I’m Not Able

We are talking about misdemeanor living in his lifestyle. Open with us to Deuteronomy chapter 1 as we consider this really important topic. Amen.

Good morning, everybody. While you are standing, would you take out your Bibles this morning? If you don't have a Bible, you can raise your hand, and one of our ushers will bring you one. We are in the Old Testament, which is the first two-thirds of your Bible. The Old Testament book of Deuteronomy is the fifth book, so if you open to the first book, Genesis, and then go through Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, you will find Deuteronomy. Chapter 1 is where we are at.

As you are turning there this morning, if you have a question about the message or about the Christian faith, you can text your questions to the number that is on the screen. Pastor Mark and I will answer those on the Questions Podcast this week. If you are looking for that, you can go to the QuestionsPodcast.com and subscribe there.

Deuteronomy chapter 1, we will begin reading today at verse 9. There, Moses says, "I spoke to you at that time, saying, 'I alone am not able to bear you. The Lord your God has multiplied you, and here you are today as the stars of heaven in multitude. May the Lord God of your fathers make you a thousand times more numerous than you are and bless you as He has promised you. How can I alone bear your problems and your burdens and your complaints? Choose wise and understanding and knowledgeable men from among your tribes, and I will make them heads over you.'"

You answered and said to me, "The thing which you have told us to do is good." So I took the heads of your tribes, wise and knowledgeable men, and made them heads over you—leaders of thousands, leaders of hundreds, leaders of fifties, leaders of tens, and officers for your tribes.

Then I commanded your judges at that time, saying, "Hear the cases between your brethren and judge righteously between a man and his brother or the stranger who is with him. You shall not show partiality in judgment. You shall hear the small as well as the great cases. You shall not be afraid in any man's presence."

Judgment is God's. The case that is too hard for you, bring to me and I will hear it. I commanded you at that time all the things that you should do.

God, I pray for wisdom as we look at the Scriptures this morning. We pray that you would help us to comprehend what is going on in this text, but you'd also help us to understand what it is that you would be speaking to us. We believe that all these things were written for our instruction and for our training, and that all Scripture is given by inspiration from you. It is useful for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness, so that we would know how to handle the things that we will face today and this week.

So, I pray, God, that you would continue that work of transformation in us, Lord, that we would walk in a way that honors and glorifies you. Not only that it honors and glorifies you, but that it would be the best for us. So, God, work in us, we pray. We ask this today in Jesus' name. And all those that agreed said, "Amen." You may be seated.

Have you ever encountered a situation that was too much for you to handle? I think that probably many of us, if not most of us, maybe all of us, can think of a situation or a time when we came to the realization that there was more than we could handle. Maybe it was one of those things where, at the beginning of the situation, you thought, "I've got this." But at a certain point, as you were moving through it, you began to recognize your own arrogance and stupidity in thinking, "I've got this."

That was my experience about eleven years ago. My wife and I decided we needed a new mattress. So, I did as we often do: I went online and found a California king memory foam mattress at Overstock.com for under five hundred dollars, delivered, with no sales tax. It was spectacular! This behemoth of a mattress appeared on my doorstep.

Monday morning, my day off, our favorite Brown truck delivery guy dropped that thing off. It looked like this giant California burrito—huge, 84 inches tall and about 20 inches in diameter. This massive thing weighed around 130 pounds, and the only thing standing between me and a good night's sleep on that mattress was getting it upstairs into our bedroom. It was just me; no one else was there. I thought, I can do this. At the time, I was 29, so it seemed like no big deal. I was a martial artist, I had run before, and I felt confident.

I didn't have one of those hand trucks or a furniture dolly. I didn't need that; I had this. I put the mattress in a fireman carry on my shoulder, got it nice and balanced, and thought, yeah, I got this. I started to make my way up the stairs at our old house, and I was doing pretty well. I had it perfectly balanced until the last few inches of my 84-inch cargo caught the lip of the ceiling on the first floor, which altered my balance, shall I say.

In that moment, if I had been thinking logically, the wise thing to do would have been to just drop it. It was memory foam; it wouldn't break. But for some reason, my reaction was not to drop it but to hug it a little tighter as it started to go backwards. As it began to fall, I heard a pop—I actually felt a pop. Well, let's just say it was a good thing I had a nice new memory foam mattress to lay on that night because my back was in significant pain.

