Tuesday, Sept. 24
Exodus 17:1 – 18:27 Read it here
In this series of seemingly unconnected stories we see some of what happened in the early days of wandering in the wilderness.
One mystery is solved: If you wondered what happened with Moses’s family while he was plaguing Pharaoh with demands for freedom for the people, we get the answer here. Moses had sent his wife, Zipporah, and sons, Gershom and Eliezer, to live with Zipporah’s father, Jethro.
Having heard of what happened in Egypt and knowing that Moses had returned, Jethro brought them to where he was. After hearing the details from Moses himself, Jethro said, “Now I know that the Lord is greater than all other gods, for he did this to those who had treated Israel arrogantly” (vs. 18:11). This appears to be the first instance in scripture of a person believing in God based on the testimony of another person.
The rest of the reading, from God providing water for the people to Jethro’s suggestion that Moses create a leadership structure to spread responsibility among the people, has a common theme of reminding us that we can’t do it all ourselves.
When the people again grumble about the lack of water, Moses takes his problem to God (always a wise move). God tells him to strike a rock with his staff – the same staff he had once used to turn the water of the Nile to blood.
While in Egypt the result had been to make fresh water undrinkable, this time it results in fresh water pouring forth from a rock. The power was not in the staff, but in Moses’s faith and obedience in doing what God told him to do, even to the point of believing the same action could provide two very different results.
Also in chapter 17 the Hebrews encounter their first violent opposition from the previous inhabitants of the promised land as they face the Amalekites. When it looks like the Amalekites are going to be too strong for them, Moses again takes the staff and raises his hands to God. As long as he keeps them raised, God helps the people prevail against their foe, but when Moses lowers his hands, the Amalekites again overwhelm them.
While it’s easy to focus on the staff, raising hands is often associated with prayer…it’s not too much of a stretch to draw from this the lesson that as long as we keep our hands lifted in prayer (literally and figuratively), we can resist the forces that come against us. It is when we give in to our fatigue and cease to pray that we lose ground.
But here Moses needed more than just divine help – he also needed help from his companions. They provided him a stone to sit on, and Aaron and Hur held his hands high, physically supporting him in prayer.
Just in case we still haven’t gotten the message, Jethro sees that Moses is heading toward burnout in the overwhelming task of mediating the myriad of petty disputes that arise any time a group of people has to live and work together.
Jethro suggests that he delegate the care of the people to able leaders within the community, so that most disputes can be resolved without involving him. That frees Moses for the work of teaching God’s law and addressing the most critical and complex issues.
These verses are often used as a model for a small-group structure within the church that focuses not on an elaborate command and control structure, but that involves the whole community in interpreting and implementing the faith.