Men Exodus chapter 18 the Bible reads in verse 1 when Jethro the priest of
Midian Moses father-in-law heard of all that God had done for Moses and for
Israel his people and that the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt then Jethro
Moses father-in-law took Zipporah Moses wife after he'd sent her back and her
two sons of which the name of the one was Gershom for he said I've been an
alien in a strange land and the other was Eliezer for the God of my father
said he was my help and delivered me from the sword affair and Jethro Moses
father-in-law came with the sons of his wife unto Moses into the wilderness
where he encamped at the mount of God so this chapter pretty much revolves around
this character Jethro and this character Jethro is a little bit of a
mystery in the sense that we don't really know that much about him or where
he's coming from just to refresh your memory back in chapter 2 of Exodus when
Moses flees Egypt and he had killed the Egyptian and Pharaoh is gonna kill Moses
so he gets out of there and he flees into the desert and he ends up helping
out this guy's daughters when they're drawing water and so he ends up meeting
Jethro and the Bible says that he was content to dwell with the man and so he
ends up working for Jethro just having a humble job of keeping the flocks of
Jethro and he ends up marrying Jethro's daughter Zipporah now the Bible
describes Jethro as the priest of Midian you know so you're wondering like is
this guy worshipping the God of the Bible I mean is this guy worshipping the
true God is he that is he a good priest or is he just some kind of priest of
whatever paganism or you know who knows what the guys into right it's the Bible
doesn't really say anything beyond that he's a priest of Midian okay and then
when we get into this chapter we get a little bit more of a feel for this guy
because when Moses ends up telling Jethro about the victories down in Egypt
and the plagues and how they brought the people out and I mean Jethro looks and
sees that there's a couple million people here that have come out of Egypt
let's look at Jethro's reaction look at verse 9 it says and Jethro rejoiced for
all the goodness which the Lord and notice the capital L capital O capital
R capital D so this is specifically referring to Jehovah here it's not just
the Lord in general it could be another religion or something I mean this is the
God of the Bible it says which the Lord had done to Israel whom he had delivered
out of the hand of the Egyptians and Jethro said blessed be the Lord who had
delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh
who had delivered the people from a from under the hand of the Egyptians now I
know that the Lord is greater than all gods for in the thing wherein they dealt
proudly he was above them so you know when you read that statement well now I
know that the Lord's above all gods you know I guess you could take that a
couple different ways because if you take it in the sense of well now I know
that I didn't used to know that then it makes it seem like he's into other gods
or that he's his religion is not pointed toward the true God but now he
knows that the Lord is the true God so then you could look at it as you know
now he's hearing this word being preached to him and he believes in the
Lord now and and this is his conversion right here to worshiping the true God
okay or you could just take it as you know hey I always believed in the Lord I
was always trusting the Lord but now I I know and understand his greatness to a
higher level you know than I did before now that I've seen this great
manifestation of his power or what he's capable of so that's why I say this is a
little bit of a mystery here it's hard to just come down for sure and say yeah
this guy is for sure the priest of most I got because you know the Bible teaches
that there's the Levitical priesthood that God instituted at Mount Sinai and
then there's the other priest after the order of Melchizedek you know where does
this Jethro fit into the program of any kind of a priesthood it doesn't seem
like this guy's priesthood is legit you know what I mean it seems like he's kind
of just this cowboy of a priest in that sense you know what I mean it doesn't
seem like he's sanctioned but you know could it be possible that he's worshiping
the right God but he's just kind of taken on an unsanctioned title of being
priest whatever that meant to him we don't really know that's why there's a
lot of mystery around this character Jethro but what we do see is that now
he's trusting the Lord now he believes right and then later his son is going to
be invited in Numbers chapter 10 verse 29 to join with the nation of Israel the
famous statement by Moses where he says come with us and we will do thee good he
says to this guy's son you know so in essence his brother-in-law he says come
with us and we'll do thee good and the guy says no no I'm gonna go do my own
thing he says no I really want you to come with us because you know the
wilderness and you can help us you can help guide us and so forth so that's
pretty much all we know about Jethro there's not a lot in scripture on this
character but let's assume for a minute that this guy is or was you know part of
a false religion earlier and he's just now converting well then the lesson that
we could learn is that you could still get great advice from your parents or in
this case in-laws or older wiser people even if they're not necessarily
Christians or saved the Bible says the children of this world are wiser in
their generation than the children of light so even if your parents aren't
saved they still could just impart to you certain character lessons or so you
don't want to just have this attitude oh my parents aren't saved therefore my
parents are scum and meaningless and and have nothing to offer and there are some
people who have that attitude sometimes you get these zealous new believers and
because their parent isn't saved they act like oh my parent is just a complete
idiot or something look you need to still honor your father and mother even
if your father mother aren't saved even if they're mixed up in a false religion
and you should focus on the things that you like about your parents focus on the
good things that your parents have given you and even heathen parents maybe they
taught you a work ethic or maybe they you know just practical things maybe
they just taught you this tip or that tip and you should be thankful for those
things and honor and respect your parents as much as you possibly can even
if they're not a hundred percent right or maybe they're not even saved still
try to get what you can from them because sometimes people that are older
might just have wisdom in certain areas of life just because they've been around
and if you're smart you'll listen to people and you know Jethro gives him
some great advice here and he listens to it he doesn't say like well who do you
think you are I'm God's man here you know I'm the guy who's who ordained you
priest my brother Aaron's about to be the high priest and I don't think you
fit into this program you know he still is willing to listen to his practical
advice because Jethro in this chapter just gives him some really practical
advice about delegating it's not like a spiritual teaching here it's more just
