What’s in your hand? (Part II)

There is still more to be drawn from this story. After Moses threw his staff down and it became a serpent, we are told that Moses “fled from it.” Once Moses realized what he had been holding, he ran away from His own weakness. But God stopped him saying,

“Stretch out your hand and grasp it by its tail.”

I’ve always thought God told him to grab it by the tail just because you don't want to grab a snake by its head since that's where the poison is! But I now think there was another reason God did this. I think God was making a point by having Moses grab the small, weak end of the staff. For years he had been holding it the other way around, and now God was teaching Him the same lesson He would teach the apostle Paul years later:

"My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."

Once Paul learned this lesson, he would go on to say, “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about MY WEAKNESSES, so that Christ's POWER may rest on me.” (2 Corinthians 12:8-10) God wanted Moses to know that HE was going to be WITH HIM. He wasn't going to do it FOR him, HE was going to do it THROUGH him.

"Now then go, and I, even I, will be with YOUR mouth..." (Exodus 4:12)

 He wanted him to pick up the same staff, but hold it differently now - by the weak end!

“Take this staff in your hand so you can perform miraculous signs with it.” (Ex 4:17)

Moses had been carrying that staff for a long time and, even though it doesn't say so, I'm guessing he had not performed ANY miraculous signs with it up to that point in his life. But something was different now! It wasn't the same anymore. In one sense it was still his staff, but at the same time, it was God’s! This sounds a lot like Galatians 2:20:  “…I live - yet not I, but Christ lives in me”

When Moses returned to Egypt, we are told he “also took the staff of God in his hand.”

Did you notice it? Before it was just his staff, now it’s “The staff of God!” That’s a BIG difference! The next verse says essentially the same thing:

“The LORD said to Moses, 'When you go back to Egypt see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders which I have put in YOUR power'...”

The word translated “power” in this verse literally means “an open hand.” Through this incident, God put something in Moses' hand that was not there before – God’s POWER! Isaiah 63:12 says that God “Caused his glorious arm to go at the right hand of Moses.” Moses had the very arm, or power of God at his fingertips! This is the same power Jesus ministered with and it is the same power he intended everyone who believes in him to minister with also! (John 14:12)

I’m not sure about you, but I definitely think its time that the church threw down its staff and picked up Gods!