Long after David and Solomon had taken Israel to the pinnacle of success as a nation, and after a raft of lesser kings had led them on a descent to mediocrity and a divided, weakened nation, Isaiah was commissioned to prophecy of their complete subjugation unless they could turn to the Lord as their supreme leader and teacher.
Amidst some of Isaiah's gloomiest predictions, are sprinkled glittering gems of hope for the more distant future.
Isa. 9:1-7 is one of those gems.
1 But there will be no gloom for those who were in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he will make glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations. 2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness— on them light has shined. 3 You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as people exult when dividing plunder. 4 For the yoke of their burden, and the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. 5 For all the boots of the tramping warriors and all the garments rolled in blood shall be burned as fuel for the fire. 6 For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 His authority shall grow continually, and there shall be endless peace for the throne of David and his kingdom. He will establish and uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time onward and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.
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Isaiah here speaks of the lands of `Zebulun and Naphtali,' which if you notice on the map are situated north and west of the sea of Galilee. These were two of the twelve tribal divisions made in Canaan after its conquest by Israel.
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When Isaiah speaks of the humbling of these lands (v.1), he is speaking of the oppression suffered when the Assyrian Tiglath-Pileser III attacked in 734 and 732 BC., within Isaiah's own childhood. The Assyrians came from the northeast to oppress the northern kingdom of Israel as it fell away from following the Lord's ways.
But, Isaiah says, a future day will come when a great Prince of Peace will liberate Zebulun and Naphtali from their yoke of oppression, and usher in an everlasting government based on justice and righteousness.
Of course we know he is speaking of the Messiah.
As we read down this passage we come across a single line of reference to `the day of Midian's defeat' (v.4), that you probably gave little thought to. It is actually a very significant reference that opens up many gems of thought for us.
Isaiah, as he is penning this passage, must have been mindful of another time when this same region was under siege from a similar quarter, around five hundred years earlier.
Judges 6:1–6 (NRSV) — 1 The Israelites did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, and the LORD gave them into the hand of Midian seven years. 2 The hand of Midian prevailed over Israel; and because of Midian the Israelites provided for themselves hiding places in the mountains, caves and strongholds. 3 For whenever the Israelites put in seed, the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the east would come up against them. 4 They would encamp against them and destroy the produce of the land, as far as the neighborhood of Gaza, and leave no sustenance in Israel, and no sheep or ox or donkey. 5 For they and their livestock would come up, and they would even bring their tents, as thick as locusts; neither they nor their camels could be counted; so they wasted the land as they came in. 6 Thus Israel was greatly impoverished because of Midian; and the Israelites cried out to the LORD for help.
After Israel had been established in the Promised Land through the ministry of Joshua, the first instalments of the covenant promises had been fulfilled. The time had come for Israel to possess the land fully, and cleanse it of paganism, and to establish itself fully as the embodiment of the kingdom of God on earth.
God invited them to demonstrate the full blessings of following his teaching and of honouring his leadership. But Israel soon settled down to accept not only the agrarian ways of the Canaanites, but often their morals, gods, and religious beliefs as well.
The fundamental issue in Judges is the lordship of God over Israel. Invariably when they strayed from the Lord, the social fabric was torn asunder and they were soon subject to suffering at the hands of the many potential oppressors surrounding them.
The Midianites were related to the Israelites in that Midian was a half-brother of Ishmael, both being Abraham's sons. They had been given gifts and separated to the east, away from Israel, by Abraham before he died (Gen 25:5,6).
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Now they had returned to take a share of the blessings that Israel was starting to enjoy. The coalition that accompanied them was, like them, nomadic herdsmen from the semi desert regions east of Moab and Amon on the map. Before Israel had moved into the Promised Land, they too had been nomadic herders, but had now settled down to cropping the land. Just when they had done all the hard work of getting the crop out of the ground, the Midianite hordes would sweep in from the eastern desert in huge numbers each spring. Mounted on camels, and bringing their livestock, they would camp on the land, bringing devastation to the crops of the Israelites, who would have to flee to inaccessible mountain country to escape them.
They cried out to the Lord for a deliverer, and it seems Gideon was the Lord's choice. We find Gideon hiding in a winepress trying to thresh wheat. That would be a bit like trying to play tennis in the lounge room. You need a big area to thresh wheat, and the winepress was quite small, and generating wind to separate the grain from the chaff in there would be nearly impossible. But notice how the angel of the Lord addressed Gideon.
Judges 6:12 (NRSV) — 12 The angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, “The Lord is with you, you mighty warrior.”
`Mighty warrior?' Gideon felt more like a refugee in his own land. He reacted in anger to the angel, claiming the Lord had abandoned Israel (v.13). Gideon did calm down, and was commissioned, like Moses before him (Ex.3:7-10), to deliver Israel (v.14).
After convincing himself that this was indeed the Lord he was dealing with (vs.17-22), Gideon was directed by the Lord into his first battle.
