🍇a winepress🐑a fleece📯a trumpet🏺a jar with a flashlight
A small army with jars.
The big ideaThe Bible tells how God chose a small army, so the win was his.
How it works
Raiders from Midian rode in on camels every year and ate the crops, so the people of Israel hid in caves. A young man named Gideon was beating his wheat in secret in a winepress, a pit cut into rock.
He felt small, but he was told that God was with him. Thirty-two thousand men came to join him. Twenty-two thousand went home, and ten thousand stayed.
At the stream God kept only three hundred, so the win would clearly be his. Gideon gave each man a trumpet and an empty clay jar with a burning flashlight inside.
At midnight the men stood in a ring around the camp, blew their trumpets and smashed their jars. The torches flamed up, and the raiders ran away.
The story in a row.The numbers.
Example 1: How many men stayed?
32,000 men came to join Gideon.
Then 22,000 went home.
Take 22,000 away from 32,000, and 10,000 are left.
So ten thousand men stayed.
Example 2: Three groups
God kept three hundred men.
Gideon split them into 3 groups, with 100 men in each.
3 × 100 = 300
So the three groups of one hundred make three hundred men.
Example 3: A flashlight in a jar
Each man had an empty clay jar with a burning flashlight hidden inside.
In those days a flashlight in a clay jar stayed dark.
When the jar broke, the light flashed out for everyone to see.
Example 4: A fleece
A fleece is a sheep's wool in one thick piece.
Gideon put one out at night, and by morning it was wet and the ground dry.
Next he asked for a dry fleece on wet ground, and it was so.
Words to know
fleece
A sheep's wool, cut off in one thick piece.
flashlight
A stick wrapped in cloth and oil, burned for light.
winepress
A pit cut into rock where grapes were crushed.
raider
Someone who rides in to take what is not theirs.
Watch out
God kept three hundred men, not ten thousand. Ten thousand were still too many.
The torches were hidden in the jars so no light showed until the jars broke.
Gideon felt small and unsure, and asked for signs. The story does not say he was never afraid.
Try it
Where did Gideon hide to beat his wheat?
How many men did God keep?
What did each man have?
10,000 men stayed and 300 were kept. How many were sent home?
Answers: 1. In a winepress · 2. Three hundred · 3. A trumpet and a clay jar with a flashlight inside · 4. 9,700
Try at homeWith a grown-up, talk about a time when something small did something big. What helped?
For grown-upsTry the mission: talk about a time something small did something big, and what helped. The story says what Gideon did; there is no need to turn it into more than that.
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