Creator, Father, King #94

As Moses lifted up the bronze snake on a pole in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him will have eternal life.

MIRIAM WAS DEAD. AARON was dead. The forty years of wilderness wandering for believing the ten spies’ bad report about Canaan was at an end. The Israelites were so close to the Promised Land.

And then they started grumbling . . . again.

“‘Why have you brought us out of Egypt to die here in the wilderness?’ they complained. ‘There is nothing to eat here and nothing to drink. And we hate this horrible manna!’” (Numbers 21:5).

If the Ancient Moaning and Groaning Olympics existed, the Israelites would have won a gold medal!

This time, God judged his people by sending venomous snakes into their camp, and many died from the bites. When the people cried out for help, God did something interesting: instead of removing the snakes, he told Moses to make a bronze snake on a pole so everyone bitten could be healed simply by looking at it.

The Israelites needed to understand that their sin brought terrible consequences, but that faith in God’s plan of salvation would save them.

What’s It Mean?

Do you know we’ve all been bitten by a poisonous snake? “The ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, the one deceiving the whole world” (Revelation 12:9) has been at work since the Garden of Eden. Because of the Fall, the venom of sin has utterly corrupted each of us since birth (Psalm 51:5; Romans 3:9-18, 23). That’s why Jesus said, “You must be born again” in John 3:7—a spiritual rebirth.

In fact, when Jesus was explaining this process, he used Old Testament Israel’s experience with the bronze snake to illustrate his point (see today’s verse). The story of the bronze snake isn’t just a story about judgment and death. It’s about God showing his people how they must be saved—and pointing ahead to the greater Savior.

Just like the Old Testament Jews had to look to God’s appointed way of deliverance (a bronze snake, lifted up) to be saved from their rebellion, we must look in faith to Jesus, who was lifted up on the cross, to be saved from our sins.

The poison of sin runs deep, but by looking to Jesus, we can receive the antidote of God’s love, mercy, and grace!

Now What?

Read Numbers 21:4-9 (the account of the bronze snake) and John 3:1-21 (the account of Jesus and Nicodemus).

Did You Know?

By King Hezekiah’s reign (at least six centuries later), the bronze serpent had become an idolatrous object of worship in Judah (2 Kings 18:4).