But all the evil men and troublemakers among David's followers said, "Because they did not go out with us, we will not share with them the plunder we recovered. However, each man may take his wife and children and go." – 1 Samuel 30:22

Today's Scripture Reading (June 16, 2025): 1 Samuel 30

The Apostle Paul gave his readers an excellent image of what the Church was supposed to look like. It is a great image of what any organization should look like. Every organization functions because it has people who fulfill a varied number of tasks. We can't all fulfill the same role; if we did, the organization would fail. And it is more than just an arbitrary decision where some lead and others follow. It involves having different people complete all the tasks that the organization needs to accomplish to survive. All the tasks must be done, but they need to be done by the right people, people who are gifted at the task at hand.

Organizational Theorist Jim Collins, in his book "Good to Great," suggested the analogy of getting people on a bus. According to Collins, it is possible to have all of the right people on the bus, but if they are in the wrong seats, then the organization will prosper as it should. There are many things in the Christian Church that I can do, but some tasks I do better than others. And there are many more things that need to be done, which I would hopelessly fail to accomplish. Success only results when we get the right people in the right seats of the organization

When it comes to importance, the truth is that we are all important because required tasks don't get accomplished unless we all do our job. Often, the importance chart is presented in an upside-down manner. The success of a store doesn't depend on the CEO or the accountant who handles the money; success depends on the people hired to meet the customers on the front line, the ones who help the people who come through the door to find the product that they want and make sure that they are going to be satisfied with their purpose. And often, these people, while being the most important, are also the lowest paid. Perhaps that should prompt us to reconsider our pay structure.

The men on the front line of David's battle have a suggestion. The people rescued should be reunited with their families. Still, the spoils, the material things taken during a raid, should be divided only among those who actually went into battle and raised a sword against the enemy. And on a superficial level, that almost makes sense. Except that supply lines and support personnel were also crucial to the army's success. Those who did the actual fighting would not have been successful without the support of the people who kept things moving behind the scenes. To use Jim Collins's terminology, for the army to succeed, they needed everyone to be in the right seat on the bus.

Interestingly, the author of Samuel tells the reader that these men who wanted to keep the spoils for only those who did the fighting were evil and troublemakers. Perhaps a better word might be 'selfish.' They wanted more of the spoils for themselves and didn't care about cutting out the people who had done the necessary jobs in support of the fighters. It was not the way that David believed the army should run. And under his leadership, he would ensure that everyone received what was fair, following the instructions God had given. 

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: 1 Samuel 31