Gideon

OK today I want to tell you the story of Gideon.

This story takes place after Israel has entered the land that God told them he would give them.  They acted badly and God allowed other countries to treat them pretty bad.  But after a while, the Israelites would say they were sorry and stop acting so bad.  When that happened, God would send someone to help them stop the other countries from being mean.  You have probably heard of Sampson.  He was one of those people. I will tell that story later.

Today let's talk about Gideon.  This dude was a just a simple farm hand.  He worked refining wheat and he helped make wine.  He wasn't a leader by any stretch of the imagination.  As a matter of fact, he was a wimp.  He was from the weakest tribe of Israel.  Not only that but his family was the weakest family in the tribe of Manasseh.  On top of that, he was the weakest dude in his whole family.  To put it in Texas terms, he was the runt of the litter.  He was the guy that always got beat up at school and the one that everyone picked on.  When a bully wanted to look good, they picked on him because he was an easy target.  I want you to picture a scrawny, wimpy, kid who is always whining.

One day, he is working doing the jobs that no one wants.  As he is working, an angel of the Lord, sat under this tree and said to Gideon, "The Lord is with you, you mighty warrior."  The angel was calling him  a man like the Rock or Brock Lesner.  Can you imagine that.  Surely the angel was mistaken.  This was just a wimped dude from a dirty poor family in a real small tribe and here this angel was calling him Arnold Schwartzenegger.  That sounds crazy.

But understand this, God uses his words to build things.  He called this man a mighty warrior because that is what he was going to become.  Also, God never looks at us where we are today.  He always sees where we could be with his help.  Maybe today you don't think you will ever amount to anything.  Well if you ask God about your situation, you will find that he always has a good plan for your life (Jeremiah 29:11).  So for us, we can't look at ourselves through our own eyes, we have to look at ourselves through God's eyes.  When we do that, we will see that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.

OK, let's get back to the story before I start preaching.  Now Gideon isn't convinced that he is a Navy Seal by any stretch and he points out to the angel that he is dirt poor.  He is the lowest person in the lowest family in the lowest tribe.  He tells the angel that he is the lowest on the totem pole.  Gideon starts telling God that he doesn't understand how this other country has been so successful at beating up on his country and God tells him to go and deliver his people from the bad country.  Gideon still doesn't believe God really wants to send him so he decides to test God.

He says to God, "Lord if you really like me, let me give you a test to make sure you are God and you want me to lead an army."  The first thing he does is make some food for the angel.  When he puts the food on a rock, the angel touched the food and fire came up from out of the rock and destroyed it.  This is when Gideon figures out he has really been talking to an angel and it scares him silly.  But God chose him and tells him it's OK.  So Gideon is still not sure that God wants him to go to war against that bad country and asks to test the lord again.  He says, "God, if this is really you, I'm going to put this jacket on the floor.  Please make the jacket wet in the morning and keep everything else around it dry."  That's exactly what happened.  Then he decides to test God one more time and says, "This time Lord, please make the ground around the jacket wet and keep the jacket dry."  That's exactly what the Lord did.  The next morning the jacket was dry and the ground was wet.

I will finish the story of Gideon in my next post.  What I want you to take from this is that sometimes it's OK to ask God to confirm himself.  You have to do it in the right heart.  If you really are seeking God and you feel like he is telling you to do something, it's OK to ask him to do something to confirm that he wants you to do something.  That's exactly what Gideon did.  But understand this.  If you just want to see some miracle for the sake of seeing one, it won't work.  God is not a circus act.  But if in your heart, you truly desire to follow God and are not sure that he is leading you in a certain direction, it's OK to ask him to confirm his plan for you.

That's another of the Minion's Bible Stories.

Israel

Hello everyone.  It's been a while since I posted a bible story and I apologize for that.  Today I want to tell you a little about how Israel was born.  Now Israel was born from the descendants of a man named Abraham.  He had eight kids that I have found in the Bible.  (Gen 25:1 for the others besides Isaac and Ishmael).  These kids went on to found many nations.  Now Isaac had two sons named Jacob and Esau through a lady named Rebekah (Gen 25: 24-26).

The Lord actually changed Jacob's name to Israel.  As many of you know, especially back then, Israel was the Lord's special chosen people.  Jesus would ultimately come from that people.  Israel is still special to God but when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Saviour, we get adopted into the family.  Here's another great thing about our God - He doesn't differentiate between someone who was born into the family and someone who was adopted.  He is Love and he loves all of his kids just the same.

But let me tell you a story about the founder of Israel that you might find very interesting.  He was a liar and a cheat  He even stole the right to be the founder of Israel from his brother Esau.  Does that shock you?  It did me when I first read it many years ago.  So here's what happened.

The first thing that Jacob stole from Esau was his birthright.  This birthright included inheritance rights from their dad (see Heb 12:16).  Here's how it happened.  Esau was a hunter.  He was Mufasa, the Lion King.  He went out to the fields and hunted wild game, etc. for the family to eat.  Now Jacob was the kid who always hid behind mama's coat tails.  He didn't go out much.  He kept to himself and just sort of hung out.  But he was always a schemer. 

