Thursday, February 20, 2014

God’s Job for an Underdog

When Gideon saw that he was the angel of the LORD, he said, "Alas, O Lord GOD! For now I have seen the angel of the LORD face to face." The LORD said to him, "Peace to you, do not fear; you shall not die." Judges 6:22-23

Our look at Gideon from Judges 6-7 provides insights into how God can take common men and do uncommon things.  He turns the natural into the supernatural and the mundane into the divine. 

Thomas Wheeler, Chief Executive Officer of the Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company tells a good story on himself. He says that while he and his wife were out driving he noticed they were low on gas. So he pulled off at the first exit and came to this dumpy little gas station with one pump. There was only one man working the place, so he asked the man to fill it up while he checked the oil. He added a quart of oil, closed the hood, and he saw his wife talking and smiling at the gas station attendant. When they saw him looking at them, the station attendant walked away and pretended as if nothing had happened. Wheeler paid the man and he and his wife pulled out of that seedy little station. As they drove down the road, he asked his wife if she knew the attendant. Well, she admitted she did know him. In fact, she had known him very well. For it seems that they not only had gone to high school together, but they dated seriously for about a year. Well, Wheeler couldn‘t help bragging a little and said, "Boy were you lucky I came along. Because if you‘d married him you‘d be the wife of a gas station attendant instead of the wife of a Chief Executive Officer." His wife replied, "My dear, if I had married him, he‘d be the Chief Executive Officer and you‘d be the gas station attendant."

We are not just who we are but who God makes us to be.  Consider how you might feel if, in the daily routine of your work, an angel appeared and confronted you as he did Gideon.  Your first response would probably be, “You have the wrong person!”  When Gideon realized that it was the angel of the LORD, he exclaimed, "Alas, O Lord GOD! For now I have seen the angel of the LORD face to face." Judges 6:22  Gideon was convinced that it was the LORD giving the command.  He was also convinced he would die because he had looked upon the face of the angel of the LORD.  

The Lord is awesome, mighty, wonderfully great, and above of all of those word descriptions, He is Holy.  Fear is the natural response of anyone when meeting with holiness.  Why, because we are not holy, we are sin-filled disobedient human beings and deep down we know it.  There is a great awe that comes with holiness and recognition that we are “other than” this holy one.  That is what the word “holy” means.

The LORD said to him, "Peace to you, do not fear; you shall not die." Judges 6:23
Thankfully, the Lord responds with a phrase that is very common in scripture when someone comes into contact with the Lord God or His messengers.  This assurance of the Lord’s peace, grace, and mercy are met with worship as Gideon builds an altar to God in the middle of a pagan land.  Now the Lord gives Gideon his first task to accomplish.  It is the beginning of a long list of accomplishments which God will do through this man named Gideon.

While we honor the many men and women who God has used through the years it is important to remember that they are no more than mortal men infused with the purpose and power of God.  That leaves the door wide open for us to be used for His purposes.  Are you God’s next Gideon?

Scripture to Claim:
But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God. 1 Corinthians 1:27-29

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