yet fitted for the work he had to do. It yet remained for him whose grace originated, saw and owned that which was in him, to bring it out into active exercise, and make it, through his wondrous ways towards him, a dominant power that should sweep all before it to the glory of Israel’s Jehovah, and the deliverance of his people.
J. L. K.