look man the pace that you're going you're gonna burn out let me help you
you need to delegate you need to be in this thing for the long haul you're
gonna wear out here's a system of how to organize the congregation and he ends up
listening and following it and God blesses it and it's great advice now
here's what's interesting though this guy Jethro like I said there's very
little in Scripture on him not a lot here but you know there's actually a
religion that claims this guy Jethro as their founder and this religion has
almost a million people in it believe it or not you've probably never even heard
of it okay it's called the Druze who's ever heard of it D R U Z E D R U Z E so
this is a small religion you know when you think of seven and a half billion
people in the world but still there are about eight hundred thousand to a
million members of this religion called the Druze now I didn't say Jews okay so
YouTube don't give me a strike now okay I'm talking about the Druze all right D
R U Z E is the name of this religion now that's not what they call themselves
though that's what outsiders call them what they call themselves is it you know
it's in Arabic but the way it would translate it in English is the people of
monotheism right so they they're really obsessed and into the fact that they
only worship one God and they're really into the oneness of God okay now this
religion if you look at it is like a total Antichrist religion because it's
all about just like mixing faiths and it's the it's like a total hybrid of
religion let me just explain to you a little bit about this religion called
the Druze okay it's considered an Abrahamic faith because you know it's
monotheistic and you know it'll be classified with like Christianity Islam
Judaism and this tiny religion called the Druze well what it actually is
historically is a spin-off from Islam okay so it developed as a spin-off from
Islam originally around a thousand AD and the people who belong to this
religion live in Lebanon Syria Israel and Jordan so it's right all in that
region there of the Palestine region and the people in this religion they believe
in reincarnation okay so if you look at this it's like half Eastern mysticism
and half so-called Abrahamic faith because of the fact that they believe
that they're going to be reincarnated and that you keep getting reincarnated
until you finally merge with the supreme consciousness you know you merge with
look that's exactly what Hinduism teaches that's pretty much like Buddhism
with Nirvana is is not that different and so and even the Greek Orthodox
Church teaches this thing about merging with God and and becoming one with God
and everything like that so they believe in being reincarnated now one of the
differences with Hinduism is that Hinduism believes that you might get
reincarnated as an animal like you could go from person to animal animal from
person these people believe that you just you only come back as a person you
don't come back as an animal okay but here's the thing is it interesting how
all these false religions always want to emphasize the oneness of God so you've
got the Muslims right and they have a whole big doctrine about oneness and
they they harp on that that God is one God has no Sun and it's just one and
then of course the Jews they say this thing every single morning where they
they misquote the Bible and they say hero Israel the Lord our God the Lord is
one so they give this thing about the oneness of God that's not what the Bible
actually says what it actually says hero Israel the Lord our God is one
Lord so it's one Lord meaning there's only one Jehovah it's not multiple but
what they're trying to say is that God is one like that's his attribute he's
this oneness God really that's funny because one of the first things God ever
said was let us make man in our image there goes oneness out the window in
Genesis chapter 1 of your Torah that you claim to read but the problem is you're
reading it blindfolded according to 2nd Corinthians chapter 3 if you don't
believe in Jesus Christ when you believe in Jesus Christ the Bible says the veil
is removed now you can understand scripture and in Genesis 1 it's let us
make man at our image because God is not a oneness God God is a Trinity the
Father the Son and the Holy Ghost that's who God is and always has been so you
got the Jews that are into oneness you got Islam that's into oneness you and if
you just Google the word oneness with nothing else just Google the word
oneness all the results are Hinduism it's like a page of Hinduism so you got
Hindus Muslims Jews okay and then you have the oneness Pentecostals where they
believe that Jesus is actually God the Father and that there was no such thing
as the Son of God in the Old Testament it was just Jesus it's called the Jesus
only movement okay and now you're even having evangelical Christians and
Baptists getting sucked into this false doctrine that denies the biblical
teaching on the Trinity okay and when we say the Trinity by the way we're talking
about the standard traditional Orthodox view of the Trinity not some weird
twist on it or spin on it okay we're talking about the classic view of the
Trinity one God three persons and all that I'm not gonna go into that
because that's not what the sermons about but the point is this religion the
Druze is gonna be perfect for the Antichrist oh and by the way they
believe that the guy who founded their religion they believe that he never
really died that he's just hiding somewhere and he's gonna have like a
second coming where he brings them into this new golden age or whatever so when
the Antichrist comes he's going to unite the Muslims the Jews so called fake
Christians he's gonna unite Hindus and Buddhists so he's gonna be this kind of
a crossover where he brings everybody in okay and look you know what's not
compatible with that teaching is the teaching of the Trinity and you say well
how are the Catholics gonna be brought into the fold they're into the Trinity
except that most Catholics don't even know their own doctrine and that all
they'll do is have Vatican three or something and just put a little different
they'll say well you know the Trinity is a little different you know or
whatever they got the quadrennity anyway since they're worshipping Mary you know
what I mean so so the point is I don't think they're gonna have any problem
sucking in their members to just follow the Pope off a cliff and and believe in
whatever weird you know thing he tells them or whatever but look don't fall for
this garbage that says oh we're all worshiping the same God it's not true
that's not true I'm not worshiping well there's only one God we're all
worshiping the same God wrong okay if you don't have the son you don't have
the father and by the way this religion the Druze the reason I say it's like a
perfect Antichrist religion too is because these are their religious texts
they'll take the Old Testament New Testament and the Quran and Plato and
Socrates you know they'll just bring in all this stuff and then they have their
own scriptures that no one's allowed to read because you have to get initiated
and then even once you get initiated you're still not allowed to read their
scriptures because when you join the religion you're called an ignorant one
