When You Feel Like the Least

The angel appeared to Gideon while he was hiding in a winepress threshing wheat — a task done at a threshing floor in the open, done in secret because he was afraid of the Midianites. And the angel's greeting was: The Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.

Mighty man of valor. Hiding in a hole in the ground.

Gideon's response was entirely reasonable: If the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? And then: I am the least in my father's house.

God's response to the second objection was not an argument. It was a commission: Go in this might of yours. The might of the man who is hiding. The strength of the one who feels least. I will be with you.

This is the pattern. Moses, slow of speech, sent to speak for a nation. Jeremiah, too young, appointed prophet to the nations. Mary, unknown girl from a forgotten town, chosen to carry the Son of God. The pattern is not what we bring. The pattern is what God does with what we bring, which is often very little.

If you feel like the least — least qualified, least prepared, least capable — you are in excellent company. And the commission God has for the least is still a commission. The question is not whether you are sufficient. The question is whether He is.