Good morning, everyone. It's a privilege to be here this morning. I'm pastor at Bellevue Chapel.
Not very long yet. We moved here last August and are just slowly settling in.
Well, it's a great privilege to be invited here this morning.
Well, I'm from the Netherlands. Sometimes when I speak somewhere, the two questions I seem to get
that seem to worry people throughout the sermon are both, what accent is that?
I just try to sound cool, so I'm trying them all. Some people say I'm Canadian or Australian or Irish.
I see my wife is Irish, so it's a real mixture. So just to help you with that confusion.
And the other question I often get is, so how tall are you? Well, I'm six foot eight,
so you don't have to worry about that either. So hopefully then you can listen to this sermon as it is.
But it's a great privilege to be part of this series, The Great Escape. I've tried.
I couldn't listen to them all, but I've tried to listen to one or two of the sermons already
because I think you've had a little gap and you've just picked it up again.
And the thing that struck me when I was listening was one sermon where John was explaining the fact
that it's not just about the great escape because that's only the start of the journey.
And however important that is, the second half is as important. It's about getting to safety.
And I think in that context, you'll and we'll together hopefully will understand what is happening here
in this exchange between a father-in-law and his son-in-law.
I mean, a beautiful picture of an elderly person, not, you know, sorry, a person older than, you know,
passing advice on to the younger. And how beautiful would that not be if this is a community where that happens,
both where the youngers are willing to take advice from some of the older men and women
who have a little bit more live experience and wisdom in that sense,
but also vice versa, that you who have been around for longer will not shy away,
but with grace explain the ways and the paths of God.
But let's look at this passage together.
Really what we've had so far in Exodus has been a roller coaster.
And what struck me about this picture in this chapter is that it's peculiarly mundane.
There's nothing exciting happening.
There's no seas splitting. There's no water coming out of a rock.
There's none of that, but there's Moses at his work.
We read in verse 13,
The next day Moses took a seat to serve as judge for the people,
and they stood around him from morning till evening.
This is like a day in the life of Moses, a day in the office.
And I wonder how Moses felt about this part, this side of his responsibility.
I think every job has a side that we're not always that keen on.
Maybe it's the administration.
You'd rather be out there with the people, or maybe it's vice versa.
You're not that keen on working with people, but you love the administration.
Well, I wonder how this would work.
You know, Moses waking up, opening up the tent.
There they are, yet again, wondering what will it be today.
More grumbling, more complaints.
How am I going to deal with these people?
There certainly is a sense that Moses, however he felt about it, is starting to grow weary.
Interestingly, though, it reminded me of the fact that actually there used to be a time
that people could visit the White House in Washington.
This was stopped way before the Second World War,
but the president, as the representative of the people,
would have opened up, quite often on a Friday,
the White House for anyone to queue up to seek wisdom or advice straight from the president.
Can you imagine that now?
But that's the picture we get now.
People queuing to see Moses.
Now, a lot of people have wondered what this chapter can teach us today.
A lot of people seem to think this has lots of lessons on leadership.
Others get the impression that maybe this is the start of a court system,
where you have a high court and a smaller court,
and that helps to spread the load.
Well, this morning I want to borrow some words from an Old Testament expert called Alec Moutier,
who wrote a commentary on this,
to help us understand maybe what is underlying all of that is happening in this chapter.
This is what he says.
He says,
The whole tone of verse 13 to 27 sounds administrative and legalistic,
but leaving it at this level is missing the point.
It's not an account of the setting up of a lower and higher courts and even a Supreme Court as such,
but of making arrangements whereby the word of God was made available right down to the smallest group,
the extended family,
so that daily life could be ordered according to the will of God.
Alec Moutier believes that this is all about arranging that the word of God would reach down to everybody,
even the smallest child in the extended family.
Isn't that interesting?
And for this word of God then to be what would lead and guide the people of God
and mold and shape them into being the people of God.
One thing that might help and why he comes to this conclusion is if we look at the wording.
