Rebellion & Division – Two Eternal Mistakes

Posted by Rev. Mark Slay

Division is one of the enemy’s greatest tools. If he can divide, then he can stop the work of God anywhere. Jesus said it this way, "A house divided against itself cannot stand." So, division is an incredible tool the enemy often uses to stop the work of God. If the enemy cannot stop you, he will just misguide you. If he misguides enough people then he has thwarted the plan of God.

We can see an example of this in Numbers 16. Korah, Dathan, and Abiram were turning against Moses and verse one starts out by telling us that they "took action." Now action is good, if it’s the right action, but if you’re misguided and you take the wrong action then it destroys. So they took action, but it was misguided action and it ended up costing them. We will see this as we read along.

The next verses tell us “they rose up before Moses, together with some of the sons of Israel, two hundred and fifty leaders of the congregation, chosen in the assembly, men of renown.” Notice these are leaders of congregation; that’s significant. It tells you no one is exempt from being misguided. So “they assembled together against Moses and Aaron, and said to them, ‘You have gone far enough, for all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is in their midst; so why do you exalt yourselves above the assembly of the Lord?

Now, "when Moses heard this, he fell on his face; and he spoke to Korah and all his company, saying, 'Tomorrow morning the Lord will show who is His, and who is holy, and will bring him near to Himself; even the one whom He will choose, He will bring near to Himself.  Do this: take censers for yourselves, Korah and all your company, and put fire in them, and lay incense upon them in the presence of the Lord tomorrow; and the man whom the Lord chooses shall be the one who is holy. You have gone far enough, you sons of Levi!'"

Notice the accusations are the same on both sides. They’re telling Moses he’s wrong and he’s telling them they’re wrong. You'll find out who was correct, all 250 of those leaders died in their rebellion. Remember, these were all people that were following God at one time. So they lost 253 leaders in one day. And it doesn’t end here. Look at verse 41.

"But on the next day all the congregation of the sons of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron, saying, ‘You are the ones who have caused the death of the Lord’s people.’" Now it’s hard to imagine that somebody actually said that and meant it, but they did. So not only did it cost the group of 253, but now the devil goes to this group of people to harm them and gets them to accuse Moses and Aaron of being the culprits behind their destruction.

It's plain to see the devil has no new tricks, just new victims. You can see that rebellion and division has been his tools for many, many years. Be careful not to allow the devil to misguide you; we can see from this passage that’s all it takes to be destroyed.