Beginning of the End - Ellen G. White

weak, sickly one in all their tribes.
The heart of Moses sank. In his love for them, he had prayed
that his name might be blotted from the book of life rather than for
them to perish, and this was their response. They blamed him for all
their hardships and even their imaginary sufferings. In his distress
he was even tempted to distrust God. His prayer was almost a
complaint: "Why have You afflicted Your servant ... that You have
laid the burden of all these people on me? ... they weep ... saying,
'Give us meat, that we may eat.' I am not able to bear all these
people alone, because the burden is too heavy for me."
The Lord answered his prayer and directed him to appoint
seventy men who had good judgment and experience to share his
responsibilities. Their influence would help put down rebellion, yet
serious evils would eventually result from their promotion. They
would never have been chosen if Moses had shown faith as strong as
the displays of God's power and goodness that he had seen. If he had
fully relied on God, the Lord would have continually guided him
and given him strength for every emergency.
Moses announced the appointment of the seventy elders. The
great leader's instruction to these chosen men could well serve as a
model of judicial integrity for the judges and lawmakers of modern
times: "Hear the cases between your brethren, and judge righteously
between a man and his brother or the stranger who is with him. You
shall not show partiality in judgment; you shall hear the small as
well as the great; you shall not be afraid in any man's presence, for
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