Abounding Grace

Pastor Ed Taylor: Here's a good habit to get into. You need to develop a habit of rejoicing. It doesn't matter, I know sometimes we're like, "I'm a pessimist, optimist, realist." I don't care what you are. Rejoice in the Lord for the great things he has done. Just what it says here. It says Jethro rejoiced over all the good which the Lord had done to Israel. All the good.

It's encouraging as I have developed that habit and I want to see more of it in my life. Because I do deal with difficulties so much, it's easy to dwell on difficulties. I don't know what the problem is, but it's easier to dwell on difficulties than it is all the good that God has done. Even the difficulty you're facing right now, down the road, you're going to see all the good that God has done.

Guest (Male): Welcome once again to Abounding Grace with Pastor Ed Taylor. Head over to Exodus chapter 18 as we give attention to the advice Jethro is about to give to Moses. Pastor Ed has observed in this passage some wise counsel on servant leadership. But this is not only applicable to leaders, but each and every one of us.

Pastor Ed Taylor: You might see it in your own life, but I watch this in my life. I see it, and now that I know about it, I pay more close attention to it. Many times I'm living life, going through the day, handling whatever I need to handle, speaking to who I need to speak to. And as I'm living, I find myself at a crossroads. I find myself at a crossroads through circumstances, through what I heard, and what I had to take care of.

At the level of leadership I have within the church, and it was this way when I was in the corporate world too, it just seems to be that's where God has placed me in the world. I am at a level of leadership where I handle a lot of difficulties. Where I'm in my life, by the time something gets to my office or to my desk, it's probably the worst of the worst that's already been tried to be solved by the other pastors and leaders here. They've already tried to handle it, and they just need to bounce something off, or they're just like, "Okay Ed, it's all yours now. Here you go."

Then I get to step into it in prayer and understanding, and collaboratively we can come up with a solution. But the level of difficulties that I face usually are bigger, so that now you can see why I have the stricter judgment. It requires not some flippant answer. Not that the pastors even give that, I don't mean that, but it's not like just, "Okay, I got 30 problems. Boom, boom, boom. Okay, we're done." It's not like that because we're dealing with people's lives. It's not just 30 little things.

You have to understand if a pastor's involved in your life trying to convince you of something, that's from the Lord, not just some pastor or some leader. The wrestling that you have is probably not so much with the person that's trying to tell you something, but rather you're wrestling with the Lord. He's brought you into a situation to stretch you and to grow me. He helps me understand that he's taking me from glory to glory and strength to strength, but I stand there resolute, or you stand there resolute, thinking, "I want my way." You may not use those words, but believe me, you're speaking in tongues and that's the interpretation: "I want my way."

We have to remember while God may give us our way, we need to understand that in the body of Christ, we're unified to follow God's way. God's way. That's the only way that the church makes progress is in unity. God, remember, is wanting to stretch us. So Moses here, as he's with Jethro, there's a time of worship and rejoicing over what God has done.

Make rejoicing a very important part of your life. You've had a hard day, rejoice in what God has done. You've had a hard week or a hard season, I'm rejoicing in what God has done. It may take you some time to develop that new habit, but you can do it. You can do it. You may be thinking you have nothing to rejoice about. Well, then you may have to go all the way back to the moment you were born again, but I promise you, you have something to rejoice.

If it's just the day that your sins were forgiven, that you recognize the election of God upon your life. That you think about the billions of people that have been on the planet Earth, and here you are in a right relationship with the living God, you can rejoice in that. But I promise you, you have more than that. But if that's the only thing you can go back to, then that's what you need to do.

You need to develop a habit of rejoicing. I know sometimes we're like, "Well, I'm a pessimist, optimist, realist." I don't care what you are. Rejoice in the Lord for the great things he has done. Just what it says here. It says Jethro rejoiced over all the good which the Lord had done to Israel. All the good. And it's encouraging as I have developed that habit and I want to see more of it in my life.

Because I do deal with difficulties so much, it's easy to dwell on difficulties. I don't know what the problem is, but it's easier to dwell on difficulties than it is all the good that God has done. And even the difficulty you're facing right now, down the road, you're going to see all the good that God has done. You don't see it now. You might think, "I know that God's working all things together for the good, but not everything's good." I know, but God is good. One day this will be a test. Testimonies don't come without tests.

This test you're in is going to become a testimony of the great things God has done, and that's what they're doing here. And it came from Moses. Notice what's happening here. It sets the tone for the rest of the chapter. And so it was, verse 13, on the next day that Moses went to work. That's what it says. He sat to judge the people, and the people stood before Moses from morning until evening.

