The Character of a Leader: The Life of Moses

Show Notes

Episode 477: 
In this episode, Jeff and guest co-host Kyle explore the end of Moses' life in the book of Deuteronomy. They reflect on Moses' humility, courage, and wisdom, highlighting how Moses argued with God to spare the Israelites, showcasing his meekness and strength under control. Drawing parallels between Moses and modern-day challenges, they emphasize the importance of holiness, humility, and being helpful in receiving God's blessings. 

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You're listening to The Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun, in practical ways. Hey, we're back. That's another episode. Is stunningly exciting episode of The Bible Guys. I'm Jeff and this is Kyle. Chris is out of town this week, but we are super excited to have you calls. Right, this is gonna be a great day. Yes, I'm excited to be on this podcast with Jeff. Come on, give it up for him. Wherever you're at a little clap, wherever in the. Car, or whatever may be. The people are going wild. Hey, So before we get into. Today's scripture, actually we're gonna play a quick game. And wherever you're at in the car, maybe you're listening at home. Maybe this is you know what you do while you're working out. We want you to let us know your answers as well, because I'm gonna ask you some questions. Jeff and I got my perspective on it as well. Okay, but basically, we're gonna play a game called one Must Go. One must Go. That's right. Desiree loves this game. So between these two options, you have to decide two wonderful things. One of them we have to get rid of us forever. Yeah, forever forever. It's just we've eliminated this. Never like Audi, your memory, it's gone. Okay, this is hard. Here we go. Here's the first one. Which one which one must go? Spaghetti or lasagna? Man, that is a tough one. Boy. I would say lasagna. Has to go. Yeah, oh wow, I would choose would spaghetti? Really? Yeah? You know, and even to be honest with you, lasagna like whoever invented that? Like that's just kind of a creative Like it's a it's a spaghetti cake. Yeah, it's like, okay, that's what it is, just like make a cake mix some of our verything. So you prefer prefer lasagna. Well, I don't know. If I've had bad lasagna. I don't have very often. Yeah, I just don't have bad lasagna. Yeah, so I don't have a problem. I'll make spaghetti, but I never make design. I've never heavy. Right, So that's that's the As I was making my decision, I thought, well, if it has to be gone forever, I should stick with the thing I know how to make. Yes, that's good. A right kicking one. Which one must go suku or crossword crossword puzzles okay really yeah, yeah, okay, So I would have normally, but I started playing Sudoku like a like a I wanted to make fun of boomers. But I started, you know, sitting on the couch playing saduku about a year ago. There you go, there you go. Yeah, it's it's a nice game. But I like crossword Okay, okay, third one cross word crosswords require a broader knowledge of things than just being able to put together a pattern. Yeah yeah, right yeah. And after a while, like I started getting in the Sadoku. I was playing like the beginner level, and I thought, I felt like I was pretty good. I challenging myself. Oh yeah, I was like timing myself. And then I go to like medium levels. Still pretty good. Then there's like a then there's a whole other level Ofoku where they give you like like four letters or four numbers, and you're like, here. We go, Yeah, you accidentally crack the code for how to split an at them. Yes, I end up. Finding myself in the back of the book where they give away the answers. A lot more than I'd like to admit. Okay, all right, Third one, would you rather let go the robot dance or the worm? The robot dance or the worm? Let's get rid of the robot dance? Yeah, because I think the worm is more fun. Oh yeah, and my grandson can do the worm? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, the worm. Man. I think whenever I see somebody do do the worm, especially if it's like a grown person, like at a wedding, I'm like, I don't know what would happen if I tried. It's way more impressive than the robot. Would it be painful? Could you imagine trying to do that like the worm? Like right now? No, I would not. I don't get up, I'd get down. I'd just be stuck there your knees. I mean, like everything about it just seems painful with the robot. I mean anybody can do that, right, that's right. Fourth one, would you rather get rid of a banana split or root beer float? Ooh, that's this banana split or root beer float? I'm going to get rid of the root beer float? Wow? Really? Yeah? Do you have banana splits like bananas? Okay? Yeah, what about you? I think I've definitely had a lot more root beer floats because it's easier to make. Requires two ingredients. But banans splits, I would say, yeah, if I had to choose between the two of them, Yeah, banas split's awesome. I just don't have them very often. Well, there you go, and the last one, would you one must go? Mini golf or laser tag? Oh? Man, uh, Mini golf or laser tag. They're both fun to me? Do you like? Do you like them? I would say mini golf is really fun for the first like four or five holes, and then you're like, wow, we've got, you know, fifteen. More to goteen more than to go and we're standing out in the sun. Yeah. Yeah, everyone starts cheating on their scorecard. But the other side, you know, laser tag, if you get a bad gun, it's shooting over to the left or to the right and it's not very accurate, or somebody has the gun that they just pull the trigger and everybody gets you. Yeah, you know, it's frustrating to get down. You're