Address—Bill Prost
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Hi President, Shall our comfort be thyself, our hope our sole desire 166.
Lord, thou hast strong.
Shall.
Come toward beautiful alerts, I told our fools and our souls.
Nsnoise.
Our loving God and our Father.
Besides thee, for what we have sung together. And we know that Thou hast indeed drawn us after thee, and of His desire that we might be able to run and never tire, and to walk and not faint. Thou's our God to mount up with wings as Eagles, as thy word said, but we do all them before these acts. Sometimes this is not the case, and sometimes we have found our God not able.
Not willing, perhaps?
But take that place which thou hast given us in the followed years of forecast.
We know that there are difficulties in the way and we just pray that as we opened our word together this afternoon, the Thou would encourage each one here. We pray especially our God for the young people and how we fancy that so many were able to be here. We ask then our God to Thou especially give a message from Thyself that will encourage each one. So we ask all this with Thanksgiving and commit the meaning to Thee in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
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Amen. Amen.
I'd like you to turn with me, please, to the Book of Judges, The Book of Judges.
Chapter 6.
Now, I know this isn't particularly set out as a young people's meeting, but I wonder if I might speak yes to everybody, but more particularly to young people. Would that be all right? Don Rule took that liberty in the meeting this morning and I was thankful for it and I needed the.
Gist of what he said too.
But here we have in this chapter a.
Time in Israel's history when things were not very good. And here we find a young man by the name of Gideon who found himself in circumstances that probably for the most part were not of his own making. He found himself, if we could use the expression a bit of a victim of the failures of those that were older and more responsible than he. And maybe some of you young people feel that way.
And I know, as we said this morning, that there are hurts and there are difficulties in each heart here.
And I venture to say that not only is it people in my generation, but people who are a generation younger.
And yet here we find a young man who was an overcomer.
Now we know the story of Gideon pretty well, I think at least most of us do, all except the very young. And maybe you've heard it spoken about before, But the Word of God always has more in it, and it's always fresh, always has that for us, which can encourage us for the day in which we're living.
And that is the important thing. You know, there's a verse in Ecclesiastes that sometimes I forget about, but it says something like this. Say not thou, What is the cause that the former days were better than these? For thou dost not inquire wisely concerning this matter. There is always the tendency on our part, my part included.
To look back perhaps, and see when times were, at least in our view, a lot better. And perhaps there is also the tendency to look forward. And maybe we think one of two things. Either we look for things to get better and expect them to, or perhaps we fear that things will get worse.
But you and I are called upon to live in the day in which we do live, and here we find a young man whom I believe got grace from the Lord and help.
In his pathway to live for God's glory in difficult circumstances. And what I want to look at this afternoon are a number of things in his early life when the Lord started to use him, that I believe have a voice for all of us today. Now I know sometimes believers and perhaps those gathered to the Lord's name are particularly adept at finding groups of sevens in Scripture.
And sometimes I think, at least when I was young, I used to feel that some of my older brethren, well, they if there weren't seven there, they'd break it up and make 7. Or if there were more than seven, they group things together. But somehow it always came out with seven. Well, I hope we're not going to do that this afternoon. But there are a number of things in this chapter that have impressed me about Gideon. And so let's look at it.
Josh or Judges chapter 6.
And we find here, we won't read the whole chapter, but we find in verse one. And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord delivered them into the hand of Midian 7 years. And it says there in verse six. And Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites and the children of Israel.
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Fade unto the Lord.
There was a state of things in Israel here which was much to be regretted, a very, very difficult time. When these Midianites came up and it says they were like grasshoppers, they overran the country, took all the food that was available there, and left the people, as it says here, greatly impoverished and, you know, young people. That is the effort of Satan today.
The Midianites, in one sense, were related to Israel.
You will remember that Midian was actually a child of Esau by a concubine, so that there was a relationship there and they were right in the land.
And somehow the children of Israel had not been able to deal with them properly. If we were to go back into the Book of Numbers, we would find that they had been the occasion of real sin in Israel, right after the encounter with Balaam and his prophecies. And here they surface again, this time to do a terrible amount of damage.
