And Jehovah said to him, I will certainly be with thee; and thou shalt smite Midian as one man.
Gideon has just answered God's call by pointing to his poor clan and his own low place in it. The reply never argues with him: it promises God's own presence, and a whole army falling as if it were one man.
Gideon asked what he was supposed to fight with. God's answer names no weapon. It names His presence, and the victory follows from that. (Older translations read "Surely I will be with you"; the ESV has "But I will be with you.")
As with David in another fight of faith, there was no sword in Gideon's hand, nothing at all to go against the Midianites with. But what does that matter? "If God is for us, who can be against us?" He does not go out unarmed. "Surely I will be with you [and as a consequence of that], you shall strike the Midianites as one man."
The call stands whether Gideon feels ready or not.
The Lord allows Gideon no excuse. He has called Gideon and Gideon must obey. But He encourages Gideon by His Word.
The promise comes only after Gideon sees himself as nothing. That emptiness is not a delay in the story. It is the preparation.
He was now in the place where God's power could come upon and use him. The same was true of the apostle Paul. The thorn in the flesh searched his heart. It brought him face to face with his own complete powerlessness, and with his lack of any natural fitness for the Lord's service. Only then could the Lord say to him, "My grace is sufficient for you." Every servant of the Lord must learn this lesson sooner or later. There is nothing in ourselves, in our position, or in our circumstances that God can use. In a word, all our resources and strength lie outside ourselves, in Himself.
Commentators differ on how to read Gideon's protest. Dennett hears humility that fitted him for service. Ridout hears "humble pride" — a fault, though one word from God was enough to remove it.
Believing that all power belongs to God is not the same as seeing that power move on your behalf. Without the second, the first can crush a person.
There is a great difference between owning that all power belongs to God, and seeing that power act on our behalf. Often the first conviction only makes us feel our own powerlessness more. And unless we can rest on God acting for us and through us, that feeling will produce despondency. Gideon cannot see how a link can be formed between God and man, so that a man carries out God's power and will. So he pleads how small and unfit he is. To form this link in his soul, the Lord gives him a promise.
God's promise does not reduce the number of Midianites. It changes how faith counts them.
See with what grace God rebukes this bit of humble pride in Gideon. It clearly was not deep-seated: one word was enough to displace it. "Surely I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man." After all, the enemy is, for faith, but a single one. He is a whole army when he oppresses and terrifies. But the moment faith asserts itself, there is only one man, as when David met the giant.
If all the strength is God's, the size or ability of the person He sends stops mattering. That truth kills two opposite errors at once.
The humbler the instrument, the more we see the power of God. What difference does it make to the Almighty God whether His instrument is left-handed or right-handed — a man or a woman — a dwarf or a giant? The instrument is nothing. God is all in all... Let us remember these things, so that we may walk humbly and lean always and only on the mighty arm of the living God. This keeps the soul well balanced. It is free from self-confidence and the excitement of the flesh on one side, and from gloom and depression on the other. If we can do nothing, self-confidence is the height of presumption. If God can do everything, despondency is the height of folly.
- Emptied. Gideon's sense of being the least is not an obstacle God has to work around. It is the place where God's power can rest on a man, as it rested on Paul.
- Promised. God answers that emptiness with no argument and no weapon. He answers with Himself, and one word forms the link between His power and a weak man.
- Consequence. The victory hangs on the first half of the sentence. Because He is with Gideon, and only because of that, Midian falls.
- Shrunken. The moment faith stirs, a terrifying army counts as one man. David saw the same thing when he faced the giant.
- Balanced. We can do nothing, so self-confidence is presumption. God can do everything, so gloom is folly. His presence removes both.
And he said to him, If now I have found favour in thine eyes, shew me a sign that it is thou who talkest with me.
The Lord has just promised Gideon His presence and victory over Midian. Gideon's answer is to ask for proof that the speaker under the oak is who He says He is. So is this a weak believer's fear, or a real faith reaching out — and why does God give the sign instead of rebuking him?
Gideon asks for a sign after God has already given His word. One writer names both the weakness in that and the one thing Gideon truly wanted.
There is weakness here, no doubt; he should have had simple confidence and not needed a sign. Still, all he really cares for is having the Lord with him.
Another writer puts Gideon beside others who asked God to say more than He had already said.
Unbelief then draws its plea from the Lord. It assumes, as it were, that there was something unclear in the revelation God has just given. "If you are the Christ, tell us plainly." Gideon was in this frame of mind in Judges 6:17; and John the Baptist, in his measure, in Matthew 11:3.
One writer admits the weakness in Gideon's asking, then points to what came after it.
He asks for a sign, it is true; and the Lord answers. I am far from denying that there was weakness in Gideon's faith. Nor am I saying there was no drawback here, as with all the others we have looked at. But even allowing all this, we must admit what followed. After the Lord stooped in grace to his weakness, we find the power of God at work in his heart and in his ways.
Gideon also wants to bring the visitor a gift. One writer sees in that wish how much Gideon still had to learn about himself.
His faith was very weak, because he did not count on the goodness of God. He was humble, no doubt, but he looked at himself, and from what he was he decided what God must be to him. Even with his humility, there had not yet been true self-judgment. He wanted to offer something, to "bring forth his present" to the Lord (v. 18). He was not trying to do something great for God. He thought that all would be well if God accepted his gift.
The Lord's reply changes what the gift is. He tells Gideon to lay it on the rock.
We have already seen that Gideon wanted to offer something to the Lord, but He can accept nothing from man as such. "Take the flesh and the unleavened cakes," He said, "and lay them on this rock, and pour out the broth" (v. 20). The only offering God can accept is Christ. If He did not receive what Gideon offered Him, He accepted what represented Christ in it.
Another writer looks at what Gideon laid on the rock and at the fire that took it up. In that, he says, the sign itself becomes a picture of Christ.
All is put on the rock, another figure of Christ, and fire carries it all up to God. So we might say he brought nothing but Christ, whom God always accepts. What better sign could he, or we, want than that? Suppose we have nothing but Christ, His work and His person. Then God's acceptance of Him is our fullest assurance and pledge that we shall be "more than conquerors through him who loved us."
The sign leads to a discovery Gideon had not asked for. Seeing the angel face to face terrifies him, and God's reply settles him.
Gideon cried "alas!" and the Lord answered, "Peace; do not fear." Then he was ready to begin. The Lord had brought him face to face with the angel of God. There he learned that his family was poor in Manasseh and that he was the least in his father's house. He learned more than that: in himself he had no power at all, and all his resources must come from the living God.
Peace is not only relief for Gideon. Another writer counts it as part of what fits a person for service.
From the Lord he gets a further qualification for service: a soul at liberty, at peace before God... Everyone will understand that there can be no true or effective service for the Lord while the soul is taken up with its own condition. It must first be free and at home in God's presence.
- Word first. God had already promised His presence; the request for a sign came after the promise, not before it.
- Weakness met. God stooped to Gideon's weak faith instead of rebuking it. His power then worked in Gideon's heart and ways.
- Gift refused. God could not accept Gideon's gift from him as he was. He took only what represented Christ in it.
- Sign given. Fire from the rock burned up the offering. The answer was God's acceptance of Christ, not just a proof of who was speaking.
- Peace produced. The encounter ended in "peace, do not fear," and that freed soul — not the sign itself — was what made him ready to serve.