and you have to like climb the ladder and and you know and that's how all
cults are too like the Mormons Freemasonry where you know Scientology
right where you have to get deep into it to figure out what they believe true
religion tells you everything up front there's nothing hidden nothing's a
secret all the doctrine is just right there in the open right just here's what
we believe and we're not ashamed of any of it when religions are hiding
teachings and and you got to get to different levels of initiation that's of
the devil okay because that's they love darkness rather than light because their
deeds are evil okay so anyway even though it's kind of a an insignificant
religion in in the greater scheme of things it's still almost a million
people so it is a substantial amount of people but if you ever heard people say
this thing of like oh man there's just so many religions in the world I don't
even know what to pick you know I don't even it's so confusing folks there
aren't as many religions as you think because really here's what you got you
got Christianity Islam Judaism Hinduism and Buddhism and after those five you
only get to tiny religions and and and really even the ones that have a million
people that would only get you up to like 10 if you included like the Druze
and maybe you include like Sikhism or you know these other ones as you start
getting into like you know 20 million people 1 million people smaller thing
and look what are they look Sikhism and the Druze are just spin-offs of Islam
and Islam is a perverted spin-off from Christianity and Judaism is just the
people who didn't accept their Messiah when he came the Christian Messiah so
you know when you look at Judaism Islam and Christianity is the right one and
then you just have these perversions or spin-offs Judaism and they say we came
from Jude no Judaism is a spin-off of Christianity it's all based on rejecting
Jesus it's all it's a religion based on rejecting Jesus that was created after
they rejected Jesus because look their temple wasn't destroyed until 70 AD and
that's when they fully became what they are today which is this you know band of
gypsies who basically don't do animal sacrifices or anything right it's just
all it's it's a new form of Judaism that had to be invented after the temple was
destroyed right so it came after Christianity is just based on rejecting
Christ reacting negatively toward Christ so put that in your pipe and smoke it
okay and then you know Islam is a perversion of Christianity Sikhism is a
spin-off from Islam the Druze is been out for us and then what else does that
leave you with so those are your so-called Abrahamic religion it's not
hard to figure out that Christianity is the right one folks okay what do you
have beside that over here you got your Buddhism and Hinduism it's all just this
reincarnation junk okay these people's whole goal in Buddhism and Hinduism is
to stop being reincarnated like their life is that bad that literally their
goal is to stop being alive that's why it never has gotten popular in the West
because we're just we're just I guess we're just having too much fun over here
you know what I mean we're not just all wishing for death every day and you know
what God said though is all they that hate me love death so why would we seek
death like oh the worst thing would be to keep living we just need to die and
never come back wouldn't that be great we're like no we're looking for streets
of gold we're looking for a mansion in heaven we want to see Jesus Christ we're
not just counting down till we can just merge into some consciousness and stop
existing and die bizarre and then once you figure out that Christianity is the
right religion it isn't hard to figure out who's actually following the Bible
because that you know you look at the Roman Catholic Church the East or
they're so far from following scripture it's not even funny it isn't hard folks
if you seek the Lord you're gonna find them every country every continent you
know it's out there if you're looking for it you'll find it
amen so anyway I was a little bit of a tangent but that's kind of a significant
thing about Jethro is that he that the Druze says we're founded by Jethro we go
all the way back to Jethro even though it started in 1080 they claim Jethro
you're like what did this have to do with Jethro I'm tying it together now
okay it's all it all makes sense now they claim oh we're following Jethro
like it's this competing system like you know we didn't go with Moses and all
that you know we stuck with Jethro whatever you know it's it's just but
it's just totally made up it's basically just hey let's find a character in the
Bible that the Bible doesn't say much about let's find a mysterious character
and just beg yeah yeah that's that's our founder that's him yeah we're founded by
Jethro in a thousand AD you know all right anyway so let's jump back into the
chapter here verse number one when Jethro the priest of Midian Moses father
in law heard of all that God had done for Moses and for Israel his people and
that the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt then Jethro Moses father-in-law
took Zipporah Moses wife after he had sent her back now here's another
character that the Bible doesn't tell us a ton about Zipporah but let me tell you
something when you look at what's there you don't get a real good picture of
Zipporah with what's there okay and I'm gonna refresh your memory on some of the
stuff about Zipporah but you get the picture that Moses and Zipporah
probably didn't have a very good relationship okay because what do we
know about Zipporah well we know he marries Jethro's daughter he marries
Zipporah they have a couple kids okay but the first time we're introduced to
Zipporah is in Exodus chapter 4 when basically God is going to kill Moses
because Moses has not circumcised his son and then Zipporah ends up angrily
circumcising her son and throwing the foreskin at the feet of Moses now this
you know when you're fighting and somebody's throwing a foreskin at you
that's pretty that's that's a knockdown drag-out fight at that point you know
when the foreskins fly so basically you know you see throws a you're a bloody
husband no look why did it why did the child need to be circumcised was it
Moses idea it's God's commandment so here's Moses trying to obey God trying
to serve God and do what's right and what's his wife say oh you're a bloody
husband you know that's a bad attitude she's not supporting him in serving God
like like he's he's basically serving God in spite of this woman is the
picture that we get it's a sad story right not only that but here we get this
little tidbit that Moses sent her home so basically you know he takes her with
them to Egypt because you know there's no point in the story where it says you
know then at this time it became too much for Zipporah and Moses said unto
Zipporah go home you know we don't get anything like that this is all we get
you know the Bible doesn't give us every detail right the Bible is already long
enough and it doesn't give us every detail but it says here that Moses
father-in-law is bringing Zipporah after he'd sent her back so all of a
sudden we're like oh wow Zipporah isn't there we just learned that that she's
just coming back to be reunited with Moses so get the picture he takes