Well, we won't dwell on it, but in verse seven it says, and it came to pass when the children of Israel cried unto the Lord, because of the Midianites, that the Lord sent a prophet unto the children of Israel. Oh, there was a warning. There was a very clear and definite warning. And in verse 10 it says, the prophet then telling what the Lord was saying, and I the Lord said unto you, I am the Lord your God.
Fear not the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell, but ye have not obeyed my voice.
There was a reason for the impoverishing, and let us realize your heart and mind that if there is an impoverishing of believers, if there is spiritual poverty in your life and mine.
It is not God's will that it should be so. It may be in God's ways to allow it, as he did here, to recall the people to himself. But it is not God's will that his people should be spiritually impoverished. And there was a remedy.
And so notice what happens here concerning Gideon verse 11. And there came an Angel of the Lord, and sat under an oak, which was an Oprah.
That pertained unto Joash the Abbey is right, and his son Gideon thresh wheat by the winepress to hide it from the Midianites. And the Angel of the Lord appeared unto him, and said unto him, The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valor.
Here is the first point I want to make.
Here was a young man where there were such hordes over running the land, that as it says there in the end of verse four, it says they left no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep nor ox, nor ***.
No sustenance. And yet here was a man, a young man in the middle of all of that, who said, with the Lord's help, I am going to have food.
He had to do it in secret.
But he was going to have food and he had it.
Where did he get that wheat that he was threshing? How did he come by it? Oh, it doesn't tell us. The point is, he got it, and even though he had to hide in secret to thresh it so that some Midianites wouldn't catch him at it and take it away from him, yet there he was, threshing that wheat by the winepress.
And I say to each one here, you know, it is in my heart and perhaps in yours too, that often we look to others to give us that spiritual food, that encouragement which we feel that we need so badly. And we are very thankful for those that the Lord has given us to be a spiritual encouragement to us. We are so thankful for those that the Lord may have put in the local assembly or the Lord may use in other ways.
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That feed us with Christ and that give us encouragement in the Christian pathway. But I say to each one here, there is no substitute for going after it personally. And if you are.
Can I use the word determined? Is that too strong a word? I don't think so if you are determined to have something of Christ for your soul.
God will make a way for you to get it. He'll make a way even if all of the difficulties are so great that it looks as if there is no way out.
There are those who would say, Oh well, everything's falling apart, what's the use? Oh, no.
The last little while I have been emailing with a young man in England who has an earnest desire to please the Lord. I have never met him, His name was passed on to me by someone else. I have very much enjoyed getting to know him as well as anyone can by e-mail, and he really wants to follow the Lord. But he is raising big questions about whether.
It is really possible to do that today anymore, and I hope and I trust with all my heart that I have given him the right answer when I have said, Brother, the Lord is the same, His Word is the same, the Spirit of God is still here and everything in God's Word that anyone ever enjoyed is yours to have if you will have the diligence and the energy to go after it.
There may have to be some difficulties. Gideon had to hide it here. We won't go into details, but it was that kind of a man on whom the Lord's eye rested, and to whom he sends an Angel and says.
The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valor.
It must start individually on your own before the Lord.
Let's go on.
Verse 13 And Gideon said unto him, Oh 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 saying, Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord hath forsaken us, and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites. And the Lord looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might.
And thou shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites. Have not I sent thee?
The second point we want to make is this, that here was a young man who knew that the Lord was able to deliver.
He looked back to those times long before, of course, he was born, when the Lord with a mighty hand had delivered his people from the land of Israel, or the land of Egypt, I should say, and how God had brought them out, brought them through the Red Sea, brought them through the wilderness, and eventually through the Jordan and into the land of Canaan. And I am sure there are some here who would look back, maybe with names that come to your mind, brethren, and going back further, people that you never knew.
And perhaps there is a longing in your soul for something of the power and display of the Lord's power that perhaps took place in those days. Is there a desire for that? I must admit there is in my soul. I was talking to a dear brother again in another country. I think it was in England as well. And he, he was, I think, a little older than I am.
And I was talking to him. I have never met him either, but we also had gotten to know one another by e-mail. And when I was talking to him, he said, Bill, where are you going next? Well, I said, I'm taking a trip out West. And ultimately, we expect to be at a conference in a place called Walla Walla, WA.
