Day 1

1^st Samuel 18

¹After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan became one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself. ² From that day Saul kept David with him and did not let him return home to his family

The life of King David the King of Israel is not only exemplary as a biblical leader but even compared with any political leader, or any spiritual leader. Thus, any leader of any type who wants to know how to lead would be advised to do a study on King David. That is why I wrote a book, Leadership King David Style, which is a look at the lessons picked from the life of David in 2nd Samuel. And there are many lessons.

In the series we are looking at his preparation to become a leader. Today I want us to just look at his emotional intelligence. By emotional intelligence, we mean his ability to read, understand and manage his own emotions so that he does not act like a guy who has lost his temper, but also his ability to read the emotions of his friends and enemies and so to act in a way that does not react to those emotions in an unwise way.

That is the big lesson that we who lead today need to copy from him. You cannot be a leader and continually act from emotional outburst. You will certainly end up making up decisions which only a few minutes later you regret about. Acting out of emotions is not acting out of your mind, because emotions cloud your mind and will make you do all kind of wrong things. That is why we sometimes talk of a person having lost his temper. What does that mean? That he is not himself. And people can sometime be mad, and even kill, or even fire their best worker only to regret later. Can we see then why this is a very, very important lesson out of David’s life? My prayer and hope is that we can learn something out of him.

The lesson is drawn out of the early part of David’s life. He is an employee of King Saul, although by that time he is already ordained or anointed to be King secretly. But he is willing to play cool, act like he has not been anointed. He was just an obedient civil servant of King Saul.

Look at 1st Samuel 18:1,

After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan became one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself.

Remember Jonathan is the son of the King therefore the likely heir, when King Saul dies. In verse 2 we read:

From that day Saul kept David with him and did not let him return to his father’s house. And Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself. Jonathan took off the robe he was wearing and gave it to David, along with his tunic, and even his sword, his bow, and his belt.

This young boy appears in public and quickly became the sensational when he killed Goliath. Women are singing about him. All kinds of things are happening, but he is able to handle his own emotions and obey the King. This young boy’s singing abilities are also already noticed, so he comes into the King’s house as one who can play music and cool the raw emotions of the King.

His ability not to react as per his own emotions or the emotions of others like women singing for him makes him an attractive person; and because he is attractive, he soon becomes friends with Prince Jonathan, the son of the King. And so, he now has an ally within the palace where the King is a potential enemy.

I think that is one of the big benefits of emotional intelligence. They say it takes two to tangle, and David will not be the second party. All that means is that if you are able to control your emotions, fights will be rare if ever. Can you see, by David controlling his emotions rather than showing whoa! Have you heard of me! Jonathan, have you heard who I am? I killed Goliath! No, no, just be cool and collected, as they say, it attracts Jonathan into friendship. My friend, if you have any leadership role, may you learn not to act out of your emotions or the emotions of those who praise you, or the emotions of those who oppose you. Just act on the basis of a cool mind. In the process, you will get people around you who admire you but have gone beyond admiration to become your friends.

Day 2

1 Samuel 18:12

¹² Saul was afraid of David, because the Lord was with David but had departed from Saul

In verse 12 we are told, he took of the robe he was wearing, that is a Kingly robe in the palace, and gave it to David, a son of a poor shepherd, or poor peasant they called Jesse. Now he is able to wear a Kingly robe along with a Kingly tunic, and a Kingly sword, a Kingly bow, and even a Kingly belt, and it all comes out of his ability to control his emotions. Therefore he becomes friendly, acceptable to Saul and to his son as well.

How many problems are you having in your leadership and if you really check, it comes out of your inability to manage your emotions or read the emotions of others? Verse 5 of 1st Samuel 18 says,

Whatever Saul sent him to do, David did it so successfully that Saul gave him a high rank in the army. This pleased all the troops and Saul’s officers as well. Saul was afraid of David because the LORD was with David but had left Saul. So, he sent David away from him and gave him command over a thousand men, and David led the troops in their campaigns. In everything he did he had great success because the LORD was with him. When Saul saw how successful he was, he was afraid of him. But all Israel and Judah loved David because he led them in their campaigns.

