the book of Numbers chapter 21 chapter 21 and let's begin reading
there verse number 4 And they journeyed from Mount
Hor by the way of the Red Sea to accomplish the land of Edom.
And the soul of the people was much discouraged because of the
way. And the people spake against
God and against Moses. That's a terrible charge, speaking
against God and against God's spokesman. The people spake against
God and against Moses. That's what they said. Wherefore
hath he brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness?
For there is no bread, neither is there any water, and our soul
loatheth this light bread." What they were saying here was that
they had no appetite for the children's bread. So, in consequence
of what they said, their attitudes and their actions, That sixth
verse says, "...the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people,
snakes. And they bit the people, and
much of the people of Israel died. And therefore the people
came to Moses and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against
the Lord and against thee. Pray unto the Lord that he take
away the serpents from us." Moses acted as an intermediary, or
intermediate, between God and the people. Moses prayed for
the people. And the Lord said unto Moses,
this is what I want you to do. Make thee a fiery serpent, and
set it upon a pole. And it shall come to pass that
every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. And Moses made a serpent of brass,
and put it upon a pole. And it came to pass that if a
serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent with brass,
he lived." Now, I want you to turn over to the book of Isaiah
chapter 45 and verse 22. Isaiah 45 and verse 22. And we're told in the verses
that I just read to you what the cure was for being bitten
by these poisonous serpents. They were to look upon the fiery
serpent or the serpent of brass that was hanging upon a pole.
If they would look upon that serpent, they'd live. That was the cure to look upon
that serpent. Well, here in this 22nd verse
of the book of Isaiah, chapter 45, it says, "...look unto me,"
notice that, God speaking, "...look unto me, and be ye saved, all
the ends of the earth, for I am God, and there is none else."
Where were they to look? He said, if a man would be saved,
We must look to Him. If a man was to be saved from
the effects of the poison of the serpent, he must look to
the serpent that is on the pole. Now, here in the third chapter
of the book of John, our Lord takes part of that experience
from the 22nd chapter of the book of Numbers and says this,
after He has talked to Nicodemus, Nicodemus came to him by night
and desired some information off of him. Of course, in the
conversation that he had with Nicodemus, he told him, he said,
if I told you earthly things and you believe not, how shall
you believe if I tell you heavenly things? You just won't believe. heaven. And then he said, and
as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must
the Son of Man be lifted up. Now, that's been taken out of
its context and meaning by modern-day evangelists anyhow. What they
try to say, this means the exaltation of the name of
the Lord Jesus, which there may be some partial truth there,
but taking it in its context, it means if he be lifted up on
the pole, if he be lifted up on the cross, as Moses lifted
up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be
lifted up on the pole. Now it says that whosoever believeth
in him should not perish, but have eternal life. Now, we're
told in this passage of scripture, and in the book of Numbers, we're
told the cure, or the remedy, from the sting of these serpents,
and from the sting of sin. We're told what the cure is.
If any man is bitten, look upon the fire serpent that's hanging
up on the pole, he shall live. If he looks upon that, he shall
live. lifted up, must or should not
perish, but have eternal life. Now, let me tell you some things
that they were not told to do, which are being done today as
a substitute. It's wildfire. It's strange fire. It's fire that is not in conjunction
with They're not told to do that. Now, I know that it seems reasonable.
That seems reasonable. It sounds logical, doesn't it? That if a man's bitten by a serpent
that he ought to seek out some fresh balm or some fresh ointment
that he might put on that bite and thereby be relieved of this
terrible effect, which would eventually be death. So they're
not told to manufacture some ointment as the means of healing
their wounds. Even though it seemed reasonable
to them, they weren't told to do that. Now the religious doctors
of our day are busy and working overtime inventing spiritual
potions and lotions, but they affect no cure. They have the inventions, and
the inventions are used and applied to the subjects that have been
bitten, but they affect no cure. They're kind of like this poor
woman, I think here in the book of Mark. Let me read something
to you here in Mark chapter 5. In verse 24 it says, and much people followed him
and thronged him, and a certain woman, which had an issue of
blood twelve years, and had suffered many things of many physicians,"
notice that, "...suffered many things of many physicians, and
had spent all that she had, and was nothing bettered, but rather
grew worse." Spent all she had. was nothing bettered, but rather
grew worse. The religious doctors of that
day had invented some spiritual lotions that would be used as
a means to effect her cure, but she had tried them all. She had
tried all of the ointments, all of the Or you can read the rest of the
story and find out what happened. She looked to Jesus. All she
done was look to Jesus. She just touched him. And virtue
run from his body and flowed into hers. And straightway the
fountain of her blood dried up. And she felt in her body that
she was healed from that plague. Well, I'm telling you this evening
that these spiritual witches as one would avoid a poisonous
serpent. They were not told to manufacture
up anointment. They were told to do what? They
were told to look! Says any man that's fit, if he'll
just look! Didn't tell him to go down to
the creek and be baptized. Didn't tell him to join this
church or that church. Didn't tell him to keep this
law or that law. read this book or that book,
but told him to look. See? Told him to look! How the
vast majority of people in the world today are crippled in soul
simply because they have been deceived by these witch doctors.