like, you around, you're all sweaty. Yeah yeah, yeah, I don't know. I think I would choose the one that has to go is laser tag. Oh really, Okay, I'm gonna choose many i'd get rid of mini golf, get rid of me. I would say laser tag. Though usually when I play, I would say, I'm always shocked at like ten minutes fly by, and you're like, I just dropped twenty two dollars for ten minutes women play, Yes, so just from a frugal perspective, laser tag kind of frustrates me, but I enjoy it a little bit more. I would say, you are. Such a dad. To go back to yesterday's episode, I just dropped twenty bucks for ten minutes, exactly. Yeah, there you are, exactly, there you go. You can't just pay, you can't just accept the fact you paid two dollars per minute of ecstasy. No, no, Now you're. Feeling grund people exactly, and especially if I didn't win, or like, you know, my name's not up on the board and. All four of you guys go at costy eighty bucks. Exactly yep, yep, and then and then like the kids, you know, they're embarrassing me the whole time. Anyway, So yeah, that's right, Oh dad, you're ruining my life's funny. Okay, Well, hey so we aligned on what two or three of those Yeah, yeah, probably fifty to fifty yep, okay, yeah, well good, well, I know that that was a riveting segment for our listen. Our listeners were just so worried about the things that we've banished from human existence. Absolutely. Yeah. Anyways, Now, I mentioned yesterday that we for some reason had the challenge of dividing these twelve verses into two full segments. And yesterday we talked about the goodness of God, that God keeps his promises. Moses was faithful, right, That's what we talked about. And then today Moses dies. Yep. This is the end of a really significant era in the Bible, and the end of the life on this earth of other than Jesus, I think, the greatest reader ever. So here we'll just read the last few verses of the Book of Deuteronomy. It says this in chapter thirty four, verse five. So Moses, the servant of the Lord, died there in the land of Moab, just as the Lord had said. The Lord buried him in a valley near Bethpure and Moab, but to this day no one knows exact place. Moses was one hundred and twenty years old when he died, yet his eyesight was clear, and he was as strong as ever. The people of Israel mourned for Moses on the plains of Moab for thirty days until the customary period of mourning was over. Now, Joshua, the son of Nune was full of the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him. So the people of Israel obeyed him, doing just as the Lord had commanded Moses. There has never been and another prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. The Lord sent him to perform all the miraculous signs and wonders of the land of Egypt against Pharaoh and all his servants in his entire land. With mighty power. Moses performed terrifying acts in the sight of all of Israel. Wow, those last two verses, Man, Hey, how's that? How's that for your epitaph at the end of your life in the and I mean, that's recording the Bible for now, you know, thousands of years. So that's pretty incredibly cool. Yeah, I've been that verse ten. There there has never been another prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. I love that verse. And in this Life Application Study by Ballant or just read this section here, because they actually kind of do a great job of summarizing, even though the end of the chapter does a great job of summer. I love the Life Study by Yeah, but I. Want to read this little section in here and just kind of break it down because it does a great job honesty of honoring Moses. But it says this Moses, the man who did not want to be sent to Egypt because he was quote unquote not very good with words, delivered the three addresses to Israel that make up the Book of Deuteronomy, which I love. I think one of his type. I think people refer to him as the reluctant leader. Yeah. I mean, there's so many in the Bible, but he's one of them. He says, God gave him the power to develop from a stuttering shepherd into a national leader and powerful order. His courage, humility, and wisdom molded the Hebrew slaves into a nation. But Moses was one person who did not let success get to his head. In the end, God was still Moses's best friend. His love, respect, and awe for God had grown daily throughout his life. Moses knew that it was not any greatness in himself that made him successful. It was a greatness of the all powerful God in whom he trusted and says there were many great and powerful prophets during the time of the kings, but it would be more than a thousand years before one greater than Moses would appear. And that's Jesus. Yeah, isn't it great? Yeah? I love that. What a great way to summer up, you know, sum up his life. I love the fact that you know he argued with literally argues with God. Yeah, multiple times. He has these face and face, face to face encounters with gods. The only person in the Bible like that. And at the beginning he's arguing with God. Oh, I can't go because I stutter. Yeah, I'm not a good speech giver. But here we are thirty four chapters in and thirty three of the thirty four chapters in the Book of Deuteronomy are speeches. Yeah, right, three, It's just three big long speeches. Love it. He's up there speaking to millions of people, declaring, thus says the Lord, and this is how you should live. Choose life. And you know, oh, that you would choose life and walk away from a life, of death, all those things, and he's just so strong in his communication. You read these things, and he has this strength and this confidence in his speech giving, which is hysterical because his biggest argument to God was I'm not a very