I'm going to draw your attention to our confessional reference, first of all, the Heidelberg Catechism, Lord's Day 34, question and answers 93, 94, and 95, page 888, 888 in the back of your hymnals. Tonight's sermon is a sermon that elicits the importance of the first commandment. The Lord's Day 34 asks in question 92, what is God's law? Then it gives all 10 commands. It answers, God spoke all these words, the first commandment, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, you shall have no other gods before me. And of course, at the time of the judges, this was their great falling, this was their great sin against the Lord. Question 93 asks, how are these commands divided? Referring now to all 10. The answer into two tables. The first has four commandments teaching us how we should live in relation to God. The second has six commandments teaching us what we owe our neighbor. Question 94 asks, what does the Lord require in the first commandment? Let us answer in unison that I, not wanting to endanger my own salvation, avoid and shun all idolatry, sorcery, superstitious rites, and prayer to saints or to other creatures. that I rightly know the only true God, trust him alone, and look to God for every good thing humbly and patiently, and love, fear, and honor him with all my heart. In short, that I renounce all created things rather than go against God's will in any way. And question 95 asks, what is idolatry? Again, let's answer all together. Idolatry is having or inventing something in which one trusts in place of or alongside of the only true God who has revealed himself in his word. Now we have an amazing account of that very revelation in Judges chapter 6. Let's turn there together, Judges chapter 6 at verse 1. Hear now the word of God. Then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord. Notice this is after 40 years that the land had rest after the defeat of Jabin and Sisera. But after 40 years, the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord. So the Lord delivered them into the hand of Midian for seven years. And the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel. Because of the Midianites, the children of Israel made for themselves the dens, the caves, and the strongholds which are in the mountains. So it was, whenever Israel had sown, Midianites would come up, also Amalekites and the people of the east would come up against them. Then they would encamp against them and destroy the produce of the earth as far as Gaza and leave no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep nor ox nor donkey. For they would come up with their livestock and their tents, coming in as numerous as locusts. Both they and their camels were without number, and they would enter the land to destroy it. So Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites, and the children of Israel cried out to the Lord. And it came to pass when the children of Israel cried out to the Lord because of the Midianites, That the Lord sent a prophet to the children of Israel who said to them, Thus says the Lord God of Israel, I brought you up from Egypt and brought you out of the house of bondage. And I delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians, out of the hand of all who oppressed you, and drove them out before you and gave you their land. Also I said to you, I am the Lord your God. Do not fear the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell, but you have not obeyed my voice. Now the angel, notice the capital A, now the angel of the Lord came and sat under the terebinth tree, which was in Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abizrite. while his son Gideon thrashed wheat in the winepress in order to hide it from the Midianites. And the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, the Lord is with you, you mighty man of valor. Gideon said to him, oh my Lord, if the Lord Yahweh is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all his miracles which our fathers told us about? Saying, did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord has forsaken us and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites. Then the Lord turned to him and said, go in this might of yours, and you shall save Israel from the hand of the Midianites. Have I not sent you? So he said to him, O my Lord, how can I save Israel? Indeed, my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house. And the Lord said to him, surely I will be with you, and you shall defeat the Midianites as one man. Then he said to him, if now I have found favor in your sight, then show me a sign that it is you who talk with me Notice the capital Y on you. Do not depart from here, I pray, until I come to you and bring out my offering and set it before you. And he said, I will wait until you come back. So Gideon went in and prepared a young goat and unleavened bread from an ephah of flour. The meat he put in a basket, and he put the broth in a pot, And he brought them out to him, capital H, under the terebinth tree and presented them. The angel of God said to him, take the meat and the unleavened bread and lay them on this rock and pour out the broth. And he did so. Then