So one day, Esau comes out of the fields from hunting and he is about to starve to death.  Esau was the first born and he was the one who would rightfully have the inheritance from his dad.  Jacob sees this as a golden opportunity to "steal" Esau's birthright.  He tells Esau that he can have some stew if Esau gives him his birthright.  Esau figures that his birthright doesn't matter much if he is dead so he agrees and gives it to Jacob.  (Gen 25)  One thing I never really understood was why Esau just didn't take the food from Jacob.

Anyway, you would think that was enough because he got the inheritance but it wasn't.  Jacob also wanted to get his father to bless him.  This was the other part of the inheritance not included in the birthright.  Now his dad tells Esau to go out to the field and hunt some game.  Esau is supposed to prepare the food and bring it to his dad who will bless him.

While Esau is gone, his brother Jacob goes into action again with the help of their mother.  This is sort of a messed up family.  Esau's mom was plotting against him.  I think she probably needed therapy but I'm not sure Dr. Phil could have fixed that mess.  Anyway, while Esau is out in the field, their mom, Rebekah, convinces Jacob to go get a couple of goats to prepare as food for their dad.  Then Jacob puts on a disguise and pretends to be Esau.  Now their dad, Isaac, is really old and his eyesight isn't very good.  So Jacob and his mom, get the food together and Jacob takes it to their dad.

Their dad realizes that something isn't quite right.  At first, Isaac asks Jacob how he got the food so quickly.  Jacob lies to him and says that God gave him the food (lie number one in this exchange).  Dad is still not convinced and he asks Jacob to come close so he can touch Jacob.  Well good ol' Jacob is wearing a disguise and it works.  Dad asks Jacob if he is really Esau and Jacob says yes (lie number two in this exchange).  So Jacob feeds his dad some food and after his dad smells the disguise (a total lie on Jacob's part), he gives Jacob his blessing (Gen 27).

Now let me ask a question.  Have you ever watched one of those old movies where some guy is selling people some magic potion that he claims will do all sorts of stuff but it won't?  Or have you watched one of those movies where someone is trying to cheat someone out of something?  Those types of people are normally bad people because what they do hurts others.  I don't normally like those kinds of people.  The come across as bad people and those are not the kind of people I like to hang out with.

Well, that is exactly the type of person that Jacob was at this point in his life.  Can you imagine God choosing this loser to be the founder of His chosen people, Israel?  Well that's exactly what God did.  However, by the time Jacob's name was changed to Israel, he had changed a lot.  When he became Israel, he was following God and guess what?  He worked for a guy who ran a con game on him a couple of times.

The point I want to leave you with is this.  You don't have to be perfect for God to use you.  As a matter of fact, He already knows all of your imperfections before He chooses you and He still loves you completely.  So if you aren't perfect, don't worry about it.  Just give your self over to him and watch what a miraculous person he turns you into.

That's another of the Minion's Bible Stories

Christmas Part 3

Hello Everyone,

This is part three of the story of Christmas.

Now Mary is pregnant with Jesus and Elizabeth is pregnant with John.  For those of you who don't know, John and Jesus' lives will be intertwined through out all of John's time on earth and most of Jesus.  I believe John is the one who ultimately baptizes Jesus and John gets his head cut of by the king because he tell the king that the king was doing something wrong.

OK, back to the story.  Mary decides that since she and Elizabeth are cousins that she's going to pay Elizabeth a visit and she does.  Here's something that strikes me as interesting.  It seems like several people must have known about what was going on with Mary and more than one believed her because when she rolls into Zach's house, Elizabeth says, "Your are most blessed of all women and the child you bear will be very blessed.  I know you are Jesus mother, why did you come to visit me.  As soon as you said hello, John started moving around.  You are very blessed because you believed that God will accomplish what he said he would."  We can learn something from this and I may have already pointed it out.  Mary was very blessed because she trusted God.  God is a gentlemen.  I believe that if Mary had told God she didn't want to be Jesus' mom, he would have passed her by and found someone else.  Now we don't have any record of this in the bible, but it's possible that Mary was not the first person God approached about this.  I can't prove that one way or the other.

But what we do know is that Mary had faith in God.  We also know that Joseph had faith in God.  So the Lord was putting Jesus in a house where his parents both had faith.  It is truly an amazing thing when people come together in agreement and stand in faith together.

So after Elizabeth talks to Mary, the anointing comes in Mary and she sings this song:

My soul glorifies God and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior
For he is mindful of how humble I am (side note, this is the second place in the bible where someone called themselves humble.  Moses wrote that he was the most humble man ever to walk the earth.)
From now on all the nations will call me blessed
For the Lord Almighty has done great things for me
His mercy extends to those that fear him from generation to generation

He has performed mighty deeds
He has scattered the proud
He has brought down kings
But has lifted up the humble

He has filled the hungry with good things
But sent the rich away empty
He has helped Israel, remembering to be merciful
To Abraham and his descendants for ever

After this, Mary hung out with Elizabeth for three months and then she went back to Joseph's place.  You have to feel for Joseph a little.  Not only did he not get to go on a honeymoon with Mary but pretty quick after they get married, she takes a three month vacation to Elizabeth's house.  I bet Joseph had to stay home because he was a carpenter and had a business to run and her his new wife takes off and leaves for three months.