Because when you are able to control your emotions, you can concentrate on the task at hand, and when you concentrate and focus on the task in hand, chances are your performance will be exemplary. Once your performance is exemplary, you make it even those who are jealous to become powerless to do any harm to you.

Can you see the connection? If you act out of emotions, your performance will suffer, and because your performance suffers, people do not admire you, people do not want you to lead them. Yes, good performance can make even those who are jealous of you powerless to harm you. That is why you need to be careful how you react, and concentrate on what needs to be done. Control your emotions even when you are being provoked to act emotionally. You need to have the ability to control the emotions, so you never act without thinking of the consequences. If for example you are feeling very emotional on a matter, suspend judgement, do not decide! Walk away from the scene rather than act out of the raw emotions. That way you are able to do what needs to be done, and be a good performer.

Look at verse 6,

When the men were returning home after David had killed the Philistine, the women came out from all the towns of Israel to meet King Saul with singing and dancing, with joyful songs and with tambourines and lutes. As they danced, they sang: “Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands.”

Here, the women have decided to compose a song, and the song is praising David and does not say very good words for King Saul, David’s boss, Saul has slain his thousands, but this young boy David his tens of thousands. What happens when people start praising you? That is one thing that causes emotional surges. When people are singing your praise, even you start feeling like you are not normal, you are special. Other human beings are not your level you feel because you can see the praise you are receiving. It is that praise that creates emotions that can bring you into trouble. Ever heard of the saying: pride comes before a fall?

Of course, you cannot stop people praising you; you cannot stop people talking nice things about you. You may not even be able to stop your emotions changing. On hearing them especially in public, you will be elated. No! You cannot stop it, or it may be difficult, but you can manage it, by not acting out of that emotion. Be aware even among these ones who are praising you, there are others who do not believe you are doing a good job. There are others who have a problem with you. It is that ability to not allow your emotions to take over that is going to help you to manage praise.

Please know, praise of a junior will infuriate the boss. If you know it, then you control your emotions! So that means when you go before the boss, and people are singing your praise, you must play down on it! Oh you know, God helped me but let us be clear, I am not the only one, other people were doing it, we were many, we were a team . play down on it. The moment you start saying yes Mr. boss, I am special, you should count yourself lucky to have me on your team, trouble will ensue. If you allow your emotions to be the one speaking, my friends you raise the boss’s temper! And the guy will be infuriated and will make your work difficult, your leadership difficult, your life difficult just because of the way you acted when people actually praised you.

Day 3

1 Samuel 18:8

⁸ Saul was very angry; this refrain displeased him greatly. “They have credited David with tens of thousands,” he thought, “but me with only thousands. What more can he get but the Kingdom?”

Thus emotional intelligence is not just understanding your own emotions but also  it is understanding the emotions of others  therefore understanding their actions so that you do not start thinking they mean what they are saying when they do not. Please know how to manage your supervisor emotions. Understand them and manage them, for that will be very, very important.

Many people are unable to rise in their careers because they do not know how to manage their emotions or those of their bosses. These are people who are good in performance; they can do a good job, but unfortunately, often lose their temper. To be good leader know how to manage juniors, how to manage colleagues, how to manage those who supervise them. All need emotional intelligence but especially your bosses.

If you could get your supervisor’s trust, he will leave you free to concentrate on your work, and in the process, you will have less trouble. Loss of temper leads to loss of trust. I think that is something you need to tell yourself, that learning the emotions of your supervisor and acting within them, where you know how you are managing them, it will make your work much easier, and you grow in your leadership. That is what happened to David

Read verse 10,

The next day an evil spirit from God came forcefully upon Saul. He was prophesying in his house, while David was playing the harp, as he usually did. Saul had a spear in his hand, and he hurled it, saying to himself, “I’’ll pin David to the wall.” But David eluded him twice.

David was able to predict that this singing by women will bring him trouble because it is going to make the boss act against him. Although he is playing his music quietly, he has his eye on the King. He knows the King could do something that could destroy him. So, by the time he is throwing the spear, David had already noticed it , moved and ran away.

Please know your enemies so that you can manage their emotions, their anger so that does not affect the group’s performance. Do not be naïve! You must understand people. Sometimes what people say is not what they feel. If you have high emotional intelligence, you will be able to tell that what they are saying and what they are likely to do are not congruent.

