THE ROD IN OUR HAND.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 189, 12 August 1933, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE ROD IN OUR HAND.

(By S.) "And the Lord said unto him, What is that in thine hand? And he eaid, A rod." A rod! A shepherd's crook! That was all. Yet that rod was to be Moses' credential to Pharaoh that he was the servant of a greater than he. By the use of that shepherd's crook he was to effect the deliverance of his countrymen, and the overthrow of their powerful enemy. Who knows what virtue there may be in what is in his hand? Who knows with what power it may • yet become instinct? Let no man despise what is in his hand. Some of us have a great deal more in our hand than Moses had, a great deal more than he ever dreamed of having. And all of us have talents of some kind, and experience in some degree, and opportunities by the score every day we rise. What miracles we could work with our rod If we cared! Have we considered what si in our hand? Are we using it aright! The most remarkable thing about the call of Moses is tha,t he was no longer a young man when it came to him.. No less than two-thirds of his life had gone by when he was told, "I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth My people out of Egypt." That is to say, the best, the real work of his life was to be done in its autumn and winter. The first two-thirds had been really a preparation for the remaining third. God had been using him all through that earlier time, as He is using all of us, for the furthering of His own wise purposes; but the special work for which Moses was to be distinguished was before him, and for that special work this earlier time was a preparation. God had been using him all tho time, and in the using of him, and all unknown to him, had been educating him and fitting him for higher service of greater usefulness; and when He now asked him, "What is that in thine hand?" Moses did not see that of which his shepherd's crook was but a symbol. He did not sec, till afterwards, that his Hebrew blood and hie Hebrew sympathies and his wide and accurate acquaintance with the splendid literature of Egypt and Babylon, and his deep insight into the temple religion of Arabia—that, in short, his whole experience was at his disposal. Do we ever take stook of ourselves? Do we know our stock-in-trade at this moment? Do .we Bee what is in our hand? For we have each of us an experience peculiar to ourselves that may be to us, and that ought to be to us, a source of power and of profit. No matter what it is, it is our experience, our stock-in-trade, something of which none but we can make use, something that is at our disposal, at our command, and at ours alone. And if Moses entered upon the work of his life when only a half of the years he had already seen were before him, and not knowing whether he would have so many, if he had a future before him then, if God had been keeping him in reserve, and fitting him and preparing him for the opportunity that would unfailingly come, surely even the most unsuccessful and the most regretful and the most despondent of us can take fresh hope, and fresh courage, and go forward!