With a Subtitle: Acts 7:25 shows why godly leaders must hear God clearly and speak clearly.
A brief Excerpt: Moses assumed others would understand God’s purpose, but they did not. Acts 7:25 reminds us that spiritual leadership requires both a clear calling from God and clear communication to the people we lead.
Scripture
Our verse for today comes from Acts 7:25, “He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was giving them salvation by his hand, but they did not understand.”
Background
In the midst of his defense regarding his stance and preaching concerning Moses and his customs, Stephen slips in this little nugget of information as to what Moses was thinking, at least in part, when he defended his fellow Hebrew and struck down and killed the Egyptian who was beating him. More than just an act of emotional impulse or a lethal blow for equality and justice, the murder by Moses was meant to express the greater calling of God for His children to rise up and follow Moses to liberty. At least that’s what Moses thought. And maybe that’s why after forty years of essentially ignoring them, he now visits them two days in a row. But whatever thoughts and intentions he carried within him, he failed to convey them successfully to the ones that most needed to hear them. And so, rather than sparking a revolution and leading his people to freedom, Moses leaves Egypt all alone, running as a murderer and a fugitive. But eventually he would learn a couple of lessons he needed to learn as a leader, and he would return to deliver God’s people from bondage.
Application
First, he learned to make sure that the calling he thought he had was really the calling that God had for him. In fact, when God does call him to leave Midian and return to Egypt, He has to scold Moses because he was so excessive in making sure that the mission for which God had chosen him was really from God and for him. And second, Moses has a clear directive on communicating his vision and plan to the people and makes it plain for them to understand what he is going to do and what the intended results will be. I’m not sure Stephen meant to pass along leadership lessons from Moses that today’s gurus would charge hundreds of dollars to over-explain in a two-day seminar. But we would do well to heed the wisdom of Moses from God to save ourselves from forty years of struggling without it. Leaders, whether in the church or at home, need to be clear in what they hear and then be clear in what they say. To suppose that others might understand is a path filled with dangerous pitfalls and avoidable heartache. But when God is leading all on the same page, there’s no telling how far He will take you.
Charge
As we seek Him today, let your ears be acutely attuned to God, and let crystal be your standard for clear communication.
Salvation – Eternal Life in Less Than 150 Words
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