Therefore, you need to be a person who will be wise like David who understood the emotions of the King and was able to escape. Who do you work with? Who are people who are opposed to you? Do you understand their emotions? Do you act in a way that does not infuriate them because you understand where they are coming from? You do not put yourself in their traps, because they will be trying to trap you to get rid of you. You know them, you understand their emotions. You are careful how you answer them and how you live your life before them. Please know your enemies, be able to access and know who means harm, then manage their anger, or their emotions.

look at verse 17,

Saul said to David, “Here is my older daughter Merab. I will give her to you in marriage; only serve me bravely and fight the battles of the LORD.” For Saul said to himself, “I will not raise a hand against him. Let the Philistines do that!”

You know, I heard a statement, fattening an enemy for slaughter. In other words, when somebody wants to harm you, they first of all become friendly to you. They give you a lot of gifts until you fully trust them. When you are fully in trust, it makes their work very easy now to destroy you. It is called fattening for slaughter. So, if you have no emotional intelligence, you will be taken in by their many gifts, by their praise, and forget that this is a person who means harm, and it will make it easier for them.

You know the enemy believes in this fattening for slaughter. Look at this King Saul, his intention is to kill David, but what is he doing? The exact opposite! He says, my daughter Merab is a good girl. You will now become the King’s son in law, enh! That is fattening David for slaughter! Who would not want to become the King son in law? But David was an intelligent person who could read other people’s minds and emotions. Therefore, he refuses to marry Merab, and so that trap he was able to go over it. Are you that kind of a person who can very easily be fattened for slaughter? Many people have lost their career because they were bribed, yet the guy bribing is even taking pictures of how he is bribing you to later use them to destroy you! If you are too keen on gifts, maybe you do not have high intelligence to understand nobody gives something for nothing. There will be a trade in.

Day 4

1 Samuel 18:18

¹⁸ But David said to Saul, “Who am I, and what is my family or my clan in Israel, that I should become the King’s son-in-law?

This shows David did not suffer from appetite for the leader’s goodies. You know when you look desperate to enjoy the leader’s goodies, he will use them to trap you, but David did not go down that route. Remember the enemy believes in fattening for slaughter. So your appetite for the boss’s goodies, especially if the boss is the one who is unhappy with you, you need to be very careful with it.

Look at verse 20,

Now Saul’s daughter Michal was in love with David, and when they told Saul about it, he was pleased. “I will give her to him,” he thought, “so that she may be a snare to him and so that the hand of the Philistines may be against him.” So, Saul said to David, “Now you have a second opportunity to become my son-in-law.” When Saul’s servants told him what David had said, Saul replied, “Say to David, `The King wants no other price for the bride than a hundred Philistine foreskins, to take revenge on his enemies. Saul’s plan was to have David fall by the hands of the Philistines. When the attendants told David these things, he was pleased to become the King’s son-in-law. So, before the allotted time elapsed, David and his men went out and killed two hundred Philistines. He brought their foreskins and presented the full number to the King so that he might become the King’s son in- law. Then Saul gave him his daughter Michal in marriage.

 

We are still talking about emotions and how to manage them. David falls in love with the King’s other daughter yet he had earlier refused Merab . But now this is different, it is not the King suggestion, it is he who has fallen in love with Michal. He is now friends with the King’s daughter that is now different!

What do we learn? Love can make you take earlier avoided risks. In other words, you could see the danger of this, and this, and this until you fall in love. That is why in many cases, the Kings used to use their daughters to bring peace with an enemy, because love is a very strong emotion.

What then does that means for you as a leader? You need to be very careful in that area. If you must marry, pick a girl, and get married but stick with your wife, do not allow the emotions of love to be aroused by other women like it happened with King Solomon. You will soon be off the right path the moment you fall in love. In fact, my suggestion is to avoid falling in love, instead stand in love.

What is the diffidence between falling and standing in love? Falling in love shows somebody who has lost control! That is why it is called falling in love; but if it is standing in love, it means you have a feeling for a person, but you take time to evaluate them. You think about them. You also assess the feeling of the person whom you feel you are admiring. You seek Gods direction all before mentioning to the target. So, you slowly move towards a relationship without your emotions taking over. Your brain is at work, you are able to pray, you are able to seek the mind of God and follow it, rather than act out of emotions. Leadership will be affected by the issues of falling in love.

