We Are Warriors

Tuesday, August 18, 2020
Then the angel of the LORD came and sat under the oak that was in Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite as his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the wine press in order to save it from the Midianites. The angel of the LORD appeared to him and said to him, "The LORD is with you, O valiant warrior." Judges 6:11-12

Have you ever felt like you have missed something that God laid in your path – even as you stepped right over it? How blessed we are that we have a Heavenly Father that never gives up on us. He pursues, even chases, us even as we ignore the miracles and opportunities He puts right in front of us. We miss God two different ways. 

1. We miss Him because we are only looking for Him to answer our prayers and fix our problems the way we ask Him to.
2. We miss Him because He sometimes answers in the most basic and ordinary way, while we are looking for a grand production.

This past Sunday we heard about how God once again used an ordinary person for His extraordinary assignment.  He took an ordinary man, hiding away in a wine press, and empowered him up to be a valiant warrior.

The Extraordinary in the Midst of the Ordinary
As Gideon was hiding in the bottom of a wine press The angel of the LORD appeared to him and said to him, "The LORD is with you, O valiant warrior.".  In fact, verse 11 says the angel of the Lord came and sat under a tree while Gideon worked.  He saw Gideon before Gideon saw him.  He most likely looked like an ordinary man, no floating apparition, no sparkling, shimmering wings.  He was just ordinary, appealing to Gideon in an ordinary way.

Gideon was quietly working, never expecting to have company.  He was in the middle of an everyday, mundane task and yet, right there, in the midst of the monotony of his task, he was met by the angel of the Lord.  This is often the way God meets us.  We don’t catch it sometimes and may entirely miss a “God meeting” because we are not looking for God in an ordinary way, in the midst of our ordinary day.  We think we are going to have some grandiose experience.  If we are always looking for an extraordinary and magnificent event, we may miss out on many intimate moments with God.  The routine, mundane, commonplace events in our lives are where God waits for us to find Him. Ordinary is often the disguise of the divine.

“O Valiant Warrior”
Here is the really good part.  Here is Gideon hiding from the enemies, scared to death like the rest of his people and the angel of the Lord calls out to Gideon, O Valiant Warrior.  Gideon’s current position made the angel’s statement seem ironic and unbelievable.  To all of us, it may seem as though Gideon is a coward, but God had a different perspective of him.  His opinion of Gideon was not based on Gideon’s actions or current situation.  Gideon may have been scared and hiding, but God saw beyond that.  He saw something that Gideon didn’t even realize was in him.  

God’s view of us is so far beyond what we can grasp.  I cannot imagine what God must think of me when I am at my worst, hiding away in sin, shame, or fear. Yet that is exactly where He meets me. If we could see our value and worth through God’s eyes, we would discover that through Jesus Christ He has redeemed us and made us “valiant warriors”.  We have been made to be conquerors not cowards!  Romans 8:37 tells us No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.  It is His power in us that makes us valiant warriors and conquerors, giving us everything we will ever need for every assignment He gives us. Watch for the extraordinary in your ordinary and be on the lookout for the divine in disguise so you don’t miss Him while you look for something “magnificent.”