Day 79: Judges 6 - 9

Bible in a year reading for day 79.

Judges 6

37 then behold, I will place a fleece of wool on the threshing floor. If there is dew only on the fleece and all the ground is dry, then I will know that You are going to save Israel by my hand, as You have said.”
38 And that is what happened. When Gideon arose the next morning, he squeezed the fleece and wrung out the dew—a bowlful of water.
39 Then Gideon said to God, “Do not be angry with me; let me speak one more time. Please allow me one more test with the fleece. This time let it be dry, and the ground covered with dew.”
40 And that night God did so. Only the fleece was dry, and dew covered the ground.

Judges 7

1 Early in the morning Jerubbaal (that is, Gideon) and all the men with him camped beside the spring of Harod. And the camp of Midian was north of them in the valley near the hill of Moreh.
2 Then the LORD said to Gideon, “You have too many people for Me to deliver Midian into their hands, lest Israel glorify themselves over Me, saying, ‘My own hand has saved me.’
3 Now, therefore, proclaim in the hearing of the people: ‘Whoever is fearful and trembling may turn back and leave Mount Gilead.’” So twenty-two thousand of them turned back, but ten thousand remained.
4 Then the LORD said to Gideon, “There are still too many people. Take them down to the water, and I will sift them for you there. If I say to you, ‘This one shall go with you,’ he shall go. But if I say, ‘This one shall not go with you,’ he shall not go.”
5 So Gideon brought the people down to the water, and the LORD said to him, “Separate those who lap the water with their tongues like a dog from those who kneel to drink.”
6 And the number of those who lapped the water with their hands to their mouths was three hundred men; all the others knelt to drink.
7 Then the LORD said to Gideon, “With the three hundred men who lapped the water I will save you and deliver the Midianites into your hand. But all the others are to go home.”
8 So Gideon sent the rest of the Israelites to their tents but kept the three hundred men, who took charge of the provisions and rams’ horns of the others. And the camp of Midian lay below him in the valley.
9 That night the LORD said to Gideon, “Get up and go down against the camp, for I have delivered it into your hand.
10 But if you are afraid to do so, then go down to the camp with your servant Purah
11 and listen to what they are saying. Then your hands will be strengthened to attack the camp.” So he went with Purah his servant to the outposts where armed men were guarding the camp.
12 Now the Midianites, Amalekites, and all the other people of the east had settled in the valley like a swarm of locusts, and their camels were as countless as the sand on the seashore.
13 And as Gideon arrived, a man was telling his friend about a dream. “Behold, I had a dream,” he said, “and I saw a loaf of barley bread come tumbling into the Midianite camp. It struck the tent so hard that the tent overturned and collapsed.”
14 His friend replied: “This is nothing less than the sword of Gideon son of Joash, the Israelite. God has delivered Midian and the whole camp into his hand.”
15 When Gideon heard the dream and its interpretation, he bowed in worship. He returned to the camp of Israel and said, “Get up, for the LORD has delivered the camp of Midian into your hand.”
16 And he divided the three hundred men into three companies and gave each man a ram’s horn in one hand and a large jar in the other, containing a torch.
17 “Watch me and do as I do,” Gideon said. “When I come to the outskirts of the camp, do exactly as I do.
18 When I and all who are with me blow our horns, then you are also to blow your horns from all around the camp and shout, ‘For the LORD and for Gideon!’”
19 Gideon and the hundred men with him reached the outskirts of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, just after the changing of the guard. They blew their horns and broke the jars that were in their hands.
20 The three companies blew their horns and shattered their jars. Holding the torches in their left hands and the horns in their right hands, they shouted, “A sword for the LORD and for Gideon!”
21 Each Israelite took his position around the camp, and the entire Midianite army fled, crying out as they ran.
22 And when the three hundred rams’ horns sounded, the LORD set all the men in the camp against one another with their swords. The army fled to Beth-shittah toward Zererah as far as the border of Abel-meholah near Tabbath.
23 Then the men of Israel were called out from Naphtali, Asher, and all Manasseh, and they pursued the Midianites.
24 Gideon sent messengers throughout the hill country of Ephraim to say, “Come down against the Midianites and seize the waters of the Jordan ahead of them as far as Beth-barah.” So all the men of Ephraim were called out, and they captured the waters of the Jordan as far as Beth-barah.
25 They also captured Oreb and Zeeb, the two princes of Midian; and they killed Oreb at the rock of Oreb and Zeeb at the winepress of Zeeb. So they pursued the Midianites and brought the heads of Oreb and Zeeb to Gideon on the other side of the Jordan.