Read verse 28,

When Saul realized that the LORD was with David and that his daughter Michal loved David, Saul became still more afraid of him, and he remained his enemy for the rest of his days. The Philistine commanders continued to go out to battle, and as often as they did, David met with more success than the rest of Saul’s officers, and his name became well known.

You get it? If you are with God, your enemies’ side will always fail! And so, as we have been talking about emotional intelligence we need to note that emotional intelligence requires connection with God. This is because only God will help you to manage your own emotions. It is God who can also manage your enemies’ emotions. It is God who can give you the wisdom to know how to relate with an emotional person so that you do not create a fire where you should be trying to create peace. That will be something that is important for you to think about.

When Saul realized that the Lord was with David, he became afraid. what does that tell you? Although he had known of the friendship of his daughter and David, he thought that the girl was not serious. He thought that he could use the girl to harm David, but he discovered that was not possible! Why? The girl was actually in love with David. God is the one who enters in the heart of Michal and lets her be defensive of her husband, love her husband. She enjoys the relationship so that the King is unable to use her to harm David. That is why you need God. Emotional intelligence just from a human standpoint is limited? It is not adequate. You need to connect yourself with God so that he can give you a word of discernment to be able to discern the other people’s actions and see where the emotions are coming from.

May the Lord help us to have this divine connection with him that allows us to understand that we are not to act out of emotions. That way we avoid the repercussions of his and our actions. He helps us to understand the emotions of others. May the Lord truly help us to be leaders who have this level of emotional intelligence.

Remember we said you are a leader because you lead. We see three requirements if you are really going to be a leader. First you must know where we are going. So, one of the critical requirements for leadership is the ability to conceptualize, think through ideas so that by the time you are bringing it to others, you yourself at least have some level of understanding of it. That is why we call you a leader because you lead you go ahead of others.

But I think, number two, it is not just enough to just think, for you need to have influence. That you must be somebody who people can trust enough to follow. You know even if you have clarity of where we are going, if I do not trust you, I will certainly not follow you. So, for you to be called a leader, I need to trust you enough to follow you to the unknown future. When you tell me to come from my area of comfort to a new area that you had promised me would be better, how do I follow you? I have to trust you and believe in you.

I think thirdly and importantly you must be involved in the journey of the group. You can’t tell me to go somewhere where you yourself are not going. So, in leadership there must be involvement by the leader.

And we are learning all these things were in David. These are people who led in the Bible. And we are trying to learn something out of them in character study. We are discussing the second King of Israel.

A lot of things that make David be great is simply because he was very different from the first King. We compare David with Saul, and get to see there are a few lessons, a few things that Saul missed. You know even the marriage of David to the daughter of Saul, Michal, had a problem. It sounds like this Saul had brought their children to feel very proud and to think of themselves as a special breed so that even the wife Michal was looking down on her husband.

Day 5

1 Samuel 18:7

⁷ As they danced, they sang: “Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands.”

But anyway, you need to understand that this David we are talking about is the same one who killed the giant, Goliath. And you know once he killed Goliath, which should have pleased the King, King Saul, a problem arose. As we saw above, the Jewish women were dancing in a victory parade. You know what they said? They sang in 1 Samuel 18:7:

Saul has slain his thousands …But David his tens of thousands

Saul became jealous of David. From that moment and for the rest of Saul’s life, he never had peace. That is how jealousy can do you harm. Instead of building up Israel, King Saul wasted all his life hunting for this boy called David. David was I think in mid-teens and growing. But Saul moved from hill to hill, not fighting enemies but trying to kill David.

As we shall see in future chapters this young man, David, however, respected God’s anointed King, so never fought back. He kept running away. He had several opportunities to kill Saul, but he never killed Saul. He said he cannot touch the Lord’s anointed.

As a leader, please learn very early that jealousy will misguide your direction. It is an emotion that is lethal. It will totally destroy your leadership. It will make you think that a teammate is an enemy. Can you imagine this is somebody helping you to win your battles and has not even said or done anything against you, but just because outsiders are thinking positive of him, instead of using this strength he has, you waste it. You know even the battle where Saul died, if only David was on his side, maybe things would have turned differently.