Judges 6:25–26 (NRSV) — 25 That night the Lord said to him, “Take your father’s bull, the second bull seven years old, and pull down the altar of Baal that belongs to your father, and cut down the sacred pole that is beside it; 26 and build an altar to the Lord your God on the top of the stronghold here, in proper order; then take the second bull, and offer it as a burnt offering with the wood of the sacred pole that you shall cut down.”
For fear of his father, whose altar to Baal it was, and the other men of the town, Gideon performed this work in the night. Gideon seemed to like working at night, and with fire, as we find him later on working in a similar way (7:19,20). In the morning the men of the town were furious when they discovered that Gideon was the culprit and demanded his life.
Isn’t it amazing how twisted we can become when we move away from the Lord's wishes? The Israelites had been instructed to put to death anyone who enticed them to follow other gods (Deut 13:6-10). Here we have Israelites demanding the life of a fellow Israelite for breaking down the altar of Baal. And you know we get just as twisted as they did if we stray from the Lord.
I know a man who when I first became a Christian, was coming to Church and joining in, and coming to God. As time went on though, he started to drink and smoke, and then finally he turned to drugs. Occasionally he still turns up at church, and we all try to help him and make him feel at home, but until he faces God with his problem and stops justifying his wrong ways, and with God’s power turns his life around, he will not experience salvation. I can see pain written all over his face when I see him. It is despair I see in his face. His mental health is slipping from him, because he knows what to do but is not doing it. I think he wants to have all the blessings he knows about, but he must make that decision. Our wrong choices in life will hold us back from God. We must not hold the Holy Spirit at arm’s length. We must let the Lord into our hearts, and we will have peace.
Strangely, though, Gideon’s father, Joash, seems to have repented overnight, and defends God in front of them all. You can read it in verse 31, 32.
One of the most important points being made in this passage is hinted at in verse 25.
Judges 6:25–26 (NRSV) — 25 That night the Lord said to him, “Take your father’s bull, the second bull seven years old...
Notice that the author is at pains to tell us that the bull is seven years old. Why does he make a point of this? Does it really matter? Well if an author makes a special point of an animal's age, it’s no bull. Seriously, if you skip back to 6:1, you will notice that it has been seven years that the Israelites had been given into the hands of Midian, and by inference, seven years they had given themselves into the hands of Baal. The Lord was announcing that the most important battle Israel faced was against Baal worship, and the sacrifice of the seven-year-old bull signified the complete end of both Baal worship and the Midianite domination of Israel.
The most daunting battle was still ahead for Gideon. The Lord then decided that 32,000 men were far too many to defeat 135,000 Midianites. So Gideon first told 22,000 men who were afraid to fight for their God and his country, to go back to their tents (7:1-4). The Lord then felt that Israel might still feel that somehow they had wrought the victory with 10,000 men, so by the water-drinking test they were again trimmed down to just 300 men (7:5-8). Mind you this is against 135,000 able-bodied Midianites.
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The Lord is making sure the Israelites, and all the foreign powers around, know that his arm had accomplished the impossible in human military terms. And the Lord wants us to know the same today. There is no way we can accomplish anything on our own. The battle is the Lord’s – always. We pick up the story in,
Judges 7:8 (NRSV) — 8 So he took the jars of the troops from their hands, and their trumpets; and he sent all the rest of Israel back to their own tents, but retained the three hundred. The camp of Midian was below him in the valley.
Now in these provisions were jars full of food, as well as the trumpets, which were only carried by a few men in order to sound a command for the rest of the company.
Judges 7:9–13 (NRSV) — 9 That same night the Lord said to him, “Get up, attack the camp; for I have given it into your hand. 10 But if you fear to attack, go down to the camp with your servant Purah; 11 and you shall hear what they say, and afterward your hands shall be strengthened to attack the camp.” Then he went down with his servant Purah to the outposts of the armed men that were in the camp. 12 The Midianites and the Amalekites and all the people of the east lay along the valley as thick as locusts; and their camels were without number, countless as the sand on the seashore. 13 When Gideon arrived, there was a man telling a dream to his comrade; and he said, “I had a dream, and in it a cake of barley bread tumbled into the camp of Midian, and came to the tent, and struck it so that it fell; it turned upside down, and the tent collapsed.”
This is the other side of the key to the victory. Not only were preparations made in the Israelite camp, but stories were rife in the Midianite camp. The Midianites had heard all about the insolence and bravery of Gideon when he tore down the altar to Baal and the Asherah pole and sacrificed to Yahweh. They had also heard of the significance of this for themselves. The Midianites wondered if this was someone after Moses ilk they were dealing with. They had heard what the Lord had done through Moses to the Egyptians. The stories in the camp of Midian were circulating and fear was growing. Now Gideon received first-hand confirmation of this through the dream of the barley loaf.