You know that realization in that moment? Maybe this wasn't a good idea. I think many of us have experienced situations like that. Perhaps there are a number of hurt backs in here from similar experiences, where we think at the front end of a decision, "I've got this," when it would have been wiser to reconsider.

It is better to say, "I'm not able," or even to say, "I need help." Instead, we often say, "I've got this," and we learn a very important lesson. Point number one on your outline: a little bit of humility may spare you a whole lot of pain. How many of you are honest enough today to raise your hand and say, "I agree with that"? A little bit of humility will spare you a whole lot of pain.

That's certainly the story being recounted for us here in Deuteronomy chapter 1, verse 9. We read, "And I spoke to you at that time." Moses is the one who is speaking, and he said, "I am not able to bear you." It might be worthwhile to underline in your Bible those words: "I am not able to bear you." By the way, we gave away a whole bunch of Deuteronomy journals a few weeks ago. If you'd like one of those, we have some more, and you can stop in the office to grab one. It makes it a little bit easier to underline in your Bible, but it is worth underlining: "I am not able to bear you."

The Lord your God has multiplied you, Moses says there in verse 10, and here you are today as the stars of the heaven in multitude. Now, that's an interesting way of saying it. Why does Moses say it like that? He says it because that is exactly the fulfillment of God's Word that God had spoken hundreds of years before to the father of the nation of Israel, the very people that Moses was now speaking to.

When God called a man named Abram in Genesis chapter 12, He said, "I want you to come and follow me." Though Abram had no children—he was 75 when he began to follow God—God said, "I'm going to bless you and multiply you. You're going to have many descendants, as many as the stars of the sky." In another place, He says, "As many as the sand that is on the seashore."

Now, hundreds of years later, God has made good on His promise. Moses says, "The Lord your God has multiplied you, and here you are today as many as the stars of the heaven in multitude." Then he pronounces this blessing: "May the Lord your God, verse 11, make you a thousand times more numerous than you are and bless you as He has promised you."

Then in verse 12, he asks, "How can I alone bear your problems, your burdens, and your complaints?" So, what's happening here in Deuteronomy, as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, if you were here, is...

Deuteronomy is the second retelling, or the second telling, of the law of God before the people of God, the nation of Israel, forty years after the first retelling of that law. This book follows a specific format that dates back about 3,400 years, beginning with an introduction and then moving into a historical statement that discusses what has transpired before.

From about chapter 1, verse 6 of Deuteronomy until the end of chapter 4, Moses is rehearsing their history. He is reminding them of the things that have happened in the past during their journey, from Mount Sinai, where the law was given to them, to this point, standing at the border of blessing and getting ready to enter the Promised Land. Moses is doing this because he is now 120 years old, and he knows that the Word of God has come to him and told him that he will not enter the Promised Land. However, the people will go in.

Moses understands that his life is coming to an end, and he knows that they will move into the Promised Land without him as their leader. This may not mean much to us, but it meant a great deal to them. For the last 38 to 40 years, anytime they encountered any issue or problem, they would always go to Moses. He would talk to God, and things would be okay. Now, he knows that that period of history is coming to an end.

Yes, they will have another leader, a man named Joshua, and his general, Caleb. However, Moses is 120 years old, while Joshua and Caleb are in their 80s. Pretty much everyone else is roughly 45 and under because the entire group of people from about 45 up to the ages of Joshua and Caleb has all died in the wilderness. That entire generation has passed away.

Now, a new generation is going to enter the land that God promised them. Moses says, "Listen, you're going to have to learn how to lead yourselves and how to govern yourselves." He is giving this retelling of their history as they prepare to move into the Promised Land under the covenant of God, without Moses before them.

Retelling all this history gives us a backdrop, reminding us that point number two on your outline is that a little reminder of the past may help you walk wisely in the future. That's the hope, and I have certainly found that to be true.

Moses says to them, "I spoke to your parents all those years ago back at Horeb." Horeb was Mount Sinai, where the children of Israel came out of Egypt. Moses led them after telling Pharaoh, "Let my people go." Ten plagues happened, as described in the book of Exodus, particularly in the first thirteen chapters, and finally, they were released from Egypt. They embarked on a journey that crossed the Red Sea and wandered through the desert for a period of time until they came to Mount Sinai, where they received the law of God.

