Ecclesial Futures
2024 – Volume 5 – Issue 2

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A R T I C L E

DOI: 10.54195/ef19268

Healing the Wounded to Lead in 
the Postcolonial Church

Pieter H. J. Labuschagne

Abstract
Amidst continuous calls for decolonization and Africanization in theological reflection 
on the African continent, this paper looks at the effects of colonialism, its power and the 
inequalities and vulnerabilities it created, and how, long after the demise of the struc-
tures of colonialism, the coloniality1 of the heart and mind still lingers. As a white South 
African, of French Huguenot descent, I come from the minority group which dominated 
non-white citizens during apartheid. I still benefit from this past privilege but the oppo-
site is true for those who suffered under apartheid, who lives with a legacy of inferi-
ority. For decolonialization to succeed, the historically wounded should be supported 
to find their true identity. This article makes use of Exegesis by Story as methodology 
to describe the journey of the Old Testament judge Gideon, as an example of healing 
and restoration of the hearts and minds of the oppressed. The research furnishes 
the church with transformational principles that can be used to come alongside the 
oppressed, and to facilitating the healing of the wounded to become leaders.

Keywords: Church as agent of change, Coloniality, Wounded, Healers, Leaders, 
Restoration, Transformation

1 Colonialism is a political system where one nation forcefully rules over another. Coloniality is the incli-
nation of the heart and mind, where colonial sentiments live on – even when the system is abolished. 
The term coloniality is therefore used in this paper to refer to an inclination of the heart and mind, 
manifesting as attitudes, ways of knowing, and patterns of living that exist because of colonialism, 
which is in turn an external system that is forcefully imposed on people by others. Seroto (2018: 3) 
defines coloniality as a result of how colonizers “undervalued and dehumanised the imagination and 
mind of indigenous people”. “Coloniality survives colonialism. It is maintained in books, in the criteria 
of academic performance, in cultural patterns, in common sense, in the self-image of peoples, in aspi-
rations of self, and so many other aspects of our modern experience. In a way, as modern subjects we 
breathe coloniality all the time and every day” (Maldonado-Torres 2007: 243).



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1 Introduction
Colonialism dominated large parts of the African continent and its people, with the 
Western way of life being forced down on different African nations. Eventually this 
political stranglehold of colonialism started to crumble. In South Africa, the first 
democratic elections were held in 1994, shortly after the release of Nelson Mandela 
from prison in 1990. This was a watershed moment for South African politics, leaving 
behind Apartheid and ushering in freedom and democracy. However, the dreams 
that people had of this new era started to wane and three decades later the call 
continues for decolonization and Africanization, and to break the stranglehold that 
the historically privileged still have on the economy. Though colonialism is dead, the 
lingering coloniality of people’s hearts and minds continue. This article calls on the 
church to intentionally implement godly principles that will heal hurting people and 
build their self-worth in a wounded world.

In the 2024 national elections in South Africa the African National Congress (ANC) 
lost their majority rule for the first time in three decades, securing 40.18% of the 
votes. This comes after a decade of political turmoil, state capture, and corruption. 
A Government of National Unity (GNU) is now in place consisting of the ANC, their 
main opposition the Democratic Alliance, and eight other, smaller parties. Though it 
falls outside the scope of this article, an interesting topic for future research would 
be how the local political shift in power will affect the coloniality of people’s hearts 
and minds.

2 Materials and Methods
This article makes use of Baird’s “Exegesis by Story” as research methodology. It is an 
integrated, wholistic approach, which includes all three traditional foci of interpre-
tation: the author, the text, and the reader. The method starts with the text, as the 
primary focus, and then reconstructs and examines the life-story behind the text. 
Note that the reader’s imaging of this world of Scripture is not the work of imagina-
tion – the dangers of that kind of exegesis are obvious and well documented. Imaging 
the world of Scripture requires discipline: a thorough historical-grammatical analysis 
of the text must be conducted, with the text itself as the anchor point for imaging 
and understanding. However, exegesis must go one step further and reconstruct the 
life-story from the surface structure of the text. This back-story is the foreground, 
the focus of the search for meaning. How did the author and community struggle 
with circumstances or issues as revealed by the passage, and what was going on 
when the text was read for the first time by the original audience?