Look with me to verse 16.
It's not on the slide,
but verse 16,
we read there that Moses sees his own role as informing the people of God's decrees and laws.
Or in other translations,
it might say statues of God.
That comes back in verse 20,
where his role is seen as showing them the way to live.
Now these words,
statutes,
decrees,
law,
that's kind of Torah language.
Torah being the first five books of Moses,
which was never meant in the mind of a Jew as being exclusively about rules and laws or the Ten Commandments,
but very much about the known word of God at that time.
How we know that is by reading,
for example,
Psalm 119.
Unfortunately,
it doesn't get read very often because it's so long,
but it's one of the most beautiful Psalms that praises God simply for his word,
his word.
And we have the word in its all completeness,
including the New Testament,
which explains to us who the person of Jesus Christ is.
We are incredibly rich.
And Psalm 119 uses exactly those words,
decrees and laws and rules.
And we sometimes get a little bit cringy about those words.
We're not that excited about decrees and laws,
but how crucial and how important.
Because ultimately,
if it comes to not just escaping,
but also getting to safety,
it is actually the word of God,
which will,
in their lives as well as ours,
manage exactly that.
We need today the word of God more than ever before.
If we've become a Christian,
it's not the way to just take that step,
but to continue to follow in that step
and to end up in safety.
We need these decrees and laws to shape and mold us
and to form our everyday life
so that we continue to follow him faithfully.
And that is exactly what this chapter is about.
Making the word of God available
to the smallest group ever.
For it was and still is this word of God
which will lead all of us as his people to safety.
People, we must never underestimate this.
We must never take away from both the authority
and the power of this word
I sometimes wonder in the visual age that we live in
that we think that books, you know,
black and white,
sheets of paper are from the past.
They can't teach us much anymore.
You know, I'm a visual learner
or I want to experience.
And however valuable that is,
ultimately God has chosen his word
to explain to us how we get to safety.
Unfortunately, there's a slight blip
because the way that Moses was going about
getting that word available to everybody
wasn't working.
Verse 18, Jethro says,
you and these people who come to you
will only wear yourselves out.
The work is too heavy for you.
You cannot handle it alone.
Moses, unfortunately,
however much you want to desire
to pass on God's directions to people's lives,
the way you do it doesn't work.
So in comes this person,
Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses,
and he comes in with advice
on how this is to be accomplished.
But listen how he does that.
In verse 17, for example,
he basically tells him,
what you do is no good.
I mean, how are we with advice?
I've been doing a little bit of research
and you constantly come across this phrase
where we love giving advice.
It's one of the greatest pleasures in life, isn't it?
We're always ready to point out to somebody,
hey, maybe you should do it this way or that way.
Certainly where I'm from in the Netherlands,
there's lots of what I call unsolicited advice.
You know, people just speak their mind
and in some ways it's nice,
but in other times I'm thinking,
you know, maybe you could have just kept that to yourself.
We're not good at receiving advice.
It can sometimes just simply be because of pride.
Because of stubbornness.
Because we think we know better.
I mean, Moses had a right to be thinking,
Jethro, who are you?
You haven't seen the things that I've seen.
You haven't experienced God the way I have.
And here you come and telling me how it should be done.
I came across this newspaper article
about what kind of advice people value.
Well, one I found interesting.
It says, if you want to be happily married,
marry a happy person.
And this seriously was somebody famous
who thought this was the best advice he'd ever given.
Or here's Gordon Ramsay, the chef.
The advice he'd been given
and that has helped him the most in life is,
put your head down and work hard.
Similarly, the tennis player,
Goran Ivanevich, that one.
He won Wimbledon, I think, once.
He learned in his life,
never give up.
If you keep believing and trying,
anything can happen.
Or somebody else said,
aim high even if you hit a cabbage.
Well, let's see if that's the advice that Jethro gives.
I'm glad, actually, he doesn't.
He doesn't go up to Moses and say,
well, just keep your head down and keep going.
