Just an Old Stick

“Then the Lord said to him, ‘What is that in your hand?’” (Genesis 4:2, NIV).

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Not much. It’s just a stick, old and rough and worn.

As long as it stayed in Moses’ hand, that’s all it was—an old stick.

Moses was reluctant. Life might be hard in the desert. But herding sheep is a lot easier than herding people. Moses had already learned the hard way that clouting difficult people over the head had consequences that clouting a rebellious sheep didn't have (Genesis 2:11ff). Even the bleating of sheep seemed musical compared to bleating people, complaining and criticizing all the time. To be asked to go back to Egypt and take charge of a herd of humans was not high on Moses’ wish list. He hoped that God would accept his excuses for not going.

God also knew that Moses was still hurting from the rejection he had experienced at the hands of his own people, and fearful because he was still wanted for murder in Egypt and could be summarily executed if, even after forty years, someone recognized him as the perpetrator. Then there was the question of evidence. Why should the Hebrews believe that this dusty, backwater renegade shepherd was a messenger from God?

It’s just an old stick. The miracle wasn’t in the old stick. The miracle was in what God could make of a surrendered old stick. God asked Moses to throw down the sign of his office. It was like asking Moses to resign, to give God who he had become so that God could make him who He wanted Moses to be.

Moses was eighty years old. Whatever happened to the “golden years” of retirement? He was a stick as old as the one he was carrying. 

What’s in your hand? Just an old stick, you say? Throw it down, let it go, give it to God and see what He can do with it.

We don’t know what would have happened if Moses hadn’t thrown down that shepherd’s staff. We do know that God gave it back to him—changed. Whatever you give to God always comes back changed. And when He changes what we give to Him, He changes us.

Yes, herding sheep in the desert was a lot safer and easier, but it would never be as satisfying as guiding God’s people on the most significant spiritual journey they would ever take.

What’s in your hand?