What Do You Have In Your Hand

What Do You Have In Your Hand?

We all know the story of the burning bush and Moses’ excuses before God.

He had 4 excuses and God had 4 answers.

- Who Am I? (vs 11-12) God’s answer was - it doesn’t matter Moses: who you are - what is important is who I am and that I will be with you.

- I won’t know what to say (vs 13-14). God’s answer was I will tell you.

- They won’t listen to me (vs 1ff). God’s answer was that I will work through you in power. They will see and believe.

- I can’t speak well (I don’t have the skills) (vs 10ff). God’s answer was to speak through him.

Do you have similar excuses as Moses? Well God has similar answers for you. Moses was once a doubter. And at the beginning of his ministry he was certainly nervous.

We are not going to focus on all of these excuses this morning, but I want to focus on a single question God asks of Moses. Before we get to that let’s read part of this account - Ex 4:1-20.

Ex 4: 2 And the LORD said unto him, What is that in thine hand? And he said, A rod.

3 And he said, Cast it on the ground. And he cast it on the ground, and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from before it.

4 And the LORD said unto Moses, Put forth thine hand, and take it by the tail. And he put forth his hand, and caught it, and it became a rod in his hand:

What do you have?Moses said “Nothing”

1) What is nothing to us is something to God

It was used ...

• To confront to soothsayers of Pharaohs court (7:12)

• To turn the waters of Egypt into Blood (7:17-20)

• To bring frogs upon the land (8:5)

• To cause lice throughout all the land of Egypt. (8:16)

• To bring thunder and hail throughout the land (9:23)

• To bring an east wind that brought the locusts across the land. (10:13)

• To cause the waters of the Red Sea to stand up like a wall (14:16)

• To cause the bottom of that sea to dry up so they could pass

• To cause the waters of the Red sea to come back upon Pharaohs armies

• To bring forth water from the rock at Horeb to supply their needs (17:5)

• To bring victory to his army (17:9)

This rod was nothing special of itself; it was just a rod (a stick).

What was significant about this stick was: It was what Moses had.

God did not ask Moses what he didn’t have.

We all could make a long list if what we don’t have.

*We don’t have enough money

*We don’t have a good education

*We don’t have a high social standing

The list can go on and on

God never directs our attention to what we don’t have, but to what we do have even though it seems small.

II) Availability is the key ...

Would this staff been able to be used if remained a stick in the hand of Moses.

To be used, it had to be made available to God for his use.

Once Moses released it, it became God’s for him to use as he needed.

The difference is the power of God.

It is not

*your ability,

*your knowledge,

*your talent,

*the size of your gift

All that matters is: How much of God is in your stick.

Your stick represents what you have that you surrender to God.

When God gets in it, it’s enough

When God gets in it

It will surprise you (Moses fled from his rod when it turned into a serpent).

We need to ask God to get in our stick.

God in our song,

God in our preaching,

God in our marriage,

God in our business.

God in our gift,

God in our talent.

When God gets in a thing it is not the same.

Just like Moses who had never seen his rod do anything like that before.

*God got in a rock and caused a river to flow out of it that quenched the thirst of 1to 3 million Israelites.

*Got got in a donkey and caused it to speak and rebuke a rebellious prophet.

*God got in an axe head of Iron and caused it to swim up to the top of the water so the prophet could reach out his hand and take hold of it.

*God got in a little pot of oil and caused it to multiply till it met every need and provided an abundant overflow.

*God got in a box, and they called it the Ark of the Covenant.