Are We There Yet?

1 Samuel 8:1-20

1And it came to pass, when Samuel was old, that he made his sons judges over Israel.

2Now the name of his firstborn was Joel; and the name of his second, Abiah: they were judges in Beersheba.

3And his sons walked not in his ways, but turned aside after lucre, and took bribes, and perverted judgment.

4Then all the elders of Israel gathered themselves together, and came to Samuel unto Ramah,

5And said unto him, Behold, thou art old, and thy sons walk not in thy ways: now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.

6But the thing displeased Samuel, when they said, Give us a king to judge us. And Samuel prayed unto the LORD.

7And the LORD said unto Samuel, Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee: for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them.

8According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt even unto this day, wherewith they have forsaken me, and served other gods, so do they also unto thee.

9Now therefore hearken unto their voice: howbeit yet protest solemnly unto them, and shew them the manner of the king that shall reign over them.

10And Samuel told all the words of the LORD unto the people that asked of him a king.

11And he said, This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: He will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots.

12And he will appoint him captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots.

13And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers.

14And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants.

15And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants.

16And he will take your menservants, and your maidservants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work.

17He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants.

18And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day.

19Nevertheless the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel; and they said, Nay; but we will have a king over us;

20That we also may be like all the nations; and that our king may judge us, and go out before us, and fight our battles.

Fixing the Bureaucracy God’s Way

Written by Dr. Ted Baehr, Publisher (Saturday, 27 November 2010 17:29)

Some of my favorite people work for the government. They are humble, dedicated and gracious. However, after a while, even the most intelligent of them start to change into creatures out of Kafka’s book THE TRIAL. They begin to believe they know more than they actually do!

The beginning of true wisdom is understanding your limitations so you can discern the good from the bad and develop the common sense to choose the good.

One government bureaucrat, who had been very clever as a child, started to think that government workers knew more then those citizens for whom he worked. He admitted that elected officials were prone to corruption, but bureaucrats were special.

Did they know how to run a company? Probably not, but they could tell people running companies how to run them.

Did they know how to cure my wife’s disease – cicatricial pemphigoid? Of course not, but they could tell her doctors how to treat her.

Could they make a great Hollywood movie? Maybe, but doubtful.

In fact, they all were singularly incompetent, but they thought they could run other people’s lives.

So, the cure is simple:

Before they go into government, make each potential bureaucrat do something else –anything productive – for at least seven years. Then, make sure they don’t stay in government more than five years, and test them frequently for bureaucratic arrogance.

Furthermore, they should all have to watch THE LIVES OF OTHERS, read about Austrian Economics, raise a family, run a business, work on a farm, and ask forgiveness constantly for having their cohorts at the IRS steal our money to pay for their service to the taxpayers they are supposed to serve.

Finally, they must not receive a pension, no way, no how!

Of course, another solution is not to give so much power to government and government bureaucrats, including judges and the judicial/legal system, in the first place!

After all, as God makes perfectly clear in 1 Samuel 8:1-20, big government and high taxes are signs of slavery.

So, maybe the Christian church should take back all of the power that modern governments have stolen in the last 150 years or so. To that end, we perhaps should look to what Moses had to say to the assembly or church of God’s chosen people about the power of the church and its leaders in Deuteronomy 16:18-20:

“Appoint judges and officials for each of your tribes in every town the Lord your God is giving you, and they shall judge the people fairly. Do not pervert justice or show partiality. Do not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the righteous. Follow justice and justice alone, so that you may live and possess the land the Lord your God is giving you.”

Amen! So be it!

Editor’s Note: Dr. Tom Snyder, editor of MOVIEGUIDE® contributed to this column.