EXODUS 18
We get an interesting type in this chapter of the coming in of the Gentiles. It speaks of what will be fully realized in the world to come, but it is reached in a certain way in the assembly now; the Gentile has come in to share the joy of God’s wonderful works in grace.
It is striking that in this book the Gentile should be the first to offer a burnt-offering. In Genesis 22 we get in type the offering of the beloved and only Son; there it is a type of what God has done in connection with the burnt-offering. But here we see the Gentile taking his place with God in the sweet savour of the burnt-offering — apprehending Christ in His personal and sacrificial acceptability to God as the ground of all blessing. It is one of the beautiful intimations in the Old Testament of God’s thought to bring in the Gentile. It was always His thought that the Gentiles should rejoice with His people (Romans 15: 10). It should have spoken to Israel of a widening-out of grace beyond their limits. Paul [p. 103] was a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles that they might come in all His sweet savour to God, acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit.
The promise to Abraham was that he should be the father of a multitude of nations, and that all families of the earth should be blessed in him, that is, on the faith principle. Now we see that the report went out “of all that God had done to Moses, and to Israel his people; that Jehovah had brought Israel out of Egypt”, and it was heard by the hearing of faith, and Jethro came to rejoice in all the wonderful works of God done for Israel. No doubt this looks on to a future day. Prophecy speaks largely of the Gentiles coming in to share in millennial blessing by and by, and we get a figure of it here. While God delivers Israel the church will be sent out of the way as Zipporah was. Then the report of what God has done in delivering Israel will go abroad in the Gentile world, and the Gentile will get blessing by owning God’s deliverance and salvation in Israel. Ezekiel 37 to 39 shows that it is the report of what God does for Israel, and in the destruction of their enemies, that goes forth to the Gentiles and makes His Name known among them. Isaiah 60 gives the result; the Gentiles come up and own the great deliverance that God has wrought in Israel; they bring their wealth and glory. That is what we get a type of here. The Gentiles come to share the joy of what God has done for Israel, and to give Him the glory due to His Name for His great deliverance. They will be blessed by owning the place that God has given to Israel, and they will learn to know Him by seeing His ways with Israel. The Queen of Sheba coming up to hear Solomon’s wisdom no [p. 104] doubt typifies the coming up of the Gentiles when the kingdom is established.
When the Gentiles come in to share the joy of Israel, the church also appears in the scene, represented here by Zipporah. So that this chapter is a beautiful picture of what will obtain in the world to come. Israel fully delivered; the Gentiles hearing of it and attracted to come and view the blessed portion of Israel, and to give God His due in regard to it all; Israel and the Gentile in happy communion; and the church there in her own proper relationship with the Deliverer, in the heavenly place with Him. And all brought about on the ground of the death of Christ; hence the burnt-offering and the sacrifices come in; all is celebrated as founded on that.
It is striking that here it is Jethro who takes the burnt-offering and sacrifices for God. He takes the lead; “Aaron came, and all the elders of Israel, to eat bread with Moses’ father-in-law;” not he with them. The Gentile is seen as taking a place of priority to Israel. This would answer more to the present time. It is one of those peculiar touches in the Old Testament which throw light on God’s great thoughts as to the Gentiles. It is one of the “prophetic scriptures” (Romans 16: 26). The greatness and character of those divine thoughts came to fruition when Paul was sent to the Gentiles and the truth of the mystery was revealed. (Ephesians 3: 5, 6.) The elders of Israel eating bread with Jethro in the presence of God is very suggestive of the fellowship of the church of God; the Jew eating bread with the Gentile in the presence of God. If the Jew and the Gentile are brought into communion now by both partaking of Christ in the presence of God, the truth of the assembly [p. 105] comes into evidence. And in Zipporah we get a figure of the assembly in her own proper relationship with Christ. We have seen her in chapter 2 as given to Moses in the day of his exile from Israel: she had a son whose name indicated that Moses was an exile, a stranger. Now she has another son — Eliezer, “God is my help”. It is well to take note of these two names, because they have to be characteristic of the church during the period of Christ’s rejection. We have to keep in the stranger’s place, and to trust in God’s power for everything. Gershom signifies that Christ is rejected, and that therefore the church must be in strangership here; but Eliezer indicates that the help of God may be counted on to maintain and support everything that is for Christ. The true character of the church’s place and hopes in this world is thus set forth.
Joseph also had a Gentile bride and two sons, but that sets forth things in another aspect. Manasseh means “Forgetting”; “For God has made me forget all my toil, and all my father’s house”. It is the Lord forgetting His rejection by Israel in the joy of His exaltation among the Gentiles; and He becomes fruitful there; Ephraim means “Fruitfulness”. In Joseph’s sons we get the thought of the compensation Christ finds among the Gentiles in the day of His rejection by Israel. But in Moses’ sons we have the sense He has of His rejection, but also that His interests are being maintained. God is caring for the glory of Christ, and for the help and preservation of everything that is of Him; Eliezer speaks of that.
The last half of the chapter is typical of the order and administration of the kingdom in righteousness.
[p. 106] Some have thought that Moses did not do right in listening to Jethro, but looking at it typically it was not the divine thought that Christ should exercise rule and judgment alone. The first prophecy on record speaks of His coming to execute judgment, but He comes “amidst his holy myriads”; the saints are with Him (Jude 14). Christ will not exercise the rule and administration of the kingdom alone. All is here in its right setting as a type. It was different in Numbers 10, where Moses said to Hobab, “Thou knowest where we are to encamp in the wilderness, and thou wilt be to us for eyes”. Jehovah had just been telling Moses about the silver trumpets — “Make thee two trumpets of silver ... for the journeying of the camps”. Then Moses said to Hobab, “Thou wilt be to us for eyes”, as if the divine guidance for journeying by the silver trumpets were not sufficient! Was it not rather in rebuke of this that we read immediately after, “The ark of the covenant of Jehovah went before them in the three days’ journey, to search out a resting-place for them”? It was as though God said in wondrous grace, I will be eyes for you! We are often like Moses; we think how nice it would be to have someone to tell us what to do and where to go!
But in Exodus 18 the advice of Jethro results in everything being set in divine order according to wisdom and righteousness. This section of the book closes with a picture of the world to come. Israel blessed; the Gentiles coming to rejoice with Israel; holy and happy communion between Israel and the Gentiles; the church coming into the scene in her own relationship; and the administration of the kingdom in divine order — chiefs of thousands, and of [p. 107] hundreds, and of fifties, and of tens! It is a figure of the character of things which the Lord referred to when He said, “Ye also shall sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel” (Matthew 19: 28). Then again in Luke 19 we are told that the one who turns his pound into ten pounds will be made ruler over ten cities, and the one who gains five pounds will be put over five cities. That is all part of the administration in righteousness of the world to come, which is typified in Exodus 18.