“18 And the
magicians did so with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they could
not: so there were lice upon man, and upon beast. 19 Then the magicians said
unto Pharaoh, This is the finger of God: and Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and
he hearkened not unto them; as the Lord had said.” – Exodus 8: 18-19
A move
of God cannot be duplicated by man or fabricated into existence. A move
of God begins and ends with God himself, and is the work of his hand. Perhaps
the trademark of God our Father is incomprehensible love, and the result of
that love, genuine change in a man’s heart and life. Humans can change,
to a certain degree; we can resolve and determine our way to some manner of
lifestyle modification. However, no matter how strong our resolve or how
deep our constitution, we can never change our own hearts.
If you
have not recently visited the book of Exodus, I encourage you to do so.
Among other things, you will find the liberation of the children of Israel
(God’s chosen people) from the hand of the Egyptians. The fact that one
man, Moses, leads an entire nation out of Egypt with no idea where he is going,
and with no record of past “leadership” experience, is impressive enough.
Far more impressive however is the manner in which they were freed. God,
and God alone, reached down to plague the Egyptian nation with a diverse manner
of plagues: frogs, lice, fire hail, and water to blood, to name a few.
The Jews did not fight for their freedom, but rather Pharaoh’s ironclad will
was broken by God, at the time of God’s choosing. Within all of this
another peculiar event was taking place. While Moses was performing
miracles left and right, Pharaohs magicians took to trying to duplicate him, by
producing counterfeit’s; and did duplicate him for a short time.
However, this could only last for a little space, for by and by those who were
supposed to be master’s in the unobservable and unexplainable could only throw
their hands up and testify: “this is the finger of God.” Once again we
see, both in the scriptures, and in human experience, that there are some
things ONLY God can do.
The devil has his “magicians” of sorts that
try and duplicate what God can do in our lives. However, like Pharaoh’s
magicians, he can only offer counterfeits and never a real move of God.
We see the devil’s duplication all around us. He offers dysfunctional
relationships to the lonely, mind numbing substances to the heart sick,
busyness to the discontent; duplication and counterfeits by the car
loads. Then by and by we as people wake to our discontentment only to
find another counterfeit, perhaps the most used of all, the great deceivers
foremost lie (in my opinion)……. “You can do it.” He tells millions and
millions of good mannered, moral people, that they can buckle down and
change. He tells them as he would tell any who would listen that they can
discipline their sin, their disobedience to God, and their unholy
tempers. Perhaps his greatest counterfeit, you can be the God of your
life; but like the magicians of Pharaoh, his counterfeits only go so far
and only last for so long. The counterfeits of Satan can never come close to a
genuine move of God.
I am convinced now more than ever that what we
need is a genuine move of God. It is more urgent than need; this is what
we must have. We must have a genuine move of God in our households, in
our churches, in our neighborhoods, in our Nation. We need the finger of
God to point out sin. We need good ole fashion Holy Ghost conviction,
because only a genuine move of God can bring about genuine conviction, which
will in turn manifest genuine change in people’s life. Let the call ring
out to anyone who will answer, to prayerfully beseech God that he might move in
our lives, and the lives of those around us. Let us pray as one man, that
whatever the cost, whatever the means, God will reach down in a mighty way
until even the magicians must say “This is the finger of God”.
