Numbers chapter 21. Someone was speaking recently
and made the statement that. How do you know that I'm not
saved and what they meant by that was the conversation had
taken place that. The Lord saved his people only,
and the Lord loves his people only. And so this individual,
being an atheist apparently, said, well, how do you know I'm
not saved? Well, obviously she didn't understand anything that
she was saying because she didn't believe that there's a God. But
that being said, we have a need that's been made predominant
in our heart as a believer. We have a need to be saved. So she said, How do you know
I'm not saved? Well, the question is, what are
you saved from? What are you saved from? And
this morning, I'm hoping to answer that question. There are three
questions would be, what are we saved from? What are we saved
for? And what are we saved to? Three
questions. So here we are in Numbers chapter
21 in verse four. And they journeyed from Mount
Hor by the way of the Red Sea to compass 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. Wherefore have you 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. The Lord sent fiery serpents
among the people and they bit the people and much people of
Israel died. Therefore, the people came to
Moses and said, we have sinned and we have spoken against the
Lord and against thee. Pray unto the Lord that he take
away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people.
And the Lord said unto Moses, make thee a fiery serpent and
set it upon a pole. And it shall come to pass that
everyone 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 of brass, he lived. This account first begins with
them being discouraged because of the journey that they were
taking by the Red Sea. Now, we understand that our life
is full of various circumstances that causes us discouragement.
There may be physical things that we're dealing with that
others will not understand and others can't enter into. And
therefore, we do pray for one another. But most of the time,
I find in my circumstances, the first thing I want to do is I
want to fix it or I want to grab a hold of it and try to correct
it. And Greg said this before, if money and time can fix it,
it's really not a problem. That's true, isn't it? If I can
spend enough money to fix it or if I can get enough money
to fix it, it's really not a problem. And if I can spend enough time
on it to fix it, it's really not that big of a deal. But there's
one thing needful to the believer that time and money cannot fix.
We've been bitten by a serpent, by a venomous serpent, and the
scripture likens Satan unto a serpent in the Garden of Eden whenever
He tempted Eve, and she took of the forbidden fruit, and man
fell because of this. So definitely sin entered, the
scripture said, by one man, Adam. And so we have been bitten by
this serpent, sin, and we have this venom coursing through our
veins that's going to kill us one day. It is appointed unto
man once to die, and after this, the judgment. So we know that
we have been bitten. We know that we are needful of
a savior, and yet, We find as our circumstances go, we are
no different than the children of Israel. One day we'll be rejoicing,
and the next day we'll be grumbling and complaining. The next day
we'll be murmuring against the Lord and against His law. That's what Moses represents,
is the law of the Lord. We'll murmur against the things
that the Lord has caused in our life. Brethren, every time that
we murmur or complain, we're murmuring and complaining against
His providence. His grace and his mercy, his
goodness. Although it may not feel like
goodness, although it may not feel like grace and mercy, that's
all that he has for his children. Do we see that? That's the only
thing that he produces towards his children. He teaches us,
the scripture says, a father that loves his child will chasten
his children. And so the Lord pitieth us and he chasteneth
us. That word chastening doesn't mean he beats us. It means he
teaches us. Well, what is he teaching us?
He's teaching us that we've been bitten and that we need a Savior. He's teaching us that Jesus Christ
is the remedy for the sin that we are. God's way is the right
way no matter what we're facing. God will teach us His way and
it is the right way. On Wednesday night, we mentioned
Elijah, how he went, and I even made this statement then, they
call it a showdown in religion. I don't know why men call it
that because Elijah had the only God present that was alive. Well,
not much of a showdown if the other guy's dead, I mean, just
to be honest with you. But they went to Mount Carmel
and Elijah was instructed to build an altar before the Lord.
And he said unto them, prior to that, he said, 400 prophets
of Baal. He said, you cry out to your God and I'm going to
cry out to my God. And the God that answers with fire, he is
the Lord. And so we know that the 400 prophets
of Baal, they begin to cut themselves. They begin to cry louder. And
Elijah was making fun of them. And he said, well, you're, he
must be on a journey or he must be sleeping, you know, and, So
they finished their facade or whatever was happening, which
is the same as all religion. Men try to work something up.
