What’s In Your Hand?

While swimming in the ocean off the Massachusetts coast, a man and his daughter were caught in a rip tide.

They credit an unlikely object as being part of the reason they survived. Erynn Johns was holding a video camera attached to a selfie stick when the current swept the family away.

The camera flipped and spun, then submerged. As they struggled to keep their heads above water, the father and daughter gripped onto the selfie stick. Erynn Johns credited the object with helping in her rescue.

But it wasn’t just a selfie stick. Lifeguards and good Samaritans, including an unidentified man wearing orange swim trunks, rushed to the man’s aid. Derrick Johns was helped to shore and put on the sand, struggling to breathe.

News outlets thought this was an unlikely story (which is why it made the news). In the biblical story, God is always using unlikely things and unlikely people as part of his plan to rescue people.

“What is in your hand?” was one of the most important questions God asked Moses. What was special about Moses’ staff? Nothing, until he laid it down. Moses’ staff became an instrument of God’s power. With it, Moses freed his people, parted the Red Sea, brought water from dry rock, and gained victory over his enemies. In his hand, it was a shepherd’s rod. In God’s hand, it was the power of heaven.

When the ordinary things of life are surrendered to the purposes of God, He can use them in extraordinary ways.

What is in your hands?

How are you allowing God to use it?