Opening illustration: My mother’s uncle was a soldier in WWII. He had served the British Army in the course of the colonization of India. During the war he was captured by the Germans and sent to the concentration camp. To India he became a MIA. His family was in shock and cried their life away. They thought he had been killed but his wife secretly harbored a hope of him being alive. Being an electrician in the army, he knew how to use all the electrical tools. After many months he was able to procure a plier/spanner. He and some of his buddies coined a plan to escape one night. Many were fearful of being shot dead during the escape and decided to stay back. Fortunately he and a couple of his close buddies used the plier to cut the camp wires and ran for their life. Few of them were shot dead during the daring escape but he and one of his buddies escaped with two bullets in their bodies. They found a hiding place and nursed their wounds before continuing their foot run from Europe to India.
For many years that followed, folks at home had almost forgotten about them thinking they had met their demise. But my mom’s uncle’s wife had harbored that hope of one day he would turn up. Sure one day he turned up at the border of India and disclosed his identity. After all the formalities, he returned home. He knocked on the door of his home and you can imagine what must have happened! His wife who opened the door fainted right there and his kids had grown so big that neither could recognize one another. It was a terrible, heart wrenching but wonderful sight of restoration and a hope turned to reality.
That night of their escape from the German concentration camp, my mom’s uncle had only a plier/spanner in his hands. He made good use of it which not only fetched him his life but restored his freedom. What do you have in your hand? How are you going to use it?
Introduction: Moses was a great man of God and did many mighty exploits as He followed God in obedience to His word. However, Moses was like most of us. He did not know the value of what was in his hands until revelation came from God. He had resigned himself to life as usual, nothing extraordinary, just getting by from day to day, and then God revealed Himself. God is revealing Himself to people in these days in order that they may be a Kingdom people ready to fulfill His will in the earth. We have something valuable to offer to the world and the truth of the matter is they are waiting for us come forth in demonstration of the Kingdom of God.
What is in your hand?
1. God’s Empowerment (vs. 1-5)
There is always something in Our Hand. Every life has some capacity. God says to each of us, "What is that in your hand?" He takes it for granted that there is something there. Do not envy each other, or despise one another. For if you do, you will paralyze your personal capacity and threaten your life with failure. To every one of us is given grace, according to the measure of the gift of God; and perhaps the hardest lesson that anyone can learn, is to believe that every gift from heaven is of equal intrinsic worth. Our success is to be measured, not by the character of the capacity, but its realization and full use.
“What is that in your hand?” is the question. “A rod” is the answer. Moses must have remembered a time when his hands held a scepter instead. Surely his mind went back to those days in the palace in Egypt when he was being trained and educated to be a Pharaoh. He may have remembered a time when he held the world in his hand, now he has nothing but a dry, dead stick. God knew what Moses had in his hand. God was not asking for information. God was asking for instruction. God was asking Moses to carefully consider the thing he held in his hand. In Moses’ life, the thing he held also held him!
That rod identified Moses and that rod also represented all the problems in his life! That rod reminded him that he used to be a prince. That rod reminded him that he was just a servant. That rod reminded him that he was poor and owned nothing. That rod reminded Moses that his life was filled with vast potential at one time, but that now, he was merely a has been, a washed up nobody on the back side of the desert.
God Uses What We Have. God always begins by using what we have in hand. Page after page of God's Word reveals that there is a chance for true usefulness, in the consecrated employment of whatever we have already in possession. In the Book of Judges, left-handed Ehud had a single dagger in his hand, and Shamgar an ox-goad: Gideon's three hundred had only pitchers and lamps, and Samson the jawbone of an ass. When David went to smite Goliath, he had a sling in his hand. When the widow appealed to Elisha for help, he said, "What hast thou in the house?" and though there was only a pot of oil, it was sufficient. Six water pots full of water were all that was needed for our Lord's first sign at Cana; and five barley-loaves with two small fishes were sufficient for the great miracle of hospitality.
Moses held a rod in his hand – useful for support – for help – for advancement – for protection – as a token of office – which, being cast upon the ground, lost all capability for usefulness, became offensive, injurious, and poisonous; but the divine command restored it to its original condition of utility and worth. God can take any insignificant/useless thing or person and use it for His glory by empowering it. For us a shepherd’s rod may seem worthless but till to date it is an identity of power and authority.
If Moses’ authority is wrapped up in the God who has called and commissioned him, then it is surely worthwhile for him to inquire as to the nature and character of God. If it were not for the other three responses of Moses (the last two are protests, not inquiries), we might find this question altogether acceptable. My own inclination is that Moses already knew enough.
Knowing God is the highest calling of the Christian and a lifetime occupation (cf. Philippians 3:10). As such, one should always seek to know more of Him. But Moses does not seek this knowledge for himself; he seeks it because he fears that the Israelites will reject his authority. In other words, this is really a reflection of the same fears of Moses which were more openly admitted in the first question. God’s answer to the first question was not sufficient for Moses, so he asked it again, in different terms. Moses still expects to be rejected by the Israelites, as he was 40 years before.
The sign of the rod = power. It was Moses’s shepherd’s crook, the tool of his calling. Cast down, it became a serpent; taken up in faith it became ‘the rod of God.’
2. Our Heart: what we are? (v. 6)
When God approached Moses, his heart was not in the right place. He was always looking for short cuts and a way out of responsibilities in life. He was so laid back with the lifestyle he had in the desert that he had grown comfortable in a zone where confrontation would not be needed and necessary. He had the most intelligent excuses possible but God was greater and prevailed over all of them. Before Moses could proceed to be useful for God, he had to get his heart right.