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The key to understanding is to live in the story. Imaging the world of the ancient 
community of faith allows the reader to interact with the author and their context 
in such a way that it becomes possible to live in it today. This method corresponds 
with the early church’s own exegetical method, which takes seriously the context 
of author, recipients, text, and readers. Baird’s approach should not be confused 
with narrative theology, which can descend into theological relativism and a denial 
of objective truth. He simply calls for a deeper understanding of the text; to move 
beyond the surface structure to the deep structure of the text; to understand the 
text better. Getting a glimpse of the people behind the text and the challenges that 
they faced makes the text more personal and easier to connect to modern readers 
and the challenges that they face.

The world of Scripture is like a city in which not only the ancient community dwelt 
but in which the community of faith continues to live today. This approach provides a 
holistic context for exegesis – understanding the process that lies behind the authors’ 
words. This leads to a measure of synchroneity with the author, the recipients, and 
the text. The more that modern readers become immersed in the story, the better 
their understanding of the text. The exegeted text and the constructed back-story 
show how the ancient audience applied the text, or were expected to apply it.

Exegesis by Story makes application part of the process of exegesis as the modern 
reader understands and experiences the text, dwelling in their world provided by 
the ancient community of faith with the proper perspective to receive and to use the 
text. For the community of faith today, to dwell in the world of Scripture and read the 
text in that context provides several advantages. The first advantage of Exegesis by 
Story is the holistic context of understanding that it provides: it helps us to under-
stand what lies behind the authors’ statements. The second advantage is contem-
poraneity, to read and understand the text in the spirit of the times, leading to a 
significant measure of synchroneity with the author, recipients and text. The third 
advantage is that the exegeted text and the reconstructed life-story show how the 
ancient audience applied the text, or was expected to apply it, and therefore what 
effect the message was expected to have on its readers.

3 The Effect of Oppression
This article looks at Gideon, the Old Testament Judge, as a type of the oppressed, and 
how his circumstances and bad experiences with Israel’s oppressors shaped his way 
of thinking and acting. Gideon’s story helps us to consider the effect of the coloniality 
of one’s heart and mind on our capacity and self-belief. Before we turn to Gideon, let 
us sketch the historical back-story in broad strokes.



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Israel entered Canaan under Joshua’s leadership after being set free from Egypt and 
wandering in the desert for 40 years. Joshua’s death led to a leadership void and 
everyone did what was right in their own eyes ( Judg. 17.6, 21.25).2 This was a repeti-
tive cycle. The Israelites sinned against the Lord and turned away from the Lord; the 
Lord’s anger burnt against them and they fell into the hands of their enemies; they 
called on the Lord and the Lord raised up a Judge to deliver them; this led to a period 
or peace; until the people became disobedient again. The cycle repeated.

Hence, the Lord appointed and equipped Judges to rescue the Israelites from their 
enemies. These Judges resonate with folk tales about national heroes that we heard 
as children. Some desperate situation presented itself and then, as if from nowhere, 
someone stepped up and saved the day. I always enjoyed these stories because it 
is part of a boy’s DNA to seek adventure and be the hero. Many of the heroes were 
young people and children, which had an even greater impact on me. The images 
that I conjured up of these heroes became part of my frame of reference. It formed 
part of my white, Western perspective on leadership. I assumed that all heroes were 
powerful and capable.

However, God has a different view of people. The Lord does not measure people by 
the same standards as we do. In fact, the Bible is saturated with examples of leaders 
whom God selected, whose selection ran contrary to these “powerful-hero-of-God” 
expectations. Moses protested when God called him to lead his people from Egypt 
because he did not consider himself qualified (Exod. 3–4). Nehemiah claimed that he 
was too young and could not speak (Neh. 1.6). David was not even considered by his 
father as a candidate to become king – calling him to appear before the prophet as 
an afterthought. When Jesse’s sons were presented to Samuel, he marvelled at their 
physique. Yet, God did not select any of them, but elected the teenage-shepherd as 
the next king (1 Sam. 16.11-12). Solomon saw himself as a little child who was inca-
pable of ruling God’s people (1 Kgs 3.6-9). Jesus’ disciples were ordinary men and 
women, who did not have the same credentials as the Jewish leaders, and had no 
special training in the Scriptures (Acts 4.13). It is clear that the Lord does not make 
selections in the same way that humans do. God does not consider outward appear-
ance but looks at the heart (1 Sam. 16.7).

