DON’T LEAVE THE PLACE OF YOUR ASSIGNMENT
“And immediately the king sent an executioner, and commanded his head to be brought: and he went and beheaded him in the prison,” Mark 6:27 (KJV)
Essentially, John the Baptist had 2 assignments. He was sent to baptize Jesus and to point Him to the world. That was all his ministry! He had no business doing any other thing. Moreover, he was supposed to be crying in the wilderness. Isaiah, the ancient Prophet of God spoke about his ministry ever before he was born.
When John the Baptist finished his assignment, he ought to have left the scene, but he didn’t. Rather he began to put his hands into what God did not call him to do. He started going to the city. He was not called to go to the city. He ought to remain in the wilderness eating locust and wild honey and putting on a leather girdle and leather skin. He was not supposed to put on designer dresses. I guess at some point in his life he began to look at other people and he came into the city and he began to put his hand in political things.
He was not called to address political issues. It is not everyone that has the authority to address political issues. But he started addressing political issues. He went to the king and accused him of taking somebody’s wife. The king targeted him and said: “Ok I will put you out of business”. Before you knew it, he was arrested and put in prison. Then the same John who pointed people to Jesus began to ask: “…Art thou he that should come or do we look for another”? (Matthew 11:3 KJV). He began to doubt his message when the problem came. And he created the problem for himself. He expected Jesus to come into the prison and bring him out. But that was not the assignment of Jesus.
Eventually, he was beheaded! He ought not to be beheaded. The problem was that he left what God told him to do. When you leave your place of assignment, you will open the door for the enemy.
Further Reading. Mark 6:17-29
Daily Bible Reading: Morning- Isaiah 39-40; Evening- Colossians 4