THE COMBAT MANUAL

Fleeces

How to Test God’s Will When You Cannot Hear Him Directly

Taught by John Lenhart  |  flowcess.com

READING ASSIGNMENT This lesson is a companion to the upcoming material on hearing from God through your specific uniqueness — covered in Chapters 7 through 10 of Modeling God Book Two, Part Two. Read those chapters in preparation for next month. This lesson covers fleeces as an accessible alternative when direct hearing is not yet developed or when you want additional confirmation.

What a Fleece Is — and What It Is Not

The word fleece has become part of Christian vocabulary without most people having a clear working definition of what it actually is or the specific rules that make it valid. The result is that a lot of what people call fleeces are not fleeces at all — they are decisions they have already made and are asking God to endorse, or they are events they are calling signs after the fact because the outcome matched what they wanted.

A genuine fleece is something specific: you are asking God to confirm His will through an event completely outside your control, which you have defined in advance, with your heart genuinely open to either outcome.

The name comes from Judges chapter 6, where Gideon does exactly this — and does it twice, contrastively, to eliminate any possibility of coincidence. But the principle appears throughout Scripture well before and after Gideon. It is one of the most practical tools available for knowing God’s will in a specific situation, and it is particularly useful when you are not yet at the point of hearing from God directly through the council meeting process.

A fleece is not asking God to confirm what you already want. It is asking God to show you what He wants — and meaning it either way.

The Biblical Foundation: Gideon

The passage where we get the name is in Judges chapter 6. God had told Gideon that He was going to save Israel through Gideon’s hand. Gideon’s response was not arrogant confidence — it was genuine uncertainty. He had heard something he thought was from God. He wanted to be sure. So he set a sign.

So Gideon said to God, “If You will save Israel by my hand as You have said — 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.” 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. — Judges 6:36-38 (NKJV)

Notice the structure. Gideon was not doubting God out of faithlessness. He was doing what any rational person does when they want to verify that what they heard is genuinely from the source they believe it came from. He stated the sign in advance. He chose something completely outside his control — he cannot make dew appear selectively on wool. He defined exactly what the outcome would mean. And God honored it.

But Gideon did not stop there. He ran a second fleece — this time in the opposite direction — specifically to eliminate any natural explanation for the first result.

Then Gideon said to God, “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.” And God did so that night. It was dry on the fleece only, but there was dew on all the ground. — Judges 6:39-40 (NKJV)

Someone could reasonably argue that wool always absorbs moisture — that the first result was natural and not a sign at all. Gideon thought of that. So he asked for the reverse: dry fleece, wet ground. The only way to get both results is divine intervention. And God delivered both.

This contrastive approach mirrors what Jesus does in Gethsemane — praying ‘if there is any other way, let this pass from Me.’ He is not expressing doubt. He is praying honestly and exhaustively, covering the question from both directions. A genuinely contrastive fleece carries the same logic: if God can arrange it both ways when you ask, you know it was not coincidence or natural variation.

THE CONTRASTIVE FLEECE Running a single fleece leaves open the possibility of coincidence. Running a contrastive fleece — asking God to produce the opposite outcome to confirm the first — eliminates it. If you ask for wet fleece and get it, a skeptic can say the wool was going to absorb moisture anyway. If you then ask for dry fleece and the ground is wet, no natural explanation covers both results. Gideon understood this. It is worth considering whether your most important fleeces should be run twice, in opposite directions, before you act on them.

A Battlefield Example: Jonathan in 1 Samuel 14

Fleeces are not limited to personal decisions. Jonathan uses one in a battlefield context — and the directness of his method is worth studying. He is deciding whether to attack a Philistine garrison. Rather than agonizing over the decision or waiting for a council meeting, he sets a specific sign and commits to acting on it.

“If they say to us, ‘Wait until we come to you,’ then we will stand still in our place and not go up to them. But if they say, ‘Come up to us,’ then we will go up. For the LORD has delivered them into our hand, and this will be a sign to us.” So both of them showed themselves to the garrison of the Philistines. And the Philistines said, “Come up to us, and we will show you something.” Jonathan said to his armor-bearer, “Come up after me, for the LORD has delivered them into the hand of Israel.” — 1 Samuel 14:9-12 (NKJV)

Jonathan did not know what the Philistines would say. He could not control it. He stated in advance what each possible response would mean. And when the sign was fulfilled, he acted immediately and decisively — Jonathan and his armor-bearer killed about twenty men in a half-acre area. The fleece produced clarity, and clarity produced action.