The same is true of Gideon’s call. His selection to serve as Judge seems odd, not just 
to us but even to himself. The fact that he turned out to be a prominent Judge is not 
evident in the account of his call. When we encounter him for the first time, he was 

2 All Scripture references are from the New Living Translation (NLT).



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weak and fearful. In Judges 6, we read that the Midianites had been ruling over Israel 
for seven years. They were cruel and the Israelites had to hide from them in moun-
tain caves. Neither crops nor animals were safe from their plundering. The people 
cried out to God for help and the angel that was sent to Gideon found him threshing 
wheat in a winepress, out of sight of the enemy. The following table summarizes the 
conversations that ensued between God, the angel and Gideon. Pay close attention 
to the words of each character.

Character Gideon’s call to be 
a Judge

God’s enabling Reference

Angel Mighty hero The Lord is with you Judg. 6.12

Gideon If the Lord is with us, why has 
all of this happened to us?
Where are all the miracles 
our ancestors told us about?
The Lord has abandoned us 
and handed us over to the 
Midianites.

Judg. 6.13

The Lord Go with the strength you 
have, and rescue Israel 
from the Midianites

I am sending you! Judg. 6.14

Gideon How can I rescue Israel? 
My clan is the weakest 
in the whole tribe of 
Manasseh, and I am the 
least in my entire family!

Judg. 6.15

The Lord You will destroy the 
Midianites as if you were 
fighting against one man.

I will be with you. Judg. 6.16

In the table several themes stand out. First, Gideon is addressed as “mighty hero” 
and is instructed to go in the strength that he has, and to rescue Israel from their 
enemies. God adds that Gideon will destroy the Midianites and that it would be as 
easy as fighting against one man. In addition to this, the Lord is sending Gideon 
on this mission. Twice it is stated that the Lord is with Gideon. As with the biblical 
leaders mentioned already, God is not looking at the immediate circumstances. God 
is looking to the future role that Gideon will play.

Second, Gideon’s response is quite negative. He does not see himself as a hero or 
believe that he can rescue his people. He points out that his clan is the weakest in his 
whole tribe, and that he is the least in his family. He doubts the Lord’s presence; and 



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asks how all these bad things could have happened to them if the Lord was indeed 
present with them. Gideon did not see any of the miracles that the ancestors talked 
about. In fact, he believes that it is the Lord who handed them over to the Midian-
ites. Gideon is blinded by despair. All he can see is how dire his circumstances are. 
The surrounding enemy and the fear that they instilled made their home in Gideon’s 
heart and mind.

Third, in modern terms, we could say that the Israelites were the colonial subjects of 
Midian. They were demoralized, stripped of all dignity and their land was plundered. 
People hid in caves and Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress; he was hiding 
so that his enemies would not confiscate his grain. For seven years they had been 
subjects of another nation and had been struggling for survival. These circumstances 
led to tunnel-vision, where survival and the here-and-now was all that mattered. The 
miracles of the past sounded like fables. The protection and presence of God seemed 
like lies. If the Lord was with them, then why were they in this unbearable position? 
Gideon heard the angel and the Lord speak but he did not believe their words. In fact, 
because of Gideon’s insecurity and vulnerability it was impossible for him to believe 
their words. It was not only the Midianite oppression that kept Gideon captive but 
also the coloniality of his heart and mind. Paying attention to this deep story that lies 
behind the words of the text, aids modern readers to place themselves in Gideon’s 
shoes. By pausing to ask how such circumstances would have affected us helps to 
live in Gideons story and to understand his hesitance and resistance to God’s call.

4 Decolonialization and Decoloniality
What we observe in Gideon’s life is also true today. Though colonialism, as a polit-
ical system, ended in most countries, the coloniality of people’s hearts and minds 
still control them. On 14 July 1957 Dr Martin Luther King Jr delivered a sermon enti-
tled Overcoming an Inferiority Complex. He pointed out that “segregation generates 
a feeling of inferiority, that it gives the individuals under the system an inferiority 
complex … it’s so easy for us to feel that we don’t count, that we are not significant, 
that we are less than. We stand every day before a system which says that to us” (see 
also Fanon 2021). On South African shores, Steve Biko (1987: 55) challenged blacks 
to see themselves as more than “appendages to white society”. Colonization was not 
only established by physical force and violence but also by colonizing people’s hearts 
and minds (Ngũgĩ wa Thiongʾo 1981; Mamdani 1996: 16–18), culture, language and 
education (Androas 2012: 5; Dladla 2011: 3; Ngũgĩ wa Thiongʾo 1981; Mbembe 2016: 
36; Nkoane 2006: 62–3).



