Gideon

the LORD’s angel came, and sat under the oak which was in Ophrah, that pertained to Joash the Abiezrite: and his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the wine press, to hide it from the Midianites.

Gideon said to him, “Oh, my lord, if the LORD is with us, why then has all this happened to us? Where are all his wondrous works which our fathers told us of, saying, ‘Didn’t the LORD bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the LORD has cast us off, and delivered us into the hand of Midian.”

Gideon went in, and prepared a young goat, and unleavened cakes of an efah of meal. He put the meat in a basket and he put the broth in a pot, and brought it out to him under the oak, and presented it.

Gideon saw that he was the LORD’s angel; and Gideon said, “Alas, Lord GOD! Because I have seen the LORD’s angel face to face!”

Then 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 Abiezrites.

Then Gideon took ten men of his servants, and did as the LORD had spoken to him. Because he feared his father’s household and the men of the city, he could not do it by day, but he did it by night.

They said one to another, “Who has done this thing?” When they inquired and asked, they said, “Gideon the son of Joash has done this thing.”

Therefore on that day he named him Jerub-Baal, saying, “Let Baal contend against him, because he has broken down his altar.”

But the Spirit of the LORD came on Gideon; and he blew a shofar; and Abiezer was gathered together after him.

Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand, as you have spoken,

Gideon said to God, “Don’t let your anger be kindled against me, and I will speak but this once. Please let me make a trial just this once with the fleece. Let it now be dry only on the fleece, and on all the ground let there be dew.”

Then Jerubbaal, who is Gideon, and all the people who were with him, rose up early, and encamped beside the spring of Harod: and the camp of Midian was on the north side of them, by the hill of Moreh, in the valley.

The LORD said to Gideon, “The people who are with you are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hand, lest Israel vaunt themselves against me, saying, ‘My own hand has saved me.’

The LORD said to Gideon, “The people are still too many. Bring them down to the water, and I will test them for you there. It shall be, that of whom I tell you, ‘This shall go with you,’ the same shall go with you; and of whoever I tell you, ‘This shall not go with you,’ the same shall not go.”

So he brought down the people to the water; and the LORD said to Gideon, “Everyone who laps of the water with his tongue, like a dog laps, you shall set him by himself; likewise everyone who bows down on his knees to drink.”

The LORD said to Gideon, “By the three hundred men who lapped will I save you, and deliver the Midianites into your hand. Let all the other people go, each to his own place.”

When Gideon had come, behold, there was a man telling a dream to his fellow; and he said, “Behold, I dreamed a dream; and behold, a cake of barley bread tumbled into the camp of Midian, and came to the tent, and struck it so that it fell, and turned it upside down, so that the tent lay flat.”

His fellow answered, “This is nothing other than the sword of Gideon the son of Joash, a man of Israel. God has delivered Midian into his hand, with all the army.”

It was so, when Gideon heard the telling of the dream, and its interpretation, that he worshiped; and he returned into the camp of Israel, and said, “Arise; for the LORD has delivered the army of Midian into your hand!”

When I blow the shofar, I and all who are with me, then blow the shofars also on every side of all the camp, and shout, ‘For the LORD and for Gideon!’”

So Gideon, and the hundred men who were with him, came to the outermost part of the camp in the beginning of the middle watch, when they had but newly set the watch: and they blew the shofars, and broke in pieces the pitchers that were in their hands.

The three companies blew the shofars, and broke the pitchers, and held the torches in their left hands, and the shofars in their right hands with which to blow; and they shouted, “The sword of the LORD and of Gideon!”

Gideon sent messengers throughout all the hill country of Ephraim, saying, “Come down against Midian, and take before them the waters, as far as Beth Barah, even the Jordan!” So all the men of Ephraim were gathered together, and took the waters as far as Beth Barah, even the Jordan.

They took the two princes of Midian, Oreb and Zeeb; and they killed Oreb at the rock of Oreb, and Zeeb they killed at the wine press of Zeeb, and pursued Midian: and they brought the heads of Oreb and Zeeb to Gideon beyond the Jordan.

Gideon came to the Jordan, and passed over, he, and the three hundred men who were with him, faint, yet pursuing.