Series: Youth for Jesus
Number: Vol. 8, No. 50
“The Israelites said to Gideon, “Rule over us — you, your son and your grandson — because you have saved us out of the hand of Midian.” But Gideon told them, “I will not rule over you, nor will my son rule over you. The LORD will rule over you.”” (Judg 8:22-24NIV)
Why did the Israelites ask Gideon and his descendants to rule over them? The reason was that he saved them from the hand of Midian. As the account goes, the Midianites had been terribly oppressing them before that time. The oppression was so much that many of the people had to seek shelter for themselves in mountain clefts, caves and strongholds. And that went on for like seven years. (Cf. Judges 6:1-6)
Thankfully, Gideon stepped up and fought bravely for them. So, they were rescued and given rest from the oppression of their enemies for forty years. In fact, the bible says that Midian did not raise its head at all against them during those forty years. So, what the Israelites had through Gideon was a great salvation. (Cf. Judges 8:28)
You can, then, see why they were at some point moved to tell the man to become their king. That means they wanted him to be more than a judge and deliverer to them. They wanted him to establish kingship in the land and make his family line the royal family.But Gideon quickly and boldly refused to be more to them than he already was. He refused to become their king. He even went on to tell them that none of his sons or grandsons would become their king. Why? They already had a King. God was that King. (Cf. 1 Sam 12:12)
Not only that, Gideon knew that it was God that called him and empowered him to save them. Truly, they were not there when God called and empowered him to do what he did. But he would not forget that fact and act as though it was by his own power and intelligence that he saved them from their enemies. That was why he lost no time in telling them that he would not be anything more than God had already chosen him to be among them. To be more than that was to become something he was not made fit for in life.
And the result could only be pain and destruction. In like manner, a man once came to Jesus and asked Him to command his brother to give him his own share of their father’s inheritance. This man wanted Jesus to be more than what God had made Him to the people. God had made Him their Messiah, teacher, healer and Saviour. He had not sent Him to be their judge in handling the matters of this life. There were others that He had given that job to. (Cf. Luke 12:13)
Why, then, did that man want Jesus to be something to him more than He was meant to be? Ignorance! He thought that since Jesus was a highly respected teacher and prophet of God among the people, He should also be able to dabble into the family matters of those coming to Him and tell them how to handle things. But doing that would simply be putting Jesus in trouble, giving the religious leaders of the land an excuse to finish Him off.
Why? The reason was that there were judges in the land at the time that had been appointed to handle all kinds of disputes between the people. And these judges must have had their own court sessions where they listened to cases and gave rulings. If Jesus, then, began to hold His own court sessions and to give rulings there, who would He claim to have received that authority from? He would simply be ensnaring Himself in His attempt to be what He was never meant to be by trying to be more than what He was ordained by God to be to the people.
Thankfully, our Lord Jesus was too wise to fall into that kind of satanic trap. So, He asked the man to tell who made Him a judge in handling such matters. In other words, He wanted the man to know that it was not in His place to be to him what he wanted Him to be. In fact, He further told him that greed was his motivation for asking Him to function in that manner. The man, then, must have left Him very disappointed. But who cares? (Cf. Luke 12:14-21)
Now what is the point of all this? First, it is that we must not allow anyone to use their ignorance, selfishness, lust or greed to pull us into taking in their lives places not meant for us. Yes, if we are good and kind to people, they will often find ways to make our relationships with them stronger, so that they can enjoy more of us. And while nothing is fundamentally wrong with that, we need to know when and where we cannot be anything more to them than what we already are. Otherwise, we will take a place never meant for us in life and expose ourselves to problems that are never meant to be for us in life. It might, then, take an abundant release of God’s mercy on our lives for what we have done not to ruin us and the people involved themselves.
The second point of this is that we must not lead people to become to us something that they have no capacity or right to be to us. Yes, they may have been many things that are good to us. But if we will continue to enjoy with peace of mind what they have been to us, we had better not allow any form of selfishness or greed to drive us to let them take up role in our lives not meant for them. We will not only be exposing them to danger by doing so but also exposing ourselves to God’s judgment. So, let us mind ourselves.
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