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Ngũgĩ wa Thiongʾo (1981: 11–12) shares his experience as a child in a colonial school, 
where English was the language of the colony, and pupils were not allowed to speak 
Gīkūyū near the school. The punishment for speaking Gīkūyū was corporal punish-
ment, a monetary fine, or wearing a metal plate around your neck with inscriptions 
like I AM STUPID or I AM A DONKEY. The opposite was true when one did well in 
English. You were rewarded with prizes, prestige and applause.

With the above in mind, it is not enough to put an end to oppressive political struc-
tures, to hand over control to the oppressed, and to expect them to be able to 
manage things in the new status quo. One also has to deal with the inward coloniality 
of the heart and mind, the lingering belief by people that they are inferior and not 
significant and the impression that they are incapable of success. It is here where the 
church should play an intentional role to heal the wounded to become leaders. It can 
only happen when people’s hearts are set free from the imprisonment of the past 
(Cross & Naidoo 2012: 228). Jansen (2009: 5) rightfully refers to this as “bitter knowl-
edge … how people remember and enact the past”. It is imperative that the church 
should minister to hearts and minds that were affected by social evils.

5 Empowerment
Gideon challenged the Lord, if it was truly the Lord speaking, to prove it. When 
Gideon returned with food that he prepared, the angel touched the food and it was 
consumed in fire and the angel disappeared. Realizing that it was indeed an angel 
of the Lord, Gideon cried out that he was doomed, because he had seen the Lord’s 
messenger face-to-face. When the Lord assured him that he would not die, Gideon 
built an altar for the Lord ( Judg. 6.17-23).

This was the first turning point in his life and resulted in him destroying the Baal altar 
and Asherah pole, as instructed by the Lord. Gideon, the oppressed, initially rejected 
the claim that the Lord was with him, was empowering him, and wanted to use him 
(Judg. 6.12, 14, 16). Yet, a personal encounter with the Lord led to bold obedience 
and performing a dangerous and confrontational act of bravery ( Judg. 6.27). What 
made the difference? Dr King (1957) answered this question in the sermon referred 
to earlier. “You should go out with the assurance that you belong and that you count 
and that you are somebody because God loves you.” This is the same truth that 
transformed Gideon from doubting the Lord’s favour, blessing and power, and how 
he, Gideon, the least in his family, and from the smallest clan in his tribe, rescued 
Israel ( Judg. 6.13, 15).



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Eventually, Gideon went to war with 300 men against the 135,000-strong coalition 
forces of the enemy. Not only did he and his men challenge them but pursued the 
survivors and captured them (Judg. 7–8). What a transformation! What made the 
difference? What should we see in the unwritten story behind the text? What made 
the difference was Gideon’s newfound identity in, and his dependence on, the Lord. 
When he prepared for war, filled with the Holy Spirit, he consulted the Lord to make 
sure that he acted in accordance to the Lord’s will. The Lord was with Gideon and 
encouraged him by agreeing to give him the well-known sign of the fleece on the 
threshing floor ( Judg. 6.36-40).

The Lord transformed a man with no self-belief into a bold leader, and a people with 
no hope into a willing army that marched towards the enemies. The circumstances 
were still the same. The enemy was still there, but God was changing Gideon’s heart 
and mind. The deep story behind the text is one of despair that is slowly turning into 
hope and trust. Gradually Gideon started to realize that his real prison was not built 
by the Midianites but by his own mind and heart.

6 Developing Confidence
In reply to Gideon’s request for a sign, he is assured that the Lord would rescue the 
Israelites and give them victory over their enemy ( Judg. 7.7, 9). As an added confir-
mation, the Lord encouraged Gideon to go down into the enemy’s camp during the 
night. There, Gideon heard a man talk about a dream that he had about Gideon 
defeating them in battle. Encouraged, he returned and marshalled his troops and the 
Lord caused confusion in the enemy’s camp so that they started to kill one another. 
Apart from the 120,000 that died in the chaos of that night, another 15,000 fled, were 
pursued, and captured by Gideon and his men ( Judg. 8.10-12).

