Numbers 16:12-14 – True leadership

To aspire to leadership is not a wrong desire. In fact in 1 Timothy 3:1. Paul commended such a desire. A person’s desire for leadership will be wrong when the motivation and intention for leadership is self-gratification. It is needful for anyone who aspires to be a leader to examine and assess his or her motive before God. Important as the gifting of a person for leadership may be, his or her character will be a far more vital criterion. Obviously, Dathan and Abiram did not appraise themselves appropriately and failed to see themselves rightly. They were flawed characters.  

Korah’s ambition was the priesthood whereas the desire of Dathan and Abiram was to usurp Moses' position. They wanted to lead the people without realizing that they lack the character to do so.  On closer examination, they were after the power and position. They were downright defiant when Moses summoned for them to appear before him. They stoutly refused to budge. Disrespectfully they challenged Moses’ leadership saying, “We will not come up.  Is it not enough that you have brought us up out of a land flowing with milk and honey to have us die in the wilderness, but you would also appoint yourself as master over us? Indeed, you have not brought us into a land flowing with milk and honey, nor have you given us an inheritance of fields and vineyards. Would you gouge out the eyes of these men? We will not come up!”

Here was a frontal attack on Moses personally. They accused him of leading them into the wilderness to kill them and not to Canaan, the land flowing with milk and honey. Egypt to them seemed more like the land of milk and honey. They had forgotten that it was they and the congregation who had chosen to listen to negative reports and had refused to go into the promised land. They further claimed that Moses had appointed himself as the leader to enslave them. Rhetorically they were accusing Moses of deceiving the people in what he was doing. They were not saying that he physically gouged out the people's eyes. They were implying that Moses could deceive the rest of the people, but he could not delude the two of them.

We can tell that while they were attacking Moses, their real target was God. Their disappointment was more with God than with Moses. This is what normally happens. People will take it out on leaders whom God has appointed because they are His representatives. The delusion of the two brothers could well be generated by their mismatched expectations. What they were experiencing seemed incongruous with what they were expecting. They failed to see that it was not the Lord, neither was it Moses who created the problems for them. They would have been in the promised land by now, had they not been derailed by pandering to their unbelief.

Korah’s issue with Moses was because he wanted the prestige and status of the priesthood. Whereas Dathan and Abiram’s issue was all about the power they wanted to have over the people. And these issues can also be seen in today’s church. People eye leadership because of prestige, status, power, and control. We must never forget that leadership in the church is all about divine calling and divine reliance. No church leader can act independently of God’s will and purpose. The Biblical way Church has to be led is often unimpressive in human estimation. But what is folly to humans is really the wisdom of God. We must view church leadership from the perspective of the cross of Christ. The strength of an appointed leader is made evident when the finished works of Christ are brought to bear in the weakness of the leader’s life. The effectiveness of a leader in the context of the church is not pragmatism but reliance on the wisdom of God. Effective leadership follows principles derived from God’s Word and not merely the skills gleaned from secular leadership seminars.  Effectiveness is about godly servant leadership. And it is a calling, not self-appointment!