Judges 6:1 - Meaning and Application

Here we see, first, Israel’s sin beginning again: “The Israelites did evil in the sight of the Lord” (Judges 6:1). A child who has been burned learns to fear fire, yet this stubborn and foolish people, though they had often suffered deeply for their idolatry, went back to it after a short time of relief from God’s judgments. Their hearts were rebellious. God’s providence alone does not change sinners’ hearts or their way of life.

Next, we see Israel’s troubles return. Sin always brings suffering in its train, and anyone who goes back to foolishness should expect to go back to misery. God acts against the stubborn as they act against him, showing himself contrary to those who walk contrary to him (Psalm 18:26; Leviticus 26:21, 24).

This trouble came from a very weak-looking enemy. God handed Israel over to Midian (Judges 6:1), not the Midian in the south where Jethro lived, but the eastern Midian that bordered Moab (Numbers 22:4). This was a people others looked down on as uncivilized and dull. We are not told they had a king, lord, or general here, because they were more like a scattered mob than a trained army. It was also more painful because Israel had once defeated them badly, nearly wiping them out (Numbers 31:7), yet by now, almost 200 years later, they had multiplied enough to become a severe punishment to Israel. In this way God stirred Israel to jealousy through a people that was “not a people,” even a foolish nation (Deuteronomy 32:21).

The smallest creature can become God’s tool to correct those who have made the great Creator their enemy. And when people we are supposed to rule become stubborn and disobedient, we should ask whether we have not been disobedient to our own sovereign Ruler.

The trouble also reached a frightening level. Midian gained the upper hand because of sheer numbers. God had promised to increase Israel like sand on the seashore, but their sin checked their growth and reduced them. Then their enemies, though weaker in every other way, overwhelmed them by numbers. They came like grasshoppers in countless swarms (Judges 6:5), not as a proper army for open battle, but as a disorderly mass to loot the land, camp on it, and profit from what they stole.

Sin had cut Israel off from God, so they had no strength to stand against them. The Midianites made terrible ruin with their raiding bands. The Israelites were forced into dens and caves, though in truth they were putting themselves there through fear. This came from their own cowardice, helped by a guilty conscience that made them tremble at the sound of a leaf. It was also the fair punishment for turning away from God, who now fought against them with the very terrors he would once have fought for them against their enemies. Without this weakness, Israel would likely have been a match for Midian. But when the heart turns away from God, it loses strength for what is good and for what is great.

Sin drains courage from people and sends them hiding into dens and caves. A day is coming when even chief captains and mighty men will call on rocks and mountains to hide them.

They were also made very poor. Midian and the other peoples from the east, who lived by plunder as the Sabeans and Chaldeans did when they robbed Job, kept making raids into Canaan. The rich land tempted them, and Israel’s laziness and comfort after forty years of peace made them easy prey. They came up against Israel (Judges 6:3), camped among them (Judges 6:4), and brought huge numbers of camels with them (Judges 6:5). They were not just a passing raiding party. They pushed deep into the country as far as Gaza on the western side (Judges 6:4). They let the Israelites sow their fields, then came at harvest time and took everything, eating the crops and destroying the grass. They also carried off the sheep and oxen when they left. In the end, they left Israel with no food except what the owners had managed to hide in caves and dens.

Here we can see God’s justice in punishing their sin. Israel had failed to honor God with their wealth in tithes and offerings, and they had used what should have been given to God for Baal instead. Now God rightly sends an enemy to take their goods away at harvest time (Hosea 2:8, 9). We also see what happens when God leaves a people. When he goes, every good thing goes with him, and every trouble rushes in. When Israel stayed close to God, they reaped what others had sown (Joshua 24:13; Psalm 105:44). Now that God had withdrawn, others reaped their fields instead. Let us, then, thank God for our nation’s peace and calm, and for the bread we earn by our labor.

At last, after seven years of these raids, one worse than the last, Israel was moved to cry out to the Lord (Judges 6:6). Their cries to Baal had ruined them and could not help them. When God brings judgment, he will win, and sinners will either bow before him or be broken before him.