Aaron's Rod Swallowed Theirs: Your Pharaoh Must Bow

Sermon outline

Jesus is the rod of God, the Word from God's mouth that swallows up every serpent the enemy throws down, and because His Spirit lives in you, you carry that authority in your mouth, your hands and your feet.

1. You should be growing: everything you need is on the inside

   Christians must grow in grace and faith, and a believer who is in the same place as last year has not grown. Growth comes through tests and challenges, which force you to reach inside for what God deposited when you were born again. You draw it out by the Word, prayer, fasting, confession and praying in tongues. The devil hates the light he sees in God's temple and attacks it with sickness, but you know your rights in Christ and can lay hands on yourself and cast it out.

   Illustration: Parents whose child stays the same height for years would rush to the doctor and say something is wrong. A Christian who is not growing is spiritually abnormal in the same way.

   “Everything you will ever need in your Christian life is on the inside of you.”

   • 2 Peter 3:18
   • Ephesians 4:13
   • John 7:38
   • 1 Corinthians 6:19
   • John 8:44
   • 1 Corinthians 14:33
   • John 10:10

2. You function with the mind of Christ

   A child of God does not lack wisdom or live in confusion. Education is good, but a born-again believer praying in the Holy Ghost receives ideas, warnings and direction that transcend it. You are not the sick trying to be healed; you are the healed keeping sickness away, operating from the mountaintop rather than the base of the mountain.

   Illustration: When his children wanted a dog, a friend who ran a police dog unit in Johannesburg gave him a German shepherd called Major. Major did the opposite of every command, and he later learned the dog had failed the unit's IQ test. He also tells how a persistent pain left within the hour when the Holy Spirit told him to lay hands on himself as he does for others.

   “You are the healed keeping sickness away.”

   • 1 Corinthians 2:16

3. Jesus, the rod out of the stem of Jesse

   In every book of the Bible you can find Jesus, and the rod in Isaiah 11 is Him. The Spirit of the Lord rests on Him as the spirit of wisdom, understanding, counsel, might, knowledge and the fear of the Lord, and the same Spirit rests on you. So you do not judge by what your eyes see or your ears hear; you tune your spirit to the Holy Ghost.

   Illustration: Samuel looked at the outward stature of Jesse's sons, but God sent him to the young boy in the field, because God looks at the heart.

   “Sometimes you may look at something and you will reject it. It's the very thing God sent to you.”

   • 2 Corinthians 13:1
   • Isaiah 11:1-3
   • Luke 4:18
   • 1 Samuel 16:7

4. A tender shoot and a strong rod

   He explains two Hebrew words for rod. Choter is a tender shoot sprouting from a dead, fallen tree: the baby in the manger who flourished where humanity had no chance. Shebet is a full-grown rod: a shepherd's rod, a king's sceptre and a club for protection and war. Jesus came as a lamb, yet He was also a lion, and His children are not weak doormats; they know when to be meek and when to be strong.

   Illustration: When soldiers came to arrest Jesus in the garden, they fell to the ground at His word, and in the temple He made a whip and drove out the money changers.

   “Jesus is not weak and his children are not weak.”

   • John 18:6
   • Matthew 21:13
   • Revelation 5:5
   • Matthew 10:16
   • Isaiah 11:4

5. I have made thee a god to Pharaoh

   God made Moses a god to Pharaoh, and you are a god to every trial that confronts you, because dominion lost in Eden has been restored. Every knee must bow to the name of Jesus: sickness, finances and children not serving God. Set a time and say 'today is my day', because the anointing is carried in your words and must be spoken out.

   Illustration: Before his wife went to preach she asked him to pray for her. Instead he told her that when she spoke her first words the anointing would fall on her, and she came back saying it happened exactly as he said.

   “The words are the receptacle of the power of God.”

   • Exodus 7:1-3
   • Psalm 82:6
   • Philippians 2:9-10
   • Genesis 1:3
   • 2 Timothy 1:7

6. There's something in your hand

   God said He would stretch forth His hand over Egypt, and there is an anointing in your hands too. Stretch your hand towards a situation and command it to bow; where your feet walk, strife must cease and you leave a blessing behind. Spiritual instructions must be obeyed, as Moses and Aaron did exactly as the Lord commanded, or nothing happens.

   Illustration: Demons, like birds, will fly over your head, but you do not have to let them nest there.

   “When you stretch your hand forth, power leaves you.”

   • Exodus 7:4-6
   • Matthew 10:41

7. Aaron's rod swallowed up their rods

   Pharaoh's magicians turned their rods into serpents, but Aaron's rod swallowed them up. If the rod typifies Jesus, then Christ has swallowed up sin, sickness and disease, so whatever the enemy brings, we have a bigger one. When believers go out under their pastor's authority and in agreement in the spirit, they become far stronger, which is why faith must work by love.

   Illustration: Like a king snake that eats other snakes, the rod of God swallows whatever serpent the enemy throws down.

   “It does not matter what the evil one will bring. It's a serpent. We have a bigger one.”

   • Exodus 7:8-13
   • Deuteronomy 32:30
   • Galatians 5:6
   • Mark 16:17