the angel of the Lord put out the end of the staff that was in his hand, and touched the meat and the unleavened bread. And fire rose out of the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread. And the angel of the Lord departed out of his sight. Now Gideon perceived. that he was the angel of the Lord. So Gideon said, Alas, O Lord God, for I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face. Then the Lord said to him, Peace be with you. Do not fear, you shall not die. So Gideon built an altar there to the Lord and called it The Lord is Peace. To this day it is still in Ophrah of the Abizrites. Now it came to pass the same night that the Lord said to him, take your father's young bull, the second bull of seven years old, and tear down the altar of Baal that your father has, and cut down the wooden image that is beside it, and build an altar to the Lord your God on top of this rock, in the proper arrangement and take the second bull and offer a burnt sacrifice with the wood of the image which you shall cut down. So Gideon took 10 men from among his servants and did as the Lord had said to him. But because he feared his father's household and the men of the city too much to do it by day, he did it by night. And when the men of the city arose early in the morning, there was the altar of Baal torn down, and the wooden image that was beside it was cut down, and the second bull was being offered on the altar which had been built. So they said to one another, Who has done this thing? And when they had inquired and asked, they said, Gideon, the son of Joash, has done this thing. Then the men of the city said to Joash, Bring out your son, that he may die, because he has torn down the altar of Baal, and because he has cut down the wooden image that was beside it. But Joash said to all who stood against him, Would you plead for Baal? Would you save him? Let the one who would plead for him be put to death by morning. If he is a God, let him plead for himself, because his altar has been torn down. Therefore, on that day, he called him Jerob Baal, saying, let Baal plead against him, because he has torn down his altar. Then all the Midianites and Amalekites, the people of the east, gathered together, and they crossed over and encamped in the valley of Jezreel. But the Spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon. Then he blew the trumpet, and the Abizrites gathered around him. And he sent messengers throughout all Manasseh, who also gathered behind him. He also sent messengers to Asher, Zebulun, and Naphtali, and they came up to meet him. So Gideon said to God, if you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said, look, I shall put a fleece of wool on the threshing floor. If there is dew on the fleece only, and it is dry on all the ground, then I shall know that you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said. And it was so. When he rose early the next morning and squeezed the fleece together, He wrung the dew out of the fleece, a bowl full of water. Then Gideon said to God, do not be angry with me, but let me speak just once more. Let me test, I pray, just once more with the fleece. Let it now be dry only on the fleece, but on all the ground let there be dew. And God did so that night. It was dry on the fleece only, but there was dew on all the ground. There we are in the reading of God's holy word. Gideon, the divine making of a strong man. First, God confronts his people with the truth. Secondly, God comforts his people with his own presence. And thirdly, God commands his people to destroy their idols. And fourthly, God condescends to Gideon's woolly requests. Beloved of God in Christ Jesus, what a wild, superstitious, and idolatrous time it was in Israel. And it reminds us a great deal of the times in which we live as I look around and observe society, people's behavior, their fears, their superstitions, their sorcery, their consulting, their horoscopes, their apprehensions, People doing as they please, resorting to violence against each other. Increasingly, we are living in days like the time of the judges, when each man does what is right in his own eyes. Why is this? Well, the big reason, the overarching reason, is that worship of the one true God has been abandoned. Our culture has turned its back on the one true God and traded it for the worship of nearly everything else. These are the kind of days when we have to get back to the worship of the true God. And as our catechism says, fear him, that is, reverence him. Tremble before God's word, love him, and yes, obey him. It's time to train a new generation in God's holy law, the Ten Commandments. And this, of course, falls right in line with Jesus' great commission to go into all the world, to baptize in the name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and to teach them everything I have commanded you. How are these commands divided? Well, the catechism answers into two tables. The first has four commandments teaching us what our relationship to God should be. The second has six commandments teaching us what we owe our neighbor. And we know from our division of the commands that this is indeed