Gideon

¹¹ Now the Angel of the Lord came and sat under the terebinth tree which was in Ophrah, which belonged to Joash ^(A)the Abiezrite, while his son ^(B)Gideon threshed wheat in the winepress, in order to hide it from the Midianites. ¹² And the ^(C)Angel of the Lord appeared to him, and said to him, “The Lord is ^(D)with you, you mighty man of valor!”

¹³ Gideon said to Him, “O ^[a]my lord, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And ^(E)where are all His miracles ^(F)which our fathers told us about, saying, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the Lord has ^(G)forsaken us and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites.”

¹⁴ Then the Lord turned to him and said, ^(H)“Go in this might of yours, and you shall save Israel from the hand of the Midianites. ^(I)Have I not sent you?”

¹⁵ So he said to Him, “O ^[b]my Lord, how can I save Israel? Indeed ^(J)my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house.”

¹⁶ And the Lord said to him, ^(K)“Surely I will be with you, and you shall ^[c]defeat the Midianites as one man.”

The Sign of the Fleece

³⁶ So Gideon said to God, “If You will save Israel by my hand as You have said— ^37 (A)look, I shall put a fleece of wool on the threshing floor; if there is dew on the fleece only, and it is dry on all the ground, then I shall know that You will save Israel by my hand, as You have said.” ³⁸ And it was so. When he rose early the next morning and squeezed the fleece together, he wrung the dew out of the fleece, a bowlful of water. ³⁹ Then Gideon said to God, ^(B)“Do not be angry with me, but let me speak just once more: Let me test, I pray, just once more with the fleece; let it now be dry only on the fleece, but on all the ground let there be dew.” ⁴⁰ And God did so that night. It was dry on the fleece only, but there was dew on all the ground.