So when Moses' father-in-law saw all that he did for the people, he said, "What is this thing that you're doing for the people? Why do you alone sit, and all the people stand before you from morning until evening?" And Moses said to his father-in-law, "Because the people come to me to inquire of God. When they have a difficulty, they come to me, and I judge between one and the other, and I make known the statutes of God and his laws."

Jethro, an outside source, comes and sees what's happening. Moses has been living this every day, but from an outside perspective, Jethro sees something and he asks a question. So what does he see? Well, no doubt the administrative leading and gifting of Moses. He set up some kind of system to deal with the problems, to oversee the needs of the people. And the system he set up was: they come to me, so I'm going to get a chair, I'm going to sit, and I'm going to listen to their problems all day. I'm going to help them understand what God's law has to say about them.

It was a functional solution and it was rather manageable in the beginning. But the system had deeper problems along the way. I love it, it's a regular conversation here. I don't think it's sarcastic or anything. Don't read into it. "What are you doing?" "Well, people are coming to me." "I mean, why are you sitting there all alone and doing it?" And what was his answer? "Because people were coming to me." It's a great answer.

It's almost like if there was nobody coming to me, I wouldn't be doing this. This is what I'm here for. You could even hear in a very sincere way, "I'm God's deliverer. I'm the man whom God commanded to serve them. I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing." But he's going to learn in a moment that there's wisdom from God that's going to come into his life. Moses is God's representative, and the people did come to him, but his system right now is set up for failure.

There's no way he can do this by himself forever. No way. That's why I often tell people within the ministry here that might be on the edge or very tired. I tell them that the answer to all the ministry problems in a church is people. And every person, if you use the Paul and Timothy illustration, Paul the apostle always had people with him. He was always pouring into people, taking people with him.

He was always pouring into people and the way we describe that relationship is in your position as Paul, you should always have a Timothy. Somebody you're pouring into, teaching, and laying a foundation. I say have many. Always looking for the next person that God puts in your path that has a calling similar to yours or a desire to serve in the church similar to yours. Within our church, I tell the guys, don't just wait for applications. Don't think, "Well, I'll have help when somebody fills out a ministry application." No.

You're always meeting people and you're praying about them and you're ministering to them and you're just inviting them along. Even inviting them along, they may not be for you, that invite might be to encourage them. But every Paul should have a Timothy, and then Timothys, you should always be looking for someone to serve with and learn from. We're pouring in, but we're also learning. So in my illustration here, we're all Pauls and we're all Timothys. And that's the body of Christ.

But especially like Moses. And Moses certainly had his leaders, but in this problem, when they were fighting the Amalekites, Joshua went, Aaron and Hur followed, and they're all ministering together. When it comes to problems, Moses says, "I'll take care of it." And I don't believe he's sinful at all, it's just the function of it all. It's the function. And that is a great debate in the church today, really causing leaders to argue. It's not what we do, it's how we do it.

Everyone wants to argue about the how. But really what matters is the what. Are we doing what God has called us to do, what he's commanded us to do? But how we do it is going to vary depending on who we are and our personalities. Even I think of churches, God raises up different churches for different types of people and different types of communities. And that's why when you may go on vacation somewhere and you're looking for a local Calvary there and you show up there, you walk in, it's a beautiful service, but so different.

So much is the same, but so different. Why? Well, you're not in Aurora anymore, that's why. God has a new community, a new place, a different pastor, different leadership. So much is the same, we do the what the same, but the how? And so you want to go and you go, "Well, we don't do that that way in our church." Hey, slow your roll a little bit. Wait a minute. What about the what? Are you teaching through the Bible? Yes. Are you loving people? Yes. Are you worshipping God? Yes, yes, yes. Then we're in fellowship with you.

You hold to the essentials of the historic Christian faith, the deity of Christ, the virgin birth, the resurrection, the things that are essential, the what. Then in the how, there's a lot of freedom. Isn't that great? Because there's so many different people in this room right now, so many different people listening and watching, so many different people. And you know what God says? "I'll use all of you just as you are." Your personality, the people that you meet, the hobbies you're into.

You like to fish, God's going to really make you a fisher of men because you like to fish. I don't like to fish, so I'm not going to be out there. I just don't understand fishing at all. I don't get it. But you love it. And so what are you going to meet? Other fishermen. You know where I'm going to meet people? At Costco. Because they cut it up and I don't even like fish, but they'll cut it up and put it in a package for you. And I'll bump into you when I'm like, "Oh, you're fishing?" "Yes, I'm fishing at Costco. Very easy and quick."

