Gideon. Fleece. The two words go together like butter and biscuits. Gideon is one of the more well known of the Judges of Israel, for two main reasons: His laying out the fleece to obtain confirmation from the Lord that he was to lead the battle against the Midianite oppressors. The famous scene of God reducing his army to a mere 300 men, telling Gideon to cull all t...

Deborah. The only female judge of Israel. A prophetess who spoke God's words to Israel. Hero of all feminists, evangelical or otherwise! Some well-meaning brothers and sisters in Christ have tried to use the story of Deborah (Judges 4-5) to justify ordaining women as elders and preachers. My intent here is not to tackle such issues, though I do want to insist that whateve...

Having now set the backdrop with the first three posts in this series, let's take a look at a few judges. Some well-known. Others not so much. Othniel. Not so well known. But since he is the first named judge in the Book of Judges, we should expect to perhaps see aforeshadowingof things to come. And indeed we do. But when the people of Israel cried out to the Lord, th...