true. Four teaching us about our relationship to God and six commands having to do with our neighbor. Just parenthetically, the two tables of God's law may in fact not have been divided in that way, but it may have been two tables with ten commands on each one, like a contract and duplicate, one contract for you and one for God. Just so you know, if you read the commentaries, they make mention of these things. God is a covenanting God. There's a copy for you, a copy for me. Boom, there they are together. So the original tables that Moses took down, and even the second copy of course, may have been written in that way with 10 on each side. We don't know. But having said that, what the catechism says is indeed true concerning the four relating to God and six relating to our fellow man. The book of Judges records what happens when God's people forsake God and his holy law. And so the time comes when God has to confront his own people with the truth. Our text tells us that the Lord, Yahweh, gave Israel into the hand of Midian for seven years. Take note of that. Does evil befall a city, and hath the Lord not done it? Let's always remember that. Does judgment come on any people, and hath the Lord not done it? We know that God is in charge of everything, and when the Lord has done it, then we can look at ourselves and inquire whether in what way we deserve what we get. What was happening? Well, our text tells us that every year the Midianites came through Israel during the peak weeks of harvest, devouring and carrying away all the abundance of the land. Whatever was visible and out in the open, the Midianites would take The people of Israel themselves were driven into hiding. They had to make homes and places of shelter in caves and in dens, in the rocks, in the surrounding foothills and mountainsides. And whatever foodstuffs they hoped to take them through to the next season had to be hidden. and hidden well. The same invasion happened year after year. For seven years they would come up with their livestock and their tents. They came like locusts in numbers. Both they and their camels could not be counted, the Bible says, so that they laid waste to the land. Every year they poured in from the east, crossed the Jordan River, camped in the plain of Jezreel, and when they had consumed everything there in Israel's breadbasket, in the plain of Jezreel, they would continue to migrate south to harvest all the fruits and the nuts and the grapes and the figs that they could find in the foothills all the way down through the Gaza Strip. All this is what God promised would happen to covenant breakers. And I would have you turn with me to the book of Deuteronomy chapter 28. Tonight, Deuteronomy 28 verse 29 through 34. Just a few pertinent verses here where we see that God had told them all this would happen in advance. Deuteronomy 28 verse 29, where the Lord told his people, and you shall grope at noonday as a blind man gropes in darkness. You shall not prosper in your ways. You shall be only oppressed and plundered continually, and no one shall save you. You shall betroth a wife, but another man shall lie with her. You shall build a house, but you shall not dwell in it. You shall plant a vineyard, but shall not gather its grapes. Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes, but you shall not eat of it. Your donkey shall be violently taken away from you, before you, and shall not be restored to you. Your sheep shall be given to your enemies, and you shall have no one to rescue them. Your sons and your daughters shall be given to another people, and your eyes shall look and fail with longing for them all the day long, and there shall be no strength in your hand. A nation whom you have not known shall eat the fruit of your land and the produce of your labor. and you shall be only oppressed and crushed continually, so you shall be driven mad because of the sight which your eyes see. And anyone familiar with the history of communist countries, whether it's communist Russia, communist China, communist Korea, know this is exactly what the communists, what the socialists do when they take over. They just come in and take everything. And so many other people have experienced these ravages of occupation when everything is taken. But worse than all of that is the truth. the divine accusation of God himself. You have not obeyed my voice. How do we feel when we cry to God for help and deliverance and God responds with accusations about our sin? Initially, at first, it's not a good feeling. This is not what we want to hear. We had hoped for a little sympathy. We had hoped for a little comfort, a little or a lot of help. How do we feel when we cry to God for help and deliverance and God sends us a preacher? Oh no. Well, we better think long and hard about the way we are treating God in our own lifestyles and what kind of harvest we are likely to reap based on the idol gods we serve. Sinners don't like to hear the truth, but the truth of God comes from the God of truth. God cannot say anything but the truth. Divine confrontation is the first step to true conversion in anyone's life. And it is the first step to saving comfort. Yes, God