What should we learn from the tribe of Gad?

Reuben and Gad (Num. 32) are the two tribes which seek an inheritance other than God had provided, and doubtless their influence drew half of Manasseh. So two and a half tribes choose independently of God. Moses rebuked them, thinking (as appears from his words) that they would not help their brethren in the war with the Canaanites. But when they assured him of their willingness to go fully armed to the war with the other tribes, Moses was pacified, and gave them the land they wished for. Nay, more, Moses said that if they went armed over Jordan, then afterward "ye shall return and be guiltless before the Lord". Guiltless! So said Moses, but not the Lord. On the contrary, here in 1 Chron. 5:25 the divine record is, "And they transgressed". The words of Moses convey no reproof for choosing possessions outside the promised land. But was not this their transgression? which the Holy Spirit emphatically marks. All Israel were transgressors; these are held up to view as having an evil prominence among transgressors. Even in the records of the returned captives who had themselves been carried away to Babylon on account of their own transgression, these two and a half tribes are called transgressors. "And they transgressed" points to their great sin in choosing for themselves when God had chosen for them. If these words refer only to the following: "went a whoring after the gods of the people of the land", they were not worse in this than all the other tribes. But they are prominent here as despisers of God's gift, for evidently they thought they had chosen a better land than that which the Lord had chosen for them. Yet though they so transgressed, they are not omitted in this genealogy, for they are sons of Israel, a part of the chosen nation. But, because of this sin, only brief mention is made of them. God did not forget them while He noted their sin. He helped them in their wars because they trusted in Him. They cried to Him in their need, a sort of faith in God; but where was their obedience? where His honour?

"Two things common in this world induced these tribes to make this choice, and this motion upon it, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life. The land was pleasant to the eye, and it was good for pasturage Too many seek their own things, and not the things of the public good, or of Christ, and so take up short of the heavenly Canaan. Their choice implied: 1. A contempt of the land of promise. 2. A distrust of the power of God. 3. A neglect of the interests of their brethren. 4. An undue consulting of their own convenience and wealth. … It is observable that as these tribes were now first placed, before the other tribes, so long afterward they were displaced before the other tribes."

God's purpose for Israel was to have His people surrounding Him in the land of promise, His tabernacle being in the midst of them with His glory in the holiest. The thought of the presence of God in the midst of His people was not uppermost in the minds of the tribe of Reuben and the children of Gad, for their minds were on the "very great multitude of cattle" that they possessed, and they desired to remain on the east side of the Jordan, separated from their brethren who had the God of Israel in their midst. Though angry with them, Moses allowed these two tribes, and the half tribe of Manasseh with them, to dwell on the wilderness side of Jordan, provided that the warriors among the two and a half tribes would, as they had proposed, go armed before the children of Israel until they had inherited their portion in the land (Num. 32:1-32).

After Saul's brethren, the Gadites are the next mentioned. The Gadites, it will be remembered, had received their inheritance (together with the Reubenites and half the tribe of Manasseh) on the other side of the Jordan. They had chosen what suited themselves and their flocks (Numbers 32), instead of the land flowing with milk and honey, a land on which the eyes of the Lord their God were resting always, from the beginning of the year unto the end of the year. They had thus sunk far below the height of their calling, and on this very account it is all the more remarkable to notice that God was still working in power in their midst. The very terms by which this company is described reveal the mighty effects of grace, according to the truth of the dispensation under which they lived. They were "men of might," who "separated themselves unto David into the hold to the wilderness," "men of war fit for the battle, that could handle shield and buckler, whose faces were like the faces of lions, and were as swift as the roes upon the mountains" (v. 8). Such were the men of this tribe, who were drawn to the man after God's own heart, men who were strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might, and thus qualified for conflict with the enemies of the Lord's anointed. For David's sake they had abandoned home and everything, and were ready to endure hardness, as good soldiers of the host of God.* It is of these that the record is given, that, like Joshua and Israel of old (Joshua 3:15), they went over Jordan when it had overflown all its banks, and were victorious over all the power of the enemy.

Gad (vv. 11-17) has greater spiritual distinction than Reuben. Like the latter, he also sought pasture land (v. 16), but he had still other interests. It is said of him: “All these were reckoned by genealogy in the days of Jotham king of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam king of Israel” (v. 17). Gad had a true concern about his genealogy. Even though the result of his zeal was annulled by his being carried away captive, at least until Jotham and Jeroboam's day his position in Israel was clear and well established, showing his sincere desire to be part of God's people and, notwithstanding all, not to deny Judah, under Jotham the centre of the kingship.

Gad was the first son of Zilpah, Leah's maid. His name means "a troop," and this name is used in the prophecy that the troop (armies of enemy nations) would trample Gad (representing Israel) underfoot, as will be fulfilled in the tribulation period, but that Gad will in the end overcome the troop. God will give Israel the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Gad means "a troop," indicating a warrior character, which will be most evident in Israel when God restores them to their inheritance. God "enlarges Gad" (v.20) for it is those who take part in the good conflict of faith to possess their possessions who will in this way be enlarged. So Gad represents Israel in the conflict of gaining their inheritance, as a lion "dwells," not running away, but tearing the arm raised against him, and "the crown of his head," evidently the enemy's crown.

And now we have a notable lesson. Reuben and Gad having cattle, and looking upon the breadth of pasture-land in the countries which had now been taken, desire their inheritance to be given them in Gilead and Bashan, and not to go over Jordan with the rest. Rebuked by Moses for divorcing themselves from the common interest, they still press the request; only they offer to leave their children in the fortified cities on the east side, and that their men of war shall go over armed before all the rest to help the rest of the tribes to their possession, and not return from the war until they are settled in it. Moses then grants their request, and gives the land to them and half the tribe of Manasseh, (who, it seems, had already taken possession of Gilead,) on these terms.

(c) The third tribe here is GAD. Both from his name and history, Gad seems a warrior-tribe; though, as with the Arab now, they could unite the pastoral occupation with it. In Jacob's prophecy he is overcome before he overcomes, and thus knows how to turn defeat into a victory. In Leah's mouth his name is a prophecy of increase; and his seven sons all survive in families.

The names here do not, however, fall into ready sequence, and are some of them difficult also to interpret certainly; nor does the blessing of Gad by Moses do more apparently than confirm the character which we have already seen to belong to him. Connecting all together, and allowing its due emphasis to Jacob's original prophecy, it would seem that Gad represents the strength that is ministered when weakness and defeat have taught their lesson, — the divine strength thus found when our own has failed and broken down, — a practical power of resurrection, which suits well with the third place in which we find the tribe in this chapter.

Perhaps it was the same time that the Assyrian overthrew the kingdom of Israel under Hoshea. Be that as it may, their tribal history is summed up in three prominent facts: they refused God's land; they went after other gods; they were carried away by Assyria. The first inevitably led to the second, and then came judgment. If their captivity be at the same time and by the same power that executed the Lord's judgment upon Israel in Hoshea's reign, why is their end so early brought before us, their beginning and their end contained in a few verses? Of the other tribes we have the beginning, not the end so distinctly told. The answer is found in the words, "And they transgressed". They are dismissed seemingly before Levi is given, which had special charge of the temple, and to lead in the worship of God; as if being outside the promised land they had cut themselves off from the privileges of the temple and the protection of the presence of Jehovah in the midst of them. Sovereign grace will bring them back at the end, and Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh will stand in their lot with the other tribes, and in equal numbers (Rev. 7), at least symbolically.