Been deceived and deluded. You know, a man that has the
truth, or knows the truth, and refuses to preach it, He's the greatest criminal that
there can possibly be outside of the bounds of hell. If a man
knows something as to the truth of how God saves a sinner and
he refuses to share it or to preach it unto people, he's a
miserable, terrible, corrupt, depraved criminal of the worst
or the base of sorts. He's going around telling people
to apply some of this spiritual potion that he's mixed up to
their need to help them while he's a criminal isn't he? Well
that's one thing that Moses didn't tell them to manufacture some
ointment now and others who were wounded in order
to get relief for themselves. They were not told to do that.
Now, I'll tell you what I mean by that. What use would it be
for me to jump into deep water to rescue a drowning man when
I can't swim a stroke myself? What good would that do? It would
only wind up with me drowning, wouldn't it? Many today, thousands
upon thousands in so-called are engaged in works of charity in
the vain or with the vain expectation of giving relief to others, thinking
that the relief that they give to others in their works of charity
will counteract the deadly virus of sin which is at work in their
own souls, such as the various benevolent
societies of our day. Men join benevolent societies
which are in competition with the Church of the Lord Jesus
Christ. I have a friend who's been trying to get in the Masonic
Lodge for over a year. They can't memorize the... whatever
they... I don't know what it is. I'm
not that much informed as to the Masonry, but if a man applies
to get in the Lodge, well then you And he's 65 years old, and his brain's not as active as
it used to be. And he's tried, and he's tried,
and he's tried, and he's tried to memorize those answers. And
he's went with his instructor hour after hour, and he can't
memorize those answers. And I talked to his wife here. and trailer and property everywhere. And he's talking about divorce.
Talking about separation now over this Masonic thing. Joining
this. That's his religion, see? That's
his religion. He's gonna die trying to get
in that thing. That's his religion. That's some
of that, that's some of that potion. That's some of that,
that, uh, uh, magic cure that some witch doctor has mixed up
and give to people. Thinking it's going to help some
of this do good business, see. The Sonic Lodge, they help, I
don't know, they help paralyzed people or somebody, the Lions
Club, they buy glasses for people So the religion of the Lord Jesus
is a substitute for the look. The look is to keep a man busy
doing something, some good thing out there, and somehow him doing
that good thing will counteract the virus of sin in his own soul
and take care of it, which is a damn lie. It will not do it. It will send him to hell. They're not told to fight the
serpents. You didn't tell them to fight
them serpents, number 22, did you? Jesus didn't say anything about
fighting the serpents. Here he said that even as Moses
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the
Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should
not perish, but have eternal life. So they're not told to
fight the serpents. Some of our moderns, had they
been there, had they been present when this took place, I tell
you what they would have done. They would have urged Moses to organize a society for the
extermination of snakes. Probably old Pat McGinnis would
have been the first to join. It wasn't told to fight these
serpents. But that's what would have happened
in our modern day when everything is organized in such a way. Well, let's do away with that.
Let's organize. Let's get a group here together.
Let's appoint a captain, a committee, a vice president, or this and
that, a lieutenant, second lieutenant, what have you. Let's get the
job done. Let's kill these snakes. And each one that was bitten
killed a thousand snakes. They'd still die, wouldn't they?
Now what does all this fighting sin amount to? All these crusades
against intemperance and profanity and vice have not caused society
to get one ounce better. And they have not brought a single
sinner a step closer to the Lord Jesus Christ. Is that right? That's right. Temperance, the
temperance, I preached one time years ago at Fairview at the
Baptist Church. People came and asked me if I'd
come and preach for them. I said I'd be glad to. And I
found out what it was when I got there. It was a group of women
in a temperance society. And they wanted me to preach
against the vices of alcohol. And all they had a big time drinking and all that, and I
preached the gospel to that church full of women, that Thursday
afternoon or Thursday night one, I forget, I preached to them.
