Quotes about Leadership

and said to Jeroboam, “Take ten pieces for yourself, for this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘Behold, I will tear the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon, and I will give you ten tribes.

If you listen to all that I command you, walk in My ways, and do what is right in My sight in order to keep My statutes and commandments as My servant David did, then I will be with you. I will build you a lasting dynasty just as I built for David, and I will give Israel to you.

Thus the time that Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel was forty years.

Then Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all Israel had gone there to make him king.

So they sent for Jeroboam, and he and the whole assembly of Israel came to Rehoboam and said,

“Your father put a heavy yoke on us. But now you should lighten the burden of your father’s service and the heavy yoke he put on us, and we will serve you.”

Rehoboam answered, “Go away for three days and then return to me.” So the people departed.

Then King Rehoboam consulted with the elders who had served his father Solomon during his lifetime. “How do you advise me to respond to these people?” he asked.

They replied, “If you will be a servant to these people and serve them this day, and if you will respond by speaking kind words to them, they will be your servants forever.”

But Rehoboam rejected the advice of the elders; instead, he consulted the young men who had grown up with him and served him.

He asked them, “What message do you advise that we send back to these people who have spoken to me, saying, ‘Lighten the yoke your father put on us’?”

The young men who had grown up with him replied, “This is how you should answer these people who said to you, ‘Your father made our yoke heavy, but you should make it lighter.’ This is what you should tell them: ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s waist!