But God is so faithful that way. And so here, the nation, remember this because this is the same for our church, this is so vital. I wish that this kind of message you should teach to everybody on the weekends, but this is for you. So this is for you that want to press in on midweek. Listen, the nation like our church has a destination and a destiny that they're living out. They don't fully know it yet. You know why? Because they're caught up with all their problems.

They're caught up with their hunger. They're caught up with, "I don't have any food," even though manna is coming out of their mouth. They are stuck in the now, but God is taking them little by little into the future. They have a promised land up ahead. And there's something always ahead for us even as the church, but the enemy's wanting to get us stalled. And get us caught up in things that don't really matter. So that now we're upset with one another and, "I didn't get this" and "I want that" and "What about this?"

And like the early church, "I can't believe it, we're a widow, they're a widow, why are they getting more?" What do you mean they're not getting more? What happened to rejoicing in all that God has done? And like the nation here, we need to always be adapting so that we... like there's going to be a big change here in order to adapt to the needs that are before them. And it's a God-given change. Not just change to change, but it's God, he's doing the work here.

And we don't want to become stuck. Because there are times in our own lives, aren't there, where we get bogged down and weighed down, we get stalled, we hit the wall, we get stuck. And it can feel like you can get caught up in that so much it feels like you can't break the routine anymore. This is just the way it's going to be. The earlier days were better. "Oh, I wish I had the earlier days, I wish I had the earlier days." I'm sure the earlier days were glorious and wonderful, but so is today.

Today's just as glorious and wonderful, you know. God is at work today as much as he was back then. But we're stuck back then. We're stuck. And it's just a routine because God's doing something different now. And we need to walk into it. And we need to switch it up. We can't keep going this way. So notice now in verse 17. So Moses' father-in-law said to him, and you might just want to mark this because God will send people into your life the same way. You ready? It says right here, "The thing that you do is not good."

We should just close the Bible study right there. But we need to be ready to say that but also receive that. And pray through it. It may be right or wrong. For Jethro, it's 100% right because we have the whole story. But for someone to have the courage enough to come to you and say, "The thing that you're doing, saying, whatever is not good" is important. You got to listen to that. I'm hopeful. I mean, I know sometimes people do it for the wrong reasons and they might just be hurtful.

But with Jethro, this is not hurtful at all. You can see it's for the sake of the people. "Both you and these people," verse 18, "will surely wear themselves out. This thing's too much for you. You're not able to perform it by yourself. Listen now to my voice. I'll give you counsel and God will be with you." Which basically is Jethro as a new believer giving Moses counsel. Are you open to have a new believer give you counsel? I hope you are. Because they're so fresh and excited about the things of God.

And God sends them into your life to go, "I don't know, I mean, I love the Bible. Why don't you read the Bible anymore?" "Well, I've already read the Bible." Whatever. You need that new believer to come along. Basically he, if indeed he did get saved in this moment, which I think he did, now you got a new believer but also a well-respected man. At least the role. I know there are well-respected roles, father-in-law, that aren't always filled with well-respected men. I get that.

But let's give it to him. He's a well-respected man in a very well-respected role. He's like, "Bro, you just can't do this. You're going to wear everybody out. This isn't... you can't keep doing this. There has to be change." And here's his counsel. "Stand before God for the people so that you may bring the difficulties to God. And you shall teach them the statutes and the laws and show them the way in which they must walk and the work they must do."

"Moreover, you shall select from all the people able men such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness, and place such over them to be rulers of thousands, rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, rulers of tens. And let them judge the people at all times. Then it will be that every great matter they shall bring to you, but every small matter they themselves shall judge. So it will be easier for you. They will bear the burden with you."

"If you do this thing," verse 23, "and God so commands you," so it's like, "I got... here's my counsel, but take it to the Lord and if he confirms that there's wisdom, then you'll be able to endure and all this people also will go to their place in peace." So Moses heeded the voice of his father-in-law and did all that he had said. And Moses chose able men out of Israel, made them heads over the people, rulers of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens.

They judged the people at all times, but the hard cases they brought to Moses, but they judged every small case themselves. Then Moses let his father-in-law depart and he went his way to his own land. Isn't that amazing? Just such a great chapter. There was Moses doing the best that he could with what he had, and then God brings him somebody and says, "No, you can do it better. You're going to wipe yourself out." Jethro had seen that Moses just basically became a problem shuffler and all he did all day was listen to problems, listen to problems, listen to problems.

Hearing complaints, issues, and problems. You can't bear that. You can't bear that. And so it was solved by getting other people involved. Just like we learn in the book of Acts. We've already learned this in the early stages of the book of Acts with that issue with the widows. We're not going to leave the Word of God and prayer. So we're going to find able men that can handle this problem and lead the church into the future. And that's the model, we're almost out of time there, we don't have time to develop, but that's the model that we follow here.