good Yes, it's. Beautiful, And even that little section they're talking about how his strength was not his own, it was through God and just a reminder that sometimes we limit ourselves, are limiting beliefs in what God can do in us and through us. Is it's pretty incredible, especially a story like this and how much that means. And I don't know about you, but I personally, I mean, I have so many moments. You know, I don't know if you're I'm sure your ministry background, I know, I've heard I've heard a lot of yours stories about college and things like that, but I had I remember when I first actually got called into ministry. It was something for sure that was a God thing, because it was not a me thing. I was already you know, going down a certain career path and that sort of thing. But when guy called me, I remember the people that I was most embarrassed to tell, where the people who like. Knew me growing up? Oh right, Yeah, and a part of it was just kind of funny when you think back here, like there's no way. And then some of the people I went to high school with, even some family members, wait, wait see, you want to be a pastor? Yeah. And it's interesting, you know, because here's you know, Moses, a reluctant leader. And I think so many, so many of us, so many people I've met, they're like, it's exactly how they describe themselves. It doesn't matter how confident we may appear or others may appear. It's like internally, you know, sometimes it has to start. It always starts, almost always with that humility, that reluctance to lead. Yeah, I did not want to be a past I mean I can remember literally and always be careful with this idea. I can literally remember telling God, I'll do anything else you want me to do. I just don't make me be a preacher. Oh yeah wow. And it seems like whenever we tell God I'll do anything except this thing, God goes I got an idea, You're gonna go do that thing? Right. It happens over and over and over again. But yeah, there was this is the thing. And then I had three pastors that I worked for before I came to hero To Church, and all three of them told me, thank God you're a musician, because God didn't make you a preacher. Wow, right, right, because that's what I was as I was a musician, you know, a worship leader everywhere, and I just got very poor grades from the preachers that I worked for before coming to Heritage. And then when I came to Heritage, I had spoken often to teenagers and young adults. I ran youth ministries and children's ministries and young adult ministries, but I had only spoken six times to adults. Yeah, I thought, I remember that being a party of yeah six times. Six times. And so when I came to Heritage Church the first time and they wanted me to speak to adults, I was very It was in my head, yeah, man, wow, that I'm not good at this. This is this is where I remember thinking when I walked out, this is why I'm not going to get this job. Right, They're not they're not going to bring me on, they're not going to vote to have me be their pastor because I just I'm not a good preacher. And so I went out and spoke and then tried really hard to wrap my head around. When I got done, I'm trying to, like, you know, do this autopsy on it. How did it go? And my wife was like, oh, you did a really nice job. And I'm like, I don't know, I don't know if I did a good job a bad job, you know. And then they called me back and kept having me come back, which was amazing. And so it turned out I'd only spoken in front of adults six times, but they didn't ask wow, and so I didn't tell them how and they voted me in anyways. But that had always been for you know, probably half my time here at Heritage Church. That's always been the thing that I felt like, Okay, man, you know, God's just going to have to get past this fact that I'm not a very good communicator, and I feel like God has filled in the gaps, and you know, yeah, that's pretty wild though. That's pretty wild though that, you know, because a. Lot of people who would you know, hear you speak obviously you speak daily in a podcast, not to mention on Sunday mornings, big crowds, all that stuff, would think, oh yeah this probably comes now, Oh yeah, this is this was easy for her, and this was probably He's probably gifted with us from the beginning. So, you know, as the church started getting bigger and you know, all these magazines, you know, making a big deal about Heritage Church, all of a sudden, I started getting invitations, Hey do you want to speak at this conference? Do you want to speak at that conference? And I kept declining them. Yeah, right, Hey, some of those conferences give you big checks. Oh wow. But I kept thinking, oh, if I go out there and said, I'm going to get exposed as a fraud. Okay, yeah, because you got these really great speakers and I'm not a great speaker. And it was one of the things that I think, I think God used that to keep me from getting out on that stage thing, and instead I gave all of my focus in my heart to I want to help the everyday average preacher pastor who's trying to figure out how to get a church started right. So I really I shifted away from conference speaking, which is not my thing, into really coaching and developing and strategizing on how to help pastors get churches started right. And so that's been a big part of my focus. But I think a part of it was just being intimidated intimidated by all these famous speakers, these guys. Our church is as big as theirs. Yeah, but you know, but I just never felt like equal to comparison. Man. It's always if you compare yourself to other people, is what Jesus says. Yeah, but we do it anyway, Oh. Ye, one hundred percent. But I do think it's interesting though. You know, the