Sermon Tone Analysis

Let’s remind ourselves a little of how we got to where we are in Judges 6.

Midian was oppressing Israel to such an extent that they were like the swarming locusts that come into a land and eat everything in sight leaving absolutely nothing behind.

In order to avoid being utterly destroyed, the people of Israel had carved out dens into the hillside in order to hide while Midian did their thing.

When the people cried out to the Lord, God sent a prophet to explain why this was happening: I have done all these things for you, I have rescued from Egypt, I have given you this land....and yet, you have not obeyed my voice!

Instead of additional pronouncement of judgment that we often see after prophet explanations of negative events, the narrator takes us to an expression of God’s grace on the people.

God visits Gideon.

Gideon, who is presented as a fearful man, is out threshing wheat....but he’s not out on the threshing floor.

He’s doing it in secret to avoid being seen by the Midianites.

He’s in the winepress in order to hide from the enemy.

There God speaks to him.

Calls him a “Mighty Man of Valor” and declares that God is with him, and tells him that Gideon will strike Midian because God is with him.

Gideon is skeptical.

He requests a sign, and God is gracious enough to give him that sign.

Gideon realizes that he was in the presence of God and is understandably afraid for his life after an encounter with the almighty.

God reassures him.

Peace be to you.

Do not fear.

You shall not die.

In response Gideon build an alter to the Lord in worship.

Last week we talked about how was all such a huge expression of God’s Grace.

The people did not deserve God raising up another deliverer.

The deliverer he did raise up

That brings us up to our text for today.

First we see that

God’s People Must Tear Down Idols

God has called Gideon for a specific purpose: to rescue the people from the hand of Midian.

But there is a problem.

The people have not obeyed the voice of the Lord.

They are worshiping the false god Baal and his goddess mistress Asherah.

We’ve talked before about the abject depravity that is represented by these false gods.

They are the fertility gods.

Worship involved sexual immorality with the temple prostitutes in an attempt to provoke Baal to the do the same with Asherah.

These gods represent everything that is wrong with the Canaanite world around them.

They represent everything wrong the the hearts of the Israel.

As we move through this book, one of the sub themes of the book is the Canaanization of the people.

As the Israelites have lived in the land they were to live as God has directed.

But what was the word of the Prophet who spoke of their sin?

The people are drifting further and further into their Canaanization and further away from their LORD.

In God’s covenant he made with Israel, he was very clear: if you follow after these false idols, you will be judged.

But if you will return to me, I will restore you.

Thus we find the necessity to tear down the idol.

Israel cannot worship both God and Baal.

One has to go.

When Joshua first brought the people into the land he challenged them on this exact point.

Turn with me for a moment to Joshua chapter 24.

Joshua throws down the gauntlet with with people.

Choose this day whom you will serve.

Notice how they respond

Joshua knows that they will be tempted by the people of the land, so he challenges them.

He wants them to be firm in their commitment.

So the people double down on their resolve:

The people made this commitment.

Implicit within this is not only that they will observe that which the Lord commanded, but that they will also pass it down to their children.

Immediately following this Joshua set up a monument that was to serve as a reminder of what they had committed to do.

These monuments were to be reminders that their children would be instructed as to their significance.

Chose this day whom you will serve.

You cannot serve both.

And so, as God raises up Gideon, he commands him: tear down that idol.

I am your God.

You shall have no others.

This people cannot continually offer their worship to these false gods and expect that I will come to their rescue.

One has got to go.

So Gideon is to take this specific bull.

It is the second Bull, one that is seven years old, use it to tear down the false alter, and then build an alter to God and offer that same bull on the alter to the Lord.

Some of these details might not strike us at first, but these actions all carry significant symbolic weight.

While scholars debate the significance of this being the second bull, they all agree that there was religious significance.

This wasn’t just an ordinary bull.

This was a special bull.

This was a specific bull.

It was any wood used to light the fire, but the wood from the very alter false gods that he had torn down.

This was not only a statement about needing to turn to the Lord, but it was a highly symbolic act as well.

Think about people who want to make a mockery of Christianity, so they tear down crosses, trample upon them and burn them.

There is no doubt in our minds what they think of the cross, right?

That’s what’s going on here.

Gideon is not just to replace the alter.

He is to do so in a highly symbolic way that makes a massive statement about who is the one true God.

This is to be a statement that communicates that there can only be ONE GOD is Israel!

This is the principle behind Jesus words in Matt 6

Matthew 6:24 (ESV)

24 “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other...

We would do well to consider this in our own lives.

So often we are tempted to be more conformed to our own culture than conformed to the image of God.

Often we make idols of all the things around us, be that money, which was Jesus’ point in Matt 6, or be that family, career, notoriety, being well-liked by others etc.

Most often we are tempted to make ourselves the idol.

We worship ourselves and seek to serve our own interests with money, career, family, etc.

We are called to die to self, to set aside the things that our flesh strives for in our own self-interest.

We must put off the old man and put on the new.

Tear it Down.

It has to go.

There may be principles here as well for how we engage the world around us.

As we proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ, we must be confronting that which is keeping others from following after Jesus Christ.

Please hear me.

I’m not calling us to be jerks by yelling about everything that sinners do.

Sinners gonna sin.

Heathens gonna heath.

But I do think this means that we cannot shy away from calling sin sin.

We must be willing to speak the truth in love, which means that we will confront the sin that we see and seek to call sinners to repentance.

Often this will mean that we will be attacking the idols of the culture, the things that they hold dear that serves their own flesh.

Gideon is called to tear down the idol from his own culture.

And so, Gideon obeys....even if he has still not overcome all his fears.