Notice also what he did before approaching the garrison. He and his armor-bearer showed themselves — they stepped forward, they made themselves visible, they did their part. They did not sit and wait for the Philistines to come find them. They handled their responsibility and gave God the space to work on the part only He could control: what the Philistines would say.

The Five Requirements of a Valid Fleece

Not every prayer for a sign is a genuine fleece. These five requirements define what makes a fleece valid — and distinguish it from wishful thinking dressed in spiritual language.

#	REQUIREMENT	WHAT IT MEANS IN PRACTICE
1	You must genuinely want God’s will — not just confirmation of what you already want	Before setting a fleece, ask yourself honestly: if God answers the opposite of what I want, am I actually open to that? If not, you are not setting a fleece — you are asking God to endorse your decision. The first step is getting your brain to a genuine ‘either way’ position. One way to do this: imagine the outcome you want — and then imagine something going wrong because of it. Wouldn’t you have wanted to know?
2	The sign must be completely outside your control	This is the most important requirement. If you can make the sign happen yourself, it proves nothing. Gideon could not make dew appear only on wool or only on the ground. Jonathan could not control what the Philistines would say. The sign has to be something only God can arrange. If you sent 600 resumes and got the job — that was you. If someone walked up and asked for your resume without you doing anything — that is worth paying attention to.
3	State the sign in advance — before it happens	The fleece must be declared before the outcome is known. If you decide after the fact that an event was your sign, that is not a fleece — that is pattern-matching in reverse. The whole point is that you stake the interpretation before you see the result, so there is no room for reinterpretation based on what you wanted to happen.
4	Consider a contrastive fleece to eliminate coincidence	Gideon ran his fleece twice — first with the wool wet and the ground dry, then the opposite. Jesus prayed contrastively in the garden: ‘If there is any other way, let this pass.’ The contrastive fleece removes the possibility that the result was random or natural. If God can do it both ways when you ask, you know it was not chance.
5	Keep working on your responsibilities while you wait	Setting a fleece is not permission to become passive. If you are asking God about a new job, set the fleece — and then get your resume ready. Get your budget in order. Do the things that are your responsibility. God is not going to send someone to ask for your resume if you do not have one. Handle the hurdles. Give God the space to move on His part while you cover yours.

THE RESUME TEST

The simplest diagnostic for whether something was a genuine sign is what I call the resume test. When someone comes to me and says, ‘I just got a new job and I think God blessed me with it’ — the first thing I ask is how they got it. If the answer is that they sent out 600 resumes, applied to 40 companies, and went through six rounds of interviews — that sounds like they got the job. Their effort, their skills, their network.

If the answer is that someone walked up to them and asked if they knew anyone who wanted this position, and it matched everything they had been thinking about — that is something worth paying attention to. Not because effort-based outcomes cannot be from God. But a fleece, by definition, requires something outside your control. The sign has to be something you could not have produced yourself.

Using Fleeces for a Decision You Are Facing

When you are trying to discern God’s will for a specific situation, there are two questions that help frame the fleece correctly. You ask both — not just the one that corresponds to the outcome you want.

QUESTION 1 — If God wanted you to CHANGE your situation…	QUESTION 2 — If God wanted you to STAY in your situation…
Ask: What would be the proof — something completely outside my control — that God wants me to move?	Ask: What would be the reason — something I could not manufacture — that God wants me to stay and improve what I have?
Example: “God, if you want me to leave this job, have someone approach me with an offer — I don’t go looking for it.”	Example: “God, if you want me to stay, show me a clear path to what needs to improve — have the right conversation come to me.”
While you wait: get your resume ready. Update your portfolio. Do everything that is your responsibility to prepare — the hurdles.	While you wait: continue working on the relationship, the job, the situation. Don’t be passive. Handle what is in front of you.
Key: if you applied for 600 jobs and got hired, that was probably you. If someone walked up and offered you something you weren’t pursuing — pay attention to that.	Key: you are not waiting to feel better about the situation. You are waiting for something to happen that only God could arrange.

The reason to ask both questions is the same reason Gideon ran his fleece twice: you are genuinely trying to know the truth, not confirm a preference. If you only ask ‘what would prove God wants me to leave’ — and never ask ‘what would prove God wants me to stay’ — you have already decided. A genuine fleece holds both possibilities open and is willing to receive either answer.