But they've been in existence for years and years and years,
and the flow of alcohol is worse now than it ever was. They've
been fighting it. They've been fighting it since
about 1920. They've organized. They're organized. They have a president. Illinois. They've got little
groups in practically every Methodist and Baptist church in the whole
of the country here. They meet. They organized against
alcohol, boy, but I'll tell you, they have not improved society. In fact, it's become worse. So,
brethren, The Lord did not tell Moses,
now organize a committee here and kill these snakes off. All
these crusades against these various, well, anti-slut literature
and all of that, pornography and all of those things which
are wrong in themselves, and certainly I'm not for it. I'm
not for it. a step near to the cross of Christ,
does it? It hasn't so far. Well, another
thing, they were not told to make an offering to the serpent.
God did not ask them for a payment in return for their healing.
He did not say, now, if you'll do this, then I'll do something
else, I'll make a deal with you. I'll make a deal with you, if
you'll bring me an offering, then I'll heal you." No, he did
not tell them to make an offering in return for their healing. Salvation is by my baptism, and
that's a work. If salvation comes because I
come to the mourner's bench and pray through, then salvation
ceases to be grace. If salvation is because I join
the church, then salvation is by a work. Salvation is by grace. It's by
the grace of God. All right? Preachers in our day,
the evangelists, they're asking their hearers to give their hearts
to Jesus. That's the main thrust. The television
programs and all this, give your heart to Jesus. Now that's a
miserable perversion of the gospel of Christ. Believe on his Son! Believe on
his Son! It says here, and as Moses lifted
up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be
lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but
have everlasting life. He didn't say anything about
giving you his heart. and he emphasized from start
to finish the awful, polluted condition of a man outside of
Christ. And he said at the end of the
sermon, he said the poor preacher announced a hymn to be sang while
the invitation was given. And he said that the hymn had
to do and rededicate yourself. And
the preacher said, poor soul, that he was doing only that which
he knew. God doesn't ask a man to give
him your heart. God doesn't need anything. He
doesn't ask the sinner for anything. But He asks the sinner to believe
in His Son. Look, now listen, we're not told to pray to the
serpent. I know that the preachers nowadays urge the hearers to
go to the mourner's bench. They think that God will hear
you for your much speaking. Get up there and pray for, shout,
and go into various gyrations of the flesh, and stay with it
for a half hour or 45 minutes or longer if you can. Somehow
God's going to be wearied with your much speaking, and He's
going to do something for you. We're not told for faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's not a substitute. They were
told here to look. They were not told to pray to
the serpent. We've got multiplied millions
of people today praying to the Virgin Mary. Is that right? They're praying to Mary, believing
that somehow their prayers to her When you pray, say, Our Father
which art in heaven, hallowed, sacred, holy, and revered be
His name. We're not told to pray to Mary
or anybody else. We're not told to even look to
Moses. They weren't told to look to Moses. Moses was their intercessor
when they were bitten and many of them died. They come to Moses and they said,
Moses, pray for us. Pray unto God that He'll do something
in our behalf. They were not told to pray to
Moses. Many are looking to Moses today
to save them. Isn't that right? Moses is representative
of the Lawgiver. He's the Lawgiver. God gave the
Law to Moses. and I'm going to be saved in
the end. If I'm a good girl or if I'm a good boy, if I'm faithful
to my wife or faithful to my husband, if I'm faithful to society, God's going to do something for
me. We're not told to look to Moses. Listen, there's multiplied
thousands upon thousands upon thousands of people to His commandments as the means
of taking them to Heaven. I don't do this, I don't do that.
God demands perfection and no man's perfect. God demands to
keep His law, absolutely, every jot and every giggle of it. It's
to be, if a man's going to go to Heaven by keeping the law,
he's got to keep it perfectly from the cradle to the grave.
But so many people in this generation true in generations past, and
I'm sure will be true in generations to come, are trusting in their
imperfect obedience to God's commandments, to take them to
heaven. Someone said, well I know you
say we're to look, but how am I to look? Well I tell you this,
don't look at your luck. Don't look at your luck. Look
to Christ. Don't look at your look, look
at Christ. Look at that snake on the pole,
that's what he told them. And every one of those people,
I don't care where they were located in that vast congregation
of men that were bitten of those Israelites by those fiery serpents,
wherever they were, if they could just roll their heads sideways
and just get a glimpse of that serpent out of the corner of
their eyes, they lived. I don't care how bad they were
bitten. It doesn't say if they were bitten
one time or twenty-five times. I'm sure that there were men
that were bitten three or four times. And I'm sure that the
poison venom of that serpent was flowing through their veins
and some of them were paralyzed. And probably some that loved
others and were concerned about others turned their heads in
order that they might look. And soon as their eyes looked
upon that serpent, they lived. They lived. I read to you there
in the book of Isaiah, chapter 45. He said, Look unto me, all
ye ends of the earth, and be ye saved. For I am God, and there
is none else. Look to me, and be ye saved.
