Being a Leader

Being a leader, in any capacity, is not about me, my knowledge or what I have to offer. God doesn’t need any of that. If I have learned nothing else from reading God’s word, it’s that He doesn’t ever choose people based on their ability or knowledge. Or any of the other things that humans choose people based on. 

More than one of the people that God chose to use in the Old Testament protested His choice. Moses said he couldn’t speak well. Barak insisted that Deborah go with him. The list goes on.  

I love the story of Gideon. Gideon was an Israelite in the time of the Judges. God had led Barak and Deborah to victory and Israel experienced 40 years of peace. But they eventually stopped following God and God allowed the Midianites to cause them a lot of grief. For seven years they destroyed the Israelites crops. They didn’t even eat them...they just destroyed them. They didn’t want them for themselves, they just didn’t want the Israelites to have them. 

When the Israelites FINALLY called out to the Lord, he sent a prophet and he said, “I brought you out of Egypt, the land of slavery. I saved you from the Egyptians and from all those who were against you. I forced the Canaanites out of their land and gave it to you...Then I said to you, “I am the Lord your God. Live in the land of the Amorites but do not worship their gods.” But you did not obey me.” 

Have you ever judged the fickleness of the Israelites? I certainly have. I have thought that if I had seen the waters parted and if he had given me a land of my own, I would be sooo full of faith. But, God has done some pretty amazing things for me. And I still complain when something in my life doesn’t work out exactly like I would like it to. I cry out and ask God “why me?!” and I doubt His love for me. I doubt His goodness. And I get myself into a scrape, and then I cry out to him and expect Him to get me out of the jam I’m in as a result of my own sinful attitude and actions.

This is where Gideon enters. He is in his barn separating the wheat from the chaff...in the winepress. He was hiding from the Midianites. An angel of the Lord comes and sits under a tree and says, “The Lord is with you mighty warrior!” (keep in mind, WE know this was an angel but Gideon didn’t yet).

This scene makes me laugh! Gideon is a starving farmer. He was probably pretty skinny...and as unlike a mighty warrior as he could get. If he weren’t so beaten down and discouraged, I bet he would have laughed. But instead he says, “if God is with us, why are we having so much trouble? Where are the miracles our ancestors told us he did when the Lord brought them out of Egypt? But now he has left us and has handed us over to the Midianites.”

Gideon was a starving farmer God sent an angel to tell him to go and save the people of Israel. The angel told him that fighting the whole Midianite army would be like fighting one man. Before Gideon would go he asked God repeatedly for signs to reassure him that God had indeed told him to do this and that God would be with him. Every time God gave him the sign he asked for and Gideon led the Israelites in victory. 

God uses people. He sees things that I don’t see, even about myself. I think God uses the people that He uses so that when His task is accomplished, there is no doubt in anyone’s mind...even the person he used to do it...who actually did it. 

God also uses people that OTHER people don’t want to be used or don’t expect. Think about the first two kings of Israel. Saul was good looking, he was someone people looked up to...he was probably voted class president. But he had a lot of confidence in HIMSELF, he was prideful and didn’t wait for Lord. He went ahead and did things that were not his things to do. God left eventually left him. He ended his life consumed by jealousy. 

Now contrast that with David, the second king. When God rejected Saul, he sent Samuel to the house of Jesse to anoint the next king. Jesse brought his sons before Samuel and one by one God rejected them all as His anointed. At the end Samuel asked if Jesse had any more sons. Jesse sent for David. Jesse hadn’t even bothered to bring David in before this. He was so stinkin sure that David was NOT  the one who would be chosen that he didn’t even bother to give him as an option...even though Samuel had told him to bring all of His sons. David was overlooked by his father, rejected by his brothers, laughed at by a giant.

When Saul finally died, there were people who thought his son should be the king instead of David. It took 7 years and countless deaths as the result of battle before David was made king over all of Israel. People rejected the person that God had anointed in lieu of their own choice, and as a result people died! And God’s will was still accomplished.

God’s ways are higher than our ways and His thoughts are above our own. He doesn’t always use the people we think He should or the ones we would choose if the choice were ours. But you know what? His will is always done. 

I hope you go away from here filled with faith. Faith that if God has called you to something...that He is going to accomplish it, regardless of the reasons you think he shouldn’t. And faith that if God has called a different person than the one you would have chosen....that He knows what He is doing and He is going to work it out for your good.

If you are waiting for a specific leader to be leading before you go to share group...trust that God will use the person who IS leading to accomplish his will in your life. If you are waiting for a specific leader to be leading before you join a step study. Stop it. Trust that God is going to work through the people who ARE leading to accomplish his will in your life. Because He will. 

God’s will will be done. He will work. My only job is to show up and be a vessel. What He accomplishes is not to my credit. And what is not accomplished is not to my credit either.