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March 4th
Our Bible reading today is in Numbers chapters 21,22.
At the end of chapter 20, Israel marched from Kadesh to Mt Hor, still a bit south of Canaan. There they camped. God called Moses and Aaron to the mountain. There God told them to bring Aaron’s son Eleazar to the mountain. God was about to gather Aaron to his people. And ordain Eleazar to take his place as High Priest to God on behalf of Israel.
The people mourned Aaron’s death for 30 days. The normal time set aside for mourning dignitaries was 7 days. Obviously Aaron meant so much to the congregation of Israel.
After the mourning was over, the silver trumpets sounded, in their certain ways, to signal the people to begin to pack up and break camp. It was time to head toward Canaan again. One of the Canaanite kings of the territory next to the border raided the marching Israelites and took some captive.
Moses and Israel vowed to God...”If You will give us victory over Arad...we will devote their cities to destruction...and so it came to pass...Israel’s first “Promised Land” victory.
It’s interesting to me how Israel dedicated their victory to God by “destroying the cities”...in other words, those cities would never be used again...except...“for God’s purposes!!!”
So it was time to move on again...but since God forbade a confrontation with the Moabites, the travel around their borders grew long and tedious to the new generation of Israelites.
Apparently, they did not learn well from their parents’ experiences...especially those of distrusting God by impatience with Moses’ leadership.
So God judged His new generation of treasured ones with fiery serpents.
Many Israelites died that day.
Would this new generation repent and turn back to God?
And the people confessed to Moses...”We have sinned against the Lord...and we have sinned against you. Please pray to the Lord that He would take the serpents from our midst. So Moses prayed and God spoke to him...”Make a fiery serpent, set it upon a pole, and everyone who is bitten and looks upon the fiery serpent will live.” And so it happened just like God said.
Jesus, speaking to Nicodemus in John 3:14,15, referred to the story of the fiery serpents we read about today. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up...and whoever believes in Him may have eternal.”
The Old Testament foreshadowing comes from the phrase “lifted up”... the serpent upon a pole...the Savior lifted up on a cross...the bronze serpent related to physical healing for the bitten Israelites...“belief in Jesus was and is so much BETTER...Eternal life...both now and forever.
Now before you're through with the reading, there will be several more battles fought and won by God empowered Israelites...fighting not for themselves, but for the glory of their Lord.
Enjoy the rest of the story...
Have a great day
