The Need for Effective Leaders
God’s people were in dire trouble. A group of influential people had control of the country and it appeared that God’s people were powerless to do anything. The state of God’s people was pathetic, they no longer adhered to what God required of them and some of them were simply evil. No-one led God’s people, they all did what seemed to be right in their own eyes.
It sounds like the church in Britain in the 21st century but actually this was a description of God’s people in ancient Israel after Joshua had led them into the Promised Land. This account is found in the Biblical book of Judges chapters 4 and 5. The land of Israel had been captured by Jabin, king of Hazor, a large Canaanite city about fifteen miles north of the Sea of Galilee (Joshua 11:1-15). Jabin was probably a dynastic name for the king of Hazor as many years earlier Joshua had completely routed another Jabin. This latest Jabin was a cruel ruler and he kept the Israelites suppressed with his army that included 900 iron chariots, the ancient tanks! After twenty years of this oppression the Israelites turned back to God - they started to pray and the Lord produced the right leaders. Just as Britain discovered before WW2, weak leadership rarely moves things forwards, at the best they manage the ‘status quo’. The country needed the inspirational Churchill for the war, not Chamberlain!
At this time there was a prophetess named Deborah, whose name means ‘bee’, who acted as a judge of people’s problems in Israel. Traditional Jewish chronology places Deborah's 40 years as judge in Israel from 1107 BC until her death in 1067 BC. It was Deborah who realised that something had to be done to free God’s people from virtual slavery. Israel had no standing army but Deborah called on a dynamic man, Barak, who lived in, Kadesh in Naphtali. Kadesh was a northern city sited near Hazor and their chariots so Barak had probably experienced the Canaanite oppression more than most. Barak means ‘thunderbolt’ and that was just the sort of leader the desperate times called for.
Why didn’t Deborah herself lead God’s people to war? Perhaps she recognised that she was more of a pastor of God’s people and not a pugilist. What is remarkable is that she had the foresight and humility to delegate in this way. Barak is named as one of the heroes of faith (Hebrews 11:32) who at great personal risk won battles for their Lord. How such men are needed to lead God’s people robustly today! We have many pastors but few effective evangelists!
Deborah said to Barak,
“The LORD, the God of Israel, commands you: Go take with you ten thousand men of Naphali and Zebulun and lead the way to mount Tabor. I will lure Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s army, with his chariots and his troops to the Kishon river and give him into your hands.” Judges 4:6-7
Barak agreed on the condition that Deborah went with him. He was an enthusiastic nobody who recognised that he needed a figurehead alongside him. The need for a team of leaders with different gifts is usually needed in our churches today.
Deborah and Barak were shrewd, the iron chariots would be ineffective in the hills around Mount Tabor where there were many streams. How Christians today need choose which battles to fight in order to win back the rule of Jesus Christ.
The following diagrams demonstrate the wisdom of Deborah and Barak. We are not told how Deborah provoked Jabin to send Sisera, the commander of his army into this difficult hilly area, but it seems that she somehow let Sisera know where the Israelite troops were mustering.
The flat plain of the valley of the Kishon river must have seemed to Sisera as ideal for his chariots. However this was his undoing as the area can flood when there is heavy rainfall. It was the Lord who bogged down Sisera’s army, leaving them helpless before Barak’s troops. In Deborah’s subsequent song she refers to this:
“From the heavens the stars fought., from their courses they fought against Sisera. The river Kishon swept them away, the age old river, the river Kishon. March on my soul; be strong.” Judges 5:21
The main body of Barak’s soldiers came from the Israelite northern tribes that had been given land nearest to Hazor, the Canaanite capital.
We are then told of a man called Heber the Kenite who, with his family, had moved north. Heber means ‘ally’ and this probably reflects the new relationship his family had with Israel Two to three generations previously a Kenite woman had married Moses and as a result the Kenites had affiliated themselves to Israel. The name Kenite identifies them as a clan of metal workers. It is likely that this family had later moved up to live near the Canaanites for business reasons, as the Canaanites needed metal workers for their chariots and weapons. It could be that it was he who informed Sisera of Barak’s military movements. Heber appears to have been acting as a double-agent.
Deborah, the ‘Bee’, encouraged Barak, ‘the thunderbolt’, to attack Jabin’s army, saying,
“Go! This is the day the Lord has given Sisera into your hands.” Judges 4:14
What a vital concept this was is still is for us today. The result of our battles for Christ are ultimately in his hands. Hasn’t Jesus similarly said to his church,
“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations.” Matthew 28:19
Barak obeyed and the next phrase confirms that God was with him.,
“At Barak’s advance, the LORD routed Sisera and all his chariots and army by the sword.” Judges 4:15
Sisera army was decimated. Sisera himself had to leave his chariot behind and fled on foot. He went to the tent of the person he thought had helped him, the tent of Heber the Kenite. He was welcomed by Jael, Heber’s wife. Her name means ‘mountain goat’. When he asked for water he was given milk and then he asked her to guard the tent whilst he slept.
