Leadership 101
This past week, I heard Fr. Richard Rohr share some wisdom about time spent connected with God – specifically, he talked about gazing at the world as opposed to looking, glaring or staring at the world. When you “gaze” your focus is soft – you may not see great detail and you may be able to take in a “bigger picture” of the world before you. You may see with God’s eyes in a new way.
Sometimes I think that the great story of scripture is like that – there is something about winging our way up to 30,000 feet to gaze at the big picture, to get perspective. I hope we can bring that 30,000 foot gaze to today’s strangely detailed text from 1 Kings.
But let’s start by understanding at least some of the details of the story we find ourselves in today.
(Which actually requires that we begin with the big picture, oddly enough) Both David and his son Solomon experienced a stellar rise in their leadership and stature and character, followed by a steep and decisive fall as they ruled over a united kingdom. Even more than David, it seems Solomon has fulfilled the description of human Kings that Samuel offered the people of Israel before anointing Saul:
He will take one-tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and his courtiers. He will take your male and female slaves and the best of your cattle and donkeys and put them to his work. He will take one-tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves...”
If we were to roll to the chapter that precedes our text for today, we discover that God is so angry with Solomon’s rule that he has raised up several adversaries to threaten the Kingdom’s stability. And through a prophet, the LORD has declared that he’ll take MOST of the kingdom away from Solomon and place it in the hands of a man named Jeroboam, an Ephraimite. The promise made to Jeroboam echoes the promise made to David – the Lord says, if you’ll walk in my ways, if you will listen to me in all I command, then I will build for you an enduring kingdom like I did for David.
Solomon gets wind of this and sets out to kill Jeroboam, causing the man to flee to Egypt.
And then, rather abruptly, all accounts of King Solomon end in this history, and the text says he “slept with his ancestors, buried in the city of his father, David…and his son Rehoboam succeeded him.
This is where we enter the story today. With Solomon dead, Rehoboam is in Shechem to be made king. Jeroboam hears of Solomon’s death and Rehoboam’s rise, and he returns from his exile in Egypt and gathers with the Israelites.
Solomon has imposed great hardships on the people, and today’s text refers to the heavy yoke they bear. Jeroboam leads the people of Israel to recommend a deal with the new leader Rehoboam…we’ll serve you IF you lighten the yoke – the burden of work and oppression – that your father Solomon placed on us as a people.
Rehoboam says he’ll give them an answer in three day’s time.
During those three days, Rehoboam first goes to his father’s advisors for counsel. They suggest that if he acts as a servant to the people, if he speaks kindly to them, he will win the people’s loyalty forever.
Dissatisfied with that counsel, Rehoboam turns to his peers – the men who have grown up with him in the kingdom – and they have a very different view.
In nothing short of locker room talk, they advise Rehoboam to assert his power and make the burden of oppression even greater on the people… Because you know, threats and a heavy hand get you everything…
So when Jeroboam returns with the people in three day’s time, the text says that Rehoboam speaks harshly to the people – quite the opposite of the counsel from the elders who advised he speak goodwords to them.
The people responded –
What share do we have in David?
We have no inheritance in the son of Jesse.
To your tents, O Israel.
Look now to your own house, O David.
When Rehoboam tried to set a task master over the people, they rebelled with violence and Rehoboam fled to the relative safety of Judah. The ten remaining tribes clamored for Jeroboam to become their king.
But once crowned, Jeroboam decided to create places for the people to worship in the North so that they did not risk returning to Jerusalem and returning to Rehoboam’s reign. So he sets a golden calf at both ends of the northern kingdom – one in Bethel and one in Dan. And the text says this became a sin, because the people did indeed NOT return to the temple in Jerusalem but instead went to these two new sites built by their king.
It's a confusing story with a lot of crazy details.
So I want to try to spin up to that 30,000 foot view and do a little gazing rather than glaring.
Practically speaking, both Rehoboam and Jeroboam demonstrate a basic failure to connect with God. When faced with a decision about how he will rule, Rehoboam turns to the elders and then to his buddies, and never to God.
Jeroboam, who received word through the prophet of the Lord that if he would keep God’s commands and listen to God, he would have an enduring kingdom, also never turns to God as he makes the first key decisions about his kingdom.
On a more nuanced level, if you read this text closely, you might hear echoes from the earlier big story. Jeroboam was driven Egypt and is returning from Egypt. The people have been subjected to heavy labor by the leader who lords over them. Aren’t there some interesting echoes here from the story of Joseph and eventually the people enslaved by Pharaoh in Egypt?
And then, there is the bit with the golden calves…while it doesn’t seem that it was Jeroboam’s intention that the people actually deify the calves themselves, it does echo that Golden Calf in the wilderness. AND it functions practically to keep people from worshiping God in the Temple in Jerusalem.
There are also some echoes that we might recognize from the New Testament gospels.
In negotiation between the people and Rehoboam, the people talk about the heavy yoke that Solomon has put on them, and they ask for that yoke to be lightened.
Do you remember something about the weight of a yoke?
In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus talks about the yoke that his followers will take on:
Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.(B) 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
Jesus would have known this story from 1 Kings, right?
Jesus would have known about the failure of human kings to lead his ancestors.
And he would teach about a new kind of kingdom. He would teach about a new kind of yoking. In Mark’s gospel, there’s this:
42 So Jesus called them and said to them, “You know that among the gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. 43 But it is not so among you; instead, whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant,(A) 44 and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. 45 For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many.”(B)
Jesus was teaching his disciples a different way to lead. Rehoboam consulted the elders and his peers…and while they gave different counsel, BOTH groups offered advice that would allow the human king to maintain control of his people, his kingdom. And by maintaining control, the human king would have wealth and power and might.
Jesus, who knew this story, chose to speak of a different kind of leadership.
I want us to be careful. It’s not that the story of failed kingship – of David and Solomon and Rehoboam and Jeroboam – is somehow about Jesus. BUT…the story of these human kings IS about our human tendency…
The way we seek power.
The way we seek control.
The way we seek possessions.
And the kingdom Jesus imagined was not about any of these things.
We study these texts to understand how radical Jesus’ teaching really way.
And to use the contrast to imagine a kingdom where the last are first.
Where the burden is light.
Where leadership is about how we serve, not what we achieve or gain.
May it be so.
Amen.
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