You want me to do what?!

As I was reading Judges for class last week, I was reminded of a blog post I wrote a couple years ago for our Camp Machaceh blog. I thought it might be fun to repost my thoughts on Gideon’s 300 person army from May 2008. Aaron and I were gearing up for our second summer of Camp Machaceh, and seminary was still over a year away. Staff recruiting had been a difficult journey that year, as it has been most years. But God provided for our every need, though not always in the way we expected.

From May 28, 2008
Lately, Aaron has been calling our summer staff Gideon’s Army and for good reason. Back in the fall when we started planning for this summer, we thought we needed at least 10 counselors. “We can’t possibly run our program with less,” we thought. But here we are three and a half weeks until staff training starts, and we have half the number we thought we needed.

I can just imagine Gideon’s face when God told him “you have too many men for me to deliver Midian into [your] hands” (Judges 7:2). I imagine him thinking something along these lines: “Are you sure God? Have you seen the Midianite army? You want to reduce my army of thousands down to 300?!” (Find the whole story of Gideon in Judges 6-8.)

But God in His infinite love and wisdom had a plan for those 300 men. In Judges 7:2, God goes on to explain why He wants to reduce the army: “in order that Israel may not boast against Me that her own strength has saved her.”

Put another way: “Faith does not operate in the realm of the possible. There is no glory for God in that which is humanly possible. Faith begins where man’s power ends.” –George Muller

If God wants to use 5 counselors and Aaron and me to show His love to campers this summer, who am I to question Him? After all, He often uses a very small number of people to do very big things. (Gideon isn’t the only example. Read Judges. And the rest of the Bible for that matter.) While I still hope and pray that God will provide at least one more counselor, I can rest in the knowledge that His plan is perfect. I have faith that He will provide the staff we need to run three weeks of camp. And in the end, God gets all the glory because the only explanation for Camp Machaceh’s success is His provision.

Camp Machaceh Staff 2008
gideons-army-cm-2008

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