April 9: Reading the Holy Bible in a year.

Mark 8:22-38. Jesus healed a blind man at Bethsaida, followed by Peter’s Confession and Jesus predicting his death.

Judges 7. Gideon called for fighting men. Eighty-two thousand men gathered to fight. God said that was too many, reduce their number, and in two steps they were whittled down to Gideon’s Valiant Three Hundred men. With that “army” and God the Midianites were defeated.

Judges 8. Gideon Defeated the Midianites, the story is getting complicated but read it anyway. After the great victory Gideon made an Ephod from the Ishmaelites’ golden earrings and this became a snare to them all. Finally Gideon died and immediately after the Israelites fell back into idolatry, worshiping Baal.

Judges 9. The Bible tells it as it is, warts and all. So it is with the story of Abimelech’s Conspiracy and the parable of the trees. All the evil led to Abimelech’s downfall. A take home from this chapter is his last words, after his skull was cracked by a millstone, dropped by a woman. “Draw thy sword, and slay me, that men say not of me, A woman slew him.”