Leaders Appointed - Deuteronomy 1-3

 Deuteronomy 1:9-18 (ESV Strong's)

9 “At that time I said to you, ‘I am not able to bear you by myself. 10 The LORD your God has multiplied you, and behold, you are today as numerous as the stars of heaven. 11 May the LORD, the God of your fathers, make you a thousand times as many as you are and bless you, as he has promised you! 12 How can I bear by myself the weight and burden of you and your strife? 13 Choose for your tribes wise, understanding, and experienced men, and I will appoint them as your heads.’ 14 And you answered me, ‘The thing that you have spoken is good for us to do.’ 15 So I took the heads of your tribes, wise and experienced men, and set them as heads over you, commanders of thousands, commanders of hundreds, commanders of fifties, commanders of tens, and officers, throughout your tribes. 16 And I charged your judges at that time, ‘Hear the cases between your brothers, and judge righteously between a man and his brother or the alien who is with him. 17 You shall not be partial in judgment. You shall hear the small and the great alike. You shall not be intimidated by anyone, for the judgment is God's. And the case that is too hard for you, you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.’ 18 And I commanded you at that time all the things that you should do.

Leaders Appointed

In the above text we read a little about the structure of the nation of Israel.  This is the “org” chart of the nation.   With over a million men, women and children, Moses was not able to lead them all.  He needed help.   Each tribe would select “wise, understanding and experienced men” to be their head.  Moose would allow them to judge the lessor disputes and solve the minor human problems that would naturally arise when you put a million people together.    Moses was instructed by God to delegate his responsibilities to other like-minded men.  God was giving him a structure to follow.  He had to, in humility, allow these other men to help with the decision making process.  Great leaders surround themselves with other great leaders.   In the last verse of this section we still see who was in charge.  Moses tells them that he will still be giving them God’s commands.  But, their job was to carry those out.  This was not a “shared” leadership model.  This was still hierarchical in structure.   They shared the responsibilities of the work, but only Moses was the leader.   That was God’s design.  He has a similar design for the Church, today.  He establishes leaders for the church, but also institutes others to help with the work (see Acts 6 and Ephesians 4).   God wants leadership to lead.  He wants others to help with the work.