Revelations, The Fine Dust of Enlightenment
In the beginning. The following is a platform of understanding. Going forward, explaining the landscape, the time period, and the varied unique characters that inhabit a lesser known and less appreciated parts of the old testament. Heroes and villains put on an emotional skin. The dust of the ages come’s alive, with flesh, bone, and blood. Untold mysteries unfold that had remained hidden in plain sight for three millenniums.
Everything in this book is good, except for the things that are a knot, and the knots are not so tight. If you can hang in there
long enough, you will undoubtedly enjoy the flight.
To my sweet granddaughter and fifth-grade proofreader Claire Wellborn, violinist, and philosopher extraordinaire.
I believe in God as I believe in the sun, not because I can see the sun but because I can see everything because of the sun. And so, to his son the holy Messiah, the prince of peace, wonderful, counselor, the only begotten of the Father, my savior, my redeemer and my
friend, the everlasting Father, Jesus the Christ.
Gideon The Sound and the Glory. cover art
Moses flew away, for his work was done upon the earth, and the full mantle of “prophet” fell on the broad shoulders of Joshua, who had chiseled the laws of God into stone, given to all of the people of Israel. The people of Israel were now on the outskirts of Canaan, just beyond the River Jordan in the plains of Moab. They were within sight of the Promised Land, approaching the border of the land God promised to Abraham and his descendants. To assert their spiritual legacy through revelations would not be an easy undertaking. They would have to proceed by faith and rely solely on the strong hand and outstretched arm of God. The land of milk and honey was peopled by mixed and hostile populations who were violently opposed to yielding a cubit of ancestral lands—they would not go without a struggle. Canaan controlled the fertile valleys and the coastline with its unfriendly strongholds of walled cities. The high valleys were the domain of the Amorites. The Hivites, (Neo) Hittites, Jebusites, and Perizzites peopled the villages, towns, and hamlets of the central lowlands. This was Israel’s time of conquest and settlement, often by force of arms. Occasionally, an attempt was made to infiltrate peaceably.The dawning of the Age of Iron created tools and skills in the form of the Kenite heavy metal wagons of war. Superior weapons were forged to drive out the rapidly multiplying immigrants before they could lay claim to all the land of Canaan.
The three chapters, Six through Eight, of the Book of Judges, consist of exactly one hundred verses revelations that speak of the adventures of Gideon. He is an unsung hero who has been hidden in plain sight for three thousand years. The account starts with the Battle of Tabor in Judges Four, where the sons of Gideon’s mother—or Gideon’s brothers—are murdered by two princes, who were now the twin kings of the Midianite horde. The slaughter of brothers had planted the seed of a blood feud in a collision of wills. This was the dry kindling that took the spark of Gideon’s confidence and ignited in him a firestorm of resolve, resulting in the toppling of kings, gods, and generals and in the revelations of the finding of perfect love. Three ferocious battles conclude in the wake of two ruined cities. The determined pursuit of their enemies by Gideon and his men is a testament to their faith, after being refused the bread of life by both Succoth and Penuel. All this was for the redemption of Israel by the hand of God in the appearance of the least likely of heroes. Gideon was a man who was lost in the forest of fear and doubt, a weak thing of this world, who through revelations became God’s instrument of vengeance and determination, a mighty man of valor. Gideon(means hewer) a simple woodsman, one who chops and hacks and makes a path through trees. Abimelech was Gideon’s willful love child who grows to be a vengeful predator and personally kills his seventy brothers, a congress of judges, to claim to be the first king of Israel.Abimelech returns Israel to the worship of Baal, and the Ephod of Gold becomes his cornerstone. He is short-lived when his head is crushed in another attempted holocaust of fire. The Ephod of Gold is resurrected by Eli, the young priest who miraculously finds a home for it, first in Shiloh, and then in the house of God in Nob, where the shepherd boy-king David takes possession of the accursed artifact. Your eyes will be opened, and deeper understandings will be shouldered, for any and all who read these five episodes will have no doubt that there is a God in Israel.
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