confronts his own people with the truth. God is a God who disciplines the sons he loves. Secondly, from our text, we see that God comforts his people with his presence. We all want help, but first of all, God gives us hope. God gives us hope before help. He does this by giving us himself. And we as Christians should know this above all. It is in Emmanuel, God with us, The angel of the Lord come in the flesh. The angel of the Lord incarnate. He is our help. And God gives us hope by giving us himself. This is always God's way. Our Texas, now the angel of the Lord, came and sat under the terebinth at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abizrite, while his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites. And the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, The Lord Yahweh is with you, O mighty man of valor. No matter what troubles we face, No matter what trials we're enduring, no matter what we're going through, the Lord is with you. This is how God comforts his people, with his own presence. Jesus said, in this world you will have trouble. And then what? But be of good cheer. I have overcome the world. And Jesus said, and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." Well, what was Gideon's response to the comfort of God himself? Is this what Gideon wanted most? Is this what he was looking for? No. Gideon's response to the angel of the Lord is not reverence or gratitude, but in fact it is complaints and counter accusations against God. Where are you God? Why aren't you giving us some real help, practical help here? The Lord has forsaken us, Gideon says to the angel of the Lord, and given us into the hand of Midian, verse 13. And don't you and I often very quickly feel the same way. Where is God now? we often wonder. He seems to be ignoring everything that's going on. Why do our oppressors usually win? In our minds we're thinking, always win. Did you notice God's amazing answer to Gideon's doubt and cynicism? Verse 14, and the Lord, Yahweh, turned to him and said, go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian, Do I not send you? Now, how often don't we want God to step in and do something about what's happening? But God says, in effect, that's precisely what I call and empower you to do. That's why I promised my own presence with you and in you. And here, brothers and sisters, we have a front row seat to the divine making of a strong man. Not strong in his own strength, obviously, but he is called strong and a man of valor. He's not strong in his own strength, but strong in the strength of the Lord his God. Gideon wants to protest this commission by God, and he does. His clan is the weakest in Manasseh. He's the youngest in his father's house. But listen to God's neutralizing response to all of Gideon's excuses. And the Lord said to him, but I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man. It'll be like one-on-one. And when one is the Lord God Almighty, that's gonna be the victor. That's the majority power right there. This was God's answer to Moses. It was God's answer to Joshua. And now it is God's answer to Gideon. And this, beloved, is God's answer to all his saints right down through the ages. I am with you. The great I am is with you, I will be with you, and you shall have no other gods before me, because you need no other help besides me. Then Gideon asked for a sign that it is really God who is addressing him. the first request for a divine sign made by Gideon. Now we notice how already God has brought about a miraculous change in the heart of Gideon. He's first angry, rebellious, skeptical, even accusing God. But now he is moved in his heart by divine grace to want communion with God. And we seem to see here receptivity to the challenge and an expectation of God's own equipping power in his life. Gideon then requests the angel of the Lord to wait while he prepares a meal. And it reminds us a great deal of the father of all believers, of Abraham, preparing food or having food prepared for his three visitors, who we know represent the Trinity. And so the angel of the Lord here promises to wait and Gideon prepares a young goat with unleavened cakes of flour and gravy. Then the angel of the Lord tells him to place the meal that he's prepared on a rock. And the angel of the Lord touches the meal with the tip of his staff and a fire springs up from the rock and consumes the entire meal. Yes, our God is a consuming fire. And this consumption is a sign of God's pleasure. And the angel of the Lord vanishes from his sight, and Gideon knows that he has been visited by God himself, and in effect, seen God face-to-face or encountered God face-to-face in this theophany of the pre-incarnate Christ. Yes, God. comforts his people with his own divine presence. And you and I should be living with this comfort. And I remind you tonight that the word comfort comes from the Latin cum forte, which means with strength, to be filled with strength, the knowledge of Jesus Christ with you. should fill each of us with strength every day of our life, whatever we're facing, whatever God is calling us to go through. Third in our text, God commands his people to