Then Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said, behold, I am laying a fleece of wool on the threshing floor. If there is dew on the fleece alone, and it is dry on all the ground, then I shall know that you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said.” And it was so. When he rose early next morning and squeezed the fleece, he wrung enough dew from the fleece to fill a bowl with water.
Judges 6:36-38
Gideon agreed to serve God but as he gets into what God has planned he begins to have doubts. He looks looks out on the plain of Jezreel and sees 135,00 armed Midianite and Amalekite soldiers preparing to attack Israel once again. Then he looks at his own army drawn from only 4 tribes. Not only do their numbers not compare favorably, 32,000 vs. 135,000, but Gideon’s soldiers are not toughened fighting soldiers. Like us, Gideon must have wondered, “God, are you really in this?”
Before we go any further, think about a believer doubting God. When the disciples did this with the Lord in the boat they thought was going to sink, He said they had little faith. That means that we as believers do to God what unbelievers do – we don’t believe what He says. The difference is once we are adopted into His family through faith in the death, burial, and resurrection of His Son, God invests in us to grow us to full maturity which means He strengthens our faith in Him. That is the situation we find here in Gideon’s story and, so often, in our own lives. We look at what God tells us to do and it looks very scary. Remember that God just performed miracles in Gideon’s life. He did a miracle to convince Gideon that He was God and should be obeyed in tearing down his father’s altar to Baal. Then God kept Gideon safe from the towns- people who wanted to kill him. Now when he is called to fight the Midianites. He looks for a miracle from God (maybe a huge army!). Instead what he sees he is a grossly outnumbered force that is not even the best of the best when it comes to military skills. Gideon does as we often do. He questions whether God really called him to do this. Maybe he misunderstood God, maybe it was his imagination. We have to give Gideon some credit. He wants to serve God he is just not sure if this task is from God.
As a result Gideon asks God for a sign. “Is this your will for me?” Again we have to stop and ask, how is this different from an atheist who tells God, “show me a sign and I will believe.”? Gideon knew that God existed. His problem was not if God was real, it was doubt that this action was really God’s direction and if his efforts would be blessed by God. We have to remind ourselves that this comes after he blows the trumpet to summon Israel. When he receives such a meager response he begins to doubt if this is God’s way.
Then Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said” Gideon’s introductory statement to God tells us the
state of his heart. Gideon looks at the way this effort is starting and how few people respond. Maybe this is not from God. (Little does he know that this is the biggest his army will ever be. In fact God is going to whittle it down so much that if Gideon walks by sight, he will flee.) But that is not Gideon’s concern now. He states very clearly what he wants to know and reviews what God told him previously. He is basically saying, God you told me I would be Your valiant warrior and would lead the people of Israel to overthrow the oppression of the Midianites. If that is true and You are going to achieve your purposes this way, I need to be sure because not many are responding. If I am doing this of my own effort it looks like a suicide mission. So Gideon asks God to confirm this way is truly God’s way.
What can we learn? We miss the point of this passage if we do not go back to the actual words of the Angel of the Lord to Gideon. He told him, “But I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man.” (Judges 6:16) God had already seen Gideon’s fear and had answered it. He would use Gideon to defeat the Midianites even if he was the only one fighting. Thus Gideon should have rejoiced. Instead of looking at how few men he had in comparison to the Midianites, he should be thankful for how many more men God had given him beyond the one God said He needed. Need to trust God? Focus on His actual words!