Believers are faced with two choices daily, even hourly. We must decide whose thoughts will lead us.  In fact, what thoughts are leading you right now? What is your first thought as you read this and question why we would bring this to light?  Recall yesterday’s activities and behaviors.  Did we wonder why certain people acted as they did without giving much thought about us and our feelings? Are we disappointed in them? 

Are we thinking about a problem that should be solved in the way we think it should be dealt with and settled once and for all?  Sometimes we follow our own assumptions and presumptions about people and our problems and it becomes a snare.  When we behave in this way; we stand as the judge, jury, and executioner without sitting down to communicate with them directly.  Misunderstandings lead to the deconstruction of relationships. But do we even care?

We are all born into sin so it’s easy to follow sin’s behaviors. The Spirit of Darkness, God’s Enemy and ours, works diligently with his demons to plant unholy thoughts that we have the power to dismiss—if we call on God’s Holy Spirit’s power.  But do we tap into this power of God’s Holy Spirit in us as our first defense?

The Enemy plants thoughts in our minds which challenges us to “have it our way,” “you deserve all you can get,” “follow your own heart,” so you can “be all you want to be.”  We fall for it because we are naturally selfish.  We learn from Jesus that “no one is good, only God is good”.  We learn from Paul, the missionary and church planter that, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”.

Are we just hopeless pawns for the enemy?  The Enemy pursues us day and night to stay engaged, bonded, and chained to sin.  The Spirit of Enemy is evil which is in direct opposition to God’s Holy Spirit who is Truth.  The limited power of the Enemy uses tools of distraction and deception for the purpose of dismantling our faith in God. The end goal of the Enemy is eternal death. God has power over the Enemy and extends that power to us. The end goal of God is eternal life. We decide.  We have a choice.  Life or death.  So, let’s call them for who they really are: Two opposing Spirits vying for our focused attention. One loves us; the other one hates us. One is Life. One is death.

All behaviors of sin come to fruition because of our selfishness and deceptive hearts that believe that when we are in control, handling life on our own; we are “good.”  We must continually be at the top of our game, however, so we compare our accomplishments to others, eyeing what they do, with plans to be even better.  We work our plan to climb over them as we are driven to seek the top rung of the “ladder of success.” We will do anything to have the top position and stay there.

Our behaviors are then driven by the “attached” sins of envy, greed, jealousy, arrogance and pride.  When we see others do good; we put them down only because we feel bad that we didn’t have a part in their accomplishment.  It’s called FOMO—Fear Of Missing Out.  This troublesome disease today causes people to do things that shouldn’t be doing, good or bad, for it is all about them wanting to be included in the glory of the accomplishment. Yikes!

Two choices.  Will we trust the Spirit of God’s Enemy who uses our human sin nature of self will to have control over us? Or will we put our trust in God’s Holy Spirit who leads us to all that is True and Right—for our good and God’s glory?    

In the following passage of Gideon and the Three Hundred’s accomplishment; many attitudes, good and bad, come to the surface—even FOMO!  “Why didn’t you call us…?”

Judges 8

Zebah and Zalmunna

Now the Ephraimites asked Gideon, “Why have you treated us like this? Why didn’t you call us when you went to fight Midian?” And they challenged him vigorously.

² But he answered them, “What have I accomplished compared to you? Aren’t the gleanings of Ephraim’s grapes better than the full grape harvest of Abiezer? ³ God gave Oreb and Zeeb, the Midianite leaders, into your hands. What was I able to do compared to you?” At this, their resentment against him subsided.

⁴ Gideon and his three hundred men, exhausted yet keeping up the pursuit, came to the Jordan and crossed it. ⁵ He said to the men of Sukkoth, “Give my troops some bread; they are worn out, and I am still pursuing Zebah and Zalmunna, the kings of Midian.”

⁶ But the officials of Sukkoth said, “Do you already have the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna in your possession? Why should we give bread to your troops?”

⁷ Then Gideon replied, “Just for that, when the Lord has given Zebah and Zalmunna into my hand, I will tear your flesh with desert thorns and briers.”

⁸ From there he went up to Peniel and made the same request of them, but they answered as the men of Sukkoth had. ⁹ So he said to the men of Peniel, “When I return in triumph, I will tear down this tower.”

¹⁰ Now Zebah and Zalmunna were in Karkor with a force of about fifteen thousand men, all that were left of the armies of the eastern peoples; a hundred and twenty thousand swordsmen had fallen. ¹¹ Gideon went up by the route of the nomads east of Nobah and Jogbehah and attacked the unsuspecting army. ¹² Zebah and Zalmunna, the two kings of Midian, fled, but he pursued them and captured them, routing their entire army.

