This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

This is day five together of week two of our look through the book of Judges.
When Judges chapter seven, seeing the victory that God brought about in Gideon's
life, the victory that occurred even through his weakness, even using his
weakness. We started to look at that yesterday and we ended by offering our
weaknesses to God.

But I want you to see today God's process for using our weaknesses to bring him
glory. Because it's a process that once you understand it, you understand the
ways of God, how God works in the lives of his people. It's a process that you
see used all throughout the scriptures.

We see it here in Judges chapter seven, but you also see it, for instance, in
first Samuel 17, David and Goliath, first Samuel 17. 50. So David defeated the
Philistine with only a sling and a stone.

He hit him and killed him. He did not even have a sword in his hand. God worked
through his weakness.

You see it in the New Testament, how God works through what we don't seem to
have and he does miracles through it in the story of the feeding of the 5,000.
In John chapter six, verses nine and 11, they were looking for someone to help
with food and the disciples brought somebody to Jesus and beginning in verse
nine, they said, "Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small
fish, but how far will they go among so many? " Jesus then took the loaves and
he gave thanks and he distributed to those who were seated as much as they
wanted and he did the same with the fish.

God took the seemingly little that they had and he used it to feed everyone. And
in Judges seven, seven, as we saw yesterday, the Lord said to Gideon, "With
these 300 men, I will rescue you and I will give you victory over the
Midianites. Send all the others home.

" Now I want you to see this process, how God does this, because it's the same
process all throughout the scriptures. If you don't understand this process, you
will be constantly confused about what God is doing in your life. When God wants
to do something great through your life, here's how he gives you what you need.

The first step is going to absolutely blow your mind. Number one, God reduces
our resources. First step is God reduces our resource.

I don't like it that he does this, but this is how he does it. He lets us see
that we have to depend on him to do that great thing that we want to see done.
It could be financial resources that we see reduced or energy or emotion.

God reduces our resources. He often does this by just allowing you to become
aware of how little you've always had. They go out and they count the crowd, the
disciples with Jesus, and they find out there's just a boy with a few fish.

We have no resources. You see, God uses small beginnings. He used that small
beginning of one boy who was willing to offer five loaves and a few fish.

Why does he do this? Well, he tells us in the story of Gideon. We saw it
together yesterday.

He told them, "I don't want you to fight with the larger army because you'll
think it was you. " So he reduces our resources because he doesn't want us to
mistake who the power is from. He wants to do it.

He wants to do it in a way that lets the people see, the world see who he is.
Now, God doesn't want to do it without us. He does it through us, but he wants
us to recognize that the power is his, and so he our resources in order to
magnify his power and himself.

Not only does he do this, then he does a second thing to get us to where he
wants us to be. He reduces our resources. Then when God wants to do something
great through your life, the second thing he does is he magnifies our need.

Not only does he let you see how little you have, he lets you see how great the
need is. This is how big an army you have to fight. This is how many thousands
you have to feed.

This is how big Goliath is. He magnifies the need. Let me ask you a question.

Why doesn't God make our lives easier? Have you ever asked yourself that? Does
life have to be so hard?

Why doesn't God give us more than enough time? Why can't he give us just more
than enough money as followers of Jesus, or more than enough energy? It would
just make things easier.

Deep down, we all know the answer to that question. It's because we trust in
ourselves and not in him. I'd like to think that if God gave me all these
things, I would just trust in him even more.

But I've seen in my own life, and you've seen the same thing in your life, when
it seems like I have enough, I trust in me and not in him. And so God allows our
needs to be very evident. He magnifies the need so that I'll trust in him.

So God wants to do something great in your life. Step one, God reduces your
resources. Step two, God magnifies your need.

Step number three, when he wants to do something great, someone trusts God with
what little they have. So if God's going to do something great in your life,
step three is you trust God with what little you have. This is the principle of
obedience.

And whether it's David or Goliath or a little boy with his lunch, somebody
trusts God. What we want to do is wait for somebody who has enough to meet the
need to be the one who trusts God, and it'll never happen. It always starts, it
always starts with someone who trusts God with what little they have.

The people, the army with Gideon set aside their swords and spears in favor of
bugles and torches and clay jars. Why was Gideon's approach so effective?
Because it was based on obedience to the direction of God.

That's why change happened. Whenever we obey the direction of God in our life,
we see change happen. So somebody trusts God with what little they have, and
then step number four happens.

God uses the little we have to show how great he is. With the army and with
Gideon, we read yesterday, the entire army of Midian fought each other in panic,
and those who were not killed ran. Again, it was not brilliant military
strategy.

It was because God knew their hearts, and God used what little they offered to
him to show how great he is. Now, there's a cycle that I fall into, and I think
it's a common experience. I've talked to a lot of people who fall into the same
cycle.

