MOVING FORWARD as a GREAT MINISTRY

REFLECTION: Acts 20:24

SERMON: Exodus 18:1-27

BENEDICTION: Romans 15:5-6

INTRO

Nobody wants to stay stuck!

And as much as many of think, we’d like to go back in time…it’s just not possible.

Maybe there was a simpler time for your family.

We parents see our kids growing up so fast, and are tempted to think it was “better” when they were younger.

You single women and men may look back to a previous group of friends that were tight…and now it’s not.

Kids may long for last year, their last vacation, a big event...

Sadly, death has taken many in our church family - there are more than a few moments when we want to “go back”

But that option is not available to us.

Many of us are wishing away today in the hopes of a perfect tomorrow!

We seem to be stuck in planning mode.

I’ll start this once we get to here...

(think DIET, EXERCISE, SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES)

We tend to RUN TOWARD DESIRE AND AWAY FROM DISCIPLINE…don’t we?

We get stuck in what could have been...

“If only, this person would have done that...”

“If only, I wouldn’t have done this...”

If only my person would have gotten in office...

Or maybe, like Napoleon Dynamite’s uncle Rico, you say “How much you wanna make a bet I can throw a football over them mountains?... Yeah... Coach woulda put me in fourth quarter, we would've been state champions. No doubt. No doubt in my mind.”

We’ve seen the danger of Israel’s romanticizing the past. When things got tough, their memory got fuzzy.

Now, they’re headed for the promised land - there will be battles ahead, victories, losses...

But one of the things I love about Chapter 18 is the normalcy of it.

We live in such a sensationalized, over-stimulated, “every-experience-has-to-be-an-over-the-top life-changing experience…sometimes, sometimes it’s good to remember that’s not the real world!

You don’t thrive in that climate.

You need an interruption like a Sunday morning at Grace Covenant Church - we’re not the only ones in town for sure -

but there is a reason that an increasing number of younger adults are becoming disenchanted with the high production weekend shows offered on the platforms at church gatherings…they are longing for something that doesn’t fill every moment with content.

a moment to think.

songs to sing communally that don’t appeal to hyper-emotionalism

Bible teaching and preaching that equips girls and boys and women and men for every-day ministry opportunities wherever they show up.

You can experience LIFE and POWER on a Sunday morning without all the hype. It’s not always quiet…but it’s not always loud.

TRANSITION

After reading about the trials, complaints, and battles of the Israelites, we move into a chapter that describes the camp of Israel as a quiet place of family fellowship and daily business...but recognizes the need to share in the work of ministry!

There is some question as to whether this chapter’s account occurs BEFORE Sinai or AFTERWARD. Does it matter?

Not really. Has no bearing on the integrity of Scripture or the Bible’s reliability.

In fact, it’s a great move to have it here to bridge (with this special moment) to Sinai from where they’ve been.

PUBLISH: THE LORD’S PROMINENCE

Notice the Reunion (18.1-6)

Exodus 18:1 ESV

1 Jethro, the priest of Midian, Moses’ father-in-law, heard of all that God had done for Moses and for Israel his people, how the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt.

Good News Travels Fast…if we publish it!

Good News brings people together!

Here’s something that’s interesting to note about Moses’ family:

Exodus 18:3 ESV

3 along with her two sons. The name of the one was Gershom (for he said, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land”),

Together the names Gershom and Eliezer tell the story of Moses’ life:

- “I was a stranger there,

- but God is my helper.”

They tell the story of the nation of Israel:

Like Moses, the Israelites were strangers in Egypt.

But God was their helper; he saved them from Pharaoh’s sword.

They tell the story of us when we come to faith in Jesus Christ.

We move from sin—with all the alienation it brings—to salvation, in which we acknowledge God as our only help!

Notice the Respect (18.7-8)

Standard Eastern greeting (v7)

there was a culturally-appropriate point of contact.

You can’t have community without contact.

HOWEVER,

You cannot go deep in the hustle and bustle of the crowd

You cannot get below the surface without stepping out of the cultural norm

They moved inside the tent toward a more intimate gathering

Hint: There are things that happen in our BIBLE STUDY GROUPS that CANNOT happen in our large gatherings - AT ALL AGES

It’s the reason I invite you to stay and pray after the service…there’s something pretty special about taking a step of faith toward accountability.

SLIDE / Covenant relationships move us from casual salutations toward meaningful conversations.

Moses goes into detail...

Exodus 18:8 ESV

8 Then Moses told his father-in-law all that the Lord had done to Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel’s sake, all the hardship that had come upon them in the way, and how the Lord had delivered them.

The LORD is the main attraction here of this incredible account.

How is your testimony?

(I just posted a helpful tool on our website under the “blog” section that will help you write out your testimony.) If we’re not intentional about these things, we wind up talking more about us, more about our struggle…or victory than we do the LORD. Remember - the LORD is the main attraction of our lives.

Paul illustrated this well when he was before King Agrippa in Acts 26.

Acts 26:4-11 - HIS LIFE BEFORE CHRIST

Acts 26:12-19 - HIS ENCOUNTER WITH THE GOSPEL / CHRIST

Acts 26:20-23 - HIS LIFE NOW BECAUSE OF CHRIST

Notice the Right Focus of the Story (18.9-12)

Since the LORD is the main attraction - Jethro’s response is to Praise the LORD

LOOK AT THE TEXT (EXODUS 18:9-12)

WHY IS THIS SUCH A BIG DEAL?

Because Jethro hadn’t yet come to know the LORD as the one true God. HE was still the PRIEST OF MIDIAN - a pagan people.

He was like many people today who think that all religions are more or less equal. They follow the popular, “Worship any way you like, as long as you mean it. God won’t mind.”

