What concerns God the most (Judg 7:1-8)

When we are facing decisions or new situations, we take stock and ask, is what we have enough to achieve our purpose? Do we have the ability for that new job, the energy or vision for a new venture, the money to buy a new house, the courage to make changes in how we live? Often our fear is that what we have is not quite sufficient. God, on the other hand, has a very different perspective. His concern is not so much whether we realise our plans, but how that process shapes us. If we have too much, we will be tempted to take the credit. Pride and self-sufficiency are hard-wired into our sinful nature so when things come too easily to us, these qualities rise to the surface. It is often when our resources (physical, material, spiritual) are squeezed that we are driven to depend on the Lord.

This is the situation Gideon finds himself in. Having been reassured by God, he is ready to lead his men against the Midianites who camp at the northern end of the valley (Judg 7:1). If Gideon was taking stock, he would have had some reassurance that with the number of troops he had and God’s help, there was a chance of beating the enemy. Then comes the surprise. While Gideon may be wondering if he has enough, God is concerned that he has too much, so is told to send home all who are afraid and trembling (Judg 7:2-3). How did he feel as his army dwindled to just one third of what it was before? Worried? Anxious? Terrified? But then, ten thousand is still a reasonable force… Except that God is not happy with the equation of ‘a reasonable force + God’ when it comes to saving His people. You still have too many warriors, Gideon… (Judg 7:4).

The rationale for picking the three hundred men is confusing, not least because the Hebrew is unclear at this point. God’s command is to separate the men who lap the water with their tongue from those who kneel, but the corresponding result describes three hundred men who lapped by putting their hand to their mouth as opposed to the rest who knelt (Judg 7:5-6). It is hard to see how drinking with hand to mouth is equivalent to lapping like a dog and how it can be done without kneeling, so it is likely that the hand-to-mouth part was inserted in the wrong place when copying the text. The suggestion is that the selected group lapped like a dog and the ones sent home knelt and used their hands to drink. Why were the lappers chosen? Were they less alert because they trusted in the Lord or were they simply inadequate as fighters and God chose them to show His power? Given all the uncertainties, it seems better not to build speculative theories around the reason. What we can know for sure is that the numbers were dramatically reduced, and God told Gideon to accept His choice without giving him explanations (Judg 7:4).

Gideon’s story demonstrates to us some important lessons. God wants us to be people who trust in Him rather than our strength or resources and sometimes the only way to bring us to that point is to allow the odds to be stacked against us. Neither does the Lord spell out all that we would want to know about the how and why. Like Gideon, we are told enough to understand the key principle (to have faith in God) and we have to take the rest on trust. Finally, we may notice that this has been a recurring lesson in Gideon’s engagement with God and it is one that comes round in our lives too with some regularity. Like a muscle, trust constantly needs exercising for it to keep in shape.

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