Oh, he said, and I could hear the longing in his voice. Oh, he said. And how, how many will be there, do you think? Oh, I said, I can't say for sure, but I would suppose 6 or 700 wouldn't be, uh, out of line, maybe even more than that. Oh, he said, just imagine to be able to sit down and sing a hymn with 700 brethren, to be able to have the Word of God opened.
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He was old enough to remember in his lifetime when there had been meetings that size where he lived.
But there weren't any more.
He wanted them, and there was nothing wrong with that. I could sympathize with him. I wished I could put him in a package and bring him over here, but his health wasn't good enough for that. But he was longing for something and was. Gideon was too. He remembered the miracles. He remembered what the Lord had done. Oh, he said, if the Lord is with us, well then. But you know, we have to be careful about what the Lord says.
Had the Lord said God is with?
Israel, the almighty man of valor, is that what the Lord had said? The Lord is with thee, with thee.
Oh, Gideon had to realize that it started with him as an individual and that God had not in that sense forsaken his people, Israel, but for the moment he was dealing with them. And in that sense the Lord didn't say to Gideon, I'm with Israel, the Lord is with thee. But notice this time when Gideon talks back to the Angel, who answers the Angel? Oh no, it says in verse 14. And the Lord looked upon him and said.
Sometimes that happens in scripture where someone is speaking, but then part way through it's the Lord that's speaking. It happens with Job, and if you read the book of Job carefully, you find that Eli who speaks to Job there toward the end of the book. But then it seems as if suddenly Job is all alone with the Lord and Eli who has lost sight of. And here I believe the Angel is lost sight of.
And Gideon is face to face with the Lord. I say it to each one of our hearts, but I say it particularly to you young people. Don't be afraid to be face to face with the Lord. Sometimes we can almost. And I don't say there was anything of that in Gideon's voice, but I allow for the possibility that there might have been almost the same. Why? Why did the Lord do this to us? What have we done to deserve this? What have I done?
And sometimes we're a little bit afraid to get into the Lord's presence because we feel that the Lord is against us.
If we're living a life of sin, if we're living a worldly life, the Lord does have to speak to us about it, no question. But never, never get the idea that the Lord is against you. The Lord is for you, and the Lord wants your blessing. The Lord wants your happiness and your joy.
But he wants it with him at the center, not something that you and I want. And here Gideon had a heart for the Lord. He couldn't see very far as he will see a little further on, but there was a heart for the Lord. And the Lord says, Gideon, I have sent you, I have sent you. And I say to each one here today, if you are willing to get into the Lord's presence, I believe you will get direction for your life.
We see a lot of young people today, and I don't want to generalize because there are so many of you that are a tremendous encouragement to us. I love to be around young people, even though it makes me feel old, but I still love to be around them. They have energy and they have an ability that I don't have any more. And I love to see the enthusiasm. And very often they don't see all the problems and difficulties that I see after 40 or 50 years. They don't see all of them. They haven't seen all those problems. It's just go for it.
I like that expression if it's in the right direction. And so it's a wonderful thing to see young people that have a heart for the Lord. But there are some dear young people who seem to lack direction in their lives, who seem to have a, shall I say, a difficulty knowing which way the Lord would have them go and what they should do. And I see dear young people trying this, trying that, going here, going there.
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And it can have a multiplicity of causes which we won't try to go into this afternoon. But I do say to you that it is possible to have clear and definite direction from the Lord. But there's an if. And the if is this if I'm willing. And I think brother Don Rule put it well this morning. If I'm willing to have before me what the Lord Jesus had before him when he said, I delight to do thy will, O God.
And we'll see that in the case of Gideon. Well, let's go on here because our time is going #3 verse 15.
And he that is Gideon said unto him, That is to the Lord, Oh my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? Behold, my family is poor in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house. And the Lord said unto him, Surely I will be with thee, and thou shalt smite the Midianites as one man.
There's something here that I want to lay a bit of emphasis on.
There was in Gideon something which I feel we need very much in these last days, and that is in Gideon there was a very healthy tone of humility.
Gideon might have gotten up and said, Oh my, well, I guess I'm somebody now. The Lord's put his hand on me and tells me to go and save Israel. Let's do it. Go for it.
