Ep 4.2 Gideon, the Dog Lappers, and God’s Glory with Pastor Kyle Bates

In week 2 of our Judges: A Study of God-Ordained Violence, we pick up with the judge: Gideon.  Gideon has a large army to defeat their enemies but God wants them to do it with a smaller army to get all the glory.  Pastor Kyle gives us some great grace-filled insight into God and our relationship with the divine during troubled times.  Discussion guide at: www.tenfootpolepodcast.com/judges

Discussion Questions:

1. How have you experienced the conditioning of men versus women and glorifying violence?

2. How do you hear that God wants them to get glory with a small army so they can’t have it themselves? Is this God ordaining this violence? Or is it what Pastor Kyle says, “if you want violence, I’ll give it to you,but it’s not what you need.”

3. “Power and violence are the things people want more than they want true wisdom, God offers the better and we keep taking the worse. We have as much free agency as we want and God says you can keep taking the bad as much as you want until you realize it’s just too bad for you.” Are these actions of God actually out of love?

4. Pastor Kyle introduces the threshing floor versus wine press metaphor. Are we trying to do it the wrong way and just missing God’s instructions?

5. Is God anti-violent or non-violent? Do you get that in the story of Gideon?

6. What does this tell us about God?