Judges 7:2 And the LORD said unto Gideon, The people that are with thee are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hands, lest Israel vaunt themselves against me, saying, Mine own hand hath saved me.
Big or Small
Judges 7 is the story of God using Gideon, a humble man from a humble family, to give victory to God’s people, Israel, over the oppressors of Midian. Now, you may recall that Gideon had a large force of men, and God cut that number down to just 300.
In Judges 7:2 it says, “The LORD said unto Gideon, The people that are with thee are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hands, lest Israel vaunt themselves against me, saying, Mine own hand hath saved me.” God wanted Israel to know that they did not win a victory on their own, God gave it to them.
How many men would Gideon have wished to take against the Midianites? Gideon probably would have liked a number at least equal to and maybe much greater than the Midianites, yet God cut the numbers down.
How many soldiers did Midian guess were coming up against them when Israel attacked in the middle of the night? Remember, God had given Gideon an odd plan. Each man was to have a trumpet and a torch covered by a pitcher. At the signal they were to break the pitchers, releasing the light, and blow on their trumpets, yelling, “The sword of the LORD and of Gideon.” I am guessing that in the all the chaos, if it was one trumpet to a division, the disoriented Midianite soldiers would have guessed that this was a huge force they were up against.
Whom did Midian fight that night and for whom did Midian fight that night? The Bible tells us that God set every man’s sword against his fellow. The Midianites turned on one another. God turned their own strength against them.
In all this there is an important lesson: you can be too big for God to use, but you can’t be too small. In Midian’s case, they were so big that they were actually a detriment to themselves because God turned their own power against them.
Friend, there may be things that you can’t do, but there is nothing today that you can’t do that God can’t do. God will deliver as we are obedient. God is simply looking for someone who is humble, not someone who is high. You can be too big for God to use, but you can never be too small.