Study Desk

Then the Lord sent a prophet to them with this message: I am the Lord God of Israel, so listen to what I say. You were slaves in Egypt, but I set you free and led you out of Egypt into this land. And when nations here made life miserable for you, I rescued you and helped you get rid of them and take their land.

I am your God, and I told you not to worship Amorite gods, even though you are living in the land of the Amorites. But you refused to listen.

Gideon chose ten of his servants to help him, and they did everything God had said. But since Gideon was afraid of his family and the other people in town, he did it all at night.

The crowd pushed closer and closer, but Joash replied, "Are you trying to take revenge for Baal? Are you trying to rescue Baal? If you are, you will be the ones who are put to death, and it will happen before another day dawns. If Baal really is a god, let him take his own revenge on someone who tears down his altar."

Gideon prayed to God, "I know that you promised to help me rescue Israel, but I need proof. Tonight I'll put some wool on the stone floor of that threshing-place over there. If you really will help me rescue Israel, then tomorrow morning let there be dew on the wool, but let the stone floor be dry."

But Gideon prayed to God again. "Don't be angry at me," Gideon said. "Let me try this just one more time, so I'll really be sure you'll help me. Only this time, let the wool be dry and the stone floor be wet with dew."

That night, God made the stone floor wet with dew, but he kept the wool dry.

The other soldier answered, "Your dream must have been about Gideon, the Israelite commander. It means God will let him and his army defeat the Midianite army and everyone else in our camp."

As soon as Gideon heard about the dream and what it meant, he bowed down to praise God. Then he went back to the Israelite camp and shouted, "Let's go! The Lord is going to let us defeat the Midianite army."

Besides, God chose you to capture Raven and Wolf. I didn't do a thing compared to you. By the time Gideon had finished talking, the men of Ephraim had calmed down and were no longer angry at him.

Gideon returned to his home in Ophrah and had the gold made into a statue, which the Israelites soon started worshiping. They became unfaithful to God, and even Gideon and his family were trapped into worshiping the statue. The Midianites had been defeated so badly that they were no longer strong enough to attack Israel. And so Israel was at peace for the remaining forty years of Gideon's life.

Soon after Gideon's death, the Israelites turned their backs on God again. They set up idols of Baal and worshiped Baal Berith as their god.

The Israelites forgot that the Lord was their God, and that he had rescued them from the enemies who lived around them.

Then they gave Abimelech seventy pieces of silver from the temple of their god Baal Berith. Abimelech used the silver to hire a gang of rough soldiers who would do anything for money.

Jotham heard what they were doing. So he climbed to the top of Mount Gerizim and shouted down to the people who were there at the meeting: Leaders of Shechem, listen to me, and maybe God will listen to you.

when God decided to punish him and the leaders of Shechem for killing Gideon's seventy sons. So God turned the leaders of Shechem against Abimelech.

The time came for the grape harvest, and the people of Shechem went into their vineyards and picked the grapes. They put the grapes in their wine-pits and walked on them to squeeze out the juice in order to make wine. Then they went into the temple of their god and threw a big party. There was a lot of eating and drinking, and before long they were cursing Abimelech.

That's how God punished Abimelech for killing his brothers and bringing shame on his father's family.

God also punished the people of Shechem for helping Abimelech. Everything happened just as Jotham's curse said it would.

But the Lord God helped Israel defeat Sihon and his army. Israel took over all of the Amorite land where Sihon's people had lived,