But he doesn't talk like that.
When he answers the Lord there, some would call it unbelief, but I don't think that's what it was. Gideon had no doubt about the Lord's power. He had no question about what the Lord was able to do. The big question was, is he going to use the likes of me? Me. Who am I? My family doesn't amount to anything. In Manasseh, the tribe that he came from, and in my father's house, I'm I'm a nobody.
Me.
You know, it's those who approach the situation in humility that the Lord can use. Somebody spoke up this morning about spiritual pride.
And I suggest that it is one of the biggest dangers that we have today. And pride can work in two ways. It can be pride in what I think I am or pride in what I am not. And the devil doesn't care which it is. He doesn't care whether you're occupied with yourself in a positive way or whether you're taken up with yourself in a negative way, as long as you're occupied with yourself.
I would suggest that Gideon was neither. He wasn't taken up with himself, but only to the extent that he thought, Lord, is it possible that you are going to use me?
I see two dangers, as I say today. On the one hand, there is the danger of saying it's all over with, it's all finished, and we just have to muddle along as best we can until the Lord comes. Because everything is breaking up and falling apart. And you just have to go wherever you can and do what you can for the Lord. And there's no point in being too particular about what the Word of God teaches or being too particular about where you break bread.
Or being too particular about the lives and otherwise of believers that you spend time with. Because after all, everything is falling apart so well, I had a brother tell me that some, not not so long ago actually, that it's all over with Bill and ******. You keep on plugging away at something that's just falling apart.
Or there can be the other thing on the other side. There can be, and it happened in Israel's history and it has happened in secular history. The getting too big for our boots.
You see it, for example, and I hesitate to speak I'll of him because he was a godly king, but I think you see it in Josiah in the Old Testament, whom the Lord used in a wonderful way and had a wonderful revival under him. But then he got thinking he was somebody and that he could start interfering militarily with the conflict that the Lord hadn't told him to get into, and he lost his life. You've seen it in secular history, haven't you?
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Those of you that have studied ancient history will remember the name of a man by the name of Charlemagne. He was a great king of the, uh, ethnic group called the Franks in Europe. So incidentally, and you know, this probably is well or better than I do, we're partly responsible for overthrowing the Roman Empire.
That's where France got its name from, the fact that the original people there were called Franks.
And Charlemagne, even though he saw that his people had helped to overflow overthrow the Roman Empire, had a tremendous admiration for that empire, and he tried to reestablish it, and he compelled the Pope to crown him Holy Roman Emperor.
But was he a Holy Roman Emperor? Did he restore the Roman Empire? No, I can still remember on a history test the question being proposed to us. Discuss the question Charlemagne Dash Roman Emperor or only a Frankish king?
And the fact of the matter is that while he did a tremendous amount of good for his people and was greatly used in that sense to establish schools and many other good institutions, he was and remained a Frankish king. God wasn't going to restore the Roman Empire at that time, but sometimes you and I can get the idea that we're going to restore things as they might have been a generation or two ago or 100 years ago.
And I say to you, beloved young people, as I say to my own soul, don't try it. Don't try it. No, we find that David served his own generation by the will of God, and then he fell on sleep. Don't try and put things back into a state that they might have been previously. It's not going to work. But what I do say with all, shall I say, conviction that God will enable you and me to live for his glory in the fullest way.
In the situation where you find yourself and Gideon had the same. But what it takes is humility and a willingness to be used of the Lord and not pretending to be something. Because God can't use pretenders. He can't use those who pretend to be what they're not. He has to bring them down to where they say, Lord, thou art worthy. Thou art worthy. Well, let's go on here #4.
What happens?
Verse 17 It seems as if finally after, if I could say it reverently, after three tries, the Lord finally gets through to Gideon. All right, Gideon says, all right, I guess, I guess it must be true. But what does he want? Verse 17 And he said unto him, If now I have found grace in thy sight, then show me a sign that thou talkest with me.
Depart not hence, I pray thee, until I come unto thee, and bring forth my present, and set it before thee. And he said, I will tarry until thou come again.
Was this another lack of faith?
This isn't the only sign that Gideon got. You'll remember if you read his subsequent history that he got at least three more signs from God. Were they a lack of faith?