Judges 8

1 Then the men of Ephraim said to Gideon, “Why have you done this to us? Why did you fail to call us when you went to fight against Midian?” And they contended with him violently.
2 But Gideon answered them, “Now what have I accomplished compared to you? Are not the gleanings of Ephraim better than the grape harvest of Abiezer?
3 God has delivered Oreb and Zeeb, the two princes of Midian, into your hand. What was I able to do compared to you?” When he had said this, their anger against him subsided.
4 Then Gideon and his three hundred men came to the Jordan and crossed it, exhausted yet still in pursuit.
5 So Gideon said to the men of Succoth, “Please give my troops some bread, for they are exhausted, and I am still pursuing Zebah and Zalmunna, the kings of Midian.”
6 But the leaders of Succoth asked, “Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna already in your possession, that we should give bread to your army?”
7 “Very well,” Gideon replied, “when the LORD has delivered Zebah and Zalmunna into my hand, I will tear your flesh with the thorns and briers of the wilderness!”
8 From there he went up to Penuel and asked the same from them, but the men of Penuel gave the same response as the men of Succoth.
9 So Gideon told the men of Penuel, “When I return in triumph, I will tear down this tower!”
10 Now Zebah and Zalmunna were in Karkor with their army of about fifteen thousand men—all that were left of the armies of the people of the east. A hundred and twenty thousand swordsmen had already fallen.
11 And Gideon went up by way of the caravan route east of Nobah and Jogbehah, and he attacked their army, taking them by surprise.
12 When Zebah and Zalmunna fled, Gideon pursued and captured these two kings of Midian, routing their entire army.
13 After this, Gideon son of Joash returned from the battle along the Ascent of Heres.
14 There he captured a young man of Succoth and interrogated him. The young man wrote down for him the names of the seventy-seven leaders and elders of Succoth.
15 And Gideon went to the men of Succoth and said, “Here are Zebah and Zalmunna, about whom you taunted me, saying, ‘Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna already in your possession, that we should give bread to your weary men?’”
16 Then he took the elders of the city, and using the thorns and briers of the wilderness, he disciplined the men of Succoth.
17 He also pulled down the tower of Penuel and killed the men of the city.
18 Next, Gideon asked Zebah and Zalmunna, “What kind of men did you kill at Tabor?” “Men like you,” they answered, “each one resembling the son of a king.”
19 “They were my brothers,” Gideon replied, “the sons of my mother! As surely as the LORD lives, if you had let them live, I would not kill you.”
20 So he said to Jether, his firstborn, “Get up and kill them.” But the young man did not draw his sword; he was fearful because he was still a youth.
21 Then Zebah and Zalmunna said, “Get up and kill us yourself, for as the man is, so is his strength.” So Gideon got up and killed Zebah and Zalmunna, and he took the crescent ornaments from the necks of their camels.
22 Then the Israelites said to Gideon, “Rule over us—you and your son and grandson—for you have saved us from the hand of Midian.”
23 But Gideon replied, “I will not rule over you, nor will my son. The LORD shall rule over you.”
24 Then he added, “Let me make a request of you, that each of you give me an earring from his plunder.” (For the enemies had gold earrings because they were Ishmaelites.)
25 “We will give them gladly,” they replied. So they spread out a garment, and each man threw an earring from his plunder onto it.
26 The weight of the gold earrings he had requested was 1,700 shekels, in addition to the crescent ornaments, the pendants, the purple garments of the kings of Midian, and the chains from the necks of their camels.
27 From all this Gideon made an ephod, which he placed in Ophrah, his hometown. But soon all Israel prostituted themselves by worshiping it there, and it became a snare to Gideon and his household.
28 In this way Midian was subdued before the Israelites and did not raise its head again. So the land had rest for forty years in the days of Gideon,
29 and he—Jerubbaal son of Joash—returned home and settled down.
30 Gideon had seventy sons of his own, since he had many wives.
31 His concubine, who dwelt in Shechem, also bore him a son, and he named him Abimelech.
32 Later, Gideon son of Joash died at a ripe old age and was buried in the tomb of his father Joash in Ophrah of the Abiezrites.
33 And as soon as Gideon was dead, the Israelites turned and prostituted themselves with the Baals, and they set up Baal-berith as their god.
34 The Israelites failed to remember the LORD their God who had delivered them from the hands of all their enemies on every side.
35 They did not show kindness to the house of Jerubbaal (that is, Gideon) for all the good things he had done for Israel.

