6:1–8:32 Gideon was the greatest of the judges. The following facts bear out this judgment. (a) His story is the longest in the book. (b) The Lord is more visibly active in his story than in any of the others. (c) The Angel of the Lord appeared to him, but to no other judge (vv. 11–24). (d) Centuries later Isaiah remembers Gideon’s defeat of Midian as a significant victory (Is. 9:4; 10:26). (e) He is listed first in Samuel’s list of deliverers (“Jerubbaal,” 1 Sam. 12:11). (f) He is paralleled with Moses (6:11–24 note). (g) The people sought to make him king (8:22–23). (h) He lived like a king (8:26–27, 30, 32). Yet for all this, Gideon failed badly at one point. Gideon made a gold ephod that drew him and others into sin (8:27). In his greatness and in his deficiency, Gideon pointed to the need for a better deliverer, a king who would truly keep the covenant. In this way he points to Christ.