But unfortunately, jealousy is not Saul’s only flaw, neither is it our only flaw. But I think whenever you study the life of King Saul, please think about power of jealousy. Ask yourself, are there people in your team whom you are not allowing to carry their weight because you do not want them to get glory? Ever heard of the saying? They made great strides who never cared who got the credit?

It will be very, very important to understand that your leadership will be short-changed by jealousy. You will never realize what God intended it to realize as long as you are suffering from insecurity because some people in the team are more gifted than you in certain areas. Even if they are more gifted in certain areas, they are not the leader, you are still the leader. And the work of a leader is not to be an expert in everything, the work of a leader is to coordinate the experts together. And I think that is what Saul missed.

So, whenever we study the life of Saul, we study the impact of being jealous. You know, there is a huge battle the Philistines are involved in. And by that time Samuel has actually died. In one of those battles, Samuel has died. And remember Samuel is the one who anointed Saul and is also the one who anointed the small boy, David. And at this point, King Saul is desperate because of this war. And what does he do? He breaks God’s command by going to consult a Medium. Who is a Medium? A Spiritist is somebody who claims to go to the spirit world and can get things from the spirit world. In fact, he is claiming that he can raise Samuel’s spirit from the dead so that King Saul can consult him. This is a cultic activity. This is the other difference of Saul compared to David. David consulted God.

And God had already said so. Go back to the book of Deuteronomy 18:9-12. God said, cultism must never be dealt with. If you want information, you go to God direct. You are not allowed to go through the spirits; you are not supposed to go through diviners. You are not supposed to talk to the dead people Ancestral worship. Just go to Deuteronomy eighteen passage.It is not allowed. Whether the person who died is like Samuel who is a good guy, or is another bad guy, simply talking to the spirit of the dead is a no-go zone at all.

For those in Africa, this is a very serious matter because our tradition kind of forced us to have a special place for the dead. But the Bible, if you believe in Jehovah, Jehovah says that is a no-go zone. And Saul knew about it. But he still went to a Spirtist. This kind of occultism activity angered Jehovah because it relied on satanic forces instead of going to God. Saul could have gone to God.

You know whatever appeared, because the lady claimed to have brought up Samuel, may even have been a demon pretending to be disguised as Samuel. But the important thing is whether real or false, it is a no-go zone. And although it predicted correctly, you need to understand the devil can do that. It predicted that he would die. It does not make it right. You know, you need to understand no amount of desperation as a leader should ever send you to the occult. To see a witchdoctor? To see a diviner? To go to see a prophet as a leader? That is a no-go zone.

The moment you go to the occult, Jehovah says He no longer will back you up. Have you heard of people, even some who are Pastors, and they go to the occult to help create crowds so that more people can come to attend his church? One leader called Saul died because of doing that amongst many other things he did wrong. I think it is important for us to learn from King Saul that the occultic powers are real, but we are not to deal with them.

Number two, they have certain amount of power, much more than a human being can have, but they do not have the power of God. So why not go to God himself who is the creator of the devil? We had a pastor called Pastor Dennis White. We used to say, the devil is God’s devil. He created him. That tells you there is no fight between the devil and God because God is the creator of the devil. So, the devil can never fight God. But for the time being He has been given freedom on earth. For those of us who choose to worship Satan, he will give you some power for he has more power than a human being, but real power is with God.

In the book of first letter of John we are told, He that is in us, if you are a Christian, is greater than He that is in the world. So, you as a leader must go to where power is. Do not go to the occult. That is the lesson we learn about comparing David with Saul.

In the battle that he was afraid of, King Saul and the army of Israel were actually overrun by the Philistines. Now, he is about to be killed. What does he do? He commits suicide. His sons were also killed by the enemy. Two things we learn from this story; first of all, remember suicide is evil because suicide is murder and a very strange type of murder, is murdering yourself. So just add 1 Samuel 18:7 to the evils of Saul. If only he had repented instead, then he would have died to go to heaven.

Now, you need to understand, that committing suicide means locking yourself away from the goodness of God. Murder is condemned. So, if you murder either somebody else or murder yourself, you have broken one of the Ten Commandments, and therefore you are saying you do not want God’s help in this life and in the life to come. So that is one of the things you need to understand. Even if the worst came to the worst, let God be in charge of your death. Do not take your own hands to kill yourself.