That we collaboratively serve together. That we're partners in the ministry and that the lead pastor, senior pastor, whatever you want to call this role, I'm not the only one that can solve problems here. I'm not the only one that's needed here. As a matter of fact, I really can't be effective without the help that God has given me through able men and women like you and like the pastoral team and their families. It's a team, it's not one man. It's not Moses.

And unfortunately over time, this Moses leadership here that's repeated in the New Testament has been made fun of with this phrase of the Moses model. The Moses model. And it's been created into a caricature that the Moses model of leadership is he's only in charge and everyone else... It's nonsense. If you read this chapter, it's collaborative. It's cooperative. Yes, Moses has a responsibility that's unique to him, which is true even in your home, you married couples.

Did you know in the home, the husband has a unique role in the home that can only be fulfilled by him? Did you know that? That's God-ordained. God created that. It doesn't make him any more important than anyone else, it's just the role and the responsibility. And so I don't receive and I don't accept the caricature of the Moses model, the idea that God would raise up a man. And you can see that throughout James in the New Testament, Peter, Paul, Jesus, Moses, all the judges, the kings, even if they were bad.

And surround him with other men and for that sake women to serve alongside of him, that is a biblical teaching, not just Moses model. It's a Bible model. What happens with structures in the church, this is what we all have to watch out for. And you know there are different ways to oversee the church, different models of church government: Episcopalian, Presbyterian, pastor-led, all kinds of that. I've done this in previous studies. Here's the thing to watch out for.

If the model of church governance is biblical or is within the biblical teaching, like acceptable, then here's... considering all that, here's the most important part when it comes to church governance. If the model's biblical, it's actually the model is not as important as the men that fill the roles. That's the most important part. Which is why a couple weeks ago, maybe last week, I look at all the pastors in the room in our pastors' meeting that we have on Wednesdays and I look at them and I tell them, as I also tell myself, don't disqualify yourself.

It's one of the most important decisions you can make. Don't disqualify yourself. I mean, that's how it starts, right? When you neglect that thought. "Ah, it's no big deal, oh, it's no, I'll never get caught." That's where it starts, where you don't think, "You know what, Lord, I want to be usable for your kingdom." I want to be more usable, not less usable. I want to progress in what God has, I don't want less. I want to have more commitment and obedience, not compromise. So don't disqualify.

And I say that to us, to all of us. Live a life above reproach, let the Lord do his work in you and then we will bear the burden together. Amen? Do you believe in that? Did you see it? We're going to bear together. We take this counsel. We're going to do it together. I like to say and we say around here: we is the language of ministry. We do it together. We have our roles, our responsibilities for sure, and we take them very seriously, but nobody's a lone ranger around here. We all do it together.

You're just as important to the body of Christ than I am. And you go, "But Ed, you're a pastor." Yeah, but that's the role that God gave me. So you know what that makes me? Faithful. What's the role that God gave you? Are you walking in it? Are you living in it? Are you committed to it? If you say, "Yes, amen," you know what that makes you? Faithful. So now what does that make us? I'm faithful, you're faithful, guess what? We're faithful. And that's how we'll stand before the Bema seat of Christ. "Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of the Lord." Amen?

Guest (Male): Thanks for listening to Abounding Grace with Pastor Ed Taylor. We're going and growing through a study of Exodus right now. You can hear this message again online at aboundinggraceradio.com or listen through our app. Search for Ed Taylor in the App Store or Google Play. Well, maybe you're looking for a good book to go through. Here in the month of March, we picked out an excellent one written by Tim LaHaye and Bob Phillips. It's titled *Anger is a Choice*, and it provides counsel and exercises to help us better understand the causes of anger, how to control it, and how lack of control affects us physically and spiritually.

We'll send you a copy when you support Abounding Grace with a gift of $25 or more. Just call, ask for *Anger is a Choice*. Our number is 877-30-GRACE. That's 877-30-GRACE. You can also order online at calvaryco.store. Abounding Grace is made possible through the generous support of our listeners. And as we continue to deliver God's Word one verse at a time, we're looking to our listeners for help. Together we can reach people with the love and truth of Christ and make a difference in these last days.

To make a secure donation, drop by aboundinggraceradio.com or call 877-30-GRACE. Next time on Abounding Grace, we'll continue Pastor Ed Taylor's study of Exodus. Thank you for listening today and we'll look for you tomorrow as we open the Word together in search of God's abounding grace.

Guest (Male): Abounding Grace is brought to you by Calvary Church Colorado, here in Aurora.