Sunday's Hymn: He Leadeth Me

He leadeth me: O blessed thought!
O words with heav’nly comfort fraught!
Whate’er I do, where’er I be,
Still ‘tis God’s hand that leadeth me.

He leadeth me, he leadeth me;
By his own hand he leadeth me:
His faithful foll’wer I would be,
For by his hand he leadeth me.

Sometimes ‘mid scenes of deepest gloom,
Sometimes where Eden’s bowers bloom,
By waters calm, o’er troubled sea,
Still ‘tis his hand that leadeth me.

Lord, I would clasp thy hand in mine,
Nor ever murmur nor repine;
Content, whatever lot I see,
Since ‘tis my God that leadeth me.

And when my task on earth is done,
When, by thy grace, the vict’ry’s won,
E’en death’s cold wave I will not flee,
Since God through Jordan leadeth me.

—Joseph H. Gilmore

 Other hymns, worship songs, or quotes for this Sunday:

• My Jesus, I Love Thee at The Outspoken Tulip
• Hallelujah! Christ Is Risen at The Happy Wonderer
• The Lord shall be a light at Tried With Fire
• Lord’s Day 18, 2019 at The Thirsty Theologian

Selected Reading

I read or listened to these recently and recommend them to you.

Theology

Why Does Doctrine Matter Anyway?
Without it, we could not answer Jesus’s question to his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” 

The Canons of Dort and the Gift of Faith
This is Kevin DeYoung on the Canons of Dort again. This time, he’s discussing one point of doctrine affirmed in this historic church document. “Faith” according to the Canons, “is not something outside of us that we grab hold of. It is a work that God works in us, producing ‘both the will to believe and the belief itself’ (Art. 14).”

Church History

2000 Years of Christ’s Power
I read Volume 1 (The Age of the Early Church Fathers) of Nick Needham’s four volume history of Christianity last year. It took me a long time to finish it—six months or so—but I really enjoyed it. He makes church history interesting! For an accessible introduction to the story of the early church, you can’t do better than this.

I plan to buy the second volume, which is about Christianity in the miccle ages, to read this summer. 

Rowland Taylor
The story of one Protestant martyr.

Service

Gifted to Serve the Church 
“Here’s my encouragement to you and to us all: find a church that preaches the Bible and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Serve somewhere, anywhere. At my church we are always needing volunteers in the nursery and children’s ministry. Serving others in love is the first step, with joy soon to follow.” 

Well Done, Good and Faithful Servant

[C]onsider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses also was faithful in all God’s house. (Hebrews 3:1b-2 ESV)

Who was the greatest leader in Old Testament history? Was it David? After all, he is described as “a man after [God’s] own heart” (1 Samuel 13:14)? Is there a better commendation than this?

Before I studied the passage of scripture from which the above text comes, David would have been my answer. I don’t think I would have even considered Moses.

But Moses is definitely a contender in the great Old Testament leader category. Because he steadfastly served God among his people, God commended him as “my servant Moses,” who is “faithful in all my house” (Numbers 12:7). That’s pretty high praise.

Jesus, according to these verses, was an apostle and a high priest. The author of Hebrews can call Jesus an apostle because Jesus was sent by God to be God’s representative on earth. He was God’s emissary and spokesman. He came from God to reveal God to humanity. Jesus was also a high priest, offering himself as a propitiatory sacrifice for his people and interceding for them before God.

Moses is one of the few Old Testament leaders who, like Jesus, was both an apostle and priest.¹ As God’s emissary, Moses was sent to bring God’s people out of Egypt (Exodus 3:10). He served as God’s spokesman when, for instance, God gave him a message to deliver to Pharaoh (Exodus 9:1). Moses represented God to his people by giving God’s law to them (Exodus 19:3ff; Exodus 24:3). In the work God sent him to do, he revealed God to both the children of Israel and the nations around them. As Moses fulfilled the mission God appointed him to do, he served as an apostle.

And yes, Moses’s brother Aaron was Israel’s official High Priest, but who do we see pleading with God on behalf of the people? Who was their best intercessor? It was Moses! Do you remember when Aaron led the people in worship of the golden calf? It was Moses who petitioned God to forgive them for all for their sin (Exodus 32:30-32). When the people of Israel grumbled and rebelled against Moses and Aaron after the spies returned from the land of Canaan with a bad report, once again, it was Moses who interceded for them. He pleaded for God to pardon them, and God did (Numbers 14:19-20). “It was Moses, not Aaron, who was Israel’s true advocate with God,” writes F. F. Bruce.² As Moses interceded for the people, he served them as a priest (Psalm 99:6).

What’s more, Moses was unique among Old Testament leaders because he had more direct access to God. When we read the story that the author of Hebrews referred back to when he wrote that Moses was faithful in all God’s house, we see that God himself stepped in to defend Moses when Aaron and Miriam challenged his authority. God said to them, 

Hear my words: If there is a prophet among you, I the LORD make myself known to him in a vision; I speak with him in a dream. [7] Not so with my servant Moses. He is faithful in all my house. [8] With him I speak mouth to mouth, clearly, and not in riddles, and he beholds the form of the LORD. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?  (Numbers 12:6–8 ESV)

God communicated to other prophets with visions and dreams, but with Moses, he spoke “mouth to mouth” and “not in riddles.” God spoke to him clearly and directly, and Moses actually saw the form of the Lord. Miriam and Aaron should have been scared to bad mouth him, because he was greater than all the other prophets.³ 

Let’s not minimize Moses. He’s a bright star in Old Testament history. As God’s good and faithful servant, I’d say he’s a bright star in all of human history.  

Who was the greatest leader in Old Testament history? It may well have been Moses.

This is the first piece in a two-part series. Part two is here.

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¹ F.F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Hebrews, page 91.

² Bruce, page 92.

³ Tom Schreiner, Commentary on Hebrews, page 117.