Throwing out your fleece

I hate making decisions.

I am not good at decision-making. I toss and turn the possibilities around in my mind until the last possible minute. If I could, I would hire someone to make all my decisions for me. Then I realized, I already have a professional decision maker...

"Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths." Proverbs 3:5-6

Yep, I can trust in the Lord and lean on Him to guide an direct me in ALL ways of life.

This is one set of verses that are memorized quite often and for good reason. We need the constant reminder to not trust our own understanding, we have a tendency to make a mess of things (or I know I do at least) and need the reminder to trust Him will all things. It can be be easily memorized but not always so easily put to practice.

When considering this idea of decision making I thought of the story of Gideon. God wanted him to lead the army against the Midianites and Gideon thought that was a little hard to believe at first. So what does he do? He wanted to double check and make sure it was really God's will before he led hundreds of men into battle.

"Behold, I will put a fleece of wool in the floor; and if the dew be on the fleece only, and it be dry upon all the earth beside, then shall I know that thou wilt save Israel by mine hand, as thou hast said. And it was so: for he rose up early on the morrow, and thrust the fleece together, and wringed the dew out of the fleece, a bowl full of water." - Judges 6:37-38

Pretty amazing, huh? Gideon, wanting to make sure God's direction was true, requested that God make the fleece wet over night an keep all the ground around it dry and the next morning, when Gideon woke up, that fleece was so soaked it filled a whole bowl full of water and the ground around it...bone dry!!

Well, it doesn't stop there.

"And Gideon said unto God, Let not thine anger be hot against me and I will speak but this once: let me prove, I pray thee, but this once with the fleece; let it now be dry only upon the fleece, and upon all the ground let there be dew. And God did so that night: for it was dry upon the fleece only, and there was dew on all the ground." Judges 6:39-40

I love how God proves His will to Gideon through this simple fleece and through Gideon's simple requests. He is always there, we can take all our cares and decisions to Him and He has every answer that we need. And if we question it, like Gideon, even twice...He is patient and long suffering and willing to prove His direction for us.

God's will isn't a mystery that we must figure out like a jigsaw puzzle, nor do we have to search for it like hidden treasure. God will guide and direct us, as long as we are willing to trust Him and ask Him. And just to make sure, we can always through out our fleece...just to make sure!