Zipporah down to Egypt he's following God's call on his life he's going there
to be the the great deliverer of Israel and he's heading down there on the way
there he has a big fight with his wife she throws a foreskin around and then
once they get down there at some point we don't know when he ends up just
sending her home like just go home you know I mean I got I got to do this you
know things are getting too intense it's getting too difficult or whatever the
reason he sends her back now in Zipporah's defense the good news is it
says he sent her back so at least we know that she didn't just forsake him
or bail out on him and say like I'm out of here nuts to you you know at least we
know that Moses sent her back so Moses obviously was either stressed out
because she's just calling him a bloody husband and throwing things or maybe
just maybe just he's worried about her safety or but for whatever the reason he
sends her back but then when we read about this reuniting of Moses with
Zipporah it's not exactly a poignant reunion here okay because look what look
what the Bible says here it says that Moses father-in-law took Zipporah Moses
wife after he'd sent her back and her two sons of which the name of the one
was Gershom and we'll talk about that in a minute and Eleazar it says in verse 5
and Jethro Moses father-in-law came unto his sons and his wife unto Moses into
the wilderness where he encamped at the Mount of God and he said unto Moses I
thy father-in-law Jethro am come unto thee and thy wife and her two sons with
her and Moses went out to meet his wife no Moses went out to meet his
father-in-law ended obeisance and kissed him and they asked each other of their
welfare and they came in and it's just no mention of even hi now obviously he
we know he's reunited with his wife and and yada but we see here that everything
about his wife that's mentioned is actually negative there's there's really
nothing good mentioned just that they're fighting there's anger she gets sent
home and then when they're reunited it's it's just the emphasis is on hanging out
with the father-in-law and you don't really see anything where he's hanging
out with his wife that much so I mean the moral that we could draw from this
is that we see people in the Bible that God greatly uses and they're imperfect
people so God doesn't only use perfect people so if your life isn't perfect
don't worry about it because God can still use you all right and you can
still do great things for God I mean Moses is one of the greatest characters
in the whole Bible I mean he did some of the greatest works and yet his family
life was messed up and you know he was having problems with his wife we don't
know the details maybe we don't even want to know the details maybe when we
get to heaven you know we'll find out I don't know or maybe it's just better to
just leave that alone all right but the point is you don't have to be a perfect
person to live for God and not only that there's always gonna be something in
your life that's going wrong like your life's never gonna be perfect and some
people the reason why they're so unhappy is because they are trying to have a
perfect life and they're unhappy because they just they always feel like they're
almost there and then something goes wrong you know I'm just about to turn
the corner financially here's it's it's round you're in a you're in a you're in
a round room trying to turn the corner all right there's no corner and here's
the thing I guarantee this and I'm not trying to just be a downer I guarantee
this when you turn the corner financially and you're like man my
finances are great then your health will go bad or your relationships will go bad
or your job will go bad or something why because our life is never going to be
perfect so you have to learn like the Apostle Paul said in whatsoever state
you are there with to be content you've got to learn to be content don't just be
like oh man once I get my finances straighten out then I'll be happy once I
can get my marriage straightened out then I'll be happy once I can get my
wayward children straightened out and on track then I'll be happy once I get my
church to man if I could just get in the right church if I could just get in a
church that's preaching the truth man then everything's gonna be great yeah
except what about all the people that are in a great church and still whining
about something else and complaining and murmuring why because there are two
kinds of people in this world people that are people that are content people
that are not content it has nothing to do with their circumstances if you're
the Apostle Paul you can be content in jail you can be content in a shipwreck
you can be content in any situation because he said I've learned in
whatsoever state I am there with to be content and then other people you can
give them all these luxuries and they're always gonna find something wrong with
it well but you know look at Haman Haman's the perfect example in the book
of Esther he's got ten sons he's got riches power fame honor and he literally
says well none of this avail of me anything as long as I see Mordecai the
Jew you know not bowing to me so it's like one thing in his life just negates
all the good things for him and you know what people are like that everything's
great in their life is all my finances it's like what about your health you're
in perfect health what about your wonderful wife what about your wonderful
children you know or it's just like oh man my marriage work hey are you saved
are you going to heaven look we all could count our blessings and think of
all the good things going for us I mean look I think all of us would like to be
Moses at the judgment seat of Christ in heaven ruling and reigning or whatever I
think all of us would like to have a name like Moses and have the the works
of Moses and the achievements of Moses but here's the thing Moses his life was
not perfect he had some ugly things in his life he had some negative things
going on and so we need to understand that number one God uses imperfect
people so don't get discouraged because your life isn't perfect you can still do
something for God you can still be greatly used by God and number two don't
seek to have a perfect life because you're gonna be a super unhappy person
since it's never gonna happen you're chasing something that doesn't exist no
one's life is perfect no one's and the people that you envy because all you see
is what they post on Facebook where they they really polished the Apple and paid
to really rosy picture guess what you don't see all the ugly things in their
life I guarantee you that they're there everybody has bad things and and and and
and pain and suffering and just problems and if it's not relationships if it's
not family if it's not fine it's always gonna be something now you say well I
don't know I know some people they just seem like they're always happy and
everything's it's not because their life's perfect it's because they've
learned in what's over state they're in to be content that's why they're always
jovial and happy and and they seem like everything's going great because you
know what to them it is going great because they're just they're just
focusing on all the good things right and and so to them they're like and some
people right now are probably listening to the sermon thing like my life's
