By Grace Sweeney.
The Lord called Gideon. While he was hiding from the Midianites threshing grain, of all places. An angel of the Lord appeared to him, and informed him he was supposed to save Israel.
I don’t know what my reaction to that would have been. I might have wondered if I was dreaming. I definitely would have been shocked– that isn’t news anyone expects to wake up to.
I hope that I would have responded differently than Gideon did, though.
Instead of listening to the angel, Gideon protested, arguing that he was the weakest man in Israel. In his mind, there was no way he could save Israel.
It’s clear that Gideon had very little confidence in himself. He’d probably been discouraged as the “least in his father’s house”. He might have been told he wasn’t good for much. He was also probably afraid of the Midianites and what people would think of him.
There was no way he could save Israel by himself.
He missed one very important piece of the equation, though.
The Lord was the one who called him. The Lord had given him gifts and was now telling him it was time to use those gifts. The Lord was the one who was going to help him fulfill this mission.
Do we ever find ourselves in Gideon’s position? Do we ever doubt our abilities and gifts?
It’s easy to do, especially in this world of social media where everyone else’s lives seem so much better, more productive, or more glittering than our own.
Every day, Satan tries to steal our confidence and hope by whispering lies. He tells us we don’t have what it takes. He agrees that other people are so much better. He tries to persuade us to be “humble” and not try to do anything very big or important, because if we thought we could, then we’d get prideful, and pride is sinful.
As with all of Satan’s lies, there’s only a small grain of truth in that.
Yes, haughty arrogance is sinful. But having pride in who you are and who the Lord’s made you is good. It’s misguided to diminish yourself when we should stand in who the Lord made you to be.
The most important thing to have confidence in, though, isn’t yourself. It’s the Lord.
He can do all things, even when we can’t do anything. He is all powerful, even when we’re powerless. He will complete every work He starts, even when it feels like we’re just going in circles.
We need to have confidence in Him and His faithfulness more than ourselves. We need to have confidence in who He has transformed us to be, rather than focusing on how we feel.
When Gideon put his trust and confidence in God, a mere 300 men was all it took to defeat the Midianites. When you consider the thousands of men in the Midianite army, that’s incredible.
Confidence is knowing that something will happen. When we set our confidence in the Lord rather than in ourselves or others, we accept that we can’t do everything and we surrender ourselves and our circumstances to the Creator. We trust that He will come through for us.
God is always there for His children. All we need to do is come to Him and ask, with confidence, for His loving help.
“Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” – Hebrews 4:16
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