THE HISTORY OF GIDEON AS BEARING ON THE PRESENT DAY

A. McKay

Judges 6: 11–14, 19, 20 (to “broth”), 24–26, 36–38; 7: 5, 13 (to “overturned it”), 19, 20

You will see, dear brethren, that I have in mind to speak about these exercises that Gideon went through, and how they bear on us in our day. The exercises have not changed through this dispensation. The attacks of the enemy have been consistent, always aimed at trying to set aside or neutralise what is precious to the heart of Christ. On the other hand, think of what the Spirit’s operations, as well as the operations of the Lord Jesus, have been so that the people of God should be maintained in freshness and power. Bear in mind that we have been taken up for two things. The word to Pharaoh was, “Let my son go, that he may serve me”, Exodus 4: 23. We have been taken up for the service of God and for the testimony.

Things were difficult in Gideon’s day as the people were being starved, not by a famine of Jehovah, but by these tribes that were related to them. When they sowed they came in and appropriated what was growing; they were denying the people of God nourishment. What God had in mind according to the prophecies, was to bring them into a land flowing with milk and honey; a land of olive yards and vineyards, houses that they had not built, water-brooks, springing fountains, a land of plenty. Why had this famine come in? On account of their unfaithfulness. Things have not changed. If there is a famine today, it is on account of our unfaithfulness. Looking back, we would have to say, that in any breakdown we have had part in it, and if there has been shame on the testimony we have added to it. That does not mean to say that we are going to sit down now with our hands folded.

We get a locality presented here, “And an angel of Jehovah came and sat under the terebinth that was in Ophrah, that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite”. That would mean somebody had been there before Gideon. There was a terebinth; a large shady tree so the idea was that there would be rest there and peace and joy, where they could enjoy fellowship. I wonder if we value fellowship? Fellowship is not only a matter of coming to the meetings, although that is a very important part of it, there is what we enjoy together; it involves our households, our localities, our neighbouring localities; we are invited to three day meetings, all that is part of the fellowship. But that has to be maintained by individuals; we start off individually. In this sorrow, we find Gideon threshing wheat in a winepress. It is very interesting to trace something of the winepress; that is where they press grapes to make wine; the wine is for the heart of God and man. You see the idea of cheer, happiness is after the harvest. But that is not what the winepress was being used for here, it was being used as a threshing-floor.

Threshing-floors in Scripture are testing places, two or three incidents are mentioned. David was brought to the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite, he knew what it was. Before that he put the ark on a new cart, but it came to the threshing-floor of Nachon and the oxen stumbled (2 Samuel 6: 6). They were not doing things according to the due order. So we need to bear in mind that we have a locality, in which we are governed by assembly principles. Assembly principles are not all got from the books; we go by the book as we say, but that is not the full answer to it. Assembly principles are governed largely through our affections; it is how we interpret what we know. Who does the assembly belong to? Who has rights over it? We go to Matthew 16, where the Lord says, “my assembly” (Matthew 16: 18). Before He mentions any assembly administration He says, “my assembly”. I hope we all understand that. Then we come in Matthew 17 to a preview of the Lord glorified; we have to bear in mind that the assembly belongs to the Lord in glory, and administration is from that standpoint. Now that is from Mr. Taylor’s ministry, but it is yours if you make it your own!

I would urge every one to take this matter up. It bears on what I said about Gideon threshing wheat in the winepress; he was using the winepress for a threshing-floor. The threshing-floor was a separating place, where they separated wheat from the straw and the chaff. Straw is easily removed, leaving the wheat and the chaff. What comes after the separation of the straw? There is the winnowing. Now both in Matthew and Luke the Lord is presented as the One whose winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly purge His threshing-floor.

What does He want? He wants the wheat. The Lord said to Peter, “Satan has demanded to have you, to sift you as wheat”, Luke 22: 31. What does wheat lead on to? It leads on to the oblation, the presentation of what was pleasurable to the heart of God; the fine flour, typifying the evenness of the Lord Jesus, of whom we sung in our hymn.

