And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.”
6 Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. 7 And the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people.
8 And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” 9 So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.
Numbers 21:6-9, ESV
The children of Israel were under attack. Not by an army, but by thousands of snakes. I remember hearing of Jonestown, where on November 18, 1978 when 918 people drank kool-aid mixed with cyanide. The whole thing was based on Jim Jones‘ delusion–conspiracy theories, and rampant paranoia.
Death on this scale is never easy to deal with. It’s frightening. It boggles our mind.
We read here of poisonous snakes attacking people in the camp of Israel. The people had taken umbrage with God and Moses because the way was too hard. They accused God of leading them out of Egypt, just so He could whole-scale destroy them!
God in response to their bitterness and murmuring allowed these vicious snakes to slither through the camp. They were quite poisonous, aggressively attacking random people. Their bites were not only painful, but deadly.
I venture to say that the effects of sin have a terrible tendency (and a purpose) to kill people. Its infection will work through our spiritual blood stream and be a certain poison that will eventually destroy us spiritually.
If we could actually see the snakes we might just take our sin a bit more seriously.
But our particular viperous horde comes to us on a spiritual level. We aren’t suddenly collapsing, and our sin doesn’t bring us immediate death. (A slow death, which is, maybe harder.) We see it sometimes, but we can’t do anything about it.
Like it or not, there is a savage battle going on in our hearts and minds.
The cross of Jesus is the only antidote, and through faith the poison is being rendered inert. But personally I must admit, there are good days, and not-so-good ones. I know it’s the poison that works inside of me. Others may see it sometimes, but it’s pretty obvious to me.
“And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.”
John 3:14-15, ESV
I came accross the following, and it seems to explain exactly what i want to say. I think it is more than a cute story. If we should take the time and unzip it, the truth will spill out.
“A fight is going on inside me,” said an old man to his son. “It is a terrible fight between two wolves. One wolf is evil. He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.
The other wolf is good. he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you.”
The son thought about it for a minute and then asked, “Which wolf will win?” The old man replied simply, “The one you feed.”
Look to Jesus, who was lifted up to destroy our sin, and heal our lives. Fix your eyes on Him, and He will save.
My other teaching site is at brokenbelievers.com
Alaska Bible Teacher 