That's what that represents. But whenever they finished, Moses
gathered together 12 stones representing the 12 tribes of Israel, representing
the Lord's people, the Lord's chosen people. He gathered them
together and he put upon it the sacrifice. And he said, I want
you to get a bucket of water and pour on it. And he did. And
he said, now do it a second time. And he did. And he said, now
do it a third time. And that represents three as the number
of the Trinity. We actually looked at the number
three a couple of Wednesdays ago, didn't we? But we know that
that represents the washing of water by the Word. It represents
the Lord Jesus Christ being offered up as the Lamb slain. And whenever
Moses, when Elijah cried out unto the Lord, the Lord answered
by fire and the wrath fell. If you want to look at it in
the picture, and it's a beautiful picture of the Lord Jesus Christ,
the wrath falling upon him, and it licked up the water and it
consumed the sacrifice. And that's what happened for
the Lord's people. He saved them by this same exact instance. As soon as that was over with,
The scripture says that Elijah slew, him and his servants slew
the 400 prophets of Baal. Now, the reason that this is
completely relevant to what I'm trying to tell us this morning
about the murmuring and complaining as the children of Israel did
first thing, prior to the Lord sending the serpent, is because
no sooner did that happen than Jezebel, the king's wife, found
out about it. And Jezebel said unto him, be
it unto me if by this time tomorrow you're not dead, Elijah. Now
you can imagine seeing the fire of God physically fall from heaven
and the glory that would have surrounded that and physically
seeing that. How How much affirmation would
that have given us to see that? Physically, we'd have been on
top of the world, so to speak. We would have just stood in awe
and been amazed. And whenever he heard this, shouldn't
his response have been, well, I know the Lord just answered
by fire from heaven, so I'm certain that nothing's going to befall
me because the Lord's purposed all things and he's going to
get the glory. That wasn't his response at all.
He tucked, tailed and ran. He ran from Jezebel, he was afraid
for his life. The scripture says he went a
day's journey into the wilderness. And he sits down under a juniper
tree and he literally says these words, Lord, let me die. Let me die. He thought he had
it so bad that it was just better for him to die. And the Lord
answered him and he said, I have many. many in Israel that have
not bowed the knee to Baal. You're not the only one, Elijah. Brethren, even though we may
feel it's the only one that having afflictions or having difficult
circumstances, we're not the only one. The Lord brings all
these things upon his people to allow us to see that we have
been bitten by a serpent. So Elijah's here underneath this
Jennifer tree. The angel of the Lord comes to
him and tells him to eat food and he does. And this is a picture
of what we're doing right now. We're in this wilderness. We're
sitting underneath the tree. Sometimes we feel like it'd be
better if we just if it was all over with and. Because we have
no strength to continue on going, or we're discouraged, or whatever
it may be. But then the Lord feeds us. The Lord feeds us bread,
and he feeds us his flesh in the form of bread, and he gives
us his blood, the wine. He reminds us that there is a
remedy, that there is a substitute, there is a savior, a redeemer.
And the scripture says Elijah went on the strength of that
food for 40 days and 40 nights. The Lord will feed us in this
wilderness and he will give us exactly what we need in showing
us that we have been bitten by the serpent, but then shutting
us up to Christ, causing us to look unto Christ. I want you to notice verse six.
They were angry at God. If we are angry because of our
circumstances, if we are angry because of anything going on
in our life, we are angry at God. And what does God do? The
Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people
and much people of Israel died. We know. We know that this is
how. God save sinners as he causes
them to be bitten. Not everyone's bitten. I want
to be clear on that. At least they don't know that
they're bitten. Let me put it that way. Everybody in Israel
here were not bitten, so everybody didn't need to look to the serpent,
did they? The serpent on the pole? Everybody was not bitten,
but several of them were bitten and died, the scripture says.
So what are we saved from is the question I'm asking. We're
saved from the bite. We're saved from the venom, the
iniquity that we have in us, the sin that doth so easily beset
us. We're saved from our transgression. We need a Savior and the only
way that we know that we need a Savior is if we have been bitten. The Lord makes us a sinner. And
then he gives us a remedy. The Lord makes us know that we
have been bitten and we have venom in our veins. We have poison
coursing through our veins, which is our lifeblood and yet gives
us the blood of Christ that washes us and cleanses us. It makes
us holy before him. This is evident the same thing
with them and us in verse seven. It's evident what you do when
you find out you've been bitten. Your confession. This was their
confession. It's evident when the Lord makes
you a sinner, it's evident because your confession is Christ is
all. The Lord's never one time made
a man a sinner and left him in that state. The Lord only makes
a man a sinner to shut him up to Christ. The Lord has never
called someone to be bitten and never given them the remedy for
it. He always gives a remedy if you're bitten. If you have
a need, Christ is the need the remedy for your need. So in verse
70 says, therefore, the people came to Moses and said we have
sinned. There's the confession. That's what we confess, isn't
it? We've sinned against God. We've sinned against nature.
We've sinned against ourself. We need a savior. That's our
confession. We've sinned. For we have spoken
against the Lord and against thee. Pray unto the Lord that
he take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the
people. This is our hope, brethren, that
the Lord would cause us to cry out for mercy, to see ourselves
in the fallen state that we are, to see ourselves without no hope,
without any hope, unless the Lord Jesus Christ interjects. And He always interjects. If
He shows you that you're hopeless, if He shows you that you're sinful,
He's going to interject and He's going to save you. That's the
good news of the Gospel. He gives us faith in the Lord
Jesus Christ to believe upon Him. Now in verse number eight,
he tells us, the Lord said unto Moses, make thee a fiery serpent
and set it upon a pole and it shall come to pass that everyone
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
of brass, he lived. This brazen serpent is the Lord
Jesus Christ. It is made of zinc and copper. That's how you make brass, is
you take zinc and copper and you forge them together in the
fire. That represents his humanity and it represents his deity,
his holiness before the Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ is this
serpent of brass. He had no venom in him, did he?
