Judges 6. Gideon, part 17: God uses

Title: Judges 6. Gideon, part 17: God uses "clothed" with the Spirit to reveal the invincibility of the faithful to do His will.      

 

Announcements:

 

Gideon is empowered by the Holy Spirit to do His will. The Holy Spirit clothes him like a suit of armor and Gideon knows and feels himself to be invincible.

 

The Spirit clothes us or fills us so that we are invincible in doing God's will.

 

JDG 6:33 Then all the Midianites and the Amalekites and the sons of the east assembled themselves; and they crossed over and camped in the valley of Jezreel.

 

JDG 6:34 So the Spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon; and he blew a trumpet [shofar], and the Abiezrites [eh-bye-ezrite] were called together to follow him.

 

"came upon" - Vbl[labash] = to clothe. The HS descended upon him and laid Himself around Gideon as if He were a coat of mail or armor, so that Gideon became invincible.

 

Christ uses similar imagery to describe the Spirit's power upon us, though we are indwelt with the Spirit and can be filled with the Spirit at any time and our relationship with the Spirit is far more personal and intimate, we are also clothed with the Spirit as we are clothed with Christ. By using this description, God is helping us to understand something that in its detail and technicality is as far from our comprehension as the heavens are above the earth.

 

By the power of the Spirit we are invincible and invulnerable.

 

ACT 1:4 And gathering them together, He commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised, "Which," He said, "you heard of from Me;

 

ACT 1:5 for John baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. "

 

ACT 1:6 And so when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, "Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?"

 

ACT 1:7 He said to them, "It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority;

 

ACT 1:8 but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth."

 

Appearing to the disciples after His resurrection:

 

LUK 24:44 Now He said to them, "These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled." 

 

LUK 24:45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures,

 

LUK 24:46 and He said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and rise again from the dead the third day;

 

LUK 24:47 and that repentance for forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.

 

LUK 24:48 "You are witnesses of these things.

 

LUK 24:49 "And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high."

 

LUK 24:50 And He led them out as far as Bethany, and He lifted up His hands and blessed them.

 

LUK 24:51 And it came about that while He was blessing them, He parted from them.

 

LUK 24:52 And they returned to Jerusalem with great joy,

 

LUK 24:53 and were continually in the temple, praising God.

 

Look again at:

LUK 24:49 "And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high."

 

The promise of the Father is the sending forth of the Holy Spirit for the purposes described by the Lord in the upper room.

 

Teach them all things.

Bring to remembrance all He taught them.

Bear witness of Christ so they could bear witness of Him to the world.

Guide them in all truth.

Glorify Jesus in their hearts.

Take what belonged to Christ and disclose it to them.

Be with them forever.

 

The promise is also that the Spirit would be performing these things in us forever, in contrast to the OT saint who only had the power of the Spirit in order to perform a certain task, which once accomplished, the Spirit would depart from him.

 

Due to a lack of understanding through a mixing of mysticism with the promise of the Spirit many have come to believe that the power of the Spirit over the believer makes his own will or self-determination unnecessary. They claim that they lose control and the Spirit takes control in a way that makes them unconscious of His work. So they speak in tongues, exhibit uncontrolled muscle spasms, grand emotional outbursts, prophetic utterances, etc. In many cases it is believed that such overwhelming control can be imparted to a person through the hands of another. This is another misunderstanding of scripture mixed with a desire for mysticism.

 

More subtly, a Christian can imagine that the Spirit performs His works in just the same overpowering of the his free will, but without all the emotional hoopla and tongues and gyrations. They come to believe that the Spirit forces them to do the will of God. Sometimes this is a perversion of predestination or simply a desire to live carnally and take no responsibility for actions.

 

Does the Spirit overpower our free-will? If we look at the description given by Christ of the Spirit's work in us we find most frequently learning: teach, remembrance, guide in truth, disclose. Could I possibly learn all things and understand what belongs to Christ if I do not choose to learn the word of God?

 

Plus, the word of God is meant to be lived or applied in life. Could I be guided in all truth or understand the inheritance of Christ if I do not choose to apply truth? Can I choose to live a carnal and selfish lifestyle as a Christian? And if so, would I come to know the fullness of Christ?

 

Without the Spirit I would have no hope of learning or understanding any of these truths and certainly I could never walk in them. But with Him I am actually invincible in knowing and performing them. Do we doubt that a Gideon clothed with the Holy Spirit can defeat the Midianite horde?

 

The Christian must choose to learn and apply God's will and when he does, thanks to the power of God the Holy Spirit, he is invincible in doing so.  

 

1CO 9:24 Run in such a way that you may win.

 

1CO 9:25 And everyone who competes in the games exercises self-control in all things. They then do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable.

 

1CO 9:26 Therefore I run in such a way, as not without aim; I box in such a way, as not beating the air;

 

1CO 9:27 but I buffet my body and make it my slave, lest possibly, after I have preached to others, I myself should be disqualified.

 

1CO 10:24 Let no one seek his own good, but that of his neighbor.

 

1CO 15:10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me.