destroy their idols. But before Gideon goes off to rid the country of the invading enemy, God requires Gideon to do a little house cleaning closer to home. to sweep off his own doorstep first. That very night the Lord tells Gideon to pull down the altar of Baal and cut down the Asherah pole beside it, build an altar to the Lord, and sacrifice his father's bull on an altar to the Lord using The King James speaks of a wooden image. We know that this wooden image, this wooden pole is an Asherah pole that the seductive prostitutes would pole dance around. And in that way, worship would be altered to Baal through sexual intercourse with these ritual prostitutes. God says, cut down the pole and use it as firewood to offer a sacrifice to me. You see, now proper worship is being offered. Such a demand, of course, by God is bound to get Gideon in trouble in his own family and community. Why does God request this? Well, you cannot have an altar to an idol and an altar to the true God side by side. It's one or the other. And furthermore, this was an act of faith and an act of courage on the part of Gideon. Additionally, this would ignite the fire in the hearts of all those who would go with Gideon against Midian. And that's exactly what our text says happens eventually. Now of course some fault Gideon for doing what he did at night instead of in broad daylight. But let's remember together here this evening that God had not told him to do it during the day necessarily. Gideon obeyed God, that's the essential thing. Well, what a shock. The men of Ofra awoke to the next morning. Baal's altar is wrecked. Lady Asherah's pole is cut into cordwood. The whole town would now surely suffer for such sacrilege to such sacred shrines. The irreverent vandal who did this deserves to die, obviously. This is what the elders of the town are muttering. And it didn't take long for one of the men who had helped Gideon in secret to just whisper his name. Well, of course, now word is out. And the town fathers of Ophrah pay Gideon's father, Joash, a visit demanding that he deliver up his son to die for what he did. Do we see images, glimpses of the Christ here? Perhaps Gideon, the deliverer, a Christotype, you do what's right, the world punishes you for it, he must die. I'm just saying. But what does Gideon's father say? Father Joash says, if Baal is really such a powerful god, let him fight his own battles, you don't have to do it for him. And from this defense of his father, Gideon gets a nickname that he'll bear for the rest of his life, Jerob Baal. Let Baal contend against him. What should shock and amaze us, truly, is how steeped in idolatry this Hebrew town is. These are all God's covenant people. And look, Listen how thoroughly secular they have become in their superstition, their fears, their conversation, their behavior, in the idols and monuments to idolatry that they tolerate, no, that they celebrate in their own town. It was so bad the vast majority of them were no longer worshipers of the true God at all. What does the Lord require in the first commandment? That I, not wanting to endanger my very salvation, but they had. That I should avoid and shun all idolatry, magic, superstitious rites, prayers to saints, or to other creatures. That I sincerely acknowledge the only true God and trust him alone and look to him for every good thing humbly and patiently, love him, fear him, honor him with all my heart. In short, that I give up everything rather than go against his will in any way. What a challenge this is becoming from community to community every June when the pride parades come marching through town. God's grace and Holy Spirit brought Gideon to that practical point of obedience. And so it must be with us. So the Spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon, and he sounded the trumpet, and the Abizrites were called out to follow him. And he sent messengers throughout Manasseh, and they too were called out to follow him. And he sent messengers to Asher, and Zebulun, and Naphtali, and they went up to meet him. May God raise up such faithful leaders in our own day. Finally, God condescends to Gideon's woolly request. We end tonight with Gideon's need for assurance that the Lord will indeed save Israel through him, even as God promised he would. Notice how Gideon asked for this sign after the Spirit of the Lord clothed him with power. It's easy to miss that. But he asked for this sign in the Spirit of the Lord. And so we understand that the Spirit's power is joined to human weakness. Right? When we're weak, then we're strong. When we realize how weak we are, that's when we as empty vessels are ready finally to be filled with God's strength and power. We all need God's assurance throughout the course of our life. And this episode reveals that God, in fact, delights to give us, his children, the assurance we need. Gideon wants to be more sure of God's clear command. Gideon is not doubting or unbelieving here. We shouldn't perceive here an absence of faith, but quite the opposite, really. Is this not faith-seeking understanding and additional confirmation? You and I might say, well, shouldn't the Word of God be enough? And