Judges 9

1 Now Abimelech son of Jerubbaal went to his mother’s brothers at Shechem and said to them and to all the clan of his mother,
2 “Please ask all the leaders of Shechem, ‘Is it better for you that seventy men, all the sons of Jerubbaal, rule over you, or just one man?’ Remember that I am your own flesh and blood.”
3 And when his mother’s brothers spoke all these words about him in the presence of all the leaders of Shechem, their hearts were inclined to follow Abimelech, for they said, “He is our brother.”
4 So they gave him seventy shekels of silver from the temple of Baal-berith, with which Abimelech hired some worthless and reckless men to follow him.
5 He went to his father’s house in Ophrah, and on one stone murdered his seventy brothers, the sons of Jerubbaal. But Jotham, the youngest son of Jerubbaal, survived, because he hid himself.
6 Then all the leaders of Shechem and Beth-millo gathered beside the oak at the pillar in Shechem and proceeded to make Abimelech their king.
7 When this was reported to Jotham, he climbed to the top of Mount Gerizim, raised his voice, and cried out: “Listen to me, O leaders of Shechem, and may God listen to you.
8 One day the trees set out to anoint a king for themselves. They said to the olive tree, ‘Reign over us.’
9 But the olive tree replied, ‘Should I stop giving my oil that honors both God and man, to hold sway over the trees?’
10 Then the trees said to the fig tree, ‘Come and reign over us.’
11 But the fig tree replied, ‘Should I stop giving my sweetness and my good fruit, to hold sway over the trees?’
12 Then the trees said to the grapevine, ‘Come and reign over us.’
13 But the grapevine replied, ‘Should I stop giving my wine that cheers both God and man, to hold sway over the trees?’
14 Finally all the trees said to the thornbush, ‘Come and reign over us.’
15 But the thornbush replied, ‘If you really are anointing me as king over you, come and find refuge in my shade. But if not, may fire come out of the thornbush and consume the cedars of Lebanon.’
16 Now if you have acted faithfully and honestly in making Abimelech king, if you have done well by Jerubbaal and his family, and if you have done to him as he deserves—
17 for my father fought for you and risked his life to deliver you from the hand of Midian,
18 but you have risen up against my father’s house this day and killed his seventy sons on a single stone, and you have made Abimelech, the son of his maidservant, king over the leaders of Shechem because he is your brother—
19 if you have acted faithfully and honestly toward Jerubbaal and his house this day, then may you rejoice in Abimelech, and he in you.
20 But if not, may fire come from Abimelech and consume the leaders of Shechem and Beth-millo, and may fire come from the leaders of Shechem and Beth-millo and consume Abimelech.”
21 Then Jotham ran away, escaping to Beer, and he lived there for fear of his brother Abimelech.

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