perfect but here's the thing that's just but but I look if you were just thinking
that just now great that just shows how content you are because because probably
there are negative things and you're just not thinking about it because
you're just so focused on the blessings and that's how we need to be where we're
thankful for what we have and not coveting what we don't have okay and
don't compare yourself to other people because you don't know what they're
actually going through you compare yourself to other people man must be
nice where they have problems and if all our problems were hung on a line you'd
take yours and I'd take mine all right so don't envy other people so we we
don't get a positive picture here of Moses home life or his marriage okay so
he named his children Gershom for he said I've been an alien in a strange
land is also quoted as I've been a stranger in a strange land because the
Bible used the word stranger and alien interchangeably it just means a
foreigner you know I've been a foreigner in this land and then the name of the
other was Eleazar for the God of my father said he was my help and delivered
me from the sword of Pharaoh so this just shows that he was always staying
true to the Lord even in those 40 years with Jethro he was for sure still
trusting in the God of his father trusting in the Lord even before the
burning bush experience he was already faithful and that's the kind of person
that God uses the guy who's just being faithful in the background you know for
40 years he's in the desert he's he's with Jethro and he's not doing anything
public or anything but he's just faithfully serving God worshiping the
Lord and God chose to you know propel him to something great but he was just
willing to just serve God in the backside of the desert so that's how we
should be ready to just serve God in whatever the capacity so he came out
there with the sons and everything and and we already talked about Jethro's
reaction when he heard about the great things that the Lord did so then we get
into the second part of the chapter beginning in verse 13 but before that
let's look at verse 12 it says in Jethro Moses father-in-law took a burnt offering
and sacrifices for God and Aaron came and all the elders of Israel to eat
bread with Moses father-in-law before God so at this point they're definitely
communing with him and they're all worshiping the true God together and so
that's why I'm saying there you know you could you could have a lot of strong
arguments for both sides of whether Moses whether Jethro is like actually a
priest unto the God of the Bible or is he not even was he not even saved before
this or was he saved but he just kind of has an unbiblical title that he's taken
on somehow you know like I said it's a mystery and I I don't think I can answer
that question I don't think anyone can really answer that question
authoritatively okay there are a lot of good arguments for both but anyway now
they're worshiping the Lord they're eating together and so but starting in
verse 13 we enter a new phase in the chapter and in in the second phase here
is Jethro's advice to Moses and of course the advice is that he needs to
delegate things to other people because it says in verse 13 it came to pass on
the morrow that Moses sat to judge the people and the people stood by Moses
from the morning unto the evening and when Moses father-in-law saw all the
he did to the people he said what is this thing that thou doest to the people
why sittest thou thyself alone and all the people stand by thee for morning
evening so basically there's just this giant line of people waiting in line to
talk to Moses big long line and Moses just Sun up to Sun down is just like
next next next and Jethro's like what are you doing okay and he explains to
him what he's doing and Moses said unto his father verse 15 because the people
come unto me to inquire of God when they have a matter they come unto me and I
judge between one and another and I do make them know the statutes of God and
his laws and Moses father-in-law said unto him the thing that I do is is not
good and of course Jethro's right scripture makes it clear that Jethro's
right when this is revisited and in Deuteronomy and so forth Jethro's right
saying this is a bad system this is no good now there are a bunch of things and
I and I've preached about this a lot I've talked about a lot I even talked
about a little bit last Wednesday so let me kind of give you a different angle on
this tonight okay let me give you a little bit different angle on this I
usually focus on the fact that Moses instead of trying to do everything
himself needs to delegate so he doesn't burn out because that is what Jethro
tells him but here's another aspect to what Jethro is saying Moses is saying
that when the people come to him he teaches unto them the statutes of God
okay basically one-on-one so they get in line and each one he talks he said all
right let me tell you what God's law is in this situation okay that was one of
the things that was not good and let me tell you why okay let's jump down a
little bit and look at Moses's father-in-law's advice look at verse 20
it says and thou shalt teach them ordinances and laws and shall show them
the way they're in they must walk and the work that they must do moreover thou
shalt provide out of all the people able men such as fear God men of truth etc
we'll talk about that in a moment but he says let them judge the people at all
seasons and it shall be that every great matter they shall bring unto thee but
every small matter they shall judge so shall it be easier for thyself and thou
shalt bear the burden they shall bear the burden with thee so here's what's
going on not only is he being taught to delegate responsibility delegate
authority delegate jobs he's also explaining to him don't teach people the
Bible just one at a time you got to teach the whole crowd teach the whole
congregation okay then they're gonna already know a lot of the answers okay
so step one is to have everybody here it taught publicly step two is to delegate
other people to answer the easy questions and then step three is you
answer the hard questions that other people can't answer okay so this is the
three-pronged approach here and and and here's what we can learn from this okay
we need churches to be teaching the Bible Sunday morning Sunday night and
Wednesday night and actually putting a lot of meat on the bone and actually
teaching the work and the laws and all the things that we need to do and
answering a lot of the tough questions from the pulpit giving all the answers
and then there will be less people with questions on their mind you see what I'm
saying so like you you'll be in certain churches and everybody just needs a ton
of counseling and people are just lined up to get counseling from the pastor and
everybody just I need counseling I need counsel I need counsel but here's what
you have to wonder when everybody needs marriage counseling and everybody needs
counseling on this and counseling on that you know you wonder is the Bible
being effectively taught from the pulpit why are there's and let me just put it
this way when I was young and married and going to church and and starting a
family and having a few kids I didn't just have tons of burning questions
