What's in your hand?

Welcome

This morning we will be in Exodus chapter 4

Background

Where we are: God is speaking to Moses through the burning bush. All of Chapter 3 has been this conversation between God and Moses, where God tells Moses that he is going to use him to go to Egypt and lead God’s people out of slavery

Exodus 3:7–10 HCSB

Then the Lord said, “I have observed the misery of My people in Egypt, and have heard them crying out because of their oppressors, and I know about their sufferings. I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and to bring them from that land to a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey —the territory of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. The Israelites’ cry for help has come to Me, and I have also seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. Therefore, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh so that you may lead My people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.”

Then Moses says to God, “who am I to do this?” And God says “I will be with you.” And moses says, “who am I supposed to say has sent me?” And God says, “I AM WHO I AM.” Then God gives Moses instructions to go and let the Israelites know that God is going to deliver them from their oppressors. And then also let Pharaoh know that you’re going to leave and worship God, but he’s not going to let you, so we’re going to have to deal with that.

So that’s where we are. God tells all this to Moses, then

Exodus 4:1 HCSB

Then Moses answered, “What if they won’t believe me and will not obey me but say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you’?”

Moses is afraid that the Israelites are going to say, “No way Yaweh sent this guy. This old dude. This outcast. This guy hasn’t been around for 40 years. And when he was here, he was raised in Pharaoh's household. God isn’t going to use this guy, he has a past!” Moses is afraid to go and be rejected.

And I think that sometimes today we still feel that fear.

Exodus 3:10 HCSB

Therefore, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh so that you may lead My people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.”

This command, this commission is very similar to another commission I know of

Matthew 28:19–20 HCSB

Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

God says to Moses, “I’m going to do this, I have seen my people oppressed and abused by the Egyptians. I know they are suffering, so I have come down to rescue them, and I’m going to use you! Therefore, go.

Jesus says to his disciples, and now through his word to you and me, “I have seen my people, my creation oppressed by sin and death. I know they are suffering, so I have come down to rescue them, and I’m going to use you! Therefore go.

But we like Moses ask “who am I to go?”

But what does God say to Moses? “I will certainly be with you”

What does Jesus say to us? “I am with you always”

Church, we need to understand this. God could have delivered Israel without Moses, without anyone at all. But he wanted to use him to do something extraordinary. God could also make himself and his commands known to the whole world. But he wants to partner with us, and go with us to do it together. What a marvelous gift: God want’s you to take part in his story of redemption.

Church, we are call for more than just to be saved, we are called to be sent.

So Moses is afraid of rejection. He thinks that just telling the Israelites that God sent him won’t be enough for them to believe it. So what’s God do? He asks Moses a question.

Exodus 4:2 HCSB

The Lord asked him, “What is that in your hand?” “A staff,” he replied.

There’s no reason Moses should think his staff is of any importance.

Exodus 4:3 HCSB

Then He said, “Throw it on the ground.” He threw it on the ground, and it became a snake. Moses ran from it,

Appropriate response.

Exodus 4:4–5 HCSB

but the Lord told him, “Stretch out your hand and grab it by the tail.” So he stretched out his hand and caught it, and it became a staff in his hand. “This will take place,” He continued, “so they will believe that Yahweh, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.”

So now Moses has this staff that can turn into a snake. Not only that, but God will use this staff to perform many other wonders. It will be used to initiate many of the plagues, to part the red sea, to provide in the wilderness, to win battles… In fact, in chapter 4:20 when Moses is leaving Midian it says that moses takes “God’s staff in his hand.”

So this is God’s staff now. But what was it before? It was just a piece of wood that Moses found.

You see God really likes to do this. He likes to take the ordinary, seemingly insignificant things in our lives and use them in significant ways. And he does this all throughout the Bible.

Rahab the prostitute using drying flax to hide the spies at Jericho.

David the shepherd boy with a sling

The loaves and fish.

Church, this is God’s M.O. He loves to take the insignificant and use them to change the world, and he’s still at it today.

Let’s read this

1 Corinthians 1:26–29 NLT

Remember, dear brothers and sisters, that few of you were wise in the world’s eyes or powerful or wealthy when God called you. Instead, God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful. God chose things despised by the world, things counted as nothing at all, and used them to bring to nothing what the world considers important. As a result, no one can ever boast in the presence of God.

Moses’ staff in his hand was just a stick… and it was probably pretty good for what he was using it for! Maybe, it was the greatest shepherds staff in the whole region, or maybe it wasn’t. It doesn’t matter though. What matters is that God chose moses, the one holding the staff. Now, I don’t know why God chose Moses. But I think part of it might have to do with the fact that Moses was obedient, and he was willing to lay down what he had for God to use! And not just lay it down, but to pick it up an Go! To Go and use it for God’s glory!

And here’s the deal. We all have something in our hands. We all have lots of stuff “in our hands”: job, businesses, skills, talents, hobbies, resources, abilities; all things that God can and will use; can and will turn into something he can use for his glory. But we have to have a spirit of obedience like Moses. Because these things become precious to us. These things become hard for us to let go and trust God with. But God wants to call us to lay these things down before him to use in his mission of saving the world. But not just to lay them down. He will call us to pick those things up and go! Go and show others the God you serve, the things he has done.

So what do you have in your hand? Whatever you have God can use in mighty ways, but we have to be willing to lay it down.

I hope you are challenged to examine the things in your life that you may be holding on to. The things that God may be calling you to turn over to him so he can use it for his mission.

But I have one more thing we need to look at. Something important, something that if we ignore, we can go and use our gifts and talents for God all in vain.

So they will believe

1 Corinthians 16:14 HCSB

Your every action must be done with love.

Talk about Pinehaven

1 Corinthians 13:1–3 ESV

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Without love, our efforts to make disciples, even with our God given gifts, will fall short.

Here’s a good definition of love.

Love is the commitment to sacrificial self-giving that seeks the highest good of another.

John 13:34–35 ESV

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”