The Lord’s enabling and empowering helped Gideon to escape his own inferiority 
complex and to discover the capacity that God had given him. Prolonged indoctrina-
tion and domination by those in power debilitates people. According to Biko (1987: 
86, 152–3, 166), fear led to a paralysis of the African spirit. From a position of white 
privilege, I was brought up with the belief that the sky is the limit. I can do anything 
that I set my mind to and this was mostly true because I had access to education, 
resources, experiences of success, and a life-long validation of my abilities.

For those who suffered under apartheid, the opposite was true. When you are force-
fully removed from your home and relocated to live in segregation under horrific 
conditions, it is hard to have self-belief. When you are subjected to inferior educa-
tion, healthcare, career opportunities, citizen’s rights, and you are told that you are 



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nothing more than an animal, you start to believe it. It becomes impossible to stand 
up and take your rightful place in society (Mashau 2018: 1, Naidoo 2019: 171). Apart-
heid was driven and characterized by fear and Africans had every reason to fear the 
security forces, which detained and intimidated them (Du Toit 2008: 36).

When change took place in South Africa with the first democratic elections in 1994, 
many from the white community willingly ceded power to the very people that they 
previously oppressed. However, the message that accompanied their surrender of 
power was clear: we hand the country over to you – now govern and make a success 
of it. Almost three decades later, whites and blacks are equally disillusioned by many 
failures. “In the emerging ‘rainbow nation’, the need to embrace another view of 
nature has been disorienting for many” ( Johnson 2008: 624).

The white community blames blacks for not trying hard enough, while the blacks 
blame apartheid. For both sides their argument makes logical sense.

Whites blame blacks for a lack of drive and zeal. They say blacks must “man-up”, stop 
blaming apartheid, and do something about their situation. From a white vantage 
point, this is the way one gets things done. Yet, not having experienced oppression 
themselves, but rather benefitting from white privilege, whites are incapable of 
imagining how debilitating and destructive a life of oppression can be. They continue 
to “think white … believing that whiteness ought to be the norm” (Green, Sonn & 
Matsebula 2007: 398). It is imperative that the church takes up the challenge to help 
people to address their whiteness and its power. Mashau (2018: 5) rightly states that 
“whiteness needs to work through its Christian heritage that is associated with impe-
rialism, conquest and colonialism that fed racism”.

There is also logic in black people blaming apartheid. The system of apartheid dehu-
manized and indoctrinated people to believe that they were inferior and incapable; 
something that has a stronghold on people’s minds and hearts. When you are thrown 
into the deep end and have never been taught to swim, are your oppressors not 
to blame when you sink and drown? Mason says “we harbour inside ourselves the 
pain and the memories, the fears and the confusions, the negative self-images and 
the low expectations, turning them into weapons with which to re-injure ourselves, 
every day of our lives” (1990: 69). “The psychological effects which were caused by 
the Apartheid system had a terrible impact upon black people. They resulted in black 
people doubting their humanness and doubting whether the God that was presented 
to them by missionaries and ministers of religion was their God” (Lephakga 2012: 70).



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The polarity of referring to “us” and “them” when we talk about other people does 
not support the move towards a more inclusive society. Elsewhere I have written:

The schism between Africa and the West feeds on the reciprocal prejudice, propaganda 
and historical injustices, which is not a fertile ground for dialogue and collaboration … 
Imperialists want to maintain the status quo – what can be more right than your own 
epistemology? That is also why the oppressed resist colonialism – what can be more 
wrong than another’s epistemology being forced upon you? (Labuschagne 2022: 248–9)

Gideon’s story ends with approximately 40 years of peace ( Judg. 8.28). His journey 
has come full-circle, from seeing himself as worthless when the Lord called him, to 
leading his people to victory over the enemy, and experiencing a time of peace. This 
means change is possible. The Lord, and the church as God’s agents, can make a 
difference in people’s self-belief and help them to see themselves for whom they 
really are. Victims of social abuse can become restorers of social justice and the 
wounded can become the healer. Joel 3.10 looked forward to the day of the Lord, 
where even the weakling would become a warrior. Gideon, the hero of our story, was 
a mighty hero all along. He just had to discover it and believe it for himself. The angel 
of the Lord called him a hero when they met, because the Lord sees beyond our limi-
tations. God sees our potential and we should do the same.