Possibly, possibly. But again, I suggest that the Lord went along with Gideon here in asking for signs because it was not so much a lack of faith in what the Lord could do, but a lack of faith in himself. And Gideon was like some of us in that he needed to be taken by the hand and let alone by the Lord, step after step after step. And you know, in one sense that is humbling because.
We don't read, for example, that a man like Joshua, whom the Lord used to conquer that land of Canaan, We don't read that Joshua had these same experiences as Gideon did. No, it was a different day. And Joshua relied on the Lord, and he went forward with a boldness and a confidence that Gideon did not have. But remember, Gideon was surrounded by all kinds of failure. And for that reason, I believe.
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Gideon proceeds cautiously and carefully. Show me a sign.
I'm not suggesting to you young people that you ask for signs.
All I say is that if you feel the Lord is leading you in the right direction, no I let me rephrase that, that's not very good if you feel that you are being LED in a direction that is of the Lord.
And yet you are still not very sure.
I don't think it is entirely wrong to ask the Lord to make it abundantly clear. Now I don't mean to take away from scriptures that say I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go. I will guide thee with mine eye. Yes, that is the preferred way to be guided. And here Gideon had the word of the Lord three times over. I'm with you, Gideon, I'm with you, I'm with you. But Gideon says I'd like a sign.
I'd like a sign.
And the sign is a nice one that he has here. We aren't going to go into it in detail, but in verse 19 it says in Gideon went in and made ready a kid and unleavened cakes of an IFA flour. The flesh put he in a basket and he put the broth in a pot and brought it out under him under the oak and presented it. And what happened? Verse 21 Then the Angel of the Lord put forth the end of the staff that was in his hand and touched the flesh in the unleavened cakes, and there rose up fire out of the rock and consumed the flesh.
And the unleavened cakes. Then the Angel of the Lord departed out of his sight.
The Lord gave fire from heaven, but notice Gideon brought what he wanted to present and what the law gave as an offering to the Lord. Now we made a mistake here too, and it might seem on first glance to be a serious mistake because.
The kid that was good, the unleavened cakes, that was a meat offering that was good. But broth?
Broth. Broth. Did you ever find that mentioned in the law as part of an offering? No. No. And so the Angel says. You pour that broth out, Gideon. Oh, how gracious the Lord is. And he'll be gracious to you, too.
Beloved young people, as some of us that are older can make a personal reference. Don't think that we haven't been there.
I know when I was your age, I used to look at some of the older brethren and I could name them. They're long since with the Lord and I used to think, well, I'm sure they never ran into the difficulties and the problems that I did. They never had the questions about their pathway that I did.
But I want to tell you now that I'm a little older.
We've been there, some of us.
Pardon a personal reference, but I can well remember when I wanted to go to medical school and my father did not think it was a very good idea.
Not one little bit.
And another brother, who is now with the Lord, who shall remain nameless, venture to tell me, Bill, doctors don't make good brethren.
Had to swallow that for a little while.
Then another brother came up to me who was also full time in the Lord's work. Well, Bill, I think you better give it up. Give it up.
And I'm not throwing stones at them. I appreciated their interest and their advice, although I must confess, when I reminded the one dear brother that made the first comment about 30 years later of what he said, he was about ready to crawl under the table. But anyway, the point is, I appreciated their interest, but it put me in an awful quandary. Was the Lord speaking to me? Was he telling me something through these brethren that I needed to pay attention to?
And I asked for a sign. I asked for a sign.
And I believe the Lord gave it to me. And probably you obviously know what the result was. And I'm not suggesting for one moment that those brethren shouldn't have said what they did. I never forgot what they said and I appreciated it. But I say to each one of you young people, some of us have been there, I think all of us have, and been through the questions and the concerns. And we put out a request for a sign and Gideon got the sign here. Wonderful.
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And what's the result? Verse 24?
Then Gideon built there, or built an altar there unto the Lord, and called Jehovah Shalom unto this day. It is yet an Oprah of the Abbey Ezraites.
I don't know whether I'm right in this. I submit the thought though for others to consider.
Gideon had already offered this sacrifice, and the Lord had graciously sent down fire from heaven, which provided the sign that Gideon was looking for.