No situation is permanent and I see yours changing for good. Your miracle is closer to you than you think. You cannot move forward in life or accomplish much when you are stuck with the what ifs, how can, when or where of your situations. Moses, overcome by self-limitation and low-self-esteem, struggled to accept his divine assignment as God’s instrument of deliverance for the Israelites who were held down in captivity in Egypt. The Lord opened Moses’ eyes to see the rod of deliverance which became the rod of God as the story progressed. David began as an insignificant shepherd boy in Israel, an afterthought of his family, but God raised him from the valley to the place of prominence with an ordinary sling shot. God will always add His powerful extra to your ordinary to make you an extraordinary person. God is in the fantastic business of divine upliftment, addition and multiplication in the lives of His children (Genesis 1:28).
3. Our Hand: what we do? (v. 7)
The hand that holds the rod of God’s power must be a cleansed hand swayed by a new heart. (Isa 52:11)
We may not be able to understand all that the sign meant for Moses; but it means for us, and it may have meant for him, that the terrible taint of pride and uncleanness which besets all God's people, and especially threatens those who are engaged in Christ's work, needs to be cleansed away. It is so easy to become contaminated by the corruption which is in the world through lust. We may be taught a profound lesson by the care with which the instruments required for a surgical operation are rendered aseptic.
God's Instruments must be Clean. The life that is to be a mission from God to the world must be a clean, pure, and holy before God. There is the animal in us all and the man or woman who is anxious to help others must first take that animal by the throat, and choke it, and beat it, until the life is pounded out of it. But this goeth not forth, save by prayer and fasting.
Illustration: Dr. Labaree was a notable Presbyterian missionary in Persia. After forty years of service he died on the Atlantic, on his way home to the United States. At his funeral, a Persian who had lived from boyhood in the city where Dr. Labaree labored, said that the two traits which most impressed the natives of that city were, first, his carefulness - he was so faithful and punctilious in the little veracities of life--and second, his unsullied innocence. He had lived for seventy-two years, and went back in cleanness and honor to the great God from whom he came.
God showed Samson the jaw bone of an ass with which he destroyed his enemies. The victory was in the jawbone. The prosperity of the widow and her sons was in the pot of oil in her house (2 Kings 4:1-4). The tree that would cure the bitter water of Marah was in the wilderness, but the Israelites didn’t see it until God showed it to them.
The seed for your miracle, breakthrough and go-through is always in your hand or just within your reach. Ask the Lord to open your eyes to see it. The Lord will show you your pot of oil, your rod of deliverance and your jaw bone of victory if you will only ask Him (Matthew 7:7). You will receive the revelation for your elevation today in Jesus name!
Don’t worry about your lack of qualification, talent or natural abilities, God can make you and will! Genesis 12:2. Abraham was an idol worshipper, but God made him the father of many nations! David was a shepherd boy, but God made him the consolidated king of Israel. Joseph was a prisoner but God made him a Prime Minister in Egypt. Apostle Paul, before his conversion, was a serial killer by association, persecuting the church, but God made him the author of more than half of the books of the New Testament. Is anything too hard for the Lord? He will make you!
No more excuses or alibi for failure. Get up, go and excel! You are not empty-handed or God-forsaken. You are His treasure in earthen vessel (2 Corinthians 4:7). God will put His super on that thing that seems so natural (if you’ll let Him have it) to give you a supernatural manifestation if you’ll let Him have it.
4. Preparation for Service: following instructions (vs. 8-9)
We live in a world of instructions. Practically everything that can be purchased comes with a set of instructions. Even boxes and cans of food quite often include instructions on how to utilize the product in some new recipe. Instructions are a vital part of our daily lives and influence us more than we realize. It is important to follow instructions for at least three reasons.
(i) First, following instructions frees us from frustration. Ignoring God's instructions for our lives will also lead to some very frustrating moments. How often we think that we have life all figured out. How often we think that we can handle life's vicissitudes on the strength of our understanding alone. How often we fail to see the bigger picture and get completely frustrated with life, people, and ourselves. Ignoring God's instructions as found in His Word will eventually lead to frustration.
(ii) Second, following instructions delivers us from danger. There is a tag on the cord of my electric hair dryer that reads, "Danger - Electrocution possible if used or dropped in tub." God's Word is filled with instruction that warns us of danger. There are many negative commands in the Word of God, the "Thou shalt not ..." passages. Rather than seeing God's negative commands in a negative light however, we ought to see them as being doubly positive.
(iii) Third, following instructions enhances our enjoyment. When we follow the instructions that come with a purchased product, our enjoyment of that product is enhanced. We enjoy using the product and more than likely will discover that the product will last longer when used properly and in accordance with the manufacturer's instructions. So it is with our lives. We will enjoy life more when we purpose to live our lives in accordance with our Maker's instructions. In some cases we can expect to live longer when we follow our Maker's instructions because we will avoid paths, habits, and relationships that might endanger and even end our lives prematurely.
God gave very clear instructions for Moses to follow. If he stuck to it to the T, he would be successful in attaining what God had intended for Israel otherwise everyone would suffer the consequences.
Application: With a rod in Moses’s hand he was able to redeem the Israelites from Egypt. God has already given each one of us something in our hands. What are we doing with it? Our choice to use, misuse or abuse the thing in our hands will also reap the same consequences.
