God can get the job done with minimal help

We had a mighty fine discussion in Sunday School this morning. As an elderly man, I am in what is known as the "adult men's" class. Ours is a small rural church, so the only other classes are the adult women's class, the young adults class, and then the youth and children's classes.

There are just three old men in our class, but we stay on track and discuss the lesson from the "quarterly," which is the Bible study booklet that is published by our denomination every three months. This quarter -- June, July and August -- we are studying Joshua, Judges and Ruth. Joshua got seven weeks. Judges gets four and Ruth gets two.

Today's lesson was about Gideon and the 300 men who ran the Midianites out of Israel, even though Israel was outnumbered four to one. It is a short but riveting story. Gideon start out with 32,000 fighting men, but God tells him that's way too many. God, whose name is Yahweh, told Gideon to announce to his fighting men that anyone who was scared and trembling about the upcoming battle to go on home. Well, 22,000 of them up and skedaddled back home.

That left Gideon with 10,000 fighting men to take on the 120,000 Midianite fighters. You've got too many men, God told Gideon. Why? God wanted the Israelites, His chosen people, to understand that their victory would be His doing, not theirs.

God told Gideon to test his fighting men by taking them down to the river and let them drink water. God told Gideon to keep on eye on how the men drank that water. Those that got down on their hands and knees to lap the water up like a dog would go in one group. Those who went to the water, put their cupped hands in and then lifted their hands to their mouths to drink would go in the other.

God told Gideon to send all the dog-like drinkers home while keeping the men who drank out of cupped hands and kept their eyes on their surroundings. Well, that left Gideon with 300 alert fighting men out of his original 32,000. And those 300 would go up against the Midianites who numbered 120,000. Goodness, gracious, sakes alive, as my Grandma Howe would say.

So, on the day of the attack, Gideon divided his men into three groups of 100 each. Every man had a ram's horn to blow like a trumpet, plus a clay pitcher with a torch inside it. The three companies took their places in the middle of the third watch, according to the scripture, which was around midnight or a little after. 

Then, they blew their trumpets and smashed the jars and held up their torches.They also shouted "A sword for the Lord and for Gideon!" All that horn-blowing and pitcher breaking noise and hollering, along with the lights from the torches, scared the Midianites so much that they tried to run away from what they thought were thousands upon thousands of Jewish soldiers. The Midianites started running around, trying to high-tail it out of there, and they got so scared and confused that they commenced to fighting one another as they sought a way of escape. Well, the Midianites got out of there and headed east. Gideon put the word out to his men, apparently even including those who did not take part in the assault on the Midianite camp, to chase them home. And so they did.

What this shows is that God can get the job done with minimal help. Actually, He can do it without any help, but he wants us to be a part of the work He is doing on this earth. On the other hand, He wants it to be clear that it is He, not we, who are in control. 

Imagine if all of the Israelite men had gotten into the fight and won. They would have needed God's help, but they would likely have taken all the credit for themselves. That's why God cut the number to 300 valiant fighters. He made it clear the work was done by Him through them.

That's still the way it works. What you accomplish in life is done by Him through you. Now that is quite a story and here in Rolla, Missouri, a scientific and intellectual community, there are likely not many people who believe it to be true. We country church people do believe it, though, for we see God as all-powerful and all-knowing. We figure He has given us these Old Testament accounts to build our faith in Him.

Even more important, though, is the New Testament account of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God and literally God Incarnate (in the flesh), who lived a perfect life and then was killed on cross. While on that cross, all of our sins were put on Jesus and the Father poured out his wrath on those sins. Repent, believe in Jesus as your Savior and follow Jesus as your Lord if you want to spend eternity with God

He said himself that he is "the Way, the Truth and the Life" and that "no man comes to the Father except through me." Tell him you believe that and then live like you believe it.

Do it now so you can spend the rest of your life here on earth getting to know him by reading and studying the book he dictated to writers, The Holy Bible.