TUESDAY 18 January 2022 “Leadership Discord” Numbers 12:1-12

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Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends,

Around the world in recent years we’ve seen what I call “Leadership Discord”. In America and the UK, sadly, it’s what we’ve grown accustomed to for several decades as the opposing party from whoever is the President or Prime Minister, seem to make it their mission to rally opposition, especially in the Congress and Parliament. As a result, there is always great tension, even discord, among the senior leaders, and this often trickles down to breed discord among the people. In some other countries where leadership is more authoritarian opposition from the people is often met with police or military force, even to the point of leaders authorizing lethal force, and citizens dying in the streets.

Sadly, ‘leadership discord’ happens everyday in millions of homes as parents disagree and end up in divorce court, abandoning their responsibility to parent their children together. In fact, in every segment of society we can easily see ‘leadership discord’ and probably we have all been impacted by it several times in our personal lives. But what happens when ‘leadership discord’ rises up among the leaders of God’s people? Would you believe it happened with Moses? NO, it is not discord among the 70 leaders we saw God raise up to help Moses lead the more than 1 million Hebrews who were traveling together, following God’s cloud and Moses toward the Promised land. No, this time the ‘leadership discord’ was in Moses’ own family!!

Look with me at numbers 12:1 “Miriam and Aaron began to talk against Moses because of his Cushite wife… ‘Has the LORD spoken only through Moses?’ they asked. ‘Hasn’t God spoken also through us?’ And the LORD heard this. (Now Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth.) Now we do know Moses married Zipporah, one of Jethro’s daughters, after he fled from Egypt as the Pharaoh’s prince. (Ex. 2:15-22) Jethro is identified to us as a ‘priest of Midian‘ in Exodus 2. Is that who Miriam and Aaron are speaking of? I’m not sure it matters, really. The point is, Miriam and Aaron are grumbling and gossiping, and both of those spread discord among the people very quickly. Also, they were rebelling against God’s established order. Clearly God had met Moses at the burning bush and established Moses as the leader, through whom God would instruct and lead the people in learning to BE the people of God. Aaron, Moses’ older brother, had been selected by God to partner with Moses, and God assigned Aaron and his sons to be the spiritual leaders of the people. As priests they were to carry out the work of worship in the “Tent of Meeting”. They had been called to a high and holy privilege and it would be passed generationally to their sons and grandsons.

You’ll recall however, Aaron had failed very badly in his leadership when Moses was up Mount Sinai with God, as recorded in Exodus 24-31. While Moses was meeting with God and receiving instructions about the worship God had designed for His people, Aaron was actually fabricating a golden calf in response to the people’s cry for a new god and a new leader, since Moses had been up the mountain so long! (Exodus 31,32) Miriam, you may recall, became a worship leader as she led the people in celebration of God’s deliverance of them as they escaped Egypt through the Red Sea. (Exodus 15) We have no indication there had been disagreement or discord between them before, but suddenly here in Numbers 12 it erupts and creates ‘leadership discord’, which could have been disastrous because these 1 million Hebrews had already proven how prone they were to grumbling and complaint against Moses and against God!

So here’s an important question: Is ‘leadership discord’ important to God? Here’s what God says about ‘leadership discord’ in the family, especially that which wounds the children and results in divorce: “You flood the LORD’s altar with tears. You weep and wail because God no longer pays attention to your offerings…YOU ask why? It is because the LORD is acting as witness between you and the wife of your youth, because you have broken faith with her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant.

Has not the LORD made them one? In flesh and in spirit they are His. And why one? Because God is seeking godly offspring. So guard yourself in your spirit and do not break faith with the wife of your youth. ‘I hate divorce’ says the LORD God of Israel…”(Malachi 2:13-16)

Is ‘leadership discord’ important to God? Look at God’s response to Miriam and Aaron’s grumbling which was causing ‘leadership discord’ among the Hebrews: “At once the LORD said to Moses, Aaron and Miriam, ‘Come to the Tent of Meeting, all three of you.’ So the three of them came. Then the LORD came down in a pillar of cloud; He stood at the entrance to the Tent and summoned Miriam and Aaron. When both of them stepped forward, God spoke to them: ‘Listen to My words: ‘When a prophet of the LORD is among you, I reveal Myself to him in visions, I speak to him in dreams. But this is not true of My servant Moses; He is faithful in all My house. With Him I speak face to face, clearly and not in riddles… why then were you not afraid to speak against My servant Moses?’ The anger of the LORD burned against them and He left them.” (Numbers 12:4-9)

Look at them, heads bowed, trembling, perhaps fallen to their knees. They are beginning to grasp the profound seriousness with which God views “leadership discord”. We understand don’t we, my friends? “Leadership discord” breaks the trust, kills the hopes of those who are trying to follow those leaders. ‘Leadership discord’ destroys families, businesses, schools, churches, even nations! God views leadership as a very serious calling and holds leaders to a high standard because of their influence on those they lead. James, the brother of Jesus, wrote this warning: “Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.” (James 3:1) Leadership influence is very, very significant to God!

For Moses, Miriam and Aaron, they were experiencing how seriously God takes ‘leadership discord’. The record says: “When the cloud lifted from above the Tent of Meeting, there stood Miriam – leprous like snow! Aaron turned toward her and saw that she had leprosy, and he cried out to Moses, ‘Please, my lord, do not hold against us the sin we have so foolishly committed. Do not let her be like a stillborn infant coming from its mother’s womb with its flesh half eaten away.” (Numbers 12:10-12)

Look at them… stunned, shocked, terrified by what God has said and done in response to their ‘leadership discord’. Look at Moses… what do you think you see in his eyes? What do you expect he’ll say? Let’s pause right here with these three in this profound moment. They’ve had an encounter with God, but this time they have encountered the judgement of God on ‘leadership discord’. I’m urging us to pause, ponder, pray and consider what God is telling us about how HE views the ‘leadership discord’ all around the world, especially when it occurs among God’s people or in the families of God’s people. Tomorrow we’ll see what God did next for these three leaders. Today we reflect… it’s important we understand how seriously God takes ‘leadership discord’. Let’s pray. . .

Today’s Scripture is Numbers 12:1-12.

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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.

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Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)

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