Lessons from Gideon

Lesson 1: God sees us as what we will be not as we are now.
The angel of the Lord appears to Gideon and says "The Lord is with you, O Valient warrior." At the time Gideon did not feel like a valient warrior, he was beating out wheat in a wine press hiding from the Midianites.

Lesson 2: God's answer to our excuses is that He will be with us.
The angel of the Lord tell Gideon that he is to go defeat the Midianites. Gideon has all sorts of excuses like being the least in his tribe and his family. The Lord responds "Surely I will be with you and you will ...." To me this is encouragement. What greater gift then God being with us in the task He has for us.

Lesson 3: Worship comes first.
Gideon had a task of setting up an altar for the Lord but first he had to take down the altars of Baal. He decided to do this at night for fear of his neighbors but he did it. He set up worship for God in his city. It was after this that the Spirit of the Lord came upon him in Judges 6:34. Gideaon declared his allegiance and so did God. Another act of worship comes in Judges 7:15, it says Gideon bowed in worship. God has let him hear a dream and interpretation of a midianite that confirmed what God was going to do through him. Gideon's response was worship. I like that.

Lesson 4: God's ways are not our ways.
God uses 300 instead of 32,000 to defeat Midian. Sometimes we feel like the odds are against us in ministry or even just life. Gideon's story reminds us that when God is for us who can be against us.

Dear God, You delivered the Israelites time and again from their own mistakes and now you do it for us. Thank you for coming to us when we cry out. May our first response be worship. May your Spirit be upon us as we go out to do your will. Amen

I found a fun blog to share

Okay I am not too much into crafts anymore but this blog seems to bring it out in you. I especially liked these cards made out of buttons. I actually tried it and using the template it was pretty easy. Here is a link to take a peek homemadebyjill .
Great ideas for baby gifts to make if I had the time. I guess I will save the ideas for a rainy day.

Living Water

We are thirsty alot these days and we have a lot of choices to choose from. Sometimes our thirst is physical and sometimes it is like the Psalmist describes in Ps 42:2 " My soul thirsts for God, for the living God." And I would say that most often we don't even know that we are actually thirsting for God. We think the solution to our problems is one thing when actually our solution is God and his living water. Take the example of the women at the well in John 4. Her problem was that she had to come to the well in the middle of the day to draw water plus she could use a good drink of water. Jesus offers her living water and she jumps at the chance for the physical to change. Then Jesus seems to change the subject when he asks her to go get her husband first. In reality, Jesus was doing what he does best. He was getting to the heart of the matter. He was going deeper to the spiritual problem. In the end, she still may have had to go back to the well for water to drink but spiritually she would never thirst again.


Often I think that my problem is that my circumstances are what needs to be changed like my students actually studying and doing their homework or my schedule working out the way I think it should or even the cold going away quicker. Sometimes in those situations, Jesus is knocking and asking us a question, not about our circumstances but about who we are in those circumstances? He is offering us the living water. He is offering us His Spirit. Jesus may not change my circumstances but He will change me. On the other hand, by changing me my circumstances may change for the better because I may have been the problem all along.


Dear God, Thank you for giving us living water so that we do not have to thirst anymore. Fill me with you today and everyday. Amen