Being raised in the Northwest, I have been a Portland Trailblazers fan for as long as I can remember. I didn’t always follow basketball closely but starting in my teen years I really started really getting invested in the team. The best thing that has ever happened to the Blazers is a player named Damian Lillard, who is in my opinion the most underrated player in the entire league. I will never forget the time I got to sit courtside and watch him square up against Russel Westbrook. Even being defended by another all-star caliber player couldn’t slow Lillard down, when he’s on he is unstoppable. When the game is down to the wire, there is almost no safer bet than giving him the ball, most people refer to it as “Dame Time”. Well, last night the Blazers were playing game 5 in the first round of the playoffs against the Denver Nuggets. The game came down to the wire, and Damian again came up clutch. He ended up shooting 12 three pointers, scoring 55 points all by himself and forcing double overtime. In doing so, he made history by doing something no other player has ever done in NBA history in any game, regular season or playoffs. He is the first player in a game to ever score at least 50 points, 10 assists, and 10 three pointers. After such a historic performance, surely you would assume that the Blazers came away with the win…but you would be wrong. The Blazers fell short to the Nuggets with a final score of 147-140 in double overtime. This was because while Damian had arguable one of the greatest games in NBA history, sadly it was a one man show. The rest of his teammates played just horribly, especially in overtime. They missed multiple wide-open shots, two dunks, and carelessly were stepping out of bounds. In fact, aside from Lillard, the rest of the team only made one shot in both overtimes. One single shot. Damian scored 17 of Portland’s 19 points. Had the rest of his team actually played well and done their part, surely the Blazers would have come away with an easy victory. However, because everyone else failed to do their part, the team lost. You see, one player cannot win the game – it always requires a team effort. Last night was a clear demonstration of that. That even though one of the greatest players in the game played one of the greatest games ever played, because he was left to do it alone, he came up short.
As I laid in bed disappointed by the loss and the team’s performance, my mind went back to the account of Moses & the advice of his father-in-law Jethro. In Exodus 18, Moses had taken on the task of acting as the sole mediator and judge of the people. From sun up until sun down, Moses was trying to solve the problems of hundreds of thousands of people all by himself. Let us read the account together: “The next day Moses sat to judge the people, and the people stood around Moses from morning till evening. When Moses’ father-in-law saw all that he was doing for the people, he said, “What is this that you are doing for the people? Why do you sit alone, and all the people stand around you from morning till evening?” And Moses said to his father-in-law, “Because the people come to me to inquire of God; when they have a dispute, they come to me and I decide between one person and another, and I make them know the statutes of God and his laws.” Moses’ father-in-law said to him, “What you are doing is not good. You and the people with you will certainly wear yourselves out, for the thing is too heavy for you. You are not able to do it alone. Now obey my voice; I will give you advice, and God be with you! You shall represent the people before God and bring their cases to God, and you shall warn them about the statutes and the laws, and make them know the way in which they must walk and what they must do. Moreover, look for able men from all the people, men who fear God, who are trustworthy and hate a bribe, and place such men over the people as chiefs of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens. And let them judge the people at all times. Every great matter they shall bring to you, but any small matter they shall decide themselves. So it will be easier for you, and they will bear the burden with you. If you do this, God will direct you, you will be able to endure, and all this people also will go to their place in peace.” (Exodus 18:13-23) Can you imagine how terrible of a situation this was? This was a lose-lose situation. Not only would Moses be exhausted, both emotionally and physically, from dealing with all the people’s problems alone day in and day out, but this was terrible for the people. With only one mediator & judge, but hundreds of thousands of problems, that meant that most people’s voices were never heard, nor were their problems ever solved. Jethro was correct – what he was doing was not good. He could not do it alone, he needed help from others. This is a lesson that we must learn that applies to nearly every area of our life. It applies to marriage – in that one spouse cannot carry the marriage by themselves, it takes both working together in love, labor, and responsibility. It applies to parenting – in that God never designed for one parent to be absent, but that children desperately need both their mother and their father actively involved in their lives. It applies to your work – whatever company or organization you are a part of would fail if it was left to you alone, it requires hard work of everyone and their respective roles for things to succeed. More than anything, it applies to the church. The Lord’s work was never designed to be a one man show. Ephesians 4:15-16 says, “Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.” Sadly, many times 80% of the work is done by 20% of the church. Is it any wonder that churches don’t grow like we would hope for them to? When members do nothing to serve but only expect to be served, and when those who do serve are overworked and burnt out, that is a recipe for disaster. If evangelism alone is left up to the preacher, because after all “that’s his job”, then a church will never have the impact in its community it could have if all worked together. We must all be equipped, ready to work and fulfill our respective roles in the work of the Lord. We would do well to remember the words of Jethro today, and if we too listen to his voice, rest assured that God will be with us!