¹³ Gideon son of Joash then returned from the battle by the Pass of Heres. ¹⁴ He caught a young man of Sukkoth and questioned him, and the young man wrote down for him the names of the seventy-seven officials of Sukkoth, the elders of the town. ¹⁵ Then Gideon came and said to the men of Sukkoth, “Here are Zebah and Zalmunna, about whom you taunted me by saying, ‘Do you already have the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna in your possession? Why should we give bread to your exhausted men?’” ¹⁶ He took the elders of the town and taught the men of Sukkoth a lesson by punishing them with desert thorns and briers. ¹⁷ He also pulled down the tower of Peniel and killed the men of the town.

¹⁸ Then he asked Zebah and Zalmunna, “What kind of men did you kill at Tabor?”

“Men like you,” they answered, “each one with the bearing of a prince.”

¹⁹ Gideon replied, “Those were my brothers, the sons of my own mother. As surely as the Lord lives, if you had spared their lives, I would not kill you.” ²⁰ Turning to Jether, his oldest son, he said, “Kill them!” But Jether did not draw his sword, because he was only a boy and was afraid.

²¹ Zebah and Zalmunna said, “Come, do it yourself. ‘As is the man, so is his strength.’” So Gideon stepped forward and killed them, and took the ornaments off their camels’ necks.

Gideon’s Ephod

²² The Israelites said to Gideon, “Rule over us—you, your son and your grandson—because you have saved us from the hand of Midian.”

²³ But Gideon told them, “I will not rule over you, nor will my son rule over you. The Lord will rule over you.” ²⁴ And he said, “I do have one request, that each of you give me an earring from your share of the plunder.” (It was the custom of the Ishmaelites to wear gold earrings.)

²⁵ They answered, “We’ll be glad to give them.” So they spread out a garment, and each of them threw a ring from his plunder onto it. ²⁶ The weight of the gold rings he asked for came to seventeen hundred shekels, not counting the ornaments, the pendants and the purple garments worn by the kings of Midian or the chains that were on their camels’ necks. ²⁷ Gideon made the gold into an ephod, which he placed in Ophrah, his town. All Israel prostituted themselves by worshiping it there, and it became a snare to Gideon and his family.

Gideon’s Death

²⁸ Thus Midian was subdued before the Israelites and did not raise its head again. During Gideon’s lifetime, the land had peace forty years.

²⁹ Jerub-Baal son of Joash went back home to live. ³⁰ He had seventy sons of his own, for he had many wives. ³¹ His concubine, who lived in Shechem, also bore him a son, whom he named Abimelek. ³² Gideon son of Joash died at a good old age and was buried in the tomb of his father Joash in Ophrah of the Abiezrites.

³³ No sooner had Gideon died than the Israelites again prostituted themselves to the Baals. They set up Baal-Berith as their god ³⁴ and did not remember the Lord their God, who had rescued them from the hands of all their enemies on every side. ³⁵ They also failed to show any loyalty to the family of Jerub-Baal (that is, Gideon) in spite of all the good things he had done for them.

WHAT DO WE LEARN—HOW DO WE RESPOND?

The Israelites “did not remember the Lord their God.”  Focus on God and His Spiritual leading was lost to entertain the Spirit of Darkness—which often happens in times of peace and rest.  “During Gideon’s lifetime, the land had peace forty years.”  We can become complacent when we are not challenged openly but inwardly by the opposition.  We learn that this is the very time to refocus on God!

All sin will always be judged by God. Consequences from our past sins often come back to haunt us. Gideon and his army, though greatly outnumbered, defeated the Midianite invaders with God’s blessing. Yet after Gideon died, the Israelites again abandoned God and worshiped Baal. Deciding to follow and worship a manmade god led to another foolish decision—choosing Abimelek as their king. He decides later to murder sixty-nine of his seventy brothers and the Israelites help him!  God repaid the treachery and idolatry of Abimelek and the town of Shechem with death and destruction.

Ah, but we get ahead of ourselves…Tomorrow, in chapter nine; we will learn of one lone survivor, Jotham, who will stand to tell the truth of God through a parable to Israel!  Stay tuned!

Lord, our God,

We are all hopeless sinners in need of a Savior and you gave us Jesus. Thank you, God for sending your Son to save us from ourselves and the sins that engulfed our beings. Thank you, Jesus for laying down your life for our deserved punishment. Thank you, Father for your resurrection power of Jesus who restored our Hope of eternal life with you. Thank you, Holy Spirit of God, who is God, for leading us back daily to all that is truth with resurrection power to live it—out loud! Thank you for forgiving us and leading us home.  Thank you for being with us always.

In Jesus Name, Amen