Number two, related with this, our sin will affect our family. In this particular battle, his sons died with him. How unfortunate that can be. That you need to understand as a leader, that what you do out there will affect your family and other followers. It can affect it in many ways. When you are a terror in your place of work, when you are a terror in your organization when you are leading, somebody gets to know that your son is your son. What do you think happens? Your son gets molested because of who you are.

Not even that. Because of the way you live your life, what do you think your son is watching? He is likely to repeat you, repeat how you are living, so that you have messed up his future, because of the kind of example you have actually given. But it needs to be very clear, if we are not good leaders, we do not live righteous lives, we affect even also our own families.

Day 6

²³ For rebellion is like the sin of divination, and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.

Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has rejected you as King.

Ironically, David the young man who Saul is jealous about, and whom Saul is running around after for years, when King Saul dies, David mourns sincerely. He mourns to the extent, one of the lessons I draw about David is the fact that he never wished his enemies evil. He operated, not at what we call the golden rule, do to others what you would them to do to you. He operated at Platinum rule. What is the platinum rule? Much more valuable than the golden rule. In other words, he never wished his enemies evil. He did good to his enemies.

Therefore, when a man came and lied that he had killed Saul, he was killed David because he said, you are a murderer and the reward for a murderer is death. So, the guy who lied that he had killed ended up killed by the soldiers of David. It is very important to understand that the reason why you are a bad King or a bad leader is if you wish your enemy evil and therefore you are always trying to do evil.

But when you are like David who controls his emotion and seeks to do enemy good, obviously you will get a bigger attraction of people. To wish your enemy evil, will hold your mind and you might even not start doing what God called you to do.

But let’s admit that King Saul did accomplish some things. Israel became a nation. David of course extended the boundaries, but the first person to put them well after many years of judges and all kinds of troubles from the neighbouring tribes, King Saul ensured they now were in control of their land. So we credit him with the ability to unite the scattered tribes, giving them one name and giving them strength. And you know he did not rule for a short time. He was a leader for forty-two years. David ruled for only forty. Saul ruled for forty-two years.

The only thing that went wrong is that instead of concentrating in leading his country, he spent quite a lot of time running after David. So, Saul started well, and he led well until the small boy kills Goliath. Maybe one of the things you need to understand as a leader is that a good start is good but a good start with a bad ending makes you be a forgotten leader. People will want to forget you as quickly as possible despite the many good things that you did at first.

That is one of the problems we have in Africa. Many people, when they talk about Zimbabwe, talk about Mugabe, the guy starts well and is the ones who are the liberators of the people. After twenty years of ruling, they are becoming old, what happens? Things start going wrong.

And when we remember such leaders, we remember them as dictators. We remember people who were ruling even when they had no biological, physical capacity. And it is soon forgotten the kind of good leaders they were at the beginning. Isn’t that a good lesson to learn that you need to be careful that the fact that you started well is not enough. You must continue leading well until you exit the stage strong.

Of course, it also means that succession planning means that do not continue in office when it is not necessary. When somebody else can actually continue allow him. David in his part actually appointed Solomon when he was still alive. I think it will be very, very important to understand this. A good start is good, but it is more important you continue to the end.

 

Day 7

1 Samuel 15:22

²² But Samuel replied: “Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices     as much as in obeying the Lord? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams

Looking at the strengths of King Saul, I think we must admit that he was a courageous man, no wonder he won so many battles. I think we also know that he was generous and gave quite a lot to people. Early in his reign, he was also admired. He was also respected by the people. Like we have just been seeing a little while ago, might this be what undid King Saul? Early success. He was not able to manage success. Might that be what brought him to where he was? Everybody was singing his song. So, to think of somebody else even being mentioned, became frightening to him.

What about you? Is your success getting into your head and in the process, you are going to spoil your own leadership. Whenever you remember King Saul, remember early success may have contributed to his ruin. So, we have seen that Saul great weakness was insecurity, being insecure.

