And the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him,
“The Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.” Judges 6:12
We now read the conversation between the Angel the Lord and Gideon. Over the next few verses the conversation will bounce back and forth between the two.
And the angel of the Lord appeared to him The word appeared is interesting. This gives the sense that Gideon did not see the Angel of the Lord so He makes Himself known to Gideon. Or we can read this that the Angel of the Lord was not there but suddenly appeared. There is another meaning of this Hebrew word. It can be translated “to face, gaze, look at, watch or inspect. If this is the sense we get the picture of the Angel of the Lord sitting under the Terebinth tree carefully gazing at and studying His servant and what He
is doing. This does not surprise us. We read in the book of the Revelation of the Lord walking among the candlesticks, His churches that represent him on this earth, carefully observing what each church is doing. We are told ” For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him”. Here we see the Lord doing exactly that with Gideon.
And said to him The Lord breaks the silence and initiates the conversation. Again this does not surprise us. “The Lord comes to seek and to save those who are lost” . He is also the one who calls people to serve Him. Our job is to willing follow and obey. What the Lord says to Gideon is startling.
The Lord is with you Remember Gideon is alone. He is hiding from the Midianites – he does not want to be found. Yet the first thing the
Lord tells him is that he is not alone. He tells him the God of all Israel is with Him This is the same promise God had given Joshua when he was installed as Israel’s new leader. “As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you.” (Joshua 1:5) Why is this important? If the God of Israel is with a person they need nothing else. There is no cause for fear. So the Lord makes an announcement designed to change Gideon’s life. This is an important promise to us in these lawless days we live in. God wants us to know He never changes and just as He was with Moses, Joshua and Gideon, He is with us. Despite the terror the world throws at believers there is no reason to fear. O mighty man of valor. The Lord’s second phrase is as shocking as the first. He uses two words that do not seem to be fitting for a man hiding in a winepress. First he calls Gideon mighty. The word means mighty, strong or warrior. This word is used to describe the giants that roamed the earth in Genesis 6. Then the Lord says Gideon is a man of valor. It is used to describe a soldier, a member of an army who is under authority. The word also refers to an elite and highly capable, brave soldier. Gideon would say he did not fit either of those characteristics but God said otherwise.
We know the Lord always tells the truth so how do these descriptions fit Gideon as he hides from the Midianites? This gives us an insight into how God views us. The Lord sees Gideon hiding in the winepress but more importantly He sees what God has designed him to be. God
“foreknows” what He has designed us to be as well. Romans 8:29 states “For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be
conformed to the image of his Son”. God knows what He has designed us to be in character and in service for Him. When the Lord
called Peter and Andrew He said “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men”. God sees us for what He designed us to be.
What can we learn? In one sentence the Lord gives us the essence of following Him. We are to follow Him to become what He created us to be. It might be something we never thought was possible, it might even intimidate us to think of doing that work. To do that the Lord gives us the secret of success in following Him. He is with us. He will go with us, He will strengthen us, He will give us the victory. All we have to do is walk with Him. That should be enough to cause us to
drop whatever we are doing and obey Him. (The disciples did.) That’s called faith. Unfortunately it wasn’t the first response of Gideon.