Moses reminds them, "Back when we were at Horeb, I told your parents and grandparents at that time, 'I can't do this on my own.'" A little bit of humility will spare you a whole lot of pain. It's a good thing to know, especially because I have observed, and maybe you have seen this as well in our current cultural moment, that the mindset often presented to us is that any acknowledgment of our inadequacies or downsides is a sign of weakness. Sometimes, we feel like we can't express our doubts or say, "I don't know if I can do this."

However, what you begin to discover when you study through the pages of Scripture is that it is actually wise to recognize the truth that the New Testament gives us. Paul, in 2 Corinthians 3, says in verses 5 and 6, "Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as being of ourselves, but our sufficiency is of God." He is the one who enables us. It is wisdom to step back from any situation and admit our deficits because every single one of us has them.

It is worth noting that Moses, here in Deuteronomy, is giving a historic introduction, a brief synopsis. However, those of you who know me know that I'm not a brief summary kind of guy. So, we need to go back and see when this event took place, as Moses is reminding them.

A generation of people is grappling with the situation where God told the nation of Israel, "I am not able to bear you now." Some of you may have a Bible that includes a center column reference, which is that place in the middle of your page with all the small writing, or perhaps it's on the right-hand side of your page. There are many small markings, and one of them probably refers to Exodus chapter 18.

If you would turn from Deuteronomy to the left, the first book of the Bible is Genesis, and the second book is Exodus. In Exodus chapter 18, we have a great story that Moses reflects on in Deuteronomy chapter 1, verses 9 through 18. In Exodus chapter 18, verse 1, we are introduced to a new character named Jethro. Jethro is introduced to us as a priest, but it is important to note that he was likely a pagan priest, very certainly a priest of pagan gods, not the one true God that Moses knows.

Jethro was a priest from an area called Midian, which is in the modern-day Saudi Arabian desert. He is also Moses' father-in-law; Moses' wife was named Zipporah, and Jethro was her father. We read in Exodus 18:1 that Jethro, the priest of Midian, Moses' father-in-law, heard of all that God—Moses' God, Israel's God—had done for Moses and for Israel, His people, that the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt.

The news of what happened in the Exodus reached Jethro. Jethro took Zipporah, Moses' wife, after he had sent her back. Moses had sent Zipporah to be with her father while he went to Egypt. He had been away on business for a while, and now he was coming back, so he sent her back with her two sons. Moses had two sons, one of whom was named Gershom, which means "stranger," for he said, "I have been a stranger in a foreign land." The name of the other son was Eliezer, which means "helper," for he said, "The Lord my God was my help, and He delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh."

Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, came with his sons and his wife to Moses in the wilderness, where he was encamped at the mountain of God, which is Mount Horeb, or Mount Sinai. Jethro said to Moses, "I, your father-in-law Jethro, am coming to you." He sent advance warning, saying, "Hey, we're coming with your wife and your two sons." So Moses went out to meet his father-in-law.

Verse 7 says he bowed down and kissed him. They asked each other about their well-being and updated each other. They went into the tent, and Moses told his father-in-law all that the Lord had done to Pharaoh and the Egyptians for Israel's sake, all the hardship that had come upon them along the way, and how the Lord had delivered them. Jethro rejoiced for all the good which the Lord had done for Israel, whom He had delivered out of the hand of the Egyptians.

Jethro, a pagan priest, heard all the testimony of what God had done. He said, "Now I know that the Lord is greater than all the gods, all the gods I have been worshipping and serving as a priest. In the very thing which they have behaved proudly, He was above them." Then Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, took a burnt offering and other sacrifices to offer to God. Aaron, Moses' brother, came with the elders of Israel to eat bread with Moses' father-in-law before the Lord. They had a big party.

The next day, verse 13 states that Moses sat to judge the people of Israel. The people stood before Moses from morning until evening. When Moses' father-in-law saw all that he did for the people, he asked, "What is this thing that you are doing for the people? Why do you sit alone, and all the people stand before you from morning to evening?"

Moses replied to his father-in-law, "Because the people come to me to inquire of God. When they have a difficulty, they come to me, and I judge between one and another. I make known to them the statutes of God and His laws."

