JU7-8: How God’s People Are To Be In A World Gone Freakin’ Nuts

“Gid‘on and the hundred men with him arrived at the edge of the camp a little before midnight, just after they had changed the guard. They blew the shofars and broke in pieces the pitchers that were in their hands.”-Judges 7:19

Picture this for a second.

It’s the dead of night.

You’re in a deep slumber from a long day’s work.

Suddenly the calm and silence is shattered by what seems like 300 fire alarms going off all at once.

How would you react?

You’d be in a state of pure panic, wouldn’t you?

Well, that’s kind of the situation that occurred when Gideon and his men launched their attack against the Midianites.

A couple of minutes before midnight they descended upon the Midianites, surrounded the camp where everyone was sleeping and began blowing their horns.

At the same time, they broke the clay covers they had been using to cover up their torches and held them up high in their left hands.

Do you get the picture?

Each soldier had a torch in their left hand and was holding the shofar he was blowing in his right hand.

Instantly, the whole enemy camp, the men, women and children were thrown into a panic.

When they ran out of their tents and into the darkness, all they saw was hundreds of torches encircling them that belonged to an enemy they knew was out to destroy them.

And keep in mind, they had no idea God had reduced the number of Gideon’s forces down to only 300 men.

Last they heard, there were 32,000 Israelite soldiers out to get ’em.

What’s also interesting is that up to this point, Gideon’s men hadn’t even drawn their weapons yet.

It would have been impossible seeing they were holding torches in one hand and shofars in the other.

Let’s take a look at a key verse that I think really drives home the essence of what was going on here.

“Then, as every man stood still in place around the camp, the whole camp was thrown into panic, with everyone screaming and trying to escape.”-Judges 7:21

Do you notice the huge contrast between Israel and the enemy?

The Israelites were calm, cool and collected holding their ground in faith.

On the other hand, the enemy was freakin’ out like there was no tomorrow.

What makes this even more amazing is that in terms of the numbers, there were a heck of a lot more of the enemy than there were Israelites.

On the enemy’s side, we’re told “everyone was screaming and trying to escape”.

The Midianite men would have grabbed their wives and children and started sprinting for the hills.

The camels would have been stampeding.

And some of the soldiers would have begun blindly lashing out at any shadow that moved killing many of their own.

We’re told these invaders tried to escape from where they had come from which is across the Jordan River to the east and to the south.

All the cities mentioned were located in the territory of Jabesh-Gilead.