The significance of the barley loaf is that barley was a very inferior grain for bread making. So the little barley loaf that rolled down with such force that it wrapped up a whole Midianite tent, was meant to prefigure Israel led by God and directed by Gideon. The camp of Midian was clearly scared out of its wits (7:14).
Judges 7:16–22a (NRSV) — 16 After he divided the three hundred men into three companies, and put trumpets into the hands of all of them, and empty jars, with torches inside the jars, 17 he said to them, “Look at me, and do the same; when I come to the outskirts of the camp, do as I do. 18 When I blow the trumpet, I and all who are with me, then you also blow the trumpets around the whole camp, and shout, ‘For the Lord and for Gideon!’ ” 19 So Gideon and the hundred who were with him came to the outskirts of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, when they had just set the watch; and they blew the trumpets and smashed the jars that were in their hands. 20 So the three companies blew the trumpets and broke the jars, holding in their left hands the torches, and in their right hands the trumpets to blow; and they cried, “A sword for the Lord and for Gideon!” 21 Every man stood in his place all around the camp, and all the men in camp ran; they cried out and fled. 22 When they blew the three hundred trumpets, the Lord set every man’s sword against his fellow and against all the army...
Clearly the terror and confusion caused as three hundred men blew their trumpets, shattered their clay jars to reveal three hundred torches, and shouted "a sword for the Lord and for Gideon," representing how many thousands of armed men supposedly behind them, was enough to send irrevocable panic careering through the camp.
Judges 7:22b–24 (NRSV) — 22b ...and the army fled as far as Beth-shittah toward Zererah, as far as the border of Abel-meholah, by Tabbath. 23 And the men of Israel were called out from Naphtali and from Asher and from all Manasseh, and they pursued after the Midianites. 24 Then Gideon sent messengers throughout all the hill country of Ephraim, saying, “Come down against the Midianites and seize the waters against them, as far as Beth-barah, and also the Jordan.” So all the men of Ephraim were called out, and they seized the waters as far as Beth-barah, and also the Jordan.
PP – 5 (See map NIV Judges 7; p340)
The victory over Midian was complete, and they never troubled Israel again. And while Israel kept its eye on worshipping the Lord for the next forty-odd years, they lived in complete peace.
I would like you to turn forward with me to our original text in Isaiah and notice how clear it is now that this passage in Judges was in his mind as he looked with dismay at the situation he found Israel in, and how he also looked forward to Christ fulfilling the type-scene depicted by Gideon's story.
Isaiah 9:2-4 2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness— on them light has shined. 3 You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as people exult when dividing plunder. 4 For the yoke of their burden, and the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian.
Isaiah's eye is on Israel in his own day, but his mind is in Judges, and the story of Gideon. When he says in v2 (read), and again in v4a, he is thinking of not only the Midianites witnessing the shattering of the jars to reveal the light of enemy attack, but he has is mind Gideon's Israel waking to the light the Lord shone into their darkened midst. This light was that he was their only saviour and warrior, and that they were wasting their lives on the gods around them.
His message to us today is identical. We are wasting our time and energy on the gods around us, who entice us off the narrow path the Lord has set before us. Of course it’s a narrow path, but it’s the only safe and happy road to walk. Whatever gets your prime focus is your god. And the Lord tells us, “You shall have no other gods before me.”
I would like you to follow me to the final parallel this morning.
Matthew 4:12–17 (NRSV) — 12 Now when Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. 13 He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, 14 so that what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: 15 “Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali, on the road by the sea, across the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles— 16 the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death light has dawned.” 17 From that time Jesus began to proclaim, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
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Jesus had returned to this very region to fulfil Isaiah's prediction of a new Gideon, who would shatter the jars and shine the light into the darkness of men's souls. This was a different kingdom he foreshadowed. There are no swords in this realm, but the message hasn't changed, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is near." The shedding of blood is still required to secure this kingdom, but it is the blood of an innocent victim.
The right of inheritance to this kingdom is no longer through blood shed by the sword, but it is through Jesus blood shed for us on Calvary. As Jesus would tell the people of Galilee when he said,
Matt. 5:3 “Blessed are they who recognise their poverty of spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
Jesus is ready to shine his light into our darkened hearts. His saving light will flood into our hearts and they need never be dark again. Your part is to ‘blow the trumpet,’ to call on the name of Jesus and the battle will begin against the enemy, in your heart.
But the best part is that the war has already been won for us, when Christ defeated Satan at the Cross and paid for our sins. That is the main battle that Gideon’s foreshadowed. That is the battle that only Jesus could fight. He fought it, and we need only accept the victory he won for us on Calvary. None of our efforts has accomplished anything to do with our salvation. The glory is all to Jesus.
On us living in the land of the shadow of death, the light of Jesus has indeed dawned, and it will not be extinguished until he returns to complete the establishment of His kingdom on earth. I want to invite you to accept the victory the Lord has wrought for us and join in the battle to hasten His kingdom.
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