Moses' father-in-law said to him, "This is important. The thing that you do is not good. Both you and these people who are with you will surely wear yourselves out, for this thing is too much for you. You are not able to perform this yourself. Listen now to my voice, and I will give you counsel, and God will be with you."

A little bit of wise counsel may keep you from a whole lot of trouble. This is certainly not a controversial statement, and I think the vast majority of us today will probably agree that this is true. A little bit of wise counsel may keep you from a whole lot of trouble in any situation.

Stating that some of you, at this moment, can pinpoint a time in your life prior to this point when a little bit of wise counsel was a huge help. You can look back and say that it kept you from some pain, some hurt, and some trouble. However, some of you don't have that memory. Instead, you have memories of hurt, pain, and trouble. Looking back, you might think, "Man, it would have been nice to have had some wise counsel," because a little bit of wise counsel may keep you from a whole lot of trouble.

Now, that truth generates some questions. For instance, where do we get good counsel? That's a really good question. In this passage, Moses' father-in-law, Jethro, gives him some wise counsel. So, where do we get wise counsel? Another question that comes up is how do you know if the counsel you're receiving is wise counsel? We can find ourselves on the receiving end of all kinds of different ideas, opinions, thoughts, and counsel. So, how do we know if the counsel we're receiving is wise?

I think this is so important that we're going to spend some time over the next couple of weeks thinking about the concept of wisdom. For the sake of our study this week, I want to consider some lessons that I have come to see, both scripturally and through experience, that have been very helpful in considering counsel. Where do we get good counsel? How do we know that it is wise counsel?

If you're taking notes, you might want to note these on the back of your sermon guide, because I have found these things to be both biblically true and observably factual. The first thing is that it's not unreasonable to seek counsel from many sources. We should be those people who are looking for counsel, wisdom, knowledge, and understanding. It is not unreasonable to seek counsel from many sources; in fact, it may be very wise to do so.

One of the wisest men who ever lived was a man by the name of Solomon. He lived 3,000 years ago and was the king of Israel. Now, he did a lot of boneheaded, stupid things in spite of the fact that God gave him great wisdom. Even having great wisdom, you can still make mistakes.

A lot of boneheaded, stupid things happen, so there's that. However, he did write some really helpful instructions. It's called The Book of Proverbs, and it's considered a book of wisdom. If you've never read The Book of Proverbs, I would encourage you to pick it up. There are 31 Proverbs, and it might not be a bad pattern to read a proverb a day for a month. You could even make that a pattern throughout your whole life. I know some people who do that regularly, and I don't think it's a harmful thing at all.

Solomon wrote in Proverbs 11, verse 14, "Where there is no counsel, the people fall; but in the multitude of counselors, there is safety." Those words might be really good to imprint upon your heart: "In the multitude of counselors, there is safety." To drive it home, he says it a second time in Proverbs 24, verse 6: "For by wise counsel, you will wage your own war; in the multitude of counselors, there is safety." It is not unreasonable to seek multiple sources of counsel because, in the multitude of counselors, there is safety.

However, when you receive an abundance of counsel from a multitude of counselors, you may end up—maybe you've experienced this before—finding that you receive multiple different ideas on what you should do. Has anyone ever had that problem? You go and talk to a few people because you're not sure what to do in a situation. You might talk with a neighbor, a friend, a family member, a co-worker, or a counselor. You say, "Let me pitch this scenario to you. Here's what's going on. What do you think?" They might respond, "Well, I don't know. Let me think about that," and then they give you some information.

You talk to another person, and then another. Maybe you talk to four, five, or six people, and suddenly you're more confused than you were at the start because you have multiple different ideas on what you should do. So, how do you determine what is the best counsel or the most wise counsel?

It is extremely important to find, both scripturally and in life, that counsel must be weighed and not counted. What does that mean? Well, maybe you say, "I talked to 15 different friends of mine. I got their thoughts, I got their ideas, I got their counsel, so I have a lot of counsel because in the multitude of counselors, there is safety." But the problem is...

Have you ever counted how many people you talk to, but not weighed whether or not what they have said is good counsel? Maybe you've experienced that some people give you pretty bad advice. Oftentimes, it is those closest to you who have a tendency to provide poor counsel because they are biased in your favor. Because of this bias, they will always opt to side with you, and that can be a challenge. We need to weigh the counsel we receive.

