Monday, April 14, 2008

Speaking of Judges 7

Instead of commenting on Mike's previous post, I felt I had to create a new post. You see, I love Judges 7. For some reason, it is one of my favorite chapters of the Bible. Seriously.

I think the main reason I love the story of Gideon and his little army is that it does seem so preposterous. Which is why we know God had to have a hand in it. I mean, God actually told Gideon his army should be smaller so the odds were so incredibly against them, they could only give credit to God.

Probably my favorite part of all is the dream the man in the Midianite camp had involving the barley loaf coming in and destroying everything.



One, because the mental image of a loaf of bread being that powerful and actually causing fear is just a bit funny. Two, because the meaning behind it is quite fascinating. A loaf a barley bread was considered not the greatest food of the time. Perhaps the Ramen noodles of the day. And it was an interesting way for God to show Gideon to trust Him, that his army could win this battle as they were the equivalent of a little barley loaf. So often throughout the Bible, God uses people/ things the rest of the world sees as insignificant. Really, no glory can be attributed to anyone but God because nothing could be accomplished without Him.

(A side note on the cartoon: I realize the barley loaf is saying "Midians" when the correct term would be "Midianites". This is actually intentional as a barley loaf would be uneducated. Yes, I have thought too much about this.)

2 comments:

Giancarlo said...

I love that you wrote about this, as I'd been meaning to attach an addendum to my post. The difference between Gideon believing our lives versus us believing his? It should actually be EASIER for us to believe about him, since he clearly has God powering him (whereas computers, et al are more directly products of man)

thatoneguy said...

That cartoon is fantastic.