At the beginning of this article I pointed out my disillusionment at God’s selection 
of “unqualified” biblical leaders and how they even doubted themselves. Yet, when 
we follow their stories, they all succeeded in their leadership roles, all the way from 
Moses, Nehemiah, David, Solomon, to Jesus’ disciples. It is valuable, therefore, to ask 
what the church should learn from the example of Gideon, and how the church could 
make a meaningful contribution in helping people to find their true identity in Christ.

7 Results: From Victim to Victor
Several principles from Gideon’s life should be consideration by the church, in healing 
victims of colonial oppression.

The deep story behind the text is that Gideon and his fellow Jews suffered under 
the Midianites, who were so cruel that the people had to hide in caves. The enemy 
constantly attacked them and stayed in the land until all the crops were destroyed 
and no animals were left. The enemy was so overpowering that they were like waves 
of locusts, too many to count. Nobody can deny the devastation of the situation, 
given the Israelites were starving ( Judg. 6.2-6). Normalcy did not exist. People were 
scattered and hiding in mountain crevices. All economic activities ceased. Families 



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were separated, life-savings destroyed, properties demolished, cultural habits and 
practices violated.

Gideon and his people were hopeless and lacked confidence. In Judg. 6.13 Gideon 
conversed with the angel and asked why the Israelites were suffering if the Lord 
was with them. Gideon heard about the miracles of the past, but in his dire circum-
stances it was hard to believe any of that. Yes, the Lord might have brought them out 
of Egypt but now God had abandoned them and handed them over to the Midianites. 
In Judg. 6.15 Gideon expanded on his lament by stating that he was a nobody, from 
the weakest clan in the tribe of Manasseh, and that he was the least in his family. Was 
this true? Or was it the kind of exaggeration that often accompanies depression and 
despair?

The angel and the Lord did not rebuke Gideon for his outbursts. They allowed him 
to speak and even to challenge the Lord’s goodness and faithfulness to Israel. Yet, 
despite this outburst, the Lord did not compromise on the mission. Gideon was 
chosen to set the people free from their enemies. Nowhere in the account of Gideon 
did the Lord ever verbally challenge Gideon’s outburst. God simply encouraged him 
through a series of signs and faith experiences.

These are important principles to consider. Gideon was blinded by his circumstances 
but the Lord saw future peace for Israel. God announced a plan and took Gideon 
along on the journey. From being nobody (in his own eyes) Gideon soon became 
Jerub-Baal, which means “Let Baal defend himself” (NLT). The scared fugitive that we 
met a few verses earlier, now became a Baal-slayer ( Judg. 6.27-32). Subsequently, 
when Israel’s enemies assembled and camped in the valley of Jezreel, a new Gideon 
emerged. Where he was hiding in a winepress 30 verses earlier, he now acted bravely, 
“the Spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon with power. He blew a ram’s horn as a call to 
arms” ( Judg. 6.34). Gideon’s previous, cynical attitude made way for a bold display of 
power. The Lord did not persuade Gideon with words, but allowed him to experience 
the Lord and to see the Lord at work with his own eyes. That made all the difference.

The Church must learn from Gideon’s encounter with the Lord that our efforts to 
bring restoration and healing must not be limited to talking and writing about it. We 
need to remember that “the Kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk; it is living by 
God’s power” (1 Cor. 4.20). The church should contribute what the world does not 
have, empowered by the enabling of the Lord. The Church consists of those called 
by God into God’s Kingdom. The Church is where people are healed and grow and 
minister as part for the body of Christ. In Rom. 12.2 Paul urges us not to “copy the 
behaviour and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by 



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changing the way you think”. Talking is not enough – the church should bring lasting 
change and reconciliation through lived experiences with God. The backstory must 
change. People must experience God’s ways. This has five concluding implications.

