Judges 6:15 “And he said unto him, Oh my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? behold, my family is poor in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house.”

This verse is a guy called Gideon telling God why God cannot use him for salvation in Israel.

As Christians, we should want to be able to be used by God for the cause of Christ in this world! Don’t you? Wouldn’t you like to see people saved?

But who can God use for this purpose?

In Isaiah 6, the prophet Isaiah saw the glory of the Lord and responded to the call of God “Then said I, Here am I; send me.”

But while all of us “could” be used… most of us sadly live in such a way that we “cannot” be used.

God only uses sanctified vessels in his service, if there is no work of sanctification in your life that has been done by the Holy Spirit of God… you simply are of no use to God yet.

Yeah you may be saved… that’s not the issue here… but fact is, all the vessels in the Old Testament tabernacle system had to be sprinkled with blood and washed, cleansed, purified for service.

They simply could not be used if they had not been sanctified for use, they were unacceptable. Remember… God is still just as holy, holy, holy as Isaiah saw, even if everyone else’s standards have changed.

And Paul reinforced this idea to Timothy in his second epistle, because until the water and blood of Christ has covered and is in action in your life, God will not use you to bring glory to him… because you’d just be a liability to yourself and others.

The Bible says “it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful” and Paul wrote “I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry”

Personally, I’d hope God could use me in some way, but in reality, for many years, he’s only got VERY limited use out of me… and truthfully most of us will only ever attain to a fraction of what God could use us for if we were truly sold out to him.

… Are you happy with that?

I’ve recently found the story of Gideon (Judges 6) particularly encouraging when thinking about the question of “who can God use?”… Because it’s clear from scripture and life that God is unusual in who he chooses to do (and who actually does) his will.

For instance, just look at who Jesus called to be his apostles… they were hardly the “cream of the crop”! In fact, they were like Jacob’s spotted and speckled sheep… a truly motley crew!!… hardly world’s elite.

Why does God do this? Well, because often the only people God can find who will trust him and he them! to do what he says to do, are the nothings and the nobodies… hence “not many mighty, not many noble, are called”

And it was the same with Gideon. Gideon couldn’t see how God could use him because he saw that he was such a nothing “I am the least in my father’s house!”. But that’s EXACTLY the kind of person God will be with and use… and he said to Gideon “go in this thy might”.

Gideon was a “mighty man of valor” not because of any special skills, abilities, education and training he himself possessed… but because of the true living God he trusted in, who had promised to be with him in all he told him to do.

… and so who can God use? Well just like Gideon, it’s just some nobody somewhere sometime who is faithful to his word, who’s sufficiency for whatever service God calls them to rests entirely in the grace and power of God.

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