Episode Transcript
PRAYER OF CONSECRATION
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Jesus, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice.
Jesus, we belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.
Exodus 18:1–12
Now Jethro, the priest of Midian and father-in-law of Moses, heard of everything God had done for Moses and for his people Israel, and how the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt.
After Moses had sent away his wife Zipporah, his father-in-law Jethro received her and her two sons. One son was named Gershom, for Moses said, “I have become a foreigner in a foreign land”; and the other was named Eliezer, for he said, “My father’s God was my helper; he saved me from the sword of Pharaoh.”
Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, together with Moses’ sons and wife, came to him in the wilderness, where he was camped near the mountain of God. Jethro had sent word to him, “I, your father-in-law Jethro, am coming to you with your wife and her two sons.”
So Moses went out to meet his father-in-law and bowed down and kissed him. They greeted each other and then went into the tent. Moses told his father-in-law about everything the Lord had done to Pharaoh and the Egyptians for Israel’s sake and about all the hardships they had met along the way and how the Lord had saved them.
Jethro was delighted to hear about all the good things the Lord had done for Israel in rescuing them from the hand of the Egyptians. He said, “Praise be to the Lord, who rescued you from the hand of the Egyptians and of Pharaoh, and who rescued the people from the hand of the Egyptians. Now I know that the Lord is greater than all other gods, for he did this to those who had treated Israel arrogantly.” Then Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, brought a burnt offering and other sacrifices to God, and Aaron came with all the elders of Israel to eat a meal with Moses’ father-in-law in the presence of God.
CONSIDER THIS
The Bible tells us a lot, yet there is so much the Bible doesn’t tell us. We aren’t getting the comprehensive daily logs of all the happenings of the Israelites on this journey. We are getting the Holy Spirit–inspired highlights. Cloud by day. Fire by night. Quail in the evening. Manna in the morning. Moses raises his arms with the staff of God and the defeat of the Amalekites.
Moses builds an altar and names it, “The Lord is my Banner.” Moses’s in-laws visit.
One of these things is not like the others, right? Why so much about Jethro, the priest of Midian, who pays a visit to Moses? Why might the Holy Spirit, who inspired the writer of the text, want us to know about Moses’s in-laws? This is a good principle of Bible study—to ask why certain things are included in the text and other things left out.
In the very last verse of the Gospel of John, we get this: “Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written” (21:25). The Holy Spirit is very selective about what gets included in Scripture. Everything is there for a purpose. We must be curious about the purpose.
So why such detail about a visit from the in-laws? I have two observations to offer from today’s text.
He [Jethro] said, “Praise be to the Lord, who rescued you from the hand of the Egyptians and of Pharaoh, and who rescued the people from the hand of the Egyptians.”
These times, perhaps like all times in one way or another, were very polytheistic (many gods) times. There were many so-called gods. Jethro was a priest of one of these gods. He was the priest of Midian. It’s what makes his next comment worthy of note:
“Now I know that the Lord is greater than all other gods, for he did this to those who had treated Israel arrogantly.”
Notice the phrase: “Greater than all other gods.” In these times, which differ from our times only in the names of the false gods, everyone was a polytheist. There is always room for another god in the pantheon of deities. It highlights the political correctness violation of a statement like, “Greater than all other gods.” Friends, we, the followers of Jesus Messiah, are monotheists (people of one God). All of life is received from, mediated by, and lived through the one true and living God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—one God in three persons—blessed Trinity.
It has me remembering a moment from the Covid-19 global pandemic. I will remember it here while stripping out any names because it demonstrates just how salient this matter remains. One of the leading governmental voices from our nation made the following remarks in an interview context: “Our behavior has stopped the spread of the virus. God did not stop the spread of the virus.” And in case it was considered a misguided stroke of bad judgment or that he really didn’t mean what he said, he later said this: “The number is down because we brought the number down. God did not do that. Fate did not do that. Destiny did not do that. A lot of pain and suffering did that.”
It reveals the widely held conviction that God is, at best, one possible actor among many others, even daring to place human beings on the same level, if not on a higher level, in this instance. Here’s a translation of the statement: “Human behavior is greater than all other gods.” It’s kind of a modern-day Genesis 11 Tower of Babel moment. And this is not a critique of the leader, who is a professing Christian. It is, rather, a reflection of the broadly sweeping spirit of the age in which we live.
Imagine if Jethro had said, “The Israelites were delivered from Pharaoh because Moses delivered them. God did not do that. Fate did not do that. Destiny did not do that. Moses did it.” It would be shocking, to say the least. Jethro said a very different thing—and he doubled down on it.
“Now I know that the Lord is greater than all other gods, for he did this to those who had treated Israel arrogantly.”
He not only said it and reinforced it, but he sealed it at an altar.
“Then Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, brought a burnt offering and other sacrifices to God, and Aaron came with all the elders of Israel to eat a meal with Moses’ father-in-law in the presence of God.”
THE PRAYER FOR DELIVERANCE
Lord Jesus, you are my Deliverer.
You are the one and only true and living God. Search me and reveal my own tendencies to acknowledge, salute, and maybe even unwittingly worship other gods in addition to the one true and living God. I think of the god of money, the god of image and reputation and standing in the community (which is another way of saying the god of what other people think), the god of education, skill, and talent, and so many more. It’s not that I would put other gods before you. It’s that I would have other gods at all that cuts me to the heart. You alone are God. This is my faith—you alone. Deliver me from my dependence on any other god and into the exclusive trust in you alone.
It will be for my good, for others' gain, and for your glory.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be. World without end, amen! Amen!