But it was done, as it says here, under an oak, and it was done on a rock. It was done on a rock.
A rock is something that's pretty stationary, but there can be lots of rocks in this world, and I could find a rock just about anywhere probably suitable to do something on. Some of us that have done a bit of wilderness camping, we sometimes look for a nice broad Flat Rock. It makes a nice convenient place for a table and maybe to set up a camp stove on or something like that and cook with and so on. But then the next day you get in your canoe and go on somewhere.
And when you get to another campsite, very often there's another rock, lots of rocks around.
But Gideon builds an altar, and I would suggest, and this is an application of the Scripture, not the only interpretation or application of it, I would suggest that the altar here speaks of that which is more a permanent thing, more abiding.
And that bears very obviously the marks of the hand of man in it. The rock. Didn't God put the rock there? And when the sacrifice was consumed, I suppose unless there were a little blackening on the rock afterward, no one would have known for sure what took place there.
And sometimes it's like that. Excuse me?
Sometimes it is like that in your life and mine. There are times in our lives when the Lord would perhaps show us a rock on which something can be done and where He gives us a real and definite sign that we have His mind about going ahead in a certain path.
But then there is a time that comes after that, when perhaps the Lord leads us to put up something more permanent, to put up something that bears the marks of our hand in it. Not that we can do anything in that sense, but if someone saw that altar, aha. There is an altar to the Lord. It isn't just a rock that someone used for the occasion. It is an altar that marks out that place.
In perpetuity.
As a place where the Lord acted.
And you know, there comes a time in your life and mine when I believe the Lord would ask us to put a semblance of permanence on what we're doing. He can show us things wherever we are. But then there comes a time when we build an altar. No record that Gideon ever used it. We don't say he didn't. No record that he used it to offer a sacrifice. But it does say that it's still there under this day. And it had a significance for Gideon. It was a milestone in his life.
And he calls it Jehovah Shalom. The Lord send peace. Isn't that beautiful?
I have seen many believers today who long for peace. I don't mean peace necessarily in the sense that they're afraid of a suicide bomber coming along and blowing them up or they're afraid of something in that type of thing happening to them. But there is fear, fear of something that might happen. There is a lack of peace in their lives. There is a pursuing after. They don't know what, whether it's in the world or among believers, but I have seen dear believers doing that.
And I say to you and to me, the Lord wants to give you peace in your life. I don't mean that it'll be a life without problems. I don't mean that it'll be a life without questions and burdens and difficulties. The whole of our lives consists of adversarial circumstances and burdens and difficulties.
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But the Lord Jesus could say, peace I leave with you, that's peace as to our sins forgiven. But then he could say, My peace I give unto you. So he builds an altar.
What else happens here? Verse 25 And it came to pass the same night that the Lord said unto him, Notice this the same night. No time to think about it. Take thy father's young Bullock, even the second Bullock of seven years old, and throw down the altar of veil that thy father hath, and cut down the Grove that is by it, and build an altar under the Lord thy God upon the top of this rock.
In the ordered place, and take the second bullet, and offer a burnt sacrifice with the wood of the Grove, which thou shalt cut down. Then Gideon took ten men of his servants, and did as the Lord had said unto him. And so it was because he feared his father's household and the men of the city, that he could not do it by day, that he did it by night.
Right away the Lord speaks to Gideon, this time something with a direct command. What he had done before was more, if we could use the expression, for Gideon's own soul, his doubts, his fears, his questions. He needed the sign. Everything was yes, it was in view of the Lord, but it was done for him.
But now that the Lord has Gideon building an altar, he says Gideon OK.
Now I want your thoughts to be turned in a little different direction.
This time, he says, as it were. Gideon, I want your thoughts to turn toward me. And you know, once again, I say it to each one of us, but particularly to you beloved young people.
The secret of a happy Christian pathway, among other things.
Is not to be taken up with yourself at all, but to have the Lord's interests before you. And God gave Gideon so much to think about with his interest. That is the Lord's interest. The Gideon didn't have time to think about his being happy or his doing something for his own enjoyment. But you know what the wonderful thing was? The Lord looked after his happiness. The Lord looked after his happiness. And to go back to what we said this morning.
The one who said.
