2019-04-14 Numbers 21
Notes
Transcript
4 Then they set out from Mount Hor by way of the Red Sea to bypass the land of Edom, but the people became impatient because of the journey.
5 The people spoke against God and Moses: “Why have you led us up from Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread or water, and we detest this wretched food!”
6 Then the Lord sent poisonous snakes among the people, and they bit them so that many Israelites died.
7 The people then came to Moses and said, “We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you. Intercede with the Lord so that he will take the snakes away from us.” And Moses interceded for the people.
8 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Make a snake image and mount it on a pole. When anyone who is bitten looks at it, he will recover.”
9 So Moses made a bronze snake and mounted it on a pole. Whenever someone was bitten, and he looked at the bronze snake, he recovered.
I. On our own we are helpless and hopeless.
I. On our own we are helpless and hopeless.
4 Then they set out from Mount Hor by way of the Red Sea to bypass the land of Edom, but the people became impatient because of the journey.
5 The people spoke against God and Moses: “Why have you led us up from Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread or water, and we detest this wretched food!”
6 Then the Lord sent poisonous snakes among the people, and they bit them so that many Israelites died.
A. Without God’s intervention our hearts are faithless.
A. Without God’s intervention our hearts are faithless.
5 The people spoke against God and Moses: “Why have you led us up from Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread or water, and we detest this wretched food!”
Illus: The snake has always been at work poisoning the minds of people to love themselves and their wants and desires since the begining of creation.
A. The story of numbers is your story.
It was the snake who told Adam and eve “did God really say” questioning the goodness and faithfulness of God.
In response to the snake, God promised a saviour who would crush the head of the snake with His heal.
Don’t mis the implications of God using snakes as a punishment. He is painting the picture that they were not snake crushers, but people who had been bitten and would die by the nasty venom the snake had been using since the garden of eden.
Adam and Eve felt the death of the snake, and the people of Israel felt it’s venom as well.
Fast forward to the New Testament. Jesus calls out a single group of people for being snakes… the self righteous.
Jesus saw that self righteousness, depending on your self and not God, is the same sin that the people fell to in the wilderness, and the same sin that the pharisees were selling in His day.
Self righteousness brings death.
19 This is the judgment: The light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil.
27 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of the bones of the dead and every kind of impurity.
28 In the same way, on the outside you seem righteous to people, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
29 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! You build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous,
30 and you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we wouldn’t have taken part with them in shedding the prophets’ blood.’
31 So you testify against yourselves that you are descendants of those who murdered the prophets.
32 Fill up, then, the measure of your ancestors’ sins!
33 “Snakes! Brood of vipers! How can you escape being condemned to hell?
B. God does not overlook faithlessness.
B. God does not overlook faithlessness.
6 Then the Lord sent poisonous snakes among the people, and they bit them so that many Israelites died.
Illus: It is possible to go through the church routine, look the right way, and be completely lost without Jesus. The people of Isreael followed God all over the wilderness and had to learn time and again that God was in charge.
Our desires, our dependence on our selves, our love of comfort, and our idolotry of personal grattification are all forms of a rejection of God.
When we worship a style of song over God… we are rejecting God.
When we fail to own up to the sins in our lives we are rejecting God.
When our desires for more stuff, comfort and luxury cannot be tamed, we are rejecting God.
It is God who satisfies us… we will not look like the Israelites who constantly complained about not having what they wanted.
Listen to the seriousness of not embracing God whole heartedly...
18 Anyone who believes in him is not condemned, but anyone who does not believe is already condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the one and only Son of God.
19 This is the judgment: The light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil.
II. Moses was not enough.
II. Moses was not enough.
7 The people then came to Moses and said, “We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you. Intercede with the Lord so that he will take the snakes away from us.” And Moses interceded for the people.
A. The people needed the removal of judgment.
A. The people needed the removal of judgment.
7 The people then came to Moses and said, “We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you. Intercede with the Lord so that he will take the snakes away from us.” And Moses interceded for the people.
Illus: Most times we don’t want to deal with sin until we see the consequences of our sin.
For many of us, repentance starts with a desire not to deal with the consequences of our foolish decisions.
God’s judgment on the people was fair… it was what they deserved… but it also served to move them toward repentance.
You may be walking through the consequences of your sin and decisions right now. Will you allow those consequences to lead you to find forgiveness in God.
There awaits a greater consequence ahead of all of us… Hell and the wrath of God. If you do not turn from your sin and to Jesus, you will face hell.
That said, God has provided a way to remove that judgment through Jesus Christ.
6 For while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly.
7 For rarely will someone die for a just person—though for a good person perhaps someone might even dare to die.
8 But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
9 How much more then, since we have now been declared righteous by his blood, will we be saved through him from wrath.
B. The people needed restoration from the venom.
B. The people needed restoration from the venom.
8 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Make a snake image and mount it on a pole. When anyone who is bitten looks at it, he will recover.”
Illus: Follow the story here… God could have simply removed the snakes and said ok… those bitten will have to face the judgment, and those who were not bitten will be ok.
He could have simply removed the snakes… and it would have been merciful on His part.
God did more.
God did more than remove the snakes, he made a way for the people to be whole and healthy again.
God does more in your life. Not only does he forgive you of your sin.... he gives you the Holy Spirit so that you no longer depend on your strength but instead have His strength in you… and He will do more… One day He will make you whole.
8 But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
9 How much more then, since we have now been declared righteous by his blood, will we be saved through him from wrath.
10 For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, then how much more, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life.
11 And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received this reconciliation.
III. The snake pointed to the Savior.
III. The snake pointed to the Savior.
9 So Moses made a bronze snake and mounted it on a pole. Whenever someone was bitten, and he looked at the bronze snake, he recovered.
Jesus became the bronze serpent.
Jesus became the bronze serpent.
Illus: Only God could defeat the snake. Only God could heal the venom. Only God can heal you.
God used the imagery of the bronze serpent to point the people to the suffering servant, Jesus Christ being lifted up for our sins.
As we enter Easter week, place yourself in this story. We are those who have sinned, been faithless, chosen our own comfort over God’s abundance.
We have no escape from the full wrath of God being poured out. The snakes will bite… and we are dead.
That said, what God asks of us is that we look to his redemption. We look to Jesus Christ and we will find life.
14 “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,
15 so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.
16 For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
14 “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,
15 so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.
16 For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.