Numbers 21:4–9

On the road they take now, Edom is clearly the great barrier. It is less than twenty miles across, but going round it is more than six times as far. That road also had a king's highway and wells of water. What a pleasant alternative to the trackless desert route! But Edom is there in force, and he will not permit it. And you cannot turn this hostility into friendship. It is exactly the same with the flesh: "the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot" (Romans 8:7).

They had just come up to Kadesh, right on the borders of the land. Between them and it lay a small strip belonging to Edom, and "the king's highway" ran through it. Edom refused to let them pass that way, and God ordered that it should be so. It was not the way for the redeemed to enter Canaan. They were then turned back for two years to have their testing, and to bring out what had been hidden in them until now. They had to go south around Mount Seir, Edom's territory, then turn north up the eastern side of the Jordan, and pass into the land through its dried-up waters, behind the ark of God. Death and resurrection is the only pathway there.

A wilderness path is always beset with difficulties, but not necessarily with discouragements. Was the victory over Arad not enough proof, along with their own history, that God would not let them die in the wilderness? The flesh never trusts God. It is always ready to take His benefits, but it gives the Giver nothing back except ingratitude.

This is a common case. We have to watch a time of victory, in case danger comes right behind it. A time of defeat, on the other hand, again and again prepares a person for a fresh and greater blessing from God. His grace is that rich. He knows how to lift up the fallen. But when people take their victory too lightly, He makes them feel their total weakness and their constant need of Himself.

There is always deep blessing in bowing to the will of God, even when we cannot see the why and the reason for things. We do not read a single complaining word from these honoured servants of God. They were quite ready to go up into the land, yet they had to turn back into the wilderness for forty years. No, they simply turned back. And well they might, when the Lord turned back also. How could they complain, when they saw the travelling chariot of the God of Israel turn back toward the wilderness?

This time there was no shred of excuse for their grumbling, except that they felt discouraged. So God did not answer as He did in chapter 20:8, but instead sent a plague of fiery serpents among the people, so that many died when bitten. The serpent is a picture of Satan. Israel had already fallen into his trap through their unbelieving discouragement, so God was now impressing on them what it means to let Satan take control of them.

Despite this victory the people became discouraged again because of the way. They spoke against God and against Moses. "Our soul loathes this light bread." Here we may trace our own experience. As one has said, "A time of victory has to be watched, in case it is the forerunner of danger."

They had often murmured against Moses (it was really against God); now it is openly against God. The Holy Spirit marks it, putting God's name first. "The people spoke against God and against Moses." It is the first time their murmuring takes on this bold character.

Probably there was at least some water available, and they still had the manna, but they spoke of loathing it. The manna speaks of Christ in His lowly humiliation on earth. Does He become distasteful to us? Do we need attractions of the flesh as well as Christ?

John 3:14 stresses the necessity for the "lifting up" of the Son of Man. The heart of man is exposed to the very limit. No sin in the history of God's people had the same enormity as the one recorded here — "Our soul loathes this light bread." The manna speaks of Christ Himself as God's provision for man's need, and they despised it. In God's sight that kind of man must go, and only the death of Jesus could remove him. In that precious "lifting up" that whole order of man has been completely judged and set aside.

What the manna presented to God was so precious to Him that He commanded Moses to store a measure of it before Him in a golden vessel. That golden vessel points us to the glorified Christ. In Christ glorified there is the treasured remembrance, for the pleasure of God the Father, of all that His Son was for Him as a Man on earth. The time came when Israel despised the "light bread." But what Israel despised, God delighted in. Israel despised and ill-treated the Christ of God when He was on earth. Yet God has glorified the Christ they rejected.

How, then, is it possible for the believer to grow tired of it? We have two natures, the old and the new, and "these are contrary the one to the other." So if we are not walking in the Spirit (see Gal. 5), the flesh will assert its desires. The flesh never loves Christ. The mind of the flesh, indeed, is enmity against God. (Rom. 8.) It is the flesh, then, that wearies of Christ. Wanting its own food, it breeds in us a distaste for the heavenly manna. But the flesh is subtle. When it acts this way in a believer, it usually loves to hide its true character.

The serpent was the source of their discontent. Once the serpents bit them, their condition was well suited to show them the true character of that discontent. If the Lord's people will not walk happily and contentedly with Him, they must taste the power of the serpent.

The serpent was the source of their discontent. Once the serpents bit them, their condition was well suited to show them the true character of that discontent. If the Lord's people will not walk with Him in happy contentment, they must taste the power of the serpent. That power is terrible, in whatever way they feel it.

All through their journey in the wilderness the people of Israel kept murmuring against God and against Moses, His representative… Their murmuring came from their sinful human nature. We all have this sinful nature. Unless we are born again, it is the only nature we have. In effect, we have all been bitten by "that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan" (Rev. 12:9). He is the origin of all the mischief, and all sin traces back to him.

Here was the moment for divine grace to display itself. Man's need has always been the occasion for the display of God's grace and mercy. The moment Israel could say, "We have sinned," there was no further hindrance. God could act, and this was enough. When Israel murmured, the serpents' bite was the answer. When Israel confessed, God's grace was the answer. In the first case the serpent was the instrument of their misery; in the second it was the instrument of their restoration and blessing. The very image of the thing that had done the harm was set up as the channel through which God's grace could pour down in rich abundance on poor wounded sinners. What a striking and beautiful picture of Christ on the cross!

Yet it is good to see Israel's conscience awake this time. They confessed before Moses that they had sinned in speaking against the Lord and against Moses. This is a refreshing contrast to their usual attitude all through the wilderness.