where I felt like I just constantly like needed I got to talk to pass I got
to get counsel I got to talk to pastor because of the fact that the pastor was
teaching the Bible from the pulpit effectively so he was doing a good job
of teaching the Bible and then I'm reading my Bible I rarely had a question
where I just got to go talk to him and figure out you know you kind of see what
I'm saying and look I'm not saying you're never gonna have questions of
course you're gonna have questions but when people just have a million
questions about everything you have to you have to wonder are they listening to
preaching did you read your Bible I mean because some of the questions that they
ask are a little bit basic or obvious now now here's the thing a lot of times
it's not necessarily the church members fault it could be the pastor's fault if
the pastor is never getting up and teaching on marriage he's never teaching
on child rearing he's never teaching on these things he doesn't explain the
doctrines of the Bible then yeah people are gonna have a lot of questions
because they're not getting taught anything so I think we can prevent a lot
of the kind of rescue 911 type of counseling needs where it's just like
everybody's just urgently needing to talk to the pastor from Sun up to Sun
down by just teaching everything from the Pope and you know typically when
people do walk up to me and answer a question 99% of the time I'm usually
able to point them to a sermon because I've literally preached at this church
over 2100 some sermons on all manner of subjects so out of those 21 2200 sermons
I can usually say to somebody or my staff can usually say to somebody oh hey
I did a whole sermon on that here's what it's called here's where you can
download it I mean the technology is great amen you know you can find what
you need and so all that to say this we need to make sure that in church the
Bible is being taught and that we're actually teaching how to live your life
from the pulpit not just getting up isn't God good Jesus died for us Jesus
loves us can't wait to get to heaven but actually getting up and saying okay
here's how to have a marriage here's how to raise your kids here's how to run a
business here's how you're gonna succeed as an employee right we need those kind
of practical sermons that tell you how to live that's exactly what Jethro is
telling look tell these people the work that they need to be doing tell them
God's laws tell them God's statutes tell them God's judgments and then most of
the time when they run into a situation they're gonna know what to do cuz they're
gonna be like oh yeah God said X Y & Z so that's what I need to do or oh who's
right in this situation well what does the Bible say so basically what Jethro
is saying to Moses is give them the Bible you know write this down which is
what obviously God's gonna lead him to do he's gonna take him up to Mount Sinai
he's gonna give him the law he's gonna write it down and he's gonna recite it
to the people and he's gonna teach them the Bible get a written Bible and then
teach it to the people that's gonna answer a lot of the questions then have
deputies to answer the easy questions and then the harder questions you answer
those yourself and then you're not gonna have a line that takes all day I mean
look do I really need to as the pastor of faith forward Baptist Church sit down
with someone and explain to them that the rapture is not pre trip right that
because who here let me just ask it this way who here believes that they could
confidently sit down with someone with the Bible and easily debunk the
pre-trib rapture they know all the places to turn put up your hand if you
could do that right so here's the thing do they have to do I have to do that
when there's a hundred people here who could easily do that not to mention all
the hundred DVDs on the back shelf they could easily do that there are a hundred
people here who could sit down with anybody who's pre-trib and and clear
that up for them you know and if we talked about if we hey who here can
prove the Trinity from the Bible you know what I mean all the hands are gonna
go up who here can prove eternal security who here can show the can give
the gospel who here knows how to go through the plan of salvation with
somebody put up your hand yeah I mean so the bottom line is you've got hundreds
of people here who know how to do these basics and that's great isn't it so that
so that basically we can get more done we can help more people we can talk to
more people it's not like well only the pastor knows the Bible so everything's
got to go through him no the goal is to teach the Bible to the layman and then
every man woman boy and girl can answer your question you know what I mean and
that that's the way it should be and that's one things I like about our
church is that our church is filled with people who know the Bible and they don't
just blindly believe what they've been taught they know what they believe they
know why they believe it they could actually turn them they don't just know
well we're not pretty trip they could turn in the Bible and they know where to
turn where would you turn folks start calling them out where are you gonna
turn Matthew 24 where else mark 13 where else revelation 6 and 7 where else first
second oh come on you gotta get a little more specific than that the New
Testament what's that there you go Luke yeah Luke 21 you know you look and and
we could we could ask ask other questions and other dot we could say hey
what about the Trinity you know one of these oneness bozos where are you gonna
take them whole book of John whole Gospel of John right what's the best
chapter in John and John for this 17 there we go I like that yeah I mean yeah
you could take your pick amen yeah John 3 16 will fix that Genesis chapter 1 I
mean yeah there's all kinds of places that you could go to teach that so the
point is have a congregation that knows the Bible have a congregation that knows
the Bible and you know what one of the problems in the old-fashioned IFB was
that their thing was oh you want to learn the Bible go to Bible College they
kept it shallow on Sunday morning shallow on Sunday night shallow on
Wednesday night and if you wanted to go deep you had to go to Bible College
folks we need to go deeper on Sunday morning Sunday night and Wednesday night
so that people don't have to go to Bible College to learn the Bible why because
most people aren't going to Bible College and I want to have a
congregation where everybody knows the Bible you know I want every man woman
boy and girl in this church to have a grasp of the Bible and to understand the
basic doctrines of the Bible and even some of the intermediate and advanced
doctrine of the Bible hey let's teach everything right here three times a week
right here okay and then another thing is you know these these endless follow-up
programs where we win someone to Christ and then we have a 10-week Bible study
with them in their living room well you know what call me Jethro but I would say
the thing that thou doest is not good why would I spend you know 10 hours
going and bring a Bible study to someone who won't even come to church I mean
here you got church available to them on a silver platter it's all set it's all
ready to roll for them and they won't go no you come to me again and again and
