“Moses listened to his father-in-law and did everything he said. So Moses chose able men from all Israel and made them leaders over the people as commanders of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens. They judged the people at all times; they would bring the hard cases to Moses, but they would judge every minor case themselves. Moses let his father-in-law go, and he journeyed to his own land.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

How do you react when someone gives you advice? Do you take it gladly, or are you one of those people who would much prefer to figure everything out on your own? I suspect it depends in large part on what your position is and who the person giving the advice is. Moses got some advice from his father-in-law. His father-in-law was not tasked with leading a whole nation. If you or I were in his sandals, I suspect there’s a decent chance we would have handled the whole situation differently. Let’s talk about what Moses did when he got some advice, and why this is a pretty good example to follow.

I’ve mentioned this a couple of times along the way of this chapter now, but we really need to not miss the extent of Moses’ humility here. He was the leader of a whole nation of people. It wasn’t a big nation as far as we think of nations today. But he was the man in charge. Yes, yes, God was really the one calling the shots, but that wasn’t how anyone in that situation was thinking about it except perhaps Moses. Moses may not have ever gotten over his sense that he was wildly over his head in this whole endeavor which was probably a good thing. But he was nonetheless the guy everyone looked to for pretty much everything. That’s pretty fertile soil for pride to grow. Somehow, though, for Moses it didn’t.

In any event, the result of Moses’ incredible humility is that when he got good advice from someone he trusted, he took it. The source of the advice really doesn’t seem to have mattered. For him, it came from a source most of us would have trouble accepting today. And yet he took it. How can we follow suit?

For starters, we focus on just the advice itself. It can be hard to separate our feelings about a particular bit of advice we get from the source of that advice. If the advice comes from someone we don’t trust or with whom we have a lot of relational baggage, we can make the mistake of rejecting it out of hand without even giving it any kind of meaningful consideration. That’s always foolish. Sometimes God will deliver godly counsel to us from sources we are inclined to reject just to teach us a lesson in humility. This doesn’t mean all our best advice is going to come from people we don’t like, but perhaps some of it will, and we need to be ready for that. On the other side of this, some advice we get isn’t good, but because we are so enamored with the source, we take it without putting it through the proper filters to keep us from doing something unwise.

So, take the advice and consider it independently of its source. In order to do that, we first hold it up against the standard of the Scriptures. Does the advice ring true with what we find there? Does it point in the direction of God’s kingdom as faithfully as the authors of the Scriptures did? Once we get a pretty good sense of this, we take the advice and run it by some close friends or wise counselors who we know to be godly and discerning. And, no, posting it on social media to get the thoughts of our friends and followers is not a good way to gain discernment.

Third, but which really needs to have been happening throughout the entire process from the start, we commit the counsel to prayer. We ask God if this is good advice or not, listening carefully for His answer. That may take some time, so we have to be patient. His answer may come in several different forms including a sense of peace about the advice (watch for this especially when we are uncomfortable with its source), a word from the Scriptures that seconds it, and the confident affirmation (or emphatic rejection in the case of bad advice) of our godly counselors.

Once we have done all of this, if the advice is sound and godly, it doesn’t matter who gave it to us. Wise counsel is wise counsel. It all comes from God’s Spirit. And when we receive wise counsel, we need to heed it just like Moses did.

One last bonus thought. Jethro obviously had a pretty big impact on Moses. He was someone Moses obviously trusted a great deal and thought of very highly. I’m sure Moses would have been glad to take him along for the whole journey that remained ahead of him. Yet when he gave Moses this advice, he left and went back home. Sometimes people come in our lives only for a season. When that season ends, they will depart and we need to let them go. God has other work for them to do in other places and with other people. On the flip side of this, Jethro was in a position to be the voice in the ear to the most powerful man in Israel. That really made him the most powerful man in Israel. Not many people would be eager to leave behind that kind of power and position. Yet when his work was finished, he left. Sometimes God calls us to a place for only a season. When the season is over, He calls us somewhere else. We need to be ready to go when that happens. He has other work for us to do in other places and with other people. Staying in this case would not be wise.

Take godly counsel and follow God’s lead when it’s time to go. That’s pretty timeless wisdom that applies well in our lives today. That’s why studying the Scriptures – even and especially the Old Testament – is such a good idea. Let’s keep on rolling!