The trouble is that God does mind.

He sent his one and only Son into the world to be the one and only Savior.

The name of God’s Son is Jesus Christ. Concerning him the Scripture says, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

This is why Christians carry such a heavy burden for the salvation of their family members.

We believe that Jesus is the only way to God and that unless we trust in him we will be separated from God forever. The decision people make about Jesus Christ marks the difference between life and death.

So more than almost anything else in the whole world, we want our wives and husbands, our mothers and fathers, our sisters and brothers, and all our friends and relatives to know Jesus Christ, finding salvation in him, and come to have a LIVING RELATIONSHIP WITH HIM.

So like Jethro, they can proclaim:

Exodus 18:10–11 ESV

10 Jethro said, “Blessed be the Lord, who has delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh and has delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians. 11 Now I know that the Lord is greater than all gods, because in this affair they dealt arrogantly with the people.”

Notice the Real Climax (18.12)

In verse 12 we see something remarkable happen:

Exodus 18:12 ESV

12 And Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, brought a burnt offering and sacrifices to God; and Aaron came with all the elders of Israel to eat bread with Moses’ father-in-law before God.

Don’t rush past this moment. This could, in fact, be the climax of the exodus.

- So far in the story we’ve had people treading on holy ground.

- We’ve had spectacular plagues of blood, frogs, gnats and hail.

- We’ve seen the death of every firstborn Egyptian.

- We’ve had pillars of cloud and fire connecting earth and sky.

- We’ve seen a highway cut through the sea with walls of water on either side.

- We’ve seen bitter water made sweet and manna appearing from heaven.

But the truly remarkable climax of all this astonishing drama is a meal.

NOT JUST ANY MEAL…

IT’S A MEAL IN THE PRESENCE OF GOD!

to which the nations are invited.

it’s a meal that joins the Gentile and the Hebrew.

The Bible tells this story of Jethro’s salvation because it shows how God was working out his plan for the salvation of the world.

Salvation was never just for the Jews. From the very beginning, God intended to save people from all nations. This was even part of his plan for the exodus.

God said to Pharaoh that he was bringing his people out of Egypt so “that I might show you my power and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth” (Exod. 9:16).

A priest from Midian was virtually the first fulfillment of that promise, as Moses proclaimed salvation to Jethro.

- The dramas come and go. They live on only in the memory.

- The nations (Jew and Gentile) are brought together by a sacrifice to eat a meal in the presence of God. But the meal continues.

- The presence of God continues.

PRAISE THE LORD!

God not only uses our pain for His glory!

He not only saves others through the witness of our testimonies…

PRACTICE: THE LORD’S GUIDANCE

(vv 13-27)

Notice the Transparency in Ministry (18.13-16)

If we take the pastoral burdens of a large congregation and multiply them by a thousand, we will get some idea of the challenges that Moses faced in leading Israel.

Moses governed a nation of one million people or more all by himself. The workload was staggering.

In verse 13, we see perhaps the world’s first case of judicial backlog.

Moses had no end of work to do.

Notice the Truthful, Compassionate Counsel (18.17-23)

At one level, this is a simple example of the wisdom of delegating responsibility. And it is striking that Moses, the man of God, is happy to adopt this wisdom from the Gentile world.

But the book of Exodus is not a book on management practice! This story is here because it paves the way for the giving of the law. Israel needs a system for resolving legal disputes because Israel is about to become a nation governed by the rule of law, the rule of God’s law.

It also serves as a prototype for

ELDER-LED congregations in the New Testament (and today)

SMALLER GROUPS ministering to one another in word and deed

Notice the Teachable Spirit (18.24-27)

Moses listens.

Moses chose.

Moses made them heads...

THEY Judged...

THEY decided...

As Maxie Dunnam explains, “It wasn’t a matter of taking leadership from Moses; it was a matter of reordering and dispensing leadership in such a way that other people would share the load.”

Romans 12:3-6

These verses (are some of many that) give us a vaccine against a one-man show in church ministry:

Don’t think of yourself more than you should.

Use good judgement

We are many members that make up one body - each of us belongs to all of us.

We have different gifts, according to God’s grace.

AND TOGETHER, WE WORK TO BUILD HIS KINGDOM

We will not stay stuck!

We will not live in the past!

We will not only look to tomorrow!

We will take our cues from the Old Testament formula in Exodus, fleshed out in the early churches of the New Testament to be...

REALIZE A GREAT MINISTRY

Gathers together with covenant purpose

Makes the LORD the main attraction

Talks about the LORD

Rejoices in the LORD

Shares the work of ministry

Shares resources to meet needs

Conclusion

I wonder, do you have a story to tell? A song to sing? Because of what the LORD has done for you?

I’m not talking about getting you out of a jam...

The story of our Exodus starts with our bondage to sin. Our entire race sinned in Adam, and thus we have always been enslaved to sin.

But after long centuries of captivity God sent a Savior to deliver us. It was his Son Jesus who saved us through his death on the cross.

The Bible says that God the Son became a man “so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil—and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death” (Heb. 2:14b, 15).

This was our Red Sea crossing. The crucifixion—and with it, the resurrection—brought us from death to life, from bondage to freedom.

But that is not the end of the story. In a way, it is only the beginning. Now we are living for Christ, following him through the wasteland.

As we walk this pilgrim road, we have a story to tell about how, in spite of our ongoing rebellion, God provides for us and delivers us from all our enemies.

And because of HIM and HIS working in and through us…the nations will gather around the table to feast at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb!

Will you be among that number? You can.

But not if stay stuck in your rebellion against this loving and compassionate God.

Repent of your sins. Trust in Jesus. Follow Him today!

PRAY