“But Jael, Heber’s wife, picked up a tent peg and a hammer and went quietly to him while he lay asleep, exhausted. She drove the tent peg through his temple into the ground, and he died.” Judges 4:21
So God’s kingdom, the ‘land of milk and honey’ was reestablished through the courageous leadership of the ‘bee’, Deborah, and the actions of Jael, the ‘mountain goat’. The Bible is clear that Deborah, Barak and Jael were all determined to see an end to their enemies control.
Deborah’s reflections
Immediately after this dramatic victory Deborah and Barak sang a poignant song together extolling the willingness of God’s people to have been willing to get involved in the battle at risk to themselves. It starts by emphasising the role of the leaders:
“When the princes of Israel take the lead, when the people willingly offer themselves – praise the LORD” Judges 5:2
They then immediately recognise that it was in fact the Lord who gave them this victory,
“Hear this, you kings! Listen you rulers! I will sing to the LORD, I will sing. I will make music to the LORD, the God of Israel. O LORD, when you went out from Seir . . . the earth shook, the heavens poured down water. The mountains quaked before the Lord, the one of Sinai, before the LORD, the God of Israel.” Judges 5:3-5
Deborah and Barak want everyone to recognise the power of the LORD, both the affluent and the poor:
“You who ride on white donkeys, sitting on your saddle blankets, and you who walk along the road, consider the voice of the singers at the watering places. They recite the righteous acts of the LORD, the righteous acts of his warriors in Israel.” Judges 5:10
They recalled that both the leaders and the people needed to get up and become active again, just as they had been in Joshua’s day. Significantly it was the ordinary people who pleaded with the leaders to do something
“Then the people of the LORD went down to the city gates. ‘Wake up, wake up, Deborah! Wake up, wake up, break out in song! Arise O Barak!’” Judges 5:12
How we need to see this today. Ordinary Christians need to keep saying to our Archbishops, Popes Cardinals, Bishops, Vicars, clergy, pastors and elders, ‘Wake up, we are being overrun. We need to be led.”
What happened when the appeal went out was thrilling. Men came, with their tribal leaders, from Ephraim, Benjamin, Manasseh (Makir, the word used here probably refers to East and West Manasseh) and from Zebulun and Issachar. They were the people who saw the victory.
Yet the song then reflects on a deep problem. When the appeal for soldiers went out there were some who simply said ‘We’ll think about it!’ but did nothing:
“In the districts of Reuben there was much searching of heart. Why did you stay among the campfires to hear the whistling for the flocks? In the district of Reuben there was much searching of heart. Gilead stayed beyond the Jordan. And Dan, why did he linger by the ships? Asher remained on the coast and stayed in his coves.” Judges 5:15b-17
The apathy of these tribes is highlighted by reminding everyone of those who were faithful:
“The people of Zebulun risked their very lives; so did Naphtali on the heights of the field.” Judges 5:18
This attack on those who refused to get involved then becomes stronger:
“‘Curse Meroz,’ said the angel of the LORD. ‘Curse its people bitterly, because they did not come to help the LORD, to help the LORD against the mighty.” Judges 5:23
Meroz was an Israelite town in Naphtali. They were cursed. They said they believed in the God of Israel but would do nothing to support his cause. How many people in Britain today will call themselves Christians but do very little to demonstrate that they belong to the LORD Jesus and his church, they don’t battle to glorify him though they may ‘think about it’!
Much later, in Isaiah’s time, in the 8th century BC, some of God’s people are severely criticised for having just an external form of religion, they sang to God but would not serve him sacrificially. They overlooked the fact that God knows everything that we think and do.
“The LORD says,
These people come near to me with their mouth and honour me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is based on merely human rules they have been taught. Therefore once more I will astound these people with wonder upon wonder; the wisdom of the wise will perish, the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish.”
Woe to those who go to great depths to hide their plans from the Lord who do their work in darkness and think, “Who sees us? Who will know?” You turn things upside down, as if the potter were thought to be like the clay! Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, “You did not make me”? Can the pot say to the potter, “You know nothing”? Isaiah 29:13-16
That was not the end of the story for those tribes who preferred to ‘think about getting involved’ but failed to do so. Forty years later God’s people forgot that their duty was to serve their Lord. Consequently another kingdom, the Midianites aided by the Amorites, invaded and again God’s people were subjugated to an oppressive regime. The invaders repeatedly came and ruined their crops and stole their sheep, cattle and donkeys. Again the Israelites prayed and a prophet bravely reminded them of God’s word to them,
“I am the LORD your God; do not worship the God’s of the Amorites, in whose land you live. But you have not listened to me.” Judges 6:10
It was then that an angel of the Lord visited Gideon who
Praise God for those leaders of God’s people, those elders, who are encouraging, training and mobilising God’s people to be active in their service of Christ.