When we talk with people and consider sources of counsel, it's important to think about a few things, such as who is giving me this counsel and what the probable outcomes of this counsel are. There are some people in this world who are very liberal with their advice. They are the kind of individuals who constantly drop their two cents, even when you haven't asked for their opinion. Perhaps you've met this person before—the two-cent dropper. You might be sharing something with them, and they immediately respond with, "You know what I think?" Before you know it, you receive a dissertation that is 27 paragraphs long, detailing their thoughts. You might think, "Wow, they've really thought about this."

On the other hand, there are people who are very slow to give their thoughts and ideas. This may be a generalization, but I have found it to be generally true that those who are slow to speak tend to be more thoughtful in their counsel than the two-cent droppers. In Proverbs, Solomon observed this and wrote in Proverbs 20:5, "Counsel in the heart of a man is like deep water, but a man of understanding will draw it out." What is he saying? Moses lived in a time when, if you wanted water, you had to draw it out of a well. Some of those wells were very deep, and it took a lot of work to bring that necessary water for life up. You had to have that water, or you could not survive.

Live and in some of the circumstances and situations of life, we need good and wise counsel. Look at the United States of America in 2020. I would suggest to you that we need wise, understanding, knowledgeable leaders. You could be accused of saying that maybe we are not seeing that so much, and not just at a national level, but also at a state level, local level, and even within churches. These are important things that we need to wrestle with.

Counsel in the heart of a man is like deep water, but a man of understanding will draw it out. If you are going to be a man or a woman of understanding today, you need to walk in wisdom, as the Scriptures say. Sometimes it takes a little work to draw up that well. Point number four on your outline: a little bit of thoughtful patience may help you uncover deep stores of wisdom.

Well, that's all well and good, but how do I find wise individuals? Where do I find such people? There are two things here to consider that I think are important, as the Scriptures teach us on this point. But before I give these to you, I want to specifically address two different groups of people here today.

There are some of you who are just kind of getting started in life, and these truths are going to be really important for you. It is not a given in life that everything is going to work out perfectly. We encounter a lot of challenges and setbacks in life, and sadly, a number of those challenges and setbacks are due to the decisions that we make. In fact, many of them are due to the decisions that we make.

It is really important, as we begin to navigate life, that we do our best to try and identify the wise path to walk through, which means, scripturally speaking, that we look for wise individuals to draw out wisdom so that we can navigate life well. Now, that's one group of people—those who are just beginning. There are others of you here today who have lived a little longer through this life, and you are at a point in life where you would say...

This message would have been really helpful had I heard it 20 or 30 years ago. In a long life, you take some paths that lead to dead ends, or you may fall into some pits along the way. However, life is not over from this point forward. Wouldn't it be good to make wiser decisions as you move forward? I suggest that it would be both honoring to God and would lead to a better experience of this life for you and those who count on you. There are people who count on you, even if you don't realize it, and so this word is important for all of us.

There are two important things to consider when looking for wise individuals to draw wisdom from. The first thing to consider is that wise people, as I've already alluded to, are slow to speak. Sometimes, you have to patiently sit with those people, ask them questions, and wait for them to respond. They may be slow to speak.

I often refer to Proverbs because it is filled with truths like this. In Proverbs chapter 17, verses 27 and 28, I can remember reading this specific text as a twenty-year-old. I recall the time and the situation I was in when I read it. Proverbs 17:27 states, "He who has knowledge spares his words, and a man of understanding is of a calm spirit."

I love the next verse, verse 28: "Even a fool is counted wise when he holds his peace." Even someone who is completely daft, as they say in Great Britain, if they just keep their mouths shut, people will think they are wise. As the old saying goes, it is better for people to think you a fool than for you to open your mouth and remove all doubt. Solomon, 3,000 years ago, noted that even a fool is counted wise when he holds his peace; when he shuts his lips, he is considered perceptive.

The counterpoint to this comes a couple of verses later in chapter 18, verse 2, where Solomon observes, "A fool has no delight in understanding but in expressing his own heart." I just have to share with you that it's on my heart. Have we not heard that a whole bunch? You might want to push pause on that one because Jeremiah the Prophet observed 2,500 years ago that the heart of man is desperately wicked.