Gideon must have cultivated, initially, and harvested, and then there is the threshing. Later on, the threshing-floor is referred to but not as used for threshing. What is it used for? Laying out the fleece. What does that mean? It is not a skin, fleece is from a live sheep. We are thankful for what has come through death, but the fleece and milk and honey did not come through death. Milk comes from the cow, honey from the bee, and the fleece is from a live sheep. I wonder if we are fully alive to all that is going on, and are we part of this great productive system that is for the maintenance of the fellowship? They were told not to offer honey; the priests had not to wear wool; these are for the nourishment and comfort of the brethren, and that little extra is to make the wheels run smoothly. What comes out of the threshing-floor when the wool is on it is a bowl full of water. The dew is caught in the

fleece, that is the gentle distilling service of the Spirit that is intended to keep us fresh and at liberty in each one of our localities. I remember a brother giving an address on this, in which he stressed the importance of what is caught by the fleece, a bowl full of water. There had been the experience of the night season. I suppose we all have experience of the night seasons. When we are young and busy, we need an alarm clock to waken us, but when we grow older we do not need it. Why? Because there are too many things that run through your mind.

I was speaking about Gideon and the fleece. Now he had these things but the first thing he did was to secure a kid of the goats. Like Abraham of old he detained the Angel. He brought this present, a kid of the goats, and an ephah of flour in unleavened cakes; he is not indiscriminate. The kid of the goats speaks of separation; so he knows what is involved in bringing this present. Gideon would have known of the tabernacle system, he would have known about the glory of the tent, that it was a covering over the tabernacle of goats’ hair. Do you know what that means? Things are going to be protected by the covering. The tent is really a covering over the holy place and it is of goats’ hair. Who had spun the goats’ hair?

The sisters did. The sisters are not just useful for helping with the singing of the hymns, they have their own distinctive place. I trust they know it, because if they do not know it, they will not know how they fill it out. If they want to fill out their place they want to know it. Now the curtains of goats’ hair were held together by clasps of copper. These clasps of copper linked the curtains together so that the tent was one whole.

Gideon was discriminate, he brought this kid and he brought this ephah of flour. It is one thing to bring a present, but then he knows there is something more than that, and he builds this altar referred to in verse 24. While things were not right in Israel, he would never lose sight of the oneness of the people. So that however small we may be, and however broken the conditions, the one loaf includes every saint of the assembly. When the Lord comes to rally His own with that triumphant shout, what a wonderful display there will be. There is great gain in being exercised to hold to the light of the whole assembly and to seek to work out matters according to the truth presented in the Scriptures. Thus there is something held for all.

Now he builds an altar, that is one thing, but then God wants something more than that. What does God say? He says, “Take the young bullock, which thy father hath, even the second bullock of seven years old, and throw down the altar of Baal that thy father hath”. He is getting strength now. If we are going to pursue what will be for the divine pleasure, and our own satisfaction (because we will only be satisfied when we are filling out what is for the divine pleasure), we must take the second bullock. It is typical of how He takes away the first that He might establish the second. Nothing of the first order is to have any place here, and the altar and all that belongs to the altar is to be used for the divine service. I do not think there is another instance like this. The altar is thrown down, the idol is cut down and the wood of the idol is taken for the wood of the burnt-offering, “take the second bullock, and offer up a burnt-offering with the wood of the Asherah that thou shalt cut down”. When the Lord was taken and put in the tomb, the stone was rolled to the mouth of the tomb, and it was sealed with the Roman seal; but an angel came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it.

That has been described as a touch of irony, God setting at nought all that the greatest authority on earth can do. The Roman seal is broken, and the angel is sitting on that stone, it is something like this. All that is being used by Satan for the spoiling of the inheritance and for the hindering of its enjoyment by the people, the Lord claims, I am going to have that, He says! So that altar is built on a strong place, strong in relation to His world as the Lord will show, and the world cannot defy Him.

If you care to read some of the ministry that relates to the history of the testimony now, and what will happen after the saints are raptured, it will show the Lord in His supreme superiority, with no rival to Him. Now the idea is that there is to be no rival to Christ in our hearts. There is little point in us thinking about Gideon throwing down this altar unless we can apply it to ourselves. The Lord is going to have the victory. He takes away the first; that is we have to do that, we have to displace the first completely. The other way of putting it, is that we have to experience the Jordan typically, like Naaman the Syrian. After raising certain questions, it says he plunged seven times, and his flesh became again as the flesh of a little child. Now these exercises have to be gone through. If the Lord is to have His portion, and the Father is to have His portion, and we are to have our portion, these exercises have to be gone through completely, there is to be nothing that we would like to retain. No doubt Naaman would have liked to retain something of his great place. The Lord had used him and all that, but that is no use. Naaman in every aspect has to go; he has to become an associate of a captive maid. So it says of Gideon that he built it in the ordered manner.