In fact, in the process, he became impulsive, with emotions out of control. And once you are impulsive, it is very easy to go to the next step which is to act unwisely. Once you are impulsive, you do not think, you do not analyse. You make wrong judgments. And I think all this was caused by the jealousy against David. It is the one that drove him to have madness. I could call it a great thirst for revenge. Not revenge for anything David did against Saul just jealousy for David doing better. He never asked himself, if God is the one who has created David better in this area, if I had a quarrel, should I not be having a quarrel with God who created him rather than with David? How many people have you punished in your leadership for them being good? For them doing better things? You should never punish somebody for something they cannot be held accountable for? It is unfair. You cannot punish people for an act of God, like they call it in insurance circles. I think it will not be fair to punish somebody for an act of God.

Unlike David who sinned and repeated, more than once, King Saul disobeyed God’s instructions. Once he started the way down, he now was not only having a quarrel with David, but he was also not listening to God. What was his problem? He knows the man of God has said this, he knows God through the man of God has said this, but in this particular circumstance, he feels I know better than God. That is pride. Or maybe call it self-confidence, and it ruined him.

Are you reaching a level where you feel like you do not want to consult anybody, you know everything, you know better than anybody? I think that will be your undoing. I think that will be something that you have to handle very clearly because if you do not handle it, I think it will cost you a lot of trouble.

In other words, if you are so proud, you can’t consult you will end up in ruin. You know some of the people you have to consult are younger than you, some of the people you have to consult are not as gifted as you in certain areas. Some are ugly. And you simply do not want to have anything to do with them. What will happen? You will run yourself. That is something that will put you into trouble.

And my prayer is that you will manage yourself right like David. The Bible tells us pride comes before a fall. So that is something that King Saul had a problem with.

I think the other thing that we learn about this is that he forgot that he is answerable to God ultimately. That God is in charge of everything, not Samuel. He could hide the sheep from Samuel. He had been told to kill all the sheep. He hid some, the good ones. And he could hide them from Samuel. But you can’t hide them from God. And because he was a prophet of God, Samuel could be shown by God. I think that is something you need to understand.

Please remember, act to the audience of one, God who sees in secret. That will help your leadership. Once you start realizing that God is with you everywhere and anywhere, and then you cannot start doing some funny things because nobody can see. Your followers cannot see because your spouse cannot see but God sees. God is with you everywhere. As a leader, what will help you in life is to practice God’s presence everywhere you go.

You know you can improve performance without competing or comparing. I think one of the things Saul did was to compare himself with David, a small boy. They were not even comparable. You need to avoid that idea of competing against others. When we compare ourselves with others, we become confused. We want what they have instead of using what God has gifted us with in our own specific measure. What David had is not what you have and yet God has made you a leader. We can stray from God and try to get what we want on our own, yet life with God has direction and purpose. Life without God will become meaningless.

So why, like David, do not you learn how to improve yourself over time by comparing your today with your yesterday and putting a target to be better tomorrow. That does not have to be better or worse than the other leaders. Do not compare yourself with other leaders. The other thing we learn about him is that Saul was not totally disobedient. He was half obedient. Partial obedience means you cannot enjoy earth and you will not enjoy heaven either. So, this guy, Saul, was kind of trying to be obedient to God but not fully. What happened? He could not do everything God wanted him to do, therefore he could not enjoy his leadership as the way he should.

He became a guy destined for hell. Half obedience. Being a guy who is in church, who contributes in church, but you are having some secret sins is Half obedience. It is not useful as a leader. Because what will happen is, you will not enjoy here or heaven. Because you want people to see one side of you but there are other things you are doing secretly. And since God can see both, you have no hope in heaven and you will not enjoy earth either. I think that is something that you need to tell yourself.

So can we come out very clearly and say, success is not measured by output. Saul did many things, but because some of his strategies and processes did not make God happy, he ends up with a problem. You know he is being asked, in 1 Samuel 15:22,

does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the Lord. To obey is better than sacrifice and to heed is better than the fat of rams, for rebellion is like the sin of divination, and arrogance like the evil of adultery. Because you have rejected the Word of the Lord, He has rejected you as King.

Success is not to be measured by the output. God is both interested in the means and also not just the means, also the end. May the Lord bless you as a leader, as you look at both your process and your target The means and the end.

 

 

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Marketplace Leadership - The Nehemiah Style
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Leadership King David's Style
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The Leader as a Steward
Finding a Life Partner
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