Outline // Sunday School #10: Gideon the Baal Crusher

Judges 6:17-39

That fire in my belly is there to let me know I HAVE to do whatever God is asking me to do…but it doesn’t always take the fear away.

Your attitude here, when you’re asking God for proof, shows your heart.  Do you have a heart that is selfish with God, a heart that NEEDS TO KNOW THAT YOU KNOW THAT YOU KNOW….a heart that NEEDS to be convinced, but also can never be fully convinced no matter how much evidence is provided.

Because the thing is, if you’re waiting for a sign–will you even see it when it comes? If you’re waiting for a sign to be obedient–will you ever be obedient?

If you REALLY had faith, you would just believe and obey without a sign. Faithful people actually look for the signs, after obeying.

Faith shows the reality of what we hope for; it is the evidence of things we cannot see. 

It is believing in something even when we can’t make “sense” of it. Believing enough to do something about it.

Judges 7:1-22

God used something that Gideon inherently understood–FEAR–to find victory over their oppressors. Fear…the very thing that Gideon probably thought disqualified him.  God used EVEN THAT.

God used Gideon’s anger to call him.  And his fear to fulfill that calling.

Do it afraid!

The end of Gideon’s story isn’t preached much. He resisted leadership and the people revering him for like a millisecond, but eventually, even he fell to it.  Judges 8:27, says, “27 Gideon made a sacred ephod from the gold [that they won in battle] and put it in Ophrah, his hometown. But soon all the Israelites prostituted themselves by worshiping it, and it became a trap for Gideon and his family.”