Day 17 - We Are Better Together
Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God-this is your true and proper worship.
Moses is one of the greatest leaders of faith, who saw the very glory of God and received what we refer to today as the Ten Commandments. Yet one day, his father-in-law visits Moses and asks an insightful question:
“Why are you trying to do all this alone?”(Exodus 18:14 NLT)
We remember Moses for his leadership, his faith, and his courage facing Pharoah as he led the people of Israel out of Egypt. But in Exodus chapter 18, Moses is found doing something that many of us do: trying to accomplish something all alone, when we don’t have to.
We were not created to be alone. It is God’s will that we flourish in community. I love that it is Jethro, Moses’ own father-in-law who suggests to Moses that he should appoint others to help with the mammoth task of leading an entire nation. Jethro became the family Moses needed when he fled his home and all he knew earlier in his life. And now through Jethro, Moses discovers again that God provides community for us - we just need to recognise it and respond to it.
Moses needed others who could look at situations with a different point of view. One of the great - but also challenging - aspects of community is that we don’t all see the same problem the same way. This can lead to robust discussions at times! But it can also help us look at a problem in a different way. Community can open new ways of looking at the world.
Community also requires us to be vulnerable. It challenges us to admit that we don’t have all the answers and that sometimes we need help. This can be a real challenge for some of us, especially in a culture that seems to demand perfection: perfect jobs, perfect marriages, perfect kids and even perfect bodies. To fully enjoy community, we need to learn to be vulnerable and rely on others. To trust that the people God has placed in our lives will support us, love us and encourage us. It isn’t always perfect, but it is God’s will for us. Verse 24 tells us that Moses listened to Jethro and the result was that his burdens were shared with others.
If you are feeling discouraged, alone or overwhelmed today, ask God to show you who you can turn to for encouragement and support. Give someone a call, organise a visit or a coffee. Community is worth building - we don’t have to do it all alone.