In Numbers 21 we find the congregation of Israel complaining against God and against Moses. They're having to take the long way around Edom because Edom's king refused to allow them to use the wide highway through his land. The Bible told us in yesterday's study that they became impatient with this additional delay in reaching the promised land and began grumbling against the Lord and against Moses, saying they wished they'd never left Egypt, claiming that the Lord and Moses want them to die in the desert, and complaining that they are being forced to depend on the "miserable" manna day in and day out. Yesterday we talked about how no group of people would have done any better than Israel did in the wilderness, but at the same time we talked about the awesome privilege granted to Israel in having God interact with her in ways He'd never interacted with any other nation. We talked about how "to whom much is given, much is required" and discussed why the Lord is so grieved by the repeated incidents of grumbling and unfaithfulness among the congregation.
The congregation at this point in the Bible consists mainly of people who were under the age of twenty or who were not born yet when the Israelites were rescued by the Lord from Egypt. The Lord stated, following the rebellion of Chapter 14, that no one over the age of twenty who witnessed His miracles in Egypt and in the wilderness would enter the promised land except for Joshua and Caleb. The rebellion is the reason why the Israelites have been in the desert for almost forty years; the older generation must die out before the Lord brings Israel into the promised land. They are now closer to the promised land than they've ever been, but in yesterday's passage they sinned against God with their words and attitudes, so the Lord sent venomous snakes among them.
We were told, "They bit the people and many Israelites died." I tend to believe the Israelites who perished from the snake bites were from the generation who were aged twenty or older when the Lord brought them out of Egypt, but the Bible doesn't specifically say. Suffering under the Lord's discipline, the survivors apologized to Moses, admitted they'd sinned against the Lord, and begged Moses to intercede for them. Moses, in a Christlike spirit, prayed for the people who so recently made themselves his enemies. The Lord is going to answer Moses' prayer today and our passage is going to contain what is---if you don't mind me saying so---one of the weirdest stories in the Bible.
"The Lord said to Moses, 'Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.' So Moses made a bronze snake and put it on a pole. Then anyone who was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived." (Numbers 21:8-9) If you're not familiar with this story you're probably thinking, "What on earth?!" Even if you are familiar with this story, you may think it strange that the Lord would have Moses fashion an object depicting a serpent (a symbol of evil and sin) and that the Lord would ask the people to look at the object in order to receive healing.
If today's passage isn't already bizarre enough, consider this: this story symbolizes Christ and His redemptive death on the cross. How can we be sure of that? Because Christ took this passage from Numbers 21 and applied it to Himself, saying, "Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in Him." (John 3:14) The Lord was speaking of the day in which He would be lifted up on a pole (nailed to the cross). When speaking of His impending crucifixion on the night of the Last Supper, the Lord said to His disciples, "'And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to Myself.' He said this to show the kind of death He was going to die." (John 12:32-33)
Why does Jesus compare His perfect self hanging on the cross to the image from Numbers 21 in which an ugly serpent made of bronze is affixed to a pole? I've had a hard time with our text today. I've consulted a number of commentaries and concordances and Bible verses. I didn't feel completely satisfied with any of the answers until I prayed for the Lord to help me. The remainder of our study today is what I believe the Lord said to me through the Holy Spirit. I don't think any human being is capable of fully understanding the enormity of what is being represented in our text from Numbers 21 but I feel satisfied with what I believe the Lord said to me and I hope the following explanation is as beneficial to you as it was to me.
The Lord instructed Moses to fashion a serpent. Serpents are usually considered a symbol of evil and sin, for it was a serpent that enticed Adam and Eve to sin against the Lord. So the Lord tells Moses to fashion a serpent (a symbol of sin) because it is sin that has brought the current distress upon the people. The serpent is to be affixed to a pole and Moses is to hold the pole high and the people are to look upon this object for healing. How does this heal them? By faith. Are they healed by having faith in Moses or in the serpent? No. Their faith is in the Lord; they believe if they do what the Lord told them to do they will be healed. Does Moses or the serpent heal them? No. The Lord heals them.
How exactly does gazing upon the serpent---nailed to a pole---do anything to relieve them of their torment? It relieves them of the torment their sin has caused by believing on faith that their sin (symbolized by the serpent) is nailed to a pole and lifted up between earth and heaven, just as Christ (who became sin for us, according to 2 Corinthians 5:21) was nailed to a pole and lifted up between earth and heaven. Moses, the mediator of the Old Covenant, is interceding in Numbers 21 for the people with God when he holds the pole up between earth and heaven. The people are to gaze upon the pole and the sin that's symbolically nailed to it and be healed and be reconciled to God. In this same way, ever since Christ gave His life for us as the mediator of the New Covenant, we can be healed and reconciled to God by gazing upon what Christ did for us when He nailed sin to the tree in His own body on the cross, in faith believing that, "He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by His wounds you have been healed." (1 Peter 2:24)
Sin is ugly. The bronze serpent, fashioned by Moses, was no doubt ugly. It was nailed to a pole and lifted up in the sight of the people so they could look upon it while believing in faith that God was able to heal them of their ugly sin and remove the curse of their sin from them. In this same way, the agonizing death of Christ was ugly. He was not beautiful as He hung on a pole between heaven and earth, at least not beautiful in the way human beings perceive beauty, for the prophet Isaiah said when he foresaw the death of Christ, "There were many who were appalled at Him---His appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any human being and His form marred beyond human likeness...He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him." (Isaiah 52:14, Isaiah 53:52) Christ bore the curse of sin for us when He hung on the cross---while He literally became sin for us. We look in faith upon what He did for us and by faith we are saved. By faith we are healed of the curse of our sin, just as by faith the Israelites of Numbers 21 were healed of their afflictions.
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