In this world, lo, I come to do thy will, O God, and who gave up everything, far more even than the apostle Paul who wrote that chapter we had this morning. Far more than anyone will ever be able to give up the one who gave up everything to do the Father's will.
And who never pleased himself, you know, and I know was the happiest man that ever walked through this world. Why? Because he set out to be happy. Because he set out to do everything that would make him happy. No, but because in doing the Father's will, there was a happiness and a joy that nothing else could produce. And so the Lord speaks to Gideon now, and he says, OK, Gideon, now I've got something for you to do.
He had to go and build another altar it seems.
And take his father's young Bullock, the second Bullock of seven years.
You know, those two words are significant, and again, we won't dwell on them, but why was it the second bullet? Why was it the second bullet?
Oh, I believe because the 1St man, Adam.
And the second man is the Lord from heaven.
The first man, Adam was made a living soul. The 2nd man is the Lord from heaven. Oh how many times in the word of God you find that God picks out the second one in a family and he is the one that is the channel of blessing instead of the first born?
I remember well in India, not this year but last year, saying to the children and young people, I said if anyone, up to the age of 16.
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Can find 7 couplets in the book of Genesis where the second one in a family was used of the Lord more than the first born. I promised them a reward. I said I'd give them some money.
And a brother immediately spoke up and he said, could that age be extended to 20? And sure enough, it was. And for the children, we said it had to be fewer. Now there are more than that, but it was interesting what they came up with. And if you want to do it, some of you children and young people, take a look just in the book of Genesis and see how many occasions you can find where the second one or one younger than the second one was a greater channel of blessing than the first born.
There are sometimes more than one in the same family. But anyway, I believe that's the point here. The second Bullock speaks of Christ, and it was the Bullock of seven years old. Oh, isn't it beautiful? How long have the children of Israel been delivered into the hand of Midian? Seven years.
The very year that God delivered them into the hand of Midian, that Bullock was born, and God had it waiting there all along. And all I say to you, beloved brethren and young people, God.
Way back in the past eternity, before you and I were ever even thought of, He chose you in Christ. But right from the foundation of the world, as soon as man sinned, God had the remedy for it. And now God takes Gideon's heart. Fact.
To Calvary's cross he takes him back to Christ as the true burnt offering.
But there's a significance in what happened here, and I want to lay some emphasis on this.
Gideon had to start at home.
Gideon had to start at home. It would have been a lot easier, wouldn't it, to have gone somewhere else and offered that sacrifice because where was this idol? The Grove here, You know, we sometimes think of a Grove, and properly so, as a group of trees. And when I was younger, I used to think that Gideon had to go with an axe or a saw or whatever and cut down a whole group, whole group of trees around, and then use the wood from those trees to.
Uh, offer the sacrifice. And I remember as a young man scratching my head and thinking that would not work. Greenwood would never burn, and how could he cut down a Grove of trees and build a fire that same night? It just wouldn't work. But that's not what it means. The word Grove here has the thought of an image to a God or a goddess. It was doubtless made of wood, but it was the image to a false God.
And yet Gideon, who had not he but his father, that idol right in his own backyard, could say to the Angel, why is all this evil befallen? And you know, sometimes we're blind to the very things that are the biggest hindrance to God's blessing. But if our heart is right, God will put his finger on it and say, deal with that, deal with that. And sometimes it is something right at home. It was not easy for Gideon because evidently this was his father's idol.
And he was afraid. And so instead of doing it by day, he does it by night. Takes 10 men, goes out there, smashes that idol up.
Kills the bullet, builds an altar, uses the wood of that Grove that idle the image of the idol to offer the sacrifice.
And there's something else I believe here that is important.
When you start out to be used from the for the Lord, there is going to be a cost involved.
Don't shy away from it. Don't shy away from the cost involved. All too often we do. And you read about the man in Luke's gospel who set out to build a tower and the Lord Jesus said he gets so far and then he's not able to finish. Oh, the world mocks at that. Just as they mock at believers who start out well and then find the cost is too high and they don't finish well. Or the one who goes out to battle with another king.