But you'll get there.
No, this is what he says.
And there's three things.
First of all, he tells Moses,
and I think it's advice to all of us,
if we are serious here at Brunsfield,
to making sure that God's word
is made available to each and every one
so that all of us will end up reaching safety.
He says, first of all,
let God be in this with you.
Let God be in this with you.
Verse 19, the second half.
This is what Jethro says.
He says, you must be the people's representative
before God and bring their disputes to him.
I wonder what Jethro meant by saying,
you know, make sure that God is in it too.
Seems very obvious, doesn't it?
But the impression we're getting
is that Moses was maybe starting
to rely too much on himself.
He alone sits to judge the people.
It's that idea where maybe
even after all the big victories
that he'd seen and seen happen
right in front of his eyes,
he might have started to think,
you know, maybe I can do this myself.
You certainly get the idea
that Moses as leader is saying,
well, it's now down to me to help these people.
Well, I'm their leader.
Look, they're coming to see me.
Maybe with that sense of pride
of, you know, feeling needed,
needing to be needed.
And so Moses was maybe more self-reliant
than God-reliant.
And I wonder how that works with us.
I mean, I can easily fall into that.
We've just started at Bellevue.
We've had lots of encouragements.
We had a baptismal service
a couple of months ago.
And all of a sudden,
there's a big surprise.
There's six people,
six precious lives
wanting to be baptized,
publicly showing the world
that they love Jesus.
But somehow, as a pastor,
and I bet John can struggle with that too,
you start thinking,
okay, so now it's down to me.
I need to try to orchestrate
another great baptismal service.
We've got to get programs in there.
We've got to, you know,
have lots of structure
to make it happen.
But time and time again,
I think this is the lesson
that I need to learn the most.
making sure that God is in it with me,
with us.
Because ultimately,
it's God that can truly make the difference
in people's lives.
It's God, through the work of His Spirit,
that can truly make sure
that God's Word doesn't just reach up here,
but reaches down here
and really starts changing lives.
And yet, however obvious it seems
that we should always be involved in God
in whatever goes on,
especially when it comes to God's Word,
time and time again,
somehow that human default is,
actually, it's down to me.
Even think of your own spiritual growth.
How many of us, even there,
rely more on ourselves than on God?
It's down to me.
I've got to make sure I read my Bible.
I've got to pray better.
I've got to spend more time with God.
When do we ever pause
and remember verses
like Philippians 2.12
where, and 13,
where Paul so eagerly reminds his readers,
it is God who wills for us
to serve Him,
to seek Him,
to work out our salvation.
We need God to be in this
very much
and not to be self-reliant.
If not,
we're going to wear ourselves out.
We're going to maybe even be making other people
rely too much on ourselves as well.
And you know,
this should be a great relief.
Maybe we're sitting here today
and we've been feeling weary
about our walk with Jesus.
We've been actually wondering,
you know,
I know I should have a hunger
and a thirst for God,
but I feel tired.
I feel spiritually tired.
What a great relief
that God is so eager
if we only let Him.
If only we let Him.
So that's the first thing.
Let God be in this with you.
Secondly,
He says teach.
And I would add the word
teach to illuminate.
Not eliminate,
illuminate.
Sorry.
Verse 20.
He says,
teach them
His decrees
and instructions
and show them the way
they are to live
and how they are to behave.
I find it interesting
that I think there's a difference
between preaching and teaching.
Now,
I wouldn't say anything bad
about preaching.
I guess that's what I'm doing
this morning.
I'm preaching.
I'm explaining
or trying to explain
God's word to you.
But I think preaching
should never stand on its own.
There's a wonderful picture
in the book of Nehemiah
where after the rebuilding
of the temple
and the rebuilding of the wall,
the word of God
gets rediscovered.
I don't know if you're familiar
with this,
but then the great Ezra
is asked to read
from God's word.
And the picture
is something like this.
The massive crowd
is packed
in this market square.
