Today's Devotional

July 15, 2005

Subject:  The Spirit Of Pharaoh Lives On

Exodus 1:8 - 11 "Now there arose up a new king over Egypt, which knew not Joseph.  And he said unto his people, Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we:  Come on, let us deal wisely with them; lest they multiply, and it come to pass, that, when there falleth out any war, they join also unto our enemies, and fight against us, and so get them up out of the land.  Therefore they did set over them taskmasters to afflict them with their burdens. And they built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Pithom and Raamses."

I remember while working in Washington D. C.,  one week I worked each night until about 8 or 9 p.m.  When I attended a meeting one morning and began answering to my boss on why some things weren't getting done, he wasn't too happy to hear that it was because I was the only one working till late each night.  He soon came up with his tag line, "CC dance faster."  He thought that I should simply do more than I had been doing.  Most people saw it as cruel in the office because they all knew that I "closed" the place every night.  I simply saw it as uncaring for a person in a leadership position.  I called it, "The Spirit Of Pharaoh."  It's the story of people in leadership positions who misuse or make inappropriate use of their power.

The Spirit of Pharaoh lives on today in many places.  Because I use the example of a boss, think not that it is limited to those in official positions.  The Spirit of Pharaoh is alive in homes, in churches and in organizations of every type.  So what is this Spirit of Pharaoh of which I speak?  I call it the Spirit of Pharaoh to characterize people in leadership positions who meet the following criteria (1) they are leaders and don't realize that God put them there (2) they are leaders and have no knowledge of why they are there and (3) they are leaders and they desire to be served instead of to serve.

You can see all of these traits in Pharaoh from the passages above.  He didn't realize that God put him in that position in fulfillment of promises to Abraham many years earlier.  He probably actually thought it was because of his "MBA from Harvard."  He also didn't realize that the people weren't there to serve him, but instead that he was there to serve them.  God would eventually awaken Pharaoh and judge him for the way he treated the children of Israel.

Today you may be in a leadership position or you may be in a servant's position, in either case, you must be able to detect the spirit of Pharaoh because when God comes calling, you need to know whether you are being freed from a life of drudgery and toil at the hand of wicked taskmasters or if you're going to be subject to the plagues.   

Carlen