Then you have to go through the experience suggested by the wool. As I said, the wool is what we produce. Take the woman in Proverbs 31, the first thing that is spoken about is wool. We would, maybe, have said flax and wool, but no, the order is wool and flax. Then it speaks about not being afraid of the snow. That is the idea, it is the comfort of the brethren, it runs alongside this. All her household were clothed in scarlet. She spins with a distaff; that is the wool has to be processed. So it is all part of the Christian pathway to be here for the pleasure of divine Persons and for the building up of each other.

The next thing is they are going to war and the test is the water. Soldiers need to drink, but then the test is are they going to lap like a dog. That means, Are you going to be a good soldier or are you going to have your eyes on the water? Divine provision is all right, but then, if there is warfare on, you have to be careful. Do not be too much engaged with the water, take enough and pass on. In books you may see illustrations of these men of Gideon with their two hands held up drinking the water, but it does not say that; Scripture speaks about those that lapped with their hand to their mouth, one hand. Where was the other hand?

They would have their weapon in the other hand. In Nehemiah’s day, they built with the trowel in one hand and the sword in the other. In difficult days, we cannot be engaged too much with the water; we take as much as we need and hurry on. That is the test. Three hundred were left out of thirty-two thousand. Were there enough to cope? The difference is that these three hundred were chosen men. Would you like to be amongst them? They were select personnel, set aside.

Gideon is now pressing on, and so he goes into the camp, he is told to go down. He was not told to put the fleece on the threshing-floor, but the Lord will go along with you if you need strengthening. He is told to go down to the camp, and he hears about this cake of barley-bread. It says, “a cake of barley-bread tumbled into the camp of Midian, and came to the tent, and smote it that it fell”. Why is that brought in? When we may get on a little in the Lord’s service, we need to be humbled. In effect the Lord is telling him that this is what he is, just a cake of barley-bread of little or no account. We know that the barley speaks of Christ; we know it speaks of the first-fruits. Then this cake of barley-bread tumbles into the camp, very undignified. So before the victory Gideon is brought to understand what he is; he is to be only in the Lord’s hands, he needs to be usable.

The next thing is the trumpets. Where will you get the trumpets? These were trumpets of ram’s horn, involving death. I spoke about the tabernacle system, with the tent of goats’ hair, then there was the covering of rams’ skins dyed red, and the covering of badgers’ skins. I think these horns would be identified with the rams’ skins, and the ram is linked with consecration. The priests had to be consecrated seven days. Do we understand what that means? Christianity is not a one day a week religion, it is seven days a week. They had not to depart from the tent of meeting seven days. It is an exercise with us that if we are going to be priestly, and if we are going to produce what is typified in these rams’ skins dyed red, then, it means committal for seven days in the week. The badgers’ skins speak of watchfulness.

These soldiers would keep their eyes open, they would be marked by watchfulness. Bear in mind that if the service of God is to be maintained with the dignity that belongs to it, we need all these elements. We cannot be specialists in anything. There was a time when some claimed to be specialists in the readings, and some in the gospel preaching, but I think we are so few now that we have been humbled, that we have all to do what we can, young ones and old ones, in order that the wonderful divine plan will be filled out.

Then we come to these lights in the pitchers. They take the trumpet in one hand and the pitcher in the other. They are spoken of as empty pitchers, there are lights in them, and the pitchers have to be broken. The light will not show until the pitchers are broken, and you cannot break the pitchers until you are standing in your appointed place, that is rule. Young people would do well to read Mr. Raven’s ministry, because he brings in the subject of rule in quite a number of his articles. He speaks of rule, atmosphere and light for instance. Now Gideon says, “Look on me, and do likewise”. Three hundred men, scattered round the camp, in weakness, yes, but alongside of that there is divine power. I think if we are going to be maintained in a measure of dignity, we will find the divine power for it, if we put ourselves in the place to get it. So they were round the camp and they broke the pitchers and the light shone out.

That leads us on to 2 Corinthians where it refers to the pitchers being broken and the radiancy of the glad tidings shining forth. It says, “we have this treasure in earthen vessels”, 2 Corinthians 4: 7. Well, have we? Our vessels have to be broken for the light to shine. It is a constant exercise from beginning to end, from this matter of threshing wheat in the winepress, going right through to these exercises of 2 Corinthians, chapters 4 and 5, where we get the truth of new creation; that is that we are standing like these men—“if any one be in Christ, there is a new creation”, 2 Corinthians 5: 17. Would that we knew something more of it, so as to be here for the divine pleasure and for the encouragement of each other. May it be so for His name’s sake.

Address at Fraserburgh
11 February 1995