So let me close out what happened to Elizabeth and Zach.  Elizabeth finally gives birth to John and her neighbors and relatives all come over to celebrate and throw a big party.  That seems a little strange to me.  I can remember when we brought each of our kids home from the hospital.  I don't remember my ex-wife or I ever wanting to have a party.  As a matter of fact, we both wanted the opposite.  We both wanted to sleep.  If someone woke the baby up, it sort of made us mad but anyway, that's what happened.  We know that Zach didn't wake John up because he still couldn't speak.  Remember, God had shut his mouth.

So eight days after his birth, when Zach and Elizabeth had not named the baby yet, the friends and family decided they were going to name the baby Zach after his father.  That's pretty pushy if you ask me.  First they come over and party like it's New Year's Eve then they get impatient about naming the kid and try to do it themselves.

Well, Elizabeth is having no part of it because she knows that the baby's name is John and she tells them this.  Unfortunately, no one in the crowd likes the idea and they tell her it is a stupid idea.  Have you ever had family trying to tell you what to do or trying to live their lives through you?  Well this is a bible record of it happening.  Anyway, they don't like her answer so they ask Zach.  This sort of reminds me of when a child asks one parent for something and gets told no so the child goes and asks the other parent.  Zach takes a writing tablet and with a written note, tells everyone that the boy's name is John.  As soon as he did that, God allowed him to talk and Zach started praising God.  Now the crowd was really in awe and they all started talking about it.  Word spread through the grapevine about the story and everyone wondered what John would amount to.



Luke 1:39 to Luke 2:5

To be continued....

The Minion

Christmas Story Part 1

Hello everyone.  Because it is the Christmas season, I will try to tell the Christmas story in my own words.

Now we all know that Jesus was born on Christmas day and that there were some wise men involved plus a barn with a bunch of animals and a star, etc.  But the Christmas story actually starts about 9 months before that.  The interesting thing is that there are two kids involved not just Jesus.  The first one's name is John.

OK, John's parents were Zacharias and Elisabeth.  Now both of them were too old to have kids.  I don't mean that they felt too old, I mean that their bodies were too old to have kids and they didn't have any kids because Elisabeth was barren.  Now Zach was a pretty important guy.  He was a real big wig in his church.    His job that year was to go into the holiest part of the temple and burn incense to the Lord.  We really don't do this today but it was a real important job.  It was so important that a whole bunch of people were outside the temple praying while Zach went in to do it.

So this angel of the Lord appears right next to him and it freaks him out.  He was really afraid.  Think of something that really scares you and that will give you a hint about what Zach was feeling.  Now something I just noticed was that Zach was a man of faith.  See he had been praying that God would give he and Elisabeth a child even though they were past the age of child bearing.  I guess he knew that if God could do it for Abraham, God could do it for him.  So this angel tells him that he will get Elisabeth pregnant and they will have a child named John and that he will be really happy and so will everyone else when John gets here.  The angel goes on to say that John will not ever drink alcohol and that the Holy Spirit will be upon him before he is even born.  Also, he will turn many of the Israelites to God and lastly that he will prepare the way for Jesus.

OK so we should all stop hear and rejoice that Zach got his prayer answered and this mighty miracle took place right?  Well we would if that was what Zach actually did.  But here is something else interesting that happens.  Now understand that Zach has been praying for a kid for a long time and here an angel appears out of thin air right in front of him inside a place where only he could go.  The angel tells him that his prayer has been answered and immediately Zach goes from talking faith to talking doubt and unbelief.

Now I don't know if I would question the angel after his entrance, etc., but Zach wants to know how it will happen and says he is way too old for something like this and that his wife is too.  Why was he praying for it then?  He obviously had some measure of faith but that faith was shaken when the angel showed up.  I think it was shaken by fear.  Now the Lord already had a plan so he decided to make Zach unable to speak until John was born because Zach didn't believe him.

Let's stop for a second.  There is a lesson to be learned.  Sometimes we start praying for God to do something and then when we get a word from Him that He will, we instantly question it.  Have you ever needed to hear from God and when you got a scripture or someone told you something, you didn't believe it?  I think I have which doesn't make sense.  Also, notice that God showed up to tell Zach what he was going to do before he did it.  When Zach walked out of the temple that day, Elisabeth was not pregnant yet.   All Zach had to go on was the word of God.  But also notice that when God tells you he is going to do something, He will do exactly what He said.  Once you have a word from God on something, just keep standing on that word until He brings to pass what He said He would.

So there was a whole prayer group that marveled at how long he spent in the temple.  It was normally an in and out job but the angel changed the plans.  Now when he came out to them he couldn't talk so everyone figured that he must have seen a vision.  Then he finished out his term as the head preacher and went home to his wife and Elisabeth got pregnant.......More to come.

That's part one of Christmas by the Minion.