Of Fleeces and Faith

It used to seem easier to dismiss Gideon as a prime example of a man God used in spite of his weak faith; not because of his weak faith.  I can still hear my voice in my brain’s audio archive preaching Gideon as an example to avoid instead of an example to follow—as one who had been given such rare, direct revelation but who, regrettably, still had to ask twice(!) in the middle of marching for divine reassurance.  Add twenty years and some level of maturity to the mix and I’m not so sure anymore that Gideon is someone I should so easily discount.  Actually, quite the contrary—Gideon instead of being an embarrassment should be emulated in the faith department.  I mean, if we were in a foxhole together, I think I’d have Gideon on my “short list” of brothers I’d ask to watch my back when taking enemy fire.

Is faith large enough to include knocking knees?  I believe it is, if we separate faith from confidence.  Gideon’s object of faith—God—never vacillated.  Gideon’s confidence—his subjective application of faith to his own situation—vacillated regularly.  Did he personally understand God’s promise properly even while marching toward the enemy with his famously small company of soldiers?  This is amazingly similar to my internal conversation with God throughout any given day.  “Did you really mean that you would ‘deliver Israel THROUGH ME’ (Judges 6:36,37)?”  I don’t think Gideon had any problems with God being able to deliver Israel or any question that God would indeed deliver Israel—but the sticking point each time includes Gideon’s participation in God’s providence.  “Me?”  And yes, I suppose there is still quite a lot in the text to suggest that Gideon was on shaky ground asking God for an additional sign of confirmation (compare Deuteronomy 6:16; Matthew 12:38; 1 Corinthians 1:22-23)—and rightly so.  But that aside, in these last twenty years I have had to enlarge my understanding of faith to include, instead of categorically exclude, a trembling obedience; a faith that is sometimes mixed with fear. 

Gideon’s fleeces serve as the focal point of his confidence; the fleeces which he put out as a direct appeal for reassurance.  “God if I am still in the correct understanding of Your will, then tonight please cause this fleece to be wet and yet not the ground around it … and vice versa the next night … please cause this fleece to be dry and yet not the ground around it.”  Did Gideon’s “test” indicate a lack of faith or a lack of confidence?  Can the two really be dissected from each other?  And is his experience normative for all experiences of faith/confidence there after?  These are serious questions.

As I have been cooking on Gideon’s story for a while, I have to say that it is remarkable from where he asks for extra divine assurance.  He asks for reaffirmation in the middle of the act of believing; in the middle of the journey to get to the enemy lines.  He has already demonstrated an active, bold and unprecedented faith-step in even getting to this middle-point.  Yet, in the middle, he has a panicky moment where he calls upon the Lord for reassurance.  The Lord, of course, does not have to comply; but He does comply and gives the reassurance that Gideon requests … twice.

In my braver moments, I want to be like Gideon to leave without all the details; to launch without the guarantee.  I want those inevitable times when fear “catches up” with my obedience not to be spoiled by the presence of fear but to be propelled by the presence of fear into a deeper dependence upon the Lord.  Without demanding God’s answer my pleas, I like the fact that God is tenderhearted enough with me not to scold me for a vacillating confidence, but instead He condescends to my low level of fragility and gives the encouragement I need.  “Yes, you are on the path of obedience.  Keep going.”  I crave that kind of confidence.  Yet I know that faith can be and still is legitimate even in those pockets of time where the confidence that sparked the journey of faith has vanished.

One of my fleeces with Uganda was my kids’ response to the idea of living overseas again.  “Lord, if the kids are excited, or even just not repulsed, by the idea of cross-cultural missions again (having had a very hard experience with it last time), then I will know that this is from You.”  God did not have to respond to my “fleece” either way; but He did.  He condescended to my low level of understanding and weak confidence to encourage me that I was, in fact, “hearing” the voice of the Lord rightly and leading the family by faith in and toward obedience.  The children responded (direct quotes—some of which were spoken without our breathing a word to them about Uganda): “I’ve always wanted to go to Africa” … “I’d like to see Lake Victoria someday” … “How can the nations hear about Jesus unless we go and tell them” … “My friend may be going to sip tea in England but I get to go hear lions roar in the wild” … “When can we leave?”

Our youngest, who was our only “hold-out” being the least positive toward the possibility of moving to and serving in Uganda because of her tight friendships at school and church, wrote this note and slid it under our bedroom door one night—“I want to go to Africa.”  I attribute this sentence to God who will even communicate to a very unsure man who vacillates in his confidence frequently through the jumbo-sized pencil of a five-year-old.  In the end, whether it is toward battle or toward Uganda, these times of tested faith are more about God’s willingness to reassure His weakest people than the ability of His weakest people to somehow find a way on their own to continue in their faith when panic blocks the road.