Everybody, all ye ends of the earth, if you look to me, be
ye saved. and look to Him. Look to Him. Let me read another verse of
Scripture to you in light of that. In the book of Hebrews, chapter
12, and verse number 2, listen to
what it says here. It says, "...looking unto Jesus." Looking unto Jesus,
the Author and Finisher of our faith. Looking unto Jesus. The Lord Jesus said here in the
book of Matthew, He said, Come unto Me, and I'll give you rest. Come to Me. Now, He does not
define the method or the manner of coming. He said you can come groping,
you can come falling, you can come stumbling, you can come
crawling, you can come running. He doesn't define the method
of coming. He says, Get back! Just like He told Moses relating
to these people, luck, luck. So He doesn't define the method
or the manner of coming. But He said, get there. He said,
come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, I'll give
you rest. I learned something about that verse of Scripture
here recently. I've been quoting that for years and years and
years and years and years. All ye that labor and are heavy
laden, Come to me, all ye that labor
under heavy laden, and I will give you rest." All ye that labor
under heavy laden. Not only does that indicate that
a man is laboring under the delusion of his false righteousness being
the means of his justification, but it's indicative of the fact
that one of God's children does labor. He does labor. If a man
never labors, if he never served Jesus Christ, he'll never know
anything about the sweetness of God's rest, will he? He'll never know anything about
the sweetness of God's rest. We have a rest. We have a rest. We have an altar. We have a rest
in glory. Seize from our labor. Seize from
our labor and we'll rest in Christ. But if a man never served Christ
down here, if he never worked for Christ down here, how's he
going to enjoy any rest up there? Now, that's what I learned about
that verse of Scripture. Listen, if we're going to go
where He is, we're going to have to go the way He got there. That's right. We're going to
have to go the way he got there. There was no slackness in the
life of Christ, was there? He said, I must be up and about
my Father's business while it is yet day, for no man worketh
when night come. All right. Come groping, stumbling,
falling, running, any way you come, you'll find a warm welcome. hands of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, nothing said about the strength or the intelligence of belief. As I said, there's nothing said
about the full scope or the full vision of the look. Just look!
Out of the corner of your eye, or out of all your eye, or out
of both eyes, or out of one eye, or just a glimpse, but look!
If you look, you're going to live. Nothing said about the
strength or the intelligence of the belief. It doesn't say that you have
to understand everything that's written in the Bible. It doesn't say that. It doesn't say that
you have to understand everything about the Incarnation. It doesn't
say that you have to understand everything there are about the
Trinity or about the Lord Jesus Christ or about God. It doesn't
say that. Nothing is said about the strength
or the intelligence of the belief. He's the Christ that saves. He's
on a pole that saves. Look to Him. Faith is simply
the eye of the soul that looks off unto the Lord Jesus Christ. So don't rest on faith, but rest
in the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Rest in Christ. See what the Lord was talking
about when He said, Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness,
even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. And whosoever believeth
on him should not perish, but have eternal life." You see, every one of us, we've
been bitten with a far deadlier poison than the serpent in the
wilderness could fight with. We've been bitten
with the serpent or the poison of sin. Sin, it runs in our veins. And we're dying people. We're
dying people. We're dying right now. I'm a
dying man speaking to dying men. Dying. Dying. You're dying. We're in the process of dying.
We didn't think we were back 25, 30 years ago. We were young. And we thought You know, we didn't
think about dying, but we can see it now. We can see it. We're
dying people. And the reason we're dying, remember
I preached here not so long ago to you? I asked this question.
I told you about the origin of death. I said, do you know what,
do you know the answer to this question? Why is it that man
dies? Why is it that man dies? I preached that down to Henry. that men die. Not many people
know why men die. I'll tell you why they die. They've been bitten. They've
been bitten by a serpent that has infused poison of sin into
their bloodstream and brought about decay and rot. That's why
they die. They die. These that are dying,
if they can look to Him who hung on a cross, the Lord Jesus Christ, Now, to be clear, make it safe. He said, you can see, he said
you were safe. That's the gospel. That's what
God requires out of a man, to believe in his son. To believe
in his son. And I guess that's going to be
the charge against mankind for this whole