Wickedness resides in our hearts, and there is a lot we don't fully understand. This is not to say that we can't come up with good things that are led by the Lord. However, the fool has no delight in understanding but only in expressing his own heart.

An important thing to consider when looking for wise people is to find those who may be slow to speak. They are slow to speak because they are thoughtful. I can remember when I first started on staff here at this church as an unpaid intern. I was not too long out of high school, just 19 years old, when I was invited to come on staff.

In that first week, I was invited to attend the pastor's meeting. I felt totally out of place and a bit intimidated sitting there. I remember feeling a little tense and intimidated in that room, and I heard a little still, small voice in the back of my mind. I believe it was divinely inspired, and it said, "Keep your mouth shut." I am grateful I heeded that advice. Those who are wise are indeed slow to speak.

The second thing that I think is very important comes from a slightly less well-known saying of Jesus, which is one of my favorite things He said. It is recorded in Matthew's Gospel, chapter 11, verse 19, and in Luke's Gospel, chapter 7, verse 35. Jesus said, "Wisdom is justified by her children." What does that mean? It simply means that outcomes are important. The wisdom of an idea will be judged by what it produces.

Because this is true, especially for those who are at the beginning stage of life, just starting out as adults, it is important to beware of receiving counsel from people whose lives are a mess. A lot of times, they are the "here's my two cents" kind of people. It is not wrong to evaluate the outcomes of a person's life to see how well they have governed the things in their life. If things are a mess, that should tell you something about the decisions they have made. Therefore, it is a safe practice to consider these factors.

Most of the time, if you find someone whose life is a mess, you may not want to pattern your life after theirs. This is why it's wise to look for wells of wisdom among people who are a bit further along in life than you are. In my early twenties, realizing this truth from the book of Proverbs, I looked around at the people in my life who happened to be at this church. I did exactly what Paul said in Philippians chapter 3: "Note those who have so walked, as you have them as a pattern."

I asked myself who the people were whose lives seemed to be working out pretty well. There was one person at that time who really stood out to me. He is still here; he was sitting in the first service this morning and is currently serving in our children's ministry. His name is Mark Searle. I remember thinking that this guy has a life worthy of emulation. Fast forward 20 years later, and he still does. He is still on a consistent path, moving forward in a straight line.

You need to look for the people in your life who are doing it well, shall we say, and note those who have successfully walked down the path of life, perhaps a bit further than you. It is important to recognize that, although it may not be politically correct in 21st-century Western thinking, everyone's ideas are not equally valuable. This is true in business, finance, marriage, parenting, and every area of life. Not all ideas are worthy of equal value; ideas must be stress-tested.

An idea is merely a theory until it is experimented with and proven true. There are many experimental life livers who have written a whole bunch of books in Amazon's self-help section. You can look at them and wonder where they are in their life. I would take the PhD from life experience far above the master's degree in psychology any day of the week.

I have a lot more to say about wisdom, and we will talk more about it next week and the week after that. Not just wisdom, but wisdom's dreadful sister.

All that aside, Moses and his father-in-law, Jethro, in Exodus chapter eighteen, have an important exchange. Jethro gives Moses some counsel, and it's worth considering how Moses could have responded. When Jethro, a pagan priest, approached him and offered advice, Moses could have dismissed him, thinking, "You're just a pagan priest. I have a burning bush experience." This burning bush does not refer to marijuana, as some people might suggest today. Moses could have pointed to his track record, claiming, "I just destroyed one of the greatest world empires of the day and led all these people out of Egypt. I don't need your input."

However, Moses did not respond that way. In Exodus 18:19, Jethro says, "Listen to my voice, and I will give you counsel, and God will be with you. Stand before God for the people so that they may bring the difficulties to God." This is significant. In verse 20, Jethro instructs Moses to teach the people the statutes and the laws, to give them an ethic, and to show them the way in which they must walk and the work they must do.

Moses is to teach them the statutes and demonstrate how to apply them in their lives. Furthermore, Jethro advises Moses to select able individuals from among the people—men who fear God, are men of truth, and hate covetousness. He suggests placing these individuals over the people as rulers of thousands, fifties, tens, and hundreds, allowing them to judge the people at all times.