He was a serpent of brass. He had no venom in him, he had
no sin in him, yet for our sakes he became sin to appease the
Father, to please his Father. He was lifted upon a pole. The
scripture says, the Lord was speaking and said, as Moses lifted
up the serpent in the wilderness, so shall the Son of Man be lifted
up. The Lord Jesus Christ himself was lifted up. And he said, if
I be lifted up, I'll draw all men unto me. I'll draw all men
unto repentance. The Lord Jesus Christ was this
one that was lifted up just as this serpent was lifted up upon
this pole. The Lord Jesus Christ was lifted upon a tree. Was he
not lifted up for his people to look upon? That's the cry
that's going forth this morning is look upon Christ. If you know
that you've been bitten, look to him. If you know that you're
a sinner, look into Christ. All you have to do is look. If
the Lord makes you a sinner, you will look. But if the Lord
has not made you a sinner, you don't have a need. If you see
yourself as dying and that is the remedy is look to Christ
and you know that he's given you the ability to do that, you're
going to look to him. He will make you look to him.
I find great rest in that because if it was left up to me to look,
I wouldn't look. But he get he causes you to be
bitten. He causes me to be bitten. Do
we see that? And he says, look into me and
live. Now, there was not a single person,
the scripture does not say that there was a single person that
was bitten that did not look under that pole, not a single
one. They all looked under that serpent, didn't they? Because
they were bitten. So it is the same for the Lord's children.
When the Lord shows you that you're bitten, you're going to
look to him. This is an irresistible calling. You have a need, and
he's the only one that can meet your need. He draws you with
cords of love. He draws his people with cords
of love, and we certainly cry out, Lord, have mercy upon me,
the sinner. The qualification for looking. The qualification for looking
is you had to be bitten. You had to be bitten. Everybody
else could look, but they wouldn't have a need to look. Everybody
else could pass by and see it, but they didn't really have a
need to look upon it for their life. This is a serious matter
of life and death. This is as serious as it gets,
our soul, eternity. And if you've been made to have
that need, you will look. Other people will pass by this
place and they will not have the need that the Lord has given
you as his people. The Lord only causes his people
to have this need. I have been bitten. I am dead
in trespasses and in sin. I need a savior. I need to look
to Jesus Christ, the serpent upon the pole. This was the qualification
they were bitten. Christ Jesus came to save those
that were bitten. That's our hope. The ones that
are sinners. That Christ Jesus came to save sinners. That's
my hope. Lastly, I want to show us in
1 Peter 1. There's great rest in this brethren
to know that our sin has been put away and we've been given
the remedy for what's in us. If you've ever felt distress
because of what you are, there's great hope in this because the
Lord Jesus Christ has put away your sin. If you've been bitten,
he has saved you because he's given you Christ. Only those
that have been given Christ will look. Only those that have been
bitten are the ones that Christ came to die for. So we're saved from our sin We're
saved from our iniquity, we're saved from our transgression,
our trespasses, and we're saved from ourself. That's what we're
saved from. We're saved for the Lord's glory,
for the Lord's honor, for the Lord's purpose, according to
his will. And lastly, what are we saved
to? First Peter chapter one, verse three, blessed be the God
and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his
abundant mercy, That's how he did it. He did it according to
his abundant mercy. He hath begotten us again to
a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. And this
is what we're saved to, brethren, verse four, to an inheritance,
to an inheritance, incorruptible and undefiled that fadeth not
away, reserved in heaven for you. You who are kept by the
power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed
at the last time. Brethren, we've been saved to
an inheritance that is incorruptible, that is undefiled, and that fadeth
not away. That brazen serpent stood upon
that pole as long as there was somebody present that needed
to look upon it. In the very moment that that
last person looked upon it, that serpent was no longer necessary.
Our Savior is necessary for His people forever, and we will always
look upon Him forever. And as soon as the last person
on this side of glory looks upon Him, Then it's over. He's going
to call his people home. That's the whole reason this
Earth was created was for his glory. It was created for the
Cross of Calvary for his people, and now he's given Christ to
us. Our inheritance. That's what we're saved too.
So we're saved from our self. Save from our sin. Save from
our iniquity. Our iniquity is what we do to
try to fix our sin, isn't it? Save from our trespasses. We're
saved for the Lord's glory for the Lord's honor. according to
His will, and were saved to an inheritance, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Look upon the brazen serpent, brethren. Look upon Christ, the
one that is the only remedy for the bitten ones, for those who
know that they're sinners. Believe on Him and live. If you're
His, you will. If you've been bitten, You need
to look. You have to look. There's no
other explanation. You must have Christ. That's our heart's desire, isn't
it? Let's pray. Father, thank You for being lifted
up for Your people. Draw us unto You and cause us
to rest in Christ, our brazen serpent. It's in His name we
pray. Amen.