They're asking Ezra to read.
And Ezra simply reads
a section of God's word.
And this goes on
for most of the day
because people are so thirsty,
so hungry for God's word.
I haven't heard it
read for so long.
But every so often
he stops reading
because behind him
there was a team
of helpers,
of Levites
who would then
go out into the crowd
and I can only imagine
what they did
was basically
gather smaller groups together,
maybe a 40 or 50,
and ask them,
have you understood
God's word?
And I reckon
they wouldn't have moved on
until all the questions
were answered,
until every question
that somebody had,
you know,
I'm not sure,
I heard that,
but did I hear that right?
Is that what that means to me?
Until everybody
had understood
what had been read,
they would have moved on.
Well, that's exactly
what should happen
in the makeup
of any church,
that there should be teaching,
teaching in the sense
of equipping,
teaching in the sense
of helping one another.
You know,
sometimes we call it
discipleship,
but that's,
you know,
maybe a technical term
for basically
helping one another,
giving each other tools
to end up being equipped
to handle God's word ourselves.
I think we're growing up
in a culture
and a society
where we're starting
to become too dependent
on some spectacular speaker
who's got it all
worked out for us
and they churn out
the answers
and I'm not blaming
them necessarily.
I think some of the blame
is on us.
It's easy to find,
you know,
this speaker on the internet.
It's all out there.
But I think
and I wonder
if it's made us lazy
and I wonder
what will happen
in another generation
if we don't keep
helping each other,
if we don't keep teaching
in a way
that equips others,
the next generation,
even the people around us,
people who've just
become a Christian,
to help them
to read God's word
themselves.
If Moses had to learn
to become less people-focused
and more God-focused
and more God-reliant,
I think the people
were challenged
to be less Moses-focused
and more word-focused,
if that makes sense.
And I know you guys
love John
and I love John,
but I think John would,
you know,
the last thing
he would want to see happen
is that you're just
simply sitting here for him
because he's got
the words of wisdom.
John eagerly wants
all of us
to read God's word
for ourselves
so that all of us
aren't depending on him
or his ministry
or on anybody's ministry.
If you're a youth leader
or any type,
if you're a home group leader,
it should not be dependent
on you.
We should always point people
back to God's word.
In order for people
to get to safety,
Moses had to
do some rethinking.
And thirdly this.
So Moses was challenged
to let God be in this.
He was to teach,
to illuminate.
And thirdly this.
He says,
But select capable men,
in verse 21,
from all the people,
men who fear God,
trustworthy men
who hate dishonest gain,
and appoint them
as officials
over thousands,
hundreds,
fifties,
and tens.
In other words,
multiply.
Multiply.
Certainly at Bellevue,
we're trying to create
a culture
where we multiply.
Where we're looking out
for people.
I mean,
this is very Paul,
isn't it?
If you're familiar
with Paul writing
to a certain Timothy,
these are the same instructions.
Find people
to equip them
to equip others.
constantly be multiplying.
Multiply rather than divide.
That's why I'm so glad
that Moses didn't get
the advice
that we read about
in the newspaper
about, you know,
just get on with it.
Just be better organized
so that you can see
more people.
And just see them
in shorter time,
you know,
slots.
So you can get
through more people.
That would have been ridiculous.
Instead,
look out
for people
who have
the capability,
who fear God,
who are trustworthy,
who are also just
in all that they do.
Interestingly though,
if that's the call
to multiply,
that's, I guess,
a call to the leadership
of this church
and anyone in leadership,
but it also makes
anyone else
who's not in leadership
with the challenge,
are you then available?
Do we have people here
who are capable
and just
in all they do?
People who fear God.
If not,
can we make ourselves
available?
And say,
I want to get involved
in this work
of God's word
to help people
get to safety.
John can't do it
on his own.
The elders can't do it
on his own,
on their own.
We must invest.
You know,
I think the big risk
here is,
sometimes it's easier
to say,
oh, I'll do it myself.