thing that it said in the thing that that Moses was known for, it said wisdom, which he definitely was a wise man, courage, courage to to do what he did, but then also humility marked him. He didn't let success to get to his head. And it makes you wonder if maybe that's a part of I mean, there's many reasons why God was such a close friend of him so on base to face a relationship, but I'm wondering if it was just Moses. Is humility the fact that he the way Moses viewed God and related to God, and even in humility to even like question God and have a conversation like there's some humility and not just to say like, hey, I don't know God, so I'm asking you this. I think that out of humility in a way, you know, And I think it's a really really uh cool reminder of the fact that that is something that that that's a characteristic that God loved so much. And then even in that it talks about how Jesus ultimately becomes, you know, the greatest prophet prophet ever and Moses a picture of Jesus, Jesus himself we see throughout scripture. I mean, he didn't he didn't use equality with God as something to be used for his advantage. He actually humbled himself. And I think that's really a great trait of Moses that so often, you know, we forget about because we see all the heroics, we see him the speaking, we see him as this great leader, and those are all great things, but it starts with that, that perspective of humility. Yeah. You know, the Bible says that Moses was the meekest person that ever lived. Oh my God. Yeah wow. And that's that goes along with that humility, that kind of thing. We tend to think of meekness as weakness. We tend to think of meekness as you know, a meek person is a kind of mousey, kind of sissy. Yeah, and that's the wrong way to view it. But I think it's his meekness is what gets God's attention so much with him. So meekness. The best definition of meekness that I've ever heard is meekness is strength and power under control. Right? Is it this knowing that you have a strength, knowing that you have this power, but managing it under control and put in submitting it to God. So let's talk about this so called if he's the meekest person ever and most of us view meekness as weakness. You know, there was a time when God says Two times when God says to Moses, get out the way, Moses, I'm gonna kill these people. Right. But one time they're all Moses up getting getting the ten commandments from God, and the people are making an idol literally and Moses, hey, I'm gonna be right back and go talk to God. They see the thunder and the lightning on top of the mountain, they feel the earthquakes. God's shaking this mountain, but they're making a golden calf and they're dancing around it, having a big party. God goes Moses, i am so sick of these people. Get out of the way. I'm gonna kill them. And another time they're complaining, Oh, you just brought us out here in the desert to kill us. Oh we wish we could get back to the leaks and the garlics and the melons in Egypt. Remember how good that was? Hey, you people were slaves in Egypt. What are you talking about? But they can only remember the good, they don't remember any of the bad. And God says, Moses, get out of the way. I'm going to kill these people, and I'm going to keep my promise to Moses to Abraham through you, right, So just got away. And Moses argues with God and goes, God, you can't kill these people. You made a promise to take them out. God goes, no, I'll keep the promise through you. And Moses goes, you can't kill these people. What are all of the pagans gonna say. They're just gonna say that you brought them out into the desert to kill them, right, and that you can't take care of them. And Moses is challenging and You're better than this, right, So he's just going, God, you're a good God, don't kill these people. And the Bible says that God repented of the evil he thought to do against the people of Israel. Dude, how meek are you that you square off and argue with God when God is so mad? Yes, listen, the creator of the universe talking to you face to face is so mad. He's about ready to wipe out three million people. And you go, hey, hey, hey, calm down. Let's you some reason here. Yeah, come on right, Yeah, that is an unbelievable thing. Now the idea of evil. Not all evil is sin. Evil is just a horrible thing, right, That's what evil is. So when the King James or I think the NASB, when they use that word, it's what it is talking about. Is God changed his mind. Repent has just changed his mind. God changed his mind about this horrible thing that he was about to do. Yeah. Right. So it wasn't that what God was doing was sinful. It was the fact, because God is job, his justice was demanding that this be resolved, and Moses was begging for mercy. There but this incredible strength, this outrageous level of courage to stand in the face of God and plead for his people when a raging God, a God who's angry, and Moses goes, God, please please just just think this through. And which of course God had, but he's pleading to what's the rest of the world going to say? What's everyone else going to say? Moses has the courage to stand to God, to stand up to God and say, God, I'm begging you to change your mind, and the Bible says God did so. Is this only time that's happened? God changed his mind? Yeah, I'm trying to think of any other and any other time in the old type somebody who could have reasoned with God and got him to yea. It depends on how you view what Abraham did with God about Sodom and Gomar, where God says, hey, I'm going to wipe out Sodom, and he goes, hey, if you can find fifty righteous? How about how about how about aready right? How could have been in twenty right? It sounds