again look I'll go to them to give them the gospel I'll go to them to invite
them to church but if they're not willing to come to church I'm not just
gonna keep going to their living room and teaching them one-on-one why because
what makes more sense getting up and teaching 300 people at once or just
teaching people one-on-one when you can teach a bunch of it now look certain
things need to be taught one-on-one like the gospel is best taught one-on-one yeah
you know preaching the gospel to a large group I've done it if I get
opportunities to do it I like it I like preaching in schools I like preaching
the crowd but let me tell you something soul winning one-on-one is more
effective any day of the week and look hey it's it's dramatic and cool to get
up and preach to 500 students at a school and look I'm sure a lot of those
students are getting saved but you know what it's a lot of marketing saved right
but it's when you go to them one-on-one and you can actually talk to them and
look them in the eye and and go and tailor it to them and and actually talk
to them one-on-one that's where you really get the best fruit and and and
I've always believed that and I always will how many times you see Jesus you
know winning people to Christ one-on-one but here's the thing but then they're
like hey stay with us Jesus stay and teach us remember the Samaritans and in
John 4 hey stay with us and he's like nope gotta go I'll say two days I'm gone
you got to come to me oh you know and then you know you see mole he goes out
the middle of nowhere 5,000 people show up plus women and children out in the
middle of nowhere he goes up into a mountain he goes down into a plane he
goes here there and people are coming to him and people are constantly saying
remain with us and teach us he says I got to go to other towns also so we got
to understand that we can't always just spoon feed every convert one-on-one
until doomsday we have to expect people to get in a congregation where Moses can
get up and teach all of them at the same time that's what church is in fact this
is even called the church in the wilderness in Acts chapter 7 and so
Church is where Moses gets up and teaches the Word of God to people so
that they have less questions he's answering their questions and look
whenever somebody comes up to me and asks me a question you know what I
always think to myself well if one person's asking me I bet a bunch of
other people are wondering the same thing I'm gonna write a sermon like that
so over the last 13 and a half years of being a pastor I've been asked hundreds
of questions and guess what that is hundreds of sermon ideas because if I
keep getting asked this that it's like Oh preach on that preach on that preach
on that why so I can answer everybody at the same time so I don't have to
individually answer the same question 200 times and you know what God is for
efficiency because God put this chapter in the Bible and God used this as a
positive example to say look be efficient with what you do have a church
get to you say you don't do discipleship we have discipleship three times a week
you're you're being discipled right now did you know that you are being
discipled as we speak you're being taught something right now okay you're
being taught a Bible story you're learning a principle about how to live
your life okay that's what church is supposed to be doing now look you're not
gonna get it all in one service you go to church a hundred and fifty six times
a year you've learned a hundred and fifty six things at the end of the year
you know one sermon might really hammer on the Trinity another sermon might
really hammer on soul winning another sermon is about marriage another sermons
about child rearing another sermons about your job by the end of the year
you've got a hundred and fifty six truths that you've learned one thing at
a time line upon line precept upon precept okay so that's what we see here
is that God wants us to be efficient I don't have time but I was going to turn
to Acts chapter number six which is like the I feel like it's the New Testament
parallel to Exodus 18 because in Acts chapter 6 what happened was the Apostles
are spread too thin their widows and their daily administrations that need to
be done in the church and there's a lot of just menial tasks that need to be
done and here's what the Apostles say it is not meet for us to leave the Word of
God and wait tables and serve tables you we need to choose other men and then
they appoint seven of what we know as deacons they would later be called
deacons but they appoint these full-time employees of the church these deacons
just to do the daily work so that they can delegate that stuff why because they
don't want to leave the Word of God to serve tables they said we're gonna give
ourselves to the ministry of the word and prayer we don't want to just get
caught up just you know taking out the trash and making the copy and vacuuming
the carpet when we have other things that we need to be doing the only way
we're gonna be able to get all of our work done is to get help with it okay
and that's it's really if you compare Acts chapter 6 and Exodus 18 God's
reiterating that in the New Testament that look you can't have Moses or the
Apostles or any spiritual leader or anything where he's just doing it all
himself and and by the way I'll close on this thought the desire to do everything
yourself is pride on your part typically people who can't delegate you know why
they can't delegate because they think well no one can do it as good as I can
I mean isn't that really what it comes down to like well I got to do this
myself because if I delegate it they're gonna mess it up you know that's
prideful to just think you're the only one you know if I'm just like well I'm
the only one who can preach here no one can ever fill in for me because I'm just
me that's prideful or if well all the Bible questions need to come to me
because I'm the one who's got the answers nobody else knows what they're
talking about that's prideful right a humble attitude is hey there are a lot
of people here who know the Bible there are other people who could get up and
preach the other people can do stuff it's okay to delegate things and get and
look when you delegate things are people gonna mess things up sometimes of course
but you know what else is gonna happen when you delegate things sometimes you
delegate things that people do a better job than you you know I've delegated
things before I was a little bit nervous like oh man I'm gonna pass off this
responsibility I'm like man I hope he does a good job and then they do a
better job than I ever would have done why because I'm not the ultimate you're
not the ultimate and so be humble enough to pass off responsibilities to other
people and give people a little bit of credit that hey they have some knowledge
they have some ability you're not the only person in the world who can be
effective at things right delegate and you know what when you delegate you're
helping other people grow too because you're giving them a chance to learn
because if you if you don't ever let anyone else run a soul winning time run
a mission strip you know preach a sermon lead the singing if you don't let people
do that how are they gonna get the practice how are they gonna learn and