You don't,
in the short term,
you don't see
quick changes
when you envision
to multiply
and to train.
But in the long term,
God's work
is going to continue
long after us.
And isn't that
the focus
that it should be about?
But again,
it's almost
countercultural.
We're,
we grew up
in a world
where it's all
about ego.
It's all about,
you know,
if you're a minister,
your big career moves
are,
get that book written,
get your name
on there.
So you can invite
lots to other
churches,
conference,
that kind of thing.
It's the upside down
logic of what
Jethro passes
on to Moses.
Can I share
one last thing?
So this is the advice
he gives
and this is
the advice
we should take today
if we're eager
to help one another
to get to safety.
It is
by making sure
God's word
is made available
to each and every one.
But there's a great
sense of humor
about God.
We haven't looked
at the first half yet
of this chapter,
but really the first half
of the chapter
is Jethro's
conversion story.
Jethro,
as far as we can tell,
has only just become
a Christian the day before.
Chapter 17 and 18,
as far as we can see,
describe two days.
And it's lovely
to think that
God, first of all,
provides water
from a rock,
then he provides
the victory
over an enemy,
and then he provides
for Jethro,
the gospel,
and for Moses,
Jethro,
God of provision.
But if we read
in verse,
sorry,
verse 9 through 12,
we see there,
we're just skipping
a few verses,
we see there
at Jethro,
after hearing
all that Moses
told him that God
had done
and how he'd rescued
them,
we see that Jethro
was delighted.
He rejoiced.
It hit him.
It cut him to the heart.
And then he said,
praise be to the Lord
who rescued you
from the hand
of the Egyptians.
But he doesn't leave
it at that.
It's not your God.
But then he says,
now I know
that the Lord
is greater
than all the other gods.
and he responds.
He brings offerings
and sacrifices
to God
and then we see
that he's even
welcomed in
and accepted
into the covenant
community
of the people
of Israel.
Isn't that amazing?
A new Christian,
a new Christian
who wasn't even
part of the Jewish people,
a Gentile,
is used
as part of God's
redemption history
in such an
extraordinary way.
Well, that's God.
Because when you look
even through the genealogy
of the birth of Jesus
time and again,
we see these surprising people,
Rahab, Ruth,
and a Jethro
who God calls
and uses them
as part of his great work.
If you would wonder,
you know,
who are we in this story?
Well, actually,
we would be Jethro.
We are also Gentiles
who have had the privilege
of being allowed
to taste
of the good news
and were crafted
into the people of God.
What a great privilege.
What a great joy.
But if that has happened
in our lives,
I hope we also know
that God then longs
to use us
maybe in a very similar way
to how he used Jethro
in the life
of his people.
Let's pray together.
Let's maybe take a moment
in silence.
Maybe just ask ourselves,
how much do I value
God's word?
How much do I value
your word?
Heavenly Father,
help us to see
how crucially important
your living word is
to help us get to safety.
Help us to see that
as a church
and to take steps
if that isn't already happening
and making sure
that your word
is made available.
Not just here on a Sunday,
but whenever we meet,
whether it's one-on-one
or beside somebody's sick bed
or even at the funeral
this coming week.
Lord,
to open up your word faithfully,
to look and learn
your decrees and statutes
and to help each other
to equip one another
to be able to read it
for ourselves
and know that your Holy Spirit
will help us to understand it.
Thank you for your goodness.
How rich are we not
to have your word
in its completeness?
And thank you for Jethro
for a great reminder
that this gospel
is for everyone,
including the outsiders,
the marginalized.
And thank you that
you then use
this outsider
not just to taste
of your great escape,
but to be part
of your great escape
and to help others
get to safety.
Lord,
thank you so much
for teaching us.
And I want to pray
for this church
that as they continue
to look through
this book of Exodus,
that you will continue
to bring your word
and bring it alive
for your glory
and for the sake
of your people.
In Jesus' name,
Amen.