GIDEON'S FLEECE
GIDEON’S FLEECE
My remarks, dear brethren, will be brief This passage came to me as I arrived here, being reminded of the timidity that is apt to mark those on whom God is pleased to place special responsibility.
This book affords other examples of this, but Gideon is outstanding, as one who was a successful leader in Israel, and yet marked, especially at the beginning, by timidity. He came under the notice of heaven, and evidently it was because he showed, on his own account, very definite instincts of care for the people of God. He was doing something that would serve the people. It was only in a small way, which indeed is applicable to the service of most of us. He was threshing wheat. We are told that, “an angel of Jehovah came and sat under the terebinth that was in Ophrah, that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite. And his son Gideon threshed wheat in the winepress, to secure it from the Midianites” (Judges 6: 11). You can readily observe that what he was doing would be relatively of small account — what one man could thresh in such a circumscribed area as a winepress. Nevertheless he was doing something that tended to undo the work of the enemy at the moment, for the Midianites were despoiling the people of food. Gideon was thus marked off as discerning what was current on the part of the enemy and meeting it as far as he could. It was said of one by the Lord, “What she could she has done” (Mark 14: 8). Such a one comes under the notice of heaven, and if one is to be used, it would be according to such uprightness and accuracy, therefore it behoves him to be subject, as another said, “Here am I; send me” (Isaiah 6: 8). It is thus that these features are provided for. It is said especially of one who ministers food to the saints, “Blessed is that bondman whom his lord on coming shall find doing thus; verily I say unto you, that he will set him over all that he has” (Luke 12: 43, 44). Such is the encouragement for those who serve according to the mind of God.
The passage says that an angel of Jehovah sat under the oak or “terebinth”. I suppose this would remind us of stability; meaning that all is held divinely. Then it is said, in verse 12, “And the Angel of Jehovah appeared to him, and said to him, Jehovah is with thee, thou mighty man of valour”. The angel is a representative of heaven, so the leader, or servant he addresses is to be viewed according to his words.
I make these remarks to preface what I have in mind. We know the story of Gideon; we should, at least. It is peculiarly instructive, rising, I might say, to a type of the service of God in Christianity. The chapter records one thing after another, tending to fortify this servant and qualify him for the great service he was to render; yet these verses I read indicate uncertainty and timidity in him. What has touched me, and what I think we all ought to take account of is, how these verses should enter into our prayers. There are those who say, Well, God will do the thing. Many of us speak about faith merely in a theoretic way, which only misleads. When faith speaks, it speaks with assurance. It is not in us as born, nor does it develop in us naturally. The Scripture says, “faith then is by a report, but the report by God’s word” (Romans 10: 17). It is very real; not mere theory. One ought to be able to give an account of the time when the report came into his soul and carried with it the idea of faith, enabling him to move on in a power that was not hitherto known. In the epistle to the Hebrews a whole chapter is devoted to what faith is and what it does. You may say, God will do what He wants [p. 396] to do. Yes, what is of God must go through; yet God sometimes repents. Let nobody quarrel with that word! That is to say, circumstances may lead Him to take up something else; to change His mind. We read in Genesis 6: 6, “Jehovah repented that he had made Man on the earth, and it grieved him in his heart”. Why should not God feel things? Why should He not act on His feelings? Faith understands that God can be affected, and that He will act accordingly. That is what Gideon had in his mind.
Gideon goes on to say, “behold, I put a fleece of wool on the threshing-floor; if dew shall be on the fleece only, and it be dry upon all the ground, then shall I know that thou wilt save Israel by my hand, as thou hast said”, verse 37. That is a remarkable thing — a fleece of wool and the dew on it; it is a very small area as compared with “all the ground”. Let us not be afraid of that. Although so insignificant, yet it had the dew, and no other part had it. That is in answer to Gideon’s prayer. The Lord says, “If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say to this mountain, Be transported hence there, and it shall transport itself”, Matthew 17: 20. Scripture also says, “the prayer of faith shall heal the sick”, James 5: 15. You say, God heals him; but Scripture says it is the prayer of faith that heals the sick — an important matter; the power of prayer. So in these terrible times, we are to pray. Every man that has an upright heart is with God about current things.
We read of terrible things happening in a certain place. Why is it? Maybe, there is little or no prayer there; that is, prayer that has power with God. Maybe, the place is barren, and the knowledge of God dead. Another place is under divine protection — eminently so. You say, It is to do with God. Well, “the fervent supplication of the righteous man has much power”, James 5: 16. God is “a living [p. 397] God who is preserver of all men, specially of those that believe”, 1 Timothy 4: 10. Remarkable things; things beyond human power happen among people who pray — the prayer of faith has power; and that is, dear brethren, the one thing I have in mind to impress on every one, the importance of prayer. There is not enough time spent in prayer; not anywhere nearly enough. We are to “pray without ceasing”, and especially in this awful pressure. “Ye that put Jehovah in remembrance, keep not silence, and give him no rest, till he establish, and till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth”, Isaiah 62: 6, 7. The Spirit of God is pleased to write that down for us. If there is a great emergency involved, distances involved, interference with the testimony, pray with prayer as Elijah did; the heavens are not brass to the saints; the voice goes up; and the answer comes. Gideon prays that there may be dew on the fleece only, and it be dry upon all the ground. No doubt it is Israel that is in mind here; the dew there and none elsewhere, and it was just a little bit of the earth. Israel was blessed when the rest of the world was not. Aaron was to bless Israel saying, “Jehovah bless thee, and keep thee; Jehovah make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee; Jehovah lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace”, Numbers 6: 24 - 26. The blessing of God is there.
Then Gideon goes on to say in verse 39, “Let not thine anger be hot against me, and I will speak but this once! Let me prove, I pray thee, but this once with the fleece; let it, I pray thee, be dry upon the fleece only, and upon all the ground let there be dew. And God did so that night, and it was dry upon the fleece only, but on all the ground there was dew”. What a night that was for Gideon! In its application to us, the blessing of God has moved out from Israel to the nations, as Paul says, “that [p. 398] the blessing of Abraham might come to the nations in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith”, Galatians 3: 14). It is here today, in this city. It is a question of God, and redemption in Christ in heaven. At the same time, this great matter involves prayer, for Christ says, “I will beg the Father, and he will give you another Comforter ... the Spirit of truth”, John 14: 16. So, dear brethren, let us pray and keep on praying. God is so gracious; He comes down to us and gives us to understand that He sees as we see, and He would do as we desire as we ask all in the name of the Lord Jesus for the glory of God.
When the Philistines came up against Israel in 1 Samuel 7, such was the day of brokenness and the confessed weakness of their position, that Samuel, instead of arming himself, ceased not to cry to the Lord for them. In keeping with the situation and their condition, he offers up “a sucking lamb” as a whole burnt-offering to the Lord. It was that which spoke of the preciousness of Christ to God. God was the Judge, and the action was in keeping with the condition which existed, corresponding to our day, when things should be carried out in that spirit of weakness, but standing aside and counting on God to act. “And the Lord heard him”.