John and his wife used a fleece to discern whether to take a job in Florida. They did not just pray about it, apply for it, and assume the outcome was God’s confirmation. They set a specific sign — something outside their control — stated what it would mean if it happened, and waited. It happened. That is how they arrived in Florida. The fleece was the decision-making tool. The answer came from outside themselves.

Using Fleeces with Other People

Fleeces are not only a personal discernment tool. They can also be a powerful instrument for helping someone else who is resistant to God’s direction — someone who knows what they should do but is not doing it, or someone who is waiting to be convinced that God is genuinely speaking to their situation.

QUESTION ONE: HOW BAD DOES IT HAVE TO GET?

When someone is avoiding a decision or a direction they know is right, I ask them directly: how bad does it have to get before you act on this? What would have to happen before you would say, okay, this is clearly God showing me I need to change?

Most people resist naming a specific answer to that question. They prefer vagueness — it keeps the threshold moveable. So I help them by offering options. Does it have to be a car accident? A health crisis? A lost relationship? A financial collapse? The moment I name something dramatic, they typically say ‘no, not that’ — which means the threshold is lower than that. Then I work downward. Eventually they name something. And that thing becomes the fleece.

We did this with a woman who was resistant to following God. She could not name what it would take. So I said: I guess you’re going to have to get in a car crash. She visibly reacted — no, not that. We kept working downward until she named something milder. About a week later, she had a one-car crash in an empty parking lot during a snowstorm. She hit the base of a light pole. Nobody was hurt, but the car was damaged. She came back and said she thought that was it. It was. She knew before I said anything.

The specificity matters. A vague threshold can always be reinterpreted. A named threshold — one the person stated in advance — cannot be moved after the fact without them knowing they moved it.

QUESTION TWO: WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO CONVINCE YOU?

When someone has already experienced something they suspect is God speaking to them but is resisting accepting it, I ask: what will it take to convince you that was God? What would have to happen that would make you say — yes, that was Him?

Again, people often do not answer spontaneously. They do not want to name something that might actually happen — because then they would have to follow through. So I offer suggestions. They reject the ones they think are too high a bar, and in rejecting them, they are implicitly naming what the lower bar is. Keep narrowing. Eventually they name it. And now they have set their own fleece.

Nobody picks something in their control. When you ask people what it would take to convince them, they always land on something outside themselves. Something that could only happen if God arranged it. That is the structure of a genuine fleece, and people arrive at it instinctively when you push them to be specific.

A fleece stated by someone else on your behalf — with your agreement — is still a fleece. You do not have to be the one who thought of it. You have to be the one who agrees it is the test.

Fleeces and Direct Hearing — How They Relate

The ideal is direct two-way communication with God — the council meeting framework we covered in the War Journal, where you enter God’s presence, bring your question, and receive a causeless answer that did not originate in your own reasoning. That is the gold standard. It is what next month’s Combat Manual lesson is about in depth.

Fleeces are not a lesser or lesser-faith version of that. They are a different tool for a different circumstance. Some people are early in the process of developing that direct hearing. Some situations warrant additional confirmation even for people who hear from God regularly. John and his wife still use fleeces — not because they cannot hear from God, but because fleeces provide an additional layer of certainty for significant decisions where the stakes justify the extra confirmation.

The two work well together. You may hear something in a council meeting that you want to verify. Set a fleece. Make it contrastive if the decision is major. Handle your responsibilities — the hurdles — while you wait. And when the sign comes, act on it with the confidence of someone who has done the due diligence that a genuine discernment process requires.

⚔  SET YOUR FLEECE Identify a decision you are currently trying to make or a situation you need God’s direction on. Write your answers to both questions: (1) If God wants me to change or move — what would be the sign, completely outside my control, that I would accept as His answer? (2) If God wants me to stay and improve — what would be the sign? State both clearly, in writing, before anything happens. Then list the hurdles — your responsibilities while you wait. What do you need to prepare, handle, or have ready? _______________________________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________________________

⚔  THE CONTRASTIVE TEST For your most significant fleece — the decision that carries the most weight — consider running it contrastively. After you have stated the first sign, write a second: what would the opposite look like? What would God have to do to confirm it both ways? Write both conditions before any outcome is known. This eliminates coincidence as an explanation and gives you the kind of certainty Gideon had before he went to battle. _______________________________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________________________

Next month: hearing from God through who you specifically are — Chapters 7 through 10 of Modeling God Book Two, Part Two.

Modeling God by John Lenhart  |  flowcess.com