Proverbs 21
Willing
The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, Like the rivers of water, He turns it wherever He wishes. Proverbs 21:1 NKJV
To be all that God has called and equipped us to be we must embrace His kingdom structure. His structure is a channel by which His blessings can flow. In God’s Kingdom He has placed us in authority and under authority. Some are accountable to us and we are accountable to others. We see this structure in the family, employment, in the structure that governs us, and in our relationship to God. Anytime we are in a place of authority we have a responsibility to those we have authority over, and we are also accountable to those who are in authority over us.
In college I was taught that a manager will cease being promoted when he reaches his level of incompetence. In the Bible we cease to progress when we lord it over those under us or when we rebel against those over us. When this happens we are stopped in our tracks and we become dysfunctional.
Structure is meant to be a path of blessing. In the family, Paul writes, in Ephesians 6, for children to obey their parents because this is the first of the Ten Commandments that comes with the promise of a blessing. Here the child by being a blessing, is blessed. The same is true in 1 Corinthians 11 where we are given the family structure and its relationship with God. The breakdown comes when we strive to be independent from the structure God has ordained. In Ruth 2:4 we see the path of blessing illustrated in the workplace by the blessings given by the employer to his employees and a blessing returned by the employees to their employer.
In my younger years I was promoted to shop foreman at Regal Industries twice. The first time it was a miserable failure and I was glad to go back to my old job. Later I was offered the job again and it was a huge success. Eventually I had 50 people under me and was even offered stock in the company. I found that I was only as good as the people under me. Care and concern for them (read blessing) was a huge investment in my success and the success of the company and the employees.
The same pattern is seen with those who are rulers and authorities over us in Romans 13, 1 Timothy 2, and 1 Peter 2. Here in our verse in Proverbs we see that the king is accountable to God. As stated earlier, abuse of the process blocks the flow of peace and blessing and as a result things begin to breakdown. If we are to succeed, we must be willing to embrace the God ordained structure that God chooses to use as His channel of blessing. We must understand that no one is independent from those over us nor are we independent from those under us in the chain of authority. We need to be willing to be a blessing to those over us and those under us. That is God’s plan and the path He blesses.
May God bless you today
Pastor Dave