while, overspread the land again, and pitched in the valley of Jezreel.
Gideon having suffered nothing for his insult to Baal, had become
bolder. Moreover, his tribe, the Abiezrites, had seen that he had
suffered nothing. Thus it came to pass that when the Spirit of the
Lord came upon him; and he blew a trumpet, all Abiezer followed him.
Not only so; he sent messengers through Manasseh, Asher, Zebulun, and
Naphtali, and they came up to meet him, the very people who a few
months before would have stoned him. They thronged after him, and now
professed themselves believers in Jehovah. They were not hypocrites.
They really believed now, after a fashion, that Baal could not help
them. Their fault was that they believed one thing one day and another
thing the next. That has always been the fault of the people. Your
grandfather did not despise them for their instability. So far as they
were not stable to Baal it was good, and he pitied them as they flocked
to his standard, hoping that he could deliver them. He blew the
trumpet, and at the simple blast of that trumpet in each village and
town the nation seemed to rise as one man, such strength was there in
its tones. These men had been idolaters, and it might have been
thought that to turn them all would have taken years of persuasion; but
no, at the simple sound of the trumpet the religion of Baal vanished.

Gideon was now at the head of a great host; he had been favoured with
visions from the Most High; the angel of the Lord had appeared to him;
he had burnt the image; and yet now, when the army was round him, fear
fell upon him again, and he doubted if he could save Israel, or if God
would keep His promise. So it always was with him, as I have already
said. He therefore prayed for another sign, and the Lord did not
rebuke him, as a man would have done if his promise had been
mistrusted. Gideon's test was strange; he did not pray that he might
see the angel again, for the thoughts that came into his mind were