You see, this cycle, the people of Israel fell into it again and again. I
recognize my need, and out of that, I depend on God, and out of that, God gives
me strength to meet that need. And then, because God gave me strength and I see
a victory, I start feeling strong, and I start to depend on myself again, like I
can meet all my own needs.

And when I start to depend on myself, I fall back into greater need, greater
need to depend on God, and into a place where all of a sudden I recognize
there's no victory in my life at all, and I've got to get back into the cycle of
depending on him. The encouragement in this story and all of these stories in
the scripture is don't wait until you're headed back down to depend on the Lord.
Back down into dependence on yourself.

Depend on him when you're at your best. When you're at your best, recognize it's
all because of the Lord. When you're at your worst, recognize it's all because
of the Lord.

There's something miraculous about being able to recognize the weaknesses that
you have in your life, being honest to God about your weaknesses. You see, my
strength tends to pull me away from God's strength because I depend on myself.
But my weakness draws me towards God's strength.

This is why Paul, one of the greatest servants of God, the Apostle Paul that
ever lived, gives us this model of being able to recognize his weaknesses. In 2
Corinthians 12, 9 and 10, Paul said that God had said to him, "My grace is
sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. " And so Paul
writes, "Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses so that
Christ's power may rest on me.

For when I am weak, then I am strong. " So what do you do with your weaknesses?
Well here in 2 Corinthians 12, Paul did two things.

I didn't read the first one for you, but the first one he did a few verses
earlier is he prayed that they would be removed. That's a good thing. It's okay
to pray that that physical weakness will be removed.

It's okay to pray that emotional weakness or that financial weakness or that
relational weakness will be removed. That's a good thing to pray that that will
happen. But God, in this instance, said, "No, I'm not going to remove it, Paul,
because I want to use even that weakness to show my greatness.

" So you pray that they would be removed. If they're removed, you praise God for
that. If they're not removed, you do the second thing that Paul did with his
weakness.

You boast in the weakness. You don't complain about it. You boast in it.

Now Paul says, "I'm boasting in it so that Christ's power may rest on me. I'm
boasting in the fact that I don't have it, so Jesus has to have it. " This is
very important this moment, that he boasted in his weakness.

It's an example of the fact that your weaknesses don't automatically become a
spiritual strength in your life. Of course they don't. You know a lot of people
who have weaknesses who are not spiritually strong, not seeing God use them.

No, it's this boasting. The word here means that you find joy in something. Not
that you have a pride in it, but that you find joy in it.

You can find joy in what God can do with your weaknesses in spite of your
weaknesses and even through your weaknesses. Again, remember those clay jars
that Gideon's army used to defeat the enemy. Remember that yesterday we talked
about the fact that God still shines his light out of clay jars, broken clay
jars.

Second Corinthians 4, 7 to 9 are the verses in the New Testament that talk about
that. These verses say, "But we have these treasures in jars of clay to show
that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We're hard-pressed
on every side, but not crushed.

We're perplexed, but not in despair. We're persecuted, but not abandoned. We are
struck down, but not destroyed.

" You want to do great things for God? You will face great weaknesses,
guaranteed. I like the first part, doing great things for God.

I don't like the second part, facing great weaknesses. But there comes this
honest moment of life recognizing we're human beings. Of course we have great
weaknesses.

Who am I fooling? I'm only fooling myself and most of the time I'm not even
fooling myself. So just be honest to God about your weaknesses and the fact that
he wants to use those places in your life where you don't have the resources to
do all that God's asking you to do to show himself great.

Because the fifth part of this process is that God works through us to
accomplish his will. When I present my weaknesses to him, he doesn't go work
through somebody else. He works through us, the very ones who are weak.

The bread was divided in the apostles' hands, the ones who thought there's not
enough here to feed anybody. The stone came out of David's sling. The 300 men of
Gideon's army broke the pots on their torches.

God worked through them. The lesson of Gideon's life, the man who we met hiding
in a wine press, who is used to defeat an entire army with 300 men, some horns,
torches, and clay pots. The lesson of Gideon's life is this.

I want to hide in my weaknesses, but God wants to use my weaknesses. You want to
hide in your weaknesses, but God wants to use your weaknesses. Let's pray it
again.

Let me just give you a moment between you and God to sort out what we've been
talking about. God, where am I hiding in a wine press, afraid of my weaknesses?
God, where do you want to use even my weaknesses?

Where do I need to step out in faith rather than hiding out from what you want
to do in my life? God, if we're going to be useful, it's not because we seem to
have all the resources that we feel like we have all the power that's needed. If
we're going to be useful, it's going to be because we're obeying you and
trusting in you, because you're the one who does the work.

We get to be involved in it, but you're the one working. And so we come to you
and pray that you help us to think in a new way, that you help us to think about
how you want to use us even when we're weak, even through our weaknesses. Thank
you, Jesus, that when we are weak, you are strong.

In your name we praise you. Amen. Well, join us next week.

We're going to start next week with some lessons on faith from Gideon on how to
survive a victory in your life. See you next week.