What’s in your hand?

Exodus 4:2

Moses—the baby spared from Pharaoh’s massacre, gathered from the rushes and reeds, raised among kings—was given every opportunity to be anything he could want to be except the thing he actually was. And when the opportunity came along for him to claim his Hebrew identity, it went sideways. It ended in murder. He had to flee to the wilderness, wear rough linens, serve someone else’s land and goals, and care for livestock. When God asked what was in Moses’s hand, the staff in his hand was there because so many things had just gone wrong in Moses’s life.

Changes the way we see what’s in our hands, doesn’t it?

Instead of the gifts that make us special, we begin to see the crosses that we’ve carried, the weights that have pulled us down, the fears, doubts, questions, and struggles we’ve weathered. When God asks us what’s in our hands, he’s asking, “What burden did you not expect to carry in this life?”

Maybe it’s the lineage of your family. Maybe it’s the color of your skin. Maybe it’s the place where you live or the church you call home or the home you call home. Maybe it’s your limitations or your confusion. Maybe it’s a theology, a true thing about God, that you can’t escape from, no matter how hard you try. Maybe it’s all the things you’ve never done and wanted to do. Maybe it’s your empty nest or maybe it’s your full one. What is it? What’s in your hand?

What heartbreaking proof do you hold that your life did not go as you planned?