Don’t Rock The Boat - Korah

One day Korah son of Izhar, a descendant of Kohath son of Levi, conspired with Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, and On son of Peleth, from the tribe of Reuben. They incited a rebellion against Moses, along with 250 other leaders of the community, all prominent members of the assembly.

Numbers 16:1-2

A missionary organization once welcomed a young man with a rather inflated view of his leadership ability. As soon as he received an assignment to a foreign mission, he began bucking the established leaders and asserting himself. Within weeks, the mission had to be abandoned as dissension within the ranks became an all-out rebellion.

Rebelling against authorities God has put in place is a great way to scuttle whatever God wants to accomplish in your life. Look at the biblical account of the would-be revolutionary Korah.

Like most overly ambitious people, Korah was a man of strong, if misguided, leadership skills. He organized a corps of leaders with the intention of usurping Moses’ authority and installing his own version of the priesthood. Korah apparently hadn’t thought his plan through completely, or he forgot what had happened to Aaron and Miriam (Moses’ brother and sister) when they challenged Moses’ leadership (see Numbers 12).

As a Levite, Korah was already a special leader, but he wanted more than what God had given him. When Korah rebelled against Moses, God removed him and his coconspirators from their positions. In fact, he removed them from the earth altogether.

God makes leaders of people whom he wants in such positions. When we rebel against those leaders, we risk being removed from the place of blessing God has for us, as happened to Korah.

Some of God’s greatest leaders have been willing to rock the boat from time to time, but they have usually had a strong grasp of appropriate respect for authority.

The Bible teaches us to submit to earthly authority because our sovereign God places people in positions of leadership. When we submit to those in authority, we demonstrate a key condition for God’s blessing: humility!