Numbers 21:6–9

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.