The story of Gideon in Judges 6-8 is one of the highlights of the book and has inspired many a sermon. What struck me this time through was how the Lord dealt with Gideon's fear and the part Gideon himself played in that.

We are introduced to Gideon as he was threshing a very small amount of wheat secretly in a wine press "so that the Midianites would not see him". There is nothing in his first encounter with God to indicate fear, but the greeting "The Lord is with you, brave and mighty man" was far from how he was feeling. Despite his protestations, the Lord ordered him: "Go with all your great strength and rescue Israel from the Midianites".

The first mention of his terror is a healthy one: the fear of the Lord. "Fire came out of the rock and burned up the meat and the bread" he had prepared for his visitor. "Gideon then realized that it was the Lord's angel he had seen … but the Lord told him, 'Peace. Don't be afraid. You will not die.' Gideon built an altar … and named it 'The Lord is Peace'". It has often been said: "Fear the Lord and you will have nothing to fear."

The next incident concerns the fear of man. This was a test. To be able to do what God was calling him to do, he would need to face and overcome his fear of family members and neighbours who were Baal worshippers. It would involve tearing down his father's altar to Baal, cutting up the symbol of the goddess Asherah beside it for fuel, building a well-constructed altar to the Lord and offering his father's bulls on it. "He was afraid of his family and the people in town to do it by day, so he did it at night." The point is he did it, and it resulted in his father's rejection of Baal. Fear of family ridicule and rejection has kept some back from committing their lives to Jesus. To our shame, the fear of man can keep us silent when we should speak out.

After being given two miraculous signs as reassurance that God was indeed going to use him to rescue Israel, and having had his army reduced from 32,000 to 300 so that all the glory would go to God, the Lord commanded him, "'Get up and attack the camp; I am giving you victory over it. But if you are afraid to attack, go down to the camp with your servant Purah. You will hear what they are saying, and then you will have the courage to attack.' So Gideon and his servant Purah went down to the edge of the enemy camp … When Gideon arrived, he heard a man telling a friend … 'I dreamed that a loaf of barley bread rolled into our camp and hit a tent. The tent collapsed and lay flat on the ground.' His friend replied, 'It's the sword of the Israelite, Gideon! It can't mean anything else! God has given him victory over Midian and our whole army!' When Gideon heard [this] he fell to his knees and worshiped the Lord. Then he went back to the Israelite camp and said, 'Get up! The Lord is giving you victory over the Midianite army!'"

Belief in a prophetic dream so galvanized and strengthened Gideon's faith that it produced spontaneous worship, removed all fear and enabled him to inspire his small band of warriors to carry out the plan beginning to form in his mind; his own noble plan that would require enormous faith and vulnerability: total dependence on God. The ensuing victory was assured.