yeah, and God keeps saying, yes, I wish he'd gotten down to two because then he would have found it right. But anyways, so it depends on how you see that one. If God was changed his mind or if God was just going along with, you know, leading Abraham in this process. But in this one it does. It does say God repented of the of the decision. He was making. He changed his mind. Yeah, So in this situation, I think it's just phenomenal to think that you have this incredible man that God could see in Moses what Moses could not see in himself, and you would think at eighty you'd know yourself pretty well at that point. Yeah, it's crazy, right, and he's like, oh, I'm a stutter, I'm not a good leader. I don't want to go. Back to that shows Moses. He's like a thirty year old trap right when he's called, right, isn't it. Usually they paint this picture of him being young and you know. But he's not. He's eighty years old. So it seems like you'd know yourself. But don't say by the time he's one twenty, he still was in great shape and had great eyes. Yeah, he had a great eyes sight, and he was as strong as ever. Yes, his mind was clear. It's pretty impressive. Yeah, So here you have this guy, like you said, he's incredibly humble. He's a person that is a friend of God, which is really phenomenal. And you know, this is one of the things. We just had a meeting with our staff and all staff meeting with grilled and had some Hamburgers and all that kind of stuff. But lately, almost every staff meeting, I'll bring up the idea that God is blessing us beyond what we deserve as a church. Right, as a team. Though we just baptized a couple hundred people on one weekend, We've already baptized four hundred people this year. Geez, halfway through the year. Right, we have a thousand more people attending now than we did last year. Right, All these things, the church stuff that people dream of having ever happened in their lifetime, we've had happen in a year. And so we have a lot of young staff members, a lot of staff members in their twenties. Yeah, you and I, unfortunately are not anymore, or thank god, are not anymore. But you know, sometimes and start to think, well, this is how it goes when you have a good plan, when you work kind of hard, when you have a good budget. Of course you can pull Ourse's area. We're doing great, and so, over and over and over again, I keep going back and reminding our staff, Hey, listen, God is blessing us in spite of us, and so if you are seeing blessing in your life today, you are being blessed in spite of you. God blessed Moses in spite of himself. Right. We know Moses had his his favors, but God did bless him. I think because of a couple of reasons. One, he was holy. This is a man who kept himself set apart from God all the time. He kept himself holy. And I think that if we want God to continue to bless us, we have to be holy people. He was incredibly humble. That's that meekness, that's that humility. That's just he's not putting himself out in front all the time, pushing himself Instead, God has to push him out there and then be helpful. And that idea it's in the Bible all the time. The New Testament. The word helpful oftentimes is translated as edify, build up, encourage the others. And this is what you see from Moses. Moses warns people about the judgment of God and the curses of God, but he spends more time going listen, God wants to bless you. Do the right thing, go the right direction, trust. And he's constantly lifting them up. In chapter thirty one, he lays hands on Joshua and he says hey, Joshua's going to be the leader, and two different times he says, so be strong and courageous. Joshua, right, Joshua, be strong, be courageous. He's constantly building up, he's constantly encouraging. And so we need to be if we want God's blessing in our lives and we want to be like Moses, we need to be holy. We need to just be walking away. He chose not to go with the lifestyle of Egypt, and you and I live in Egypt, we do, and all the godless stuff around us, and he chose to reject that lifestyle. He chose to be holy, and he chose to go with Jesus and suffer for Jesus rather than have all the benefits of Egypt. He walked away from all that godlessness, and we need to walk away from the godlessness in our society. And then he was incredibly humble and he was always helpful. Those three things I think set us up for being able to receive blessing similar to what Moses received. I remember hearing quote one time that says it says, if you want to test a man or woman, if you want to test a man's character, don't give him adversity, give him power. I thought that was interesting because a lot of times when we think about our character, we think adversity will determine because there's you know a bunch of quotes about testing and. Going difficulties up, and I believe that's true too. But it's like, if you want to test a man's character given power, which in a lot of ways, power would be success. Right. So you're talking about this idea of you know, seeing some of the blessings and oftentimes with that, you. Start to feel power. If you start to feel successful, you. Feel like you got some wins, and in those I feel like God is kind of just like hold up, remember remember like just like like remember who brought you. Out of Egypt? To remember? Remember that was God's promised the entire time to remember remember remember. And I think it would be wise for us, in light of you know, Moses and his epic life, to just go back to that, just remembering who got us there. That's right, that's good. That's a great place to end right there. Man. Well, hey, thank you for joining us here on another episode of the Bible guys, and we'll see you again tomorrow. M