Using What God Gave Us to Reach the Lost

Then Moses answered and said, “But suppose they will not believe me or listen to my voice; suppose they say, ‘The LORD has not appeared to you.’ So the LORD said to him, “What is that in your hand?” He said, “A rod.” (Exodus 4:1-2)

It is easy to understand why Moses reacted as he did. When we speak to the lost, we want more than “God sent me to tell you something.” The world is full of people who say that they were sent by God. Jehovah’s Witnesses say that only they are His representatives on earth, that I AM sent them. So do Mormons. They claim that they alone represent God. Muslims say a similar thing; and there are myriad cults, strange sects, and weirdos who say that they are speaking for God.

So, God asked Moses, “What is that in your hand?” (v. 2). It was a rod that Moses held in his hand. Perhaps you did not realize that you also have the rod of Moses in your hand. You do hold to the Law, don’t you? Do you think that it is good? Is it right for the Law to forbid murder, stealing, lying, and adultery? Of course, you hold to it. We cannot fault the moral Law. As the Bible says, it is perfect, holy, just, and good (see Psa.19:7; Rom. 7:12). Perhaps you have never thought much about the Law (the Ten Commandments) or that you could do anything evangelistic with it. You have simply used the Commandments to steady yourself morally in your Christian walk, and to fend off the enemy’s attacks. You know that to transgress any of the Law’s precepts—to lie, covet, steal, commit adultery, and so on—is to “give place to the devil” (Eph. 4:27).

But, as you study Scripture, you will see that the Law can be turned into something radically different. It can be used to bring to this world “the knowledge of sin” (Rom. 3:20). It can be used as a “tutor” to bring sinners to Christ (see Gal. 3:24). Jesus, Paul, and others cast it down as a serpent to guilty sinners—to be a convincing sign that God had sent them.

“The Law of God plagues a guilty sinner in the same way civil law plagues a guilty criminal.”

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So, do what Moses did. Simply cast it before the feet of a sinful world and watch what it does. In this case, seeing is believing. The Law bites into the human conscience. It has power to bring death, as it did for Paul in his own life. In Rom. 7 he explained how the Law showed him the true nature of sin—that it was “exceedingly sinful.” It produced evidence of his guilt and then passed its terrible sentence. The Law condemned him to death. With Paul, the serpent had a fatal bite: I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death. (Rom. 7:9,10)

The Law of God plagues a guilty sinner in the same way civil law plagues a guilty criminal. A murderer has little concern if he thinks he has outwitted the law. But the moment it puts steel handcuffs on his wrists, it produces a justifiable fear. It arrests him and forces him to face the just consequences of his crime.

That is why we must not allow sinners to think for a moment that they have outwitted God’s Law. They must be made to understand that the Judge of the universe will bring every work to judgment, including every secret thing, whether it is good or evil (see Eccles. 12:14). And the way to convince them that what you are saying is true is to simply cast the rod at their feet. God will do the rest. He will do a miracle by turning the dead, inanimate rod of the Law into a living and fiery serpent (see John 16:8).

The rod of Moses gave him courage. It was the sign that “I AM” was with him. What more could we want than to have God work through us to reach the lost? So take what is in your hand, and with the help of God, labor in the gospel while there is still time.

“All men are under the Law by nature, and consequently they are condemned by it because they have broken its commands; and apart from our Lord Jesus men are only reprieved criminals, respited from day to day, but still under sentence and waiting for the appointed hour when the warrant shall be solemnly executed upon them.” Charles Spurgeon

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