you know that's how you train the next generation of leadership that's how you
train other leaders and you can multiply your efforts so and look I know you're
not a pastor but you know what what about in your home ladies and look I'm
telling you you mothers out there you wives out there you need to learn to
delegate tasks to your children let your daughter cook a meal okay and you say
well you know she's gonna mess it up or whatever so what okay so what if she
messes it up sometimes she might even you know cook some amazing meal that
you've never thought of or let's say she messed it up a little bit but guess what
that's how you learn you know you learn by messing up you make the mistakes you
mess it up you get better at it and you know what in the long run letting your
daughter cook some meals letting your daughter do some laundry letting your
daughter do some cleaning tasks and things like that you know in the long
run that's gonna pay off because now you can do other stuff in that freeze people
wonder how do you have 11 kids you got to delegate some things if my wife and I
did everything ourselves well it wouldn't be possible you know if we just
had like 11 little Lord Fauntleroy's sitting around and we're just waiting on
our children hand and foot anything else for you master Solomon master Isaac can
I get you anything else master John you know I mean it look you're not gonna get
anything done it's a it's not gonna happen and put you know what you'd be
raising your kids to be a spoiled brat hey make your kids pitch in teach them
and delegate to them and then how many look I'm not even gonna ask for a raise
of hand how many mothers feel burned out right now but I guarantee if I just if
people would answer honestly and I was just like hey how many of you mothers
out there are feeling burned out in your job as a stay-at-home mom I guarantee
you a bunch of hands would go up of women that are feeling burned out
because it's a hard job right I mean just all the cooking and cleaning and
homeschooling I mean it's it's a and it's and it's a job it starts early you
know I mean the Sun comes up and the kids it's they just wake up and they're
just these balls of energy I mean Mike my kids in my house what time the kids
get up in our house about six six thirty yeah I mean it's six thirty the kids who
are the most work are up and Adam and it's not because they go to bed early
you know I mean you know and I mean we put our kids down to bed relatively
early you know we get our kids down by what 738 they start going down then the
big kids go to bed at 9 but we get our little kids down around like 730 or 8
6 a.m. and 630 they're up we gotta get up at like 5 in order if we want to beat
them to the punch you know and get in there before you know they wake up and
start terrorizing not just cake but anyway but look you talk to people and
by the way don't let your kids stay up till 11 o'clock at night okay it's just
people people literally have their toddlers staying up till 11 o'clock at
night they have little elementary school aged kids stay up till 11 o'clock at
night and then they wonder like I'm so burned out put your kids in bed and have
a little you time you know what I mean 730 is bedtime a man all the kids are
just like I hate this church but look the point is hey if you're getting
burned out then you got to find a way to get a workaround you know Moses is
getting burned out here Jethro can see it happening and sometimes you can't
always see it but an outsider can come in and see it and say look you're
getting burned out here you need a new system okay so if you're feeling burned
out and ripping your hair out all the time and you know what you need to get
it you need to get some delegated work and you know the hardest time is when
you only have little kids and you don't you know you can't delegate much but
man as soon as you start getting a little bit older kids start teaching
them start delegating things to them and you know what typically kids enjoy
working they usually love working they want to work get them to help okay and
then also learn to make them go to bed at night okay early and then make them
take a nap in the afternoon when they're young okay why so you can get a
break this is what my wife does my wife even I think she even wrote a thing
about on her blog and she called it like remaining sane through naps or something
I don't I'm probably butchering that title of her article but it was
something along the lines of nap time is the key to sanity or something I I'm
paraphrasing but basically she's saying look you know make the kids take a nap
in the afternoon and the ones that are too old to take a nap which how old in
our house is too old to take a nap six seven what is it about six or seven six
six they graduate from naps around six eight six right but here's the thing all
the kids six and up are forced to be completely silent during nap time so
they have to like read a book or be silent and then the little kids take a
nap and we have a silent house for two hours in the afternoon to maintain
sanity okay and then bedtime to maintain sanity all right so work smarter not
necessarily harder and if you can work harder and smarter now you're really
gonna achieve great things in your life when you can do both at the same time
right and that's what Moses I believe did I believe he was a hard worker and I
believe that he didn't just sit around and but like oh man this was great
Jethro now I can kick back look the goal of delegating is that it frees you up to
serve God more you know that the Apostles aren't like we need these deacons
so that we can take it easy hey they needed the deacons so they could be
dedicated to the Word of God dedicated to preaching dedicated to reaching
people with the gospel dedicated to prayer and spiritual pursuits and
winning souls to Christ and leading the church and preaching not to do nothing
but to do something different that's effective see I don't have time to read
my Bible hey delegate some stuff and read your Bible don't be Martha be Mary
let's fire a word of prayer father we thank you for this great chapter Lord we
thank you for Jethro Lord and and the Druze really can't claim this guy but we
can Lord as Christians look to him as a man who you used with the wisdom that he
had here and and thank you for the wisdom that he imparted here about being
efficient and about delegating and just about the fact that you know every
single teaching of the Bible doesn't need to be taught one-on-one the gospel
is best taught one-on-one but when it comes to the precepts and the doctrines
and how to live Lord help us to teach that in the congregation Lord if there's
anything that I'm failing to preach as a pastor I pray that you will reveal that
to me Lord if there's something that I don't talk about or if there's if
there's a portion of scripture that I haven't expounded or some practical
truth that I have not delivered Lord I pray that you just reveal that to me so
that I can preach it this Sunday Lord and help me not to leave any gaps in in
my teaching Lord and please just bless our church bless those who come out to
church on Wednesday night in the middle of the week give them a safe trip home
and give them a special blessing for attending your house and in Jesus name we
pray. Amen.