And when the other king has 20,000 and he has only 10,000, he's tempted to sue for peace. Oh yes, you can have peace. You can have, you can always have peace as long as you're willing to have peace. On the terms of the one who says I've got the biggest army, yes, you can have peace, but it'll be on my terms. And the devil will give you peace if you are willing to submit to his terms.
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But the devil's peace will be a little bit, and pardon the reference to it, but it'll be a little bit like the kind of peace that existed in Europe in the 1930s when Hitler said, well, just let me have this. And then there will be peace. And then a little while later, just let me have this, and then there will be peace. And then just one more thing.
And one more and one more until finally other nations had to stand up and say that's it. But you know the devil Devil will keep grabbing more and more from you and me. He'll never give you true and lasting peace.
And that's what's happening in among believers today if we're not careful. But here Gideon was willing to begin at home. And I say to you, beloved young people, don't look for some great work of the Lord outside your home environment. Don't look for some foreign land to go to. Yes, it's wonderful to go and be used to the Lord in a foreign land. And it's just a tremendous encouragement to some of us that have the privilege of going out to foreign lands to have young people go with us.
As I said earlier, they lend an energy and an enthusiasm that I love to see, and it means so much to our dear brethren too. But don't think that that is going to fix something in your life or my life that needs to be dealt with. I have to fix something at home. Here was an idol right in the backyard. And God says Gideon, deal with that idol first. I can't use you until it.
Is out of the way. He had to destroy the idol to have the sacrifice. And you know, the idol in New Testament terms speaks of that which would take my heart away from Christ.
Paul could say, or rather the apostle John could say, children keep yourselves from idols and Paul could say covetousness, which is idolatry. The idolatry of the Old Testament is the worldliness of today. And I've told this story before, but I remember while reading about two sisters, one of whom was living for the Lord in a godly way, and the other one who was trying to live with one foot in the world and who was most unhappy.
And she came home one day and her sister was just playing at the piano, playing a hymn and enjoying it. And the sister, who was trying to live with one foot in the world, came in, listened for a moment, then said to her sister, you know, I give the world to have the joy and peace in my heart that you have.
And the older sister took her up on it and she said yes, she said. And that's just what it's going to cost you. That's just what it's going to cost you.
I'd give the world to have the peace that you have, and that's what it's going to cost you. This idol had to go for that alternatively built and that sacrifice to be offered at Gideon did it one last thing.
Verse 34 or 33 Then all the Midianites and the Amalekites and the children of the East were gathered together and went over and pitched in the valley of Jezreel. Oh, if you set out to do something for the Lord, you're going to be a marked man or a marked woman. How do these Midianites know to come together? How did the Amalekites know to gather together? Oh, no doubt the devil knew very well that there was a Gideon who was there, who on whom the Lord had his eye, and whom the Lord was going to use.
And they say we've got to stop this man in his tracks, and the devil's trying to do that today.
There are young brothers over in India whom the devil is trying to stop, whom the devil is going after in a terrible way. Why? Because he does not take kindly to the invasion of his Kingdom. And they are having an impact and an effect because of their freshness and their energy and their ability to go out and preach the gospel in. The Lord is working. But the devil isn't lying down either. And so here all of this host comes together.
But verse 34 says, But the spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon, and he blew a trumpet. Oh, there will come a time in your life when God will say, as it were, blow a trumpet.
But I suggest that that's not the first thing. We'd all like to be the one to blow the trumpet, wouldn't we? We'd all like to get out there and say that's cool, but there had to be a long process before all of that could take place. But there came a time when the Lord used Gideon, and we know the history, how it went. We don't have time to go into it. And I say to each one here today, Lord can use you in a wonderful way if you'll only be willing to follow Him.
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And I suggest to you that these examples in the life of Gideon show us in picture how that God can work even under the most difficult of circumstances, and how he can use you and me in the day in which we're living.
Let's sing another hymn before we close, and if it's all right, I think that him that our brother Dave suggested at the beginning is a good one. 3/18 Was that the one? Thank you. Oh Lamb of God, still keep us close to Thy pierced side. Is only there in safety and peace. We can abide the foes and snares around us, and lusts and fears within the grace.
That sought and found us.
Alone can keep us clean 318.
10-4 oh 10-4 8 oh 10-4 Do you believe in real life and do you hear me alive now?
Nsnoise.