First, we met Gideon threshing wheat in a winepress – far from the prying eyes of his 
enemy. He was negative and scoffed at God’s call to rescue his people. His circum-
stances and his oppressors did not allow any space for a positive self-image. They 
wanted the Israelites to know who was in charge, and robbed them of their identity, 
self-belief and courage. The threat of the enemy was as much an external reality as 
it was an internal one. The Israelites were not only hiding from their enemies; they 
forgot who they were. Shifting our focus to the oppression by the West, Ngũgĩ points 
out that language has a dual character – it is a means of communication and a carrier of 
culture (1981: 13). Forcing Africans to speak English, separated them from themselves, 
their words and their world. Ngũgĩ adds that language “is the collective memory bank 
of a people’s experience in history” (15). Language carries culture and is therefore 
inseparable from people and the community they belong to (16). By forcing them to 
use the colonial language learning, “for a colonial child, became a cerebral activity and 
not an emotionally felt experience” (17). In embracing his own culture, Ngũgĩ eventu-
ally abandoned English, and only wrote in Gīkūyū. It is important for the church to 
contribute to the change that is needed in the world. Social injustice is something that 
should be dealt with in the church, especially in churches were the previous colonial 
influences are evident in the liturgy, polity, and language. Space should be created 
for church members to feel safe enough to exit the winepress, like Gideon, and to 
experience faith in ways that resonate with their own culture and background. It took 
Gideon a long time to get from the winepress to the battlefield but the rewriting of his 
narrative by the Lord and the angel messenger is what led Gideon on his way.

Second, neither the angel nor the Lord rebuked Gideon for his attitude; they simply 
continued to share their plan with Gideon. The Lord knew that Gideon needed time 
and encouragement to believe about himself what the Lord already knew. Some-
times Gideon asked for a sign, and sometimes God took the initiative in providing 
a sign. Initially Gideon had a negative attitude and he did not have any self-belief, 
as a consequence of his circumstances. The Lord, however, had a plan and saw in 
Gideon a person who could fulfil that plan. To succeed, Gideon had to get up, stand 
firm, and live up to what God was asking from him. The church should help believers 
to associate with such truths, because God is always at work in transforming people 
into God’s likeness and into useful vessels. Instead of talking to people about their 
desperate context, or judging them for the debilitating effect it has on them, the 
church should model faith, speak the truth, and encourage belief. Fixing people’s 
eyes on the Lord and on his purposes, sets people free from the prison of their past.



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Third, what the Lord said about the biblical leaders mentioned in this paper was 
the opposite of what they believed about themselves. Yet, this is what made them 
dependent on the Lord. These leaders could not succeed without God. The church 
should help people to look beyond their lack of faith or belief in what we can do for 
God. Further, the church should help people to experience God’s call and to be chal-
lenged like never before. Those who are reduced to the lower rungs of society, those 
who have no self-belief, those who are oppressed and mistreated can be healed and 
become successful leaders.

Fourth, Gideon, the one hiding in a winepress, became Gideon, the leader of an army. 
From hiding, to calling people publicly to war, was a complete transformation. Note 
what this transformation in Gideon’s life accomplished. It gave courage to his people 
and they came out of hiding to follow him. The Lord is Lord of the underdog. The Lord 
uses those we do not consider worthy so that God’s power can shine through and 
that all can see what God is capable of.

Fifth, Gideon saw no way out of his situation. He had not seen the great exploits 
of the Lord that his ancestors referred to. He believed that they were in this diffi-
cult situation because of God and he did not see how a nobody, like himself, could 
be of any use to his people. He had obstacles that kept him from obedience. These 
included the fact the enemy was strong and outnumbered them, he was from a small 
clan, had no physical strength and his own father was worshipping Baal. While these 
physical barriers incapacitated Gideon, what was rooted much deeper in his heart 
and mind, was his own coloniality, the belief that he was useless. It was only when 
the Lord started to rewrite his narrative, that Gideon gained confidence and obeyed 
the call of God. If God had not reached out to Gideon, he would have remained in 
the winepress, imprisoned by his own heart and mind. The church should stand 
against the physical and psychological barriers which remain after decades of colo-
nial oppression. It the church does not reach out to those incapacitated by their own 
coloniality, and paint a godly picture of life for them, they will remain imprisoned. 
The church should echo the Lord’s words to Gideon: “Mighty hero, the Lord is with 
you!” ( Judg. 6.12).

About the Author
Pieter H. J. Labuschagne serves as the Head of Course Development at the South 
African Theological Seminary and is the pastor of Northway Baptist Church in 
Pretoria, South Africa. With over 20 years of experience as a missionary, his research 
interests encompass missiology, contextual studies, hermeneutics, and ecclesiology. 
Contact: Pieter@sats.ac.za



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