Today, I am reading and commenting on  Judges 9-10.

I want to write about the parable of the trees selecting a king which Jotham told to the citizens of Shechem after Abimelek had killed all of his brothers.  In the parable, the trees sought out a king, while in the event Jotham related it to, Abimelek sought to become king (or, a reasonable facsimile of king).  In the parable, the trees first sought out those who had accomplishments which demonstrated that they had skills which would allow them to lead, but those they approached were unwilling to give up doing that which they were good at in order to provide order for the other “trees”.    Finally, the trees turned to the thorn bush, which was only good at getting in everyone’s way and causing pain.  The thorn bush demanded that all of the other tress lower themselves to that they would be in his shade.  In the same way, bad leaders seek to cut everyone down to below their level, while good leaders seek to empower everyone to rise to the heights their abilities will take them.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.