of course, you'd right away want to come down and say, absolutely. It should be. But Gideon asks for more. And God gives it. The first time Gideon asked for a wet fleece on the dry threshing floor. Though the nature of fleece is to absorb moisture, this would still be quite remarkable because the threshing floor is hard packed and devoid of grass. The second sign Gideon asked for would be even more remarkable because a dry fleece is on a wet threshing floor, goes against all natural laws, and such a sign would demonstrate God's power over creation. Yes, our help is in the name of the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. Though you and I should be very cautious and careful about inventing our own fleeces and seeking our answers from God in such a way, but the clear revelation of our text tonight says this in the first place, and it was so. just as Gideon requested. When Gideon rose early in the morning and squeezed the fleece, he wrung enough dew from the fleece to fill a bowl of water, verse 38. In other words, the fleece wasn't just a little damp. It was soaking, soggy, wet like a sponge. And the second night, God did as Gideon requested, and the fleece was dry, dry on the fleece only, and all the ground all around, there was dew. Beloved how God delights to stoop down and reassure his own children in the very midst of our fears and apprehensions. God is patient with our weaknesses. God doesn't mind working through circumstances to bolster our fragile faith, to strengthen our weak grip on his word. In fact, God is eager to do just that, and he is able to do just that, for he and only he is the true and living God. I find it very much a challenge, I must say, to pray in a way which gives God an opportunity to answer. Here are some examples. A young man may be very much in love with a young woman, the girl of his dreams, the girl he's set his heart on. What if he should pray, Lord God, I have sought this relationship in prayer, and it's in my heart to propose marriage. If she says yes, I am going to take her response as your confirmation to my desire, as your blessing on my dreams. Is that a good way to relate to God? I think it is. I think that's a way to involve God in what we're doing. And you know, you could do that with business plans. Say, Lord God, I feel that you have led me in this direction to invest in this piece of equipment, to invest in this storefront business. I've made the offer. If the offer is accepted, I take this as your plan for my life, and I'm committed to it. And then you wait and see what God would do. Is that perhaps a way for ministers to proceed with calls to a congregation? And say a congregation is corresponding with a prospective minister, and what if the minister would pray beforehand, ahead of time, not after he receives the call, but what if the minister would pray, Lord, if I get this call, I am going to hear it as your call. And he prays this before the vote, right? Before the congregation votes, before the letter of call is penned, and you give it in God's hands. But if you pray that way and make that vow to God, then you have to live by it because you are promising to the living God. Do we pray like that? Would that be somewhat of a Gideon type prayer? I'd like you to talk about that in the weeks to come because, you know, brothers and sisters, I think we all, by the grace of God, we believe in God. But God can be very distant very often in our lives. We serve a living God who is intimately involved, really truly, with every facet of our life. Perhaps it's possible for us to pray and through prayer to interact with him in such a way that involves him more and leads to a greater assurance in our life. Question 95 asks, what is idolatry? Idolatry is having or inventing something in which one trusts in place of or alongside of the only true God who has revealed himself in his word. You know, it could be anything. It could be relationships, business associates, money. For many people, it's the government. They trust in the government. Or they trust in professionals. People with degrees. It's all idolatry. Gideon learned through his woolly requests. Don't put your faith in fleece. Put your faith in the living God, for he alone is worthy. Amen. Let us pray. Lord God in heaven, we thank you for drawing near to your people in their distress. Lord, how we thank you for the comforting presence that you give, how you come to us yourself. You are indeed Emmanuel, God with us. Lord, we praise you for Jesus Christ. We know you the true God through Christ whom you have sent. We see him all through the Old Testament. Lord, we see him by faith in the New Testament. Lord, we perceive the presence of the living Christ in our own lives. And in this, our hearts rejoice. Lord, please banish, get rid of, abolish, cleanse our hearts and minds, cleanse our very lives of trust or allegiance or dependence on anything else besides you. Lord, may our hearts beat. May we live for you alone. and for your name's honor and glory. Lord, bless your people with the shalom you promised that can only be found in the Savior Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray, amen.