Judges 6:1-10

¹Then the sons of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord; and the Lord gave them into the hands of Midian seven years. ²The power of Midian prevailed against Israel. Because of Midian the sons of Israel made for themselves the dens which were in the mountains and the caves and the strongholds. ³For it was when Israel had sown, that the Midianites would come up with the Amalekites and the sons of the east and go against them. ⁴So they would camp against them and destroy the produce of the earth as far as Gaza, and leave no sustenance in Israel as well as no sheep, ox, or donkey. ⁵For they would come up with their livestock and their tents, they would come in like locusts for number, both they and their camels were innumerable; and they came into the land to devastate it. ⁶So Israel was brought very low because of Midian, and the sons of Israel cried to the Lord.

⁷Now it came about when the sons of Israel cried to the Lord on account of Midian, ⁸that the Lord sent a prophet to the sons of Israel, and he said to them, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘It was I who brought you up from Egypt and brought you out from the house of slavery. ⁹I delivered you from the hands of the Egyptians and from the hands of all your oppressors, and dispossessed them before you and gave you their land, ¹⁰and I said to you, “I am the Lord your God; you shall not fear the gods of the Amorites in whose land you live. But you have not obeyed Me.”’”