God does not cancel His judgments. He gives the sinner an answer to them… They prayed that God would take the serpents away, but no such prayer could prevail. The executioners of righteousness had to stay in the camp — death must follow sin. But the Lord tells Moses to make a serpent of brass and set it on a pole. Then Moses must announce, so the whole camp hears it, that every bitten Israelite who looks to that lifted-up serpent will be healed and live.

The people only wanted the serpents taken away from them. They thought no further than some improvement in their present circumstances. But God's thoughts of love and pity are far higher than this. His way is to give life to dying souls.

Faith is the instrument by which the sinner lays hold of Christ's salvation. The wounded Israelite had only to look and live. He was to look not at himself, not at his wounds, not at others around him, but straight at God's remedy and at nothing else. If he refused or failed to look at it, there was nothing for him but death.

It is not God cancelling His judgments, but providing the sinner with an answer to them… Israel prayed that the serpents might be taken away, but no such prayer could prevail. The executioners of righteousness had to stay in the camp. Death must follow sin, for God had said at the beginning, "in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." But the Lord commands Moses to make a serpent of bronze and set it on a pole. Then Moses must proclaim, so the whole camp can hear, that every bitten Israelite who looks to that uplifted serpent will be healed and live.

This was not the withdrawing of the fiery serpents, as the camp had craved. It was not the cancelling of the sentence passed on their sin. It was another thing, a different and higher thing. It let the Israelite in the wilderness triumph over the miserable state he had brought on himself. It was not simply an escape from that state, but a triumph over it. An Israelite bitten by a fiery serpent, if he only looked at the bronze serpent, could then smile at the fiery serpents, though they were still loose in the camp.

The serpent on the pole was just like the serpents that had brought death into the camp. The Son of Man came in the likeness of sinful flesh. The serpent on the pole was sinless. The Son of Man was also sinless. The serpent on the pole was made of bronze. Bronze is the symbol of the judgment of God according to the responsibility of man. The Son of Man lifted up on the cross bore the judgment that lay on responsible man.

It may seem strange that the bronze serpent pictures the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus, since the serpent stands for Satan. But it was on the cross that the Lord Jesus met all the power of Satan and crushed Satan's head. So it was not a live serpent lifted up, but one that symbolised the paralysing of all Satan's power.

A look in itself would have been nothing. But God joined healing and life to it, so to look is everything. What a lesson of faith is here! It all goes back to the power and grace of God. He is the One who said that everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.

The remedy was simple, and the cure immediate. It was not a question of their doings, experiences, or evidences; it was look and live. God commanded them to look outside themselves, straight to the object set before them. Though they were at the point of death, they lived at once… The remedy was one, only one. It was wholly of God's providing. It was free to every bitten man, without money and without price. No one tried it in vain. Those who did not look died.

Here is a type of Christ, not simply of blood, but of death. It is a question of sin in the flesh, not of sins committed by the flesh. Blood purges the conscience, purges us from our sins. The flesh is never purged; the old man is condemned… Here in the bronze serpent it is life through death.

What I am, as a man, has been utterly condemned in the cross of Christ. In death God has set it aside completely from before Him… Until a person learns this, there is self-confidence, and an effort to improve the flesh. When I learn the truth of the serpent of bronze I find that God has got rid of me in the cross of His Son, and only Christ remains.

The people only wanted the serpents taken away from them. They thought of nothing more than some improvement in their present circumstances. But God's thoughts of love and pity are far higher than this. His way is to give life to dying souls — to abolish death... The remedy was simple, and the cure immediate. It was not a question of their doings, experiences, or evidences; it was look and live.

The serpent Moses made was in the likeness of the serpent that bit the people. In the same way, the Son of Man came in the likeness of the flesh of sin. It was of brass, and brass stands for the judgment of God against sin. The altar for killing the offerings and burning their bodies was of brass. In the same way, on the cross the Son of Man came under the judgment of the flesh of sin. God abandoned Him and dealt with Him as sin deserved. Yet He Himself was altogether the delight of the heart of God.

The brass serpent was not a fiery flying serpent, but in the likeness of it. So our Lord was not "sinful flesh." He was infinitely holy. But He became a Man, and came in "the likeness of sinful flesh."... DEATH and death only could meet the case.

Here our Lord's words in the gospel leave us in no doubt whatever of the interpretation: "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so also must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."... But the cross is the great puzzle that makes everything else clear — the contradiction that reconciles all other things.

Long ago, one look at the serpent of brass on the pole healed the bitten Israelite. In the same way, the dead sinner now receives life by looking at Jesus on the cross, and Jesus on the throne. No one told the Israelite to look at his wound, though the sense of his wound is what made him look... It was not the way he looked, but the object he looked at, that healed the Israelite.

The life or healing had to be individual. The bitten Israelite had to look for himself to the uplifted Serpent... A look will do it, but the look must be a personal, individual act. Faith is the act of the soul in immediate dealing with God. No one else can believe for me. No religious ceremony or human arrangement can take God's place for me.

Human reason could see no obvious link between two things: looking at a brass object on a pole, and the curing of poison at work in your veins. Those who looked did so because they believed the word of God in the lips of Moses... A child told by his mother to look would do it, in simple trust. So would anyone ready to become like a little child in this matter.

Israel had found healing through it. Was it not natural that they should want to keep it as a visible witness to that healing? It was a respectable thing, an ancient picture of deliverance from sin and its consequences through the sacrifice of Christ. But in the hands of the enemy of our souls, this object had become a means of idolatry for the people, who burned incense to it. It took faithful Hezekiah to step in, single out this hidden idolatry, and destroy it — even though it wore the look of something God Himself had set up.