There is something profoundly important in this thirty-four hundred-year-old truth regarding a hierarchy of leadership. We are currently living in a culture that claims all hierarchies are false and wrong, advocating for their removal. However, it is wise to be cautious before moving a wall or a fence; one should consider why it is there in the first place. Jethro's advice to establish rulers is a foundational principle that should not be overlooked.

Thousands of rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens were appointed to judge the people at all times. Every great matter they would bring to Moses, but every small matter they themselves would judge. This arrangement would make it easier for Moses, as they would bear the burden with him. If he followed these instructions, as God commanded, and if it was in line with God's will, then he would be able to endure, and all the people would go to their place in peace.

In verse 24, we see that Moses listened to the voice of his father-in-law. It is important to note that Moses heeded the advice given to him. He chose able men out of Israel and made them heads over the people: rulers of thousands, rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens. They judged the people at all times, bringing only the hard cases to Moses while judging every small case themselves. After this, Moses let his father-in-law depart, and Jethro went his way to his own land.

Now, fast forward 40 years. Moses is recounting this event in Deuteronomy chapter 1, the text we are examining today. He is speaking again to the children of Israel, many of whom were too small or not even born yet to know about this situation from forty years prior. What is missing in Moses's retelling of the story is the mention of Jethro. He does not refer to his father-in-law as Jethro or mention that he was a pagan priest.

Some may wonder if Moses was dishonoring his father-in-law by not giving him credit. I don't think so. Point number five on your outline is that a little bit of knowledge becomes your wisdom when you act upon it. It becomes yours when you act on it. It doesn't matter where it came from at that point; when you act on it, it is yours. You may be able to give chapter and verse, or you may not, but when you act on it, it is yours. However, it has everything to do with acting on it. You can receive the best counsel possible and be on the absolutely right track, but if you don't heed it, it is useless. Again, Solomon observed in Proverbs chapter 12, verse 15, that the way of the fool is to disregard wisdom.

Is right in his own eyes, but he who heeds counsel is wise. Someday, far in the future, we're going to get to the Book of Judges. In the Book of Judges, we will read repeatedly that everyone did what was right in his own eyes, and we'll see what that got them. The way of the fool is right in his own eyes, but he who heeds counsel is wise.

In Deuteronomy chapter 1, we read in verse 12, "How can I alone bear your problems and your burdens and your complaints? Choose wise and understanding, knowledgeable men from among your tribes, and I will make them heads over you." You answered and said to me, "The thing which you have told us to do is good."

I don't say this this morning to dishonor anyone or throw anybody under the Bible bus, but I have worked with some people in the past who have proved their foolishness by sticking to their own path while disregarding the multitude of wise counsel. They received wise counsel from multiple people, and when the wise counsel was the same, they still said, "No, I reject that. I'm going to do what I think I'm supposed to do because the Lord told me," or "because I'm convinced that this is the right thing."

If you're going to reject wise counsel, you better have a good reason for it. If you don't, you will fall, and your folly will become apparent to other people around you. But here's the danger: your folly only becomes apparent after you've led some other people down a path toward injury. So, you have to be very careful with these things.

Three little words could determine a whole lot for your life going forward from this point. It's either going to be, "I've got this," or "I'm not able; I need help." It's wisdom to recognize humbly your inability and your insufficiency.

To look around and say who is doing this right, and then sit with the wise, you will be better off for it in the end. I promise. Would you stand with me as we close in prayer?

God, I thank you for the wisdom of Scripture. I thank you that these things were written for our instruction and that we would be trained by them. But it is only good for us if we heed it. He who thinks he stands, Lord, the one who thinks that they've got this, is often the quickest to fall. So let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.

God, would you drill these things into our hearts? Just thinking about this passage this week and considering our church, our county, our state, our nation, and this world, we need wise understanding and knowledgeable people who have been proved in leadership. We need those who can lead over their own household, then lead over ten people, then lead over fifty people, and then lead over hundreds and thousands. We need that, but it's only going to come from us.

Lord, whether we want to admit it or realize it, we are the future leaders of this church and this nation. So, God, I pray that you would teach us to walk in wisdom and that we would experience the joy of walking in wisdom, that you would be honored and glorified by it.

God, do work in us that we would be able to enter into the fullness or the blessing that you desire for us. We pray this today in Jesus' name. Amen.