The Montgomery advertiser., 1902-11-29
Fourth Quarter, Lesson TX; No vember 30, 1902; Judges,
 vii, Ia. ..-.
Gideon and the Three Hundred.

Gideon and the Three 6unoreo. The Hebrew Church had a catacomb ex' perience as we'll as the Christian Church The fierce oppression of the Midianltes drove them to the device of carving grottoes in the mountains, and corrldors onto which ce]l-like dwellings opened dimly lighted with "air-holes like win dews."
 The Christian Church was ground be- meath the earth by the iron heel of Ro- man despotism, and that without cause But the Hebrew Church richly deserved its affliction because of its black apos- tasy. It was following greedily in the way of Baai. The generation Whicn nao seen the splendid deliverance of Deborah and Barak was still alive. But these lustrous characters and their valoroua deeds were already forgotten, and the land was full of altars to the Sun-Goo andAthe wanton groves of his voiuptuous censort. the Star-Queen.
 At length, after seven years, the He brews grew weary of raising harvests only to see them ruthlessly burned or trampied by camel-droves of the enemy These exiles in mountain dens sighed TOT their happy homes in the luxurious val leys. Their hearts were broken at sight of their sons slain and their daughters meeting a worse fate. They cry Enough to Gods punitive Providence Instantly Jehovah prepared for tneir oe' liverance.
 Gideon, the son of Joash, Is engaged in the homely task of threshing wheat No nsonshiner. Lever ran his stu more clandestineIy. He fas strewR 2 e few sheayes in the stone vat beneath the wine press; and there. entirely hidden from view, as noiselessly as possible, with a hoop-pole perchance, he Is whipping out a few measures of grain. The persist ence and inventiveness of the man mark him as one well qualified to outwit even a willy foe.
 Sarcasm was matter of heredity with Gideon. His Jehovah is not with me, or I would not be threshing wheat in wine-press," is matched by his father 8, If Baal be a god, let him contend for himself with the one who has cast down his altar
 Gideon was as humble and self-depre- eating as Moses. He deemed himself the least member of an insignificant house, and deprecatingiy cried: Wherewitn shall I save iIsrael?''
 Religion as well as charity begins at home Gideon first reformed his fath- CTS house. His sanctifed artfulness is apparent again. Had he taken the day time to split up that big-breasted idol, null down the altar, and open the licent- ious shade of the star goddess's grove to the sunlight, he would have had a fight on hand, and that, too. with his own kindred. When sunrise revealed the thing done. 1t was no use crying over split milk" The fathers facetiousness revealed itself in the nickname he gave his son, Jerubbaal-"Let Baal have it out with him."
 The first sign by which. at touch of the rod in the angels hand. the rocky table was converted Into an altar, on which the savory meal spread for his retreshment was suddenly consumed by preternatura! fire-that sign heartened Gideon for the first steps In his great task But when he looked down upon Esdraelon, that battle-plain of Palestine. and saw the swarming Midianites, he coveted further tokens; and the signs of the fleece. wet and dry, were given to him. In the Midianite soldiers dream of the contemptibe oarley-loaf upsetting the camp, and, his comrades comment upon it. both of which Gideon was per mitted to hear as he reconnoitered the enemy by night, he was further encour- aged in his extremely exacting task
 Now came the double sitting of the pet ty army of Israel, already so inadequate