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Nicodemus and the Serpent in the Wilderness

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Nicodemus and the Serpent in the Wilderness

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Nicodemus and the Serpent in the Wilderness

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There is a famous scripture in the Gospel of John you will have seen plastered across television screens at major sporting events. What is the history to this verse? What precipitated Jesus using these words in conversation with Nicodemus? We will study the background to this famous scripture.

Transcript

[Peter Eddington] The Bible is an amazing piece of literature that proves itself time and time again as the inspired Word of God. It's a seamless message from Genesis to Revelation that ties in the gospel of the kingdom and the message of salvation from start to finish. It's really one volume, as we know, divided into two testaments. Only by divine inspiration could one volume, filled with books written by dozens of different individuals living thousands of years apart, deliver such a coherent message. There's nothing else like it, no other piece of literature like it. And as we know, it is the inspired Word of God.

One such proof of the Bible involves the life of Jesus Christ Himself as prophesied by the Old Testament in hundreds of places, Jesus lived and walked on this Earth as the promised messiah eventually dying for our sins that we may be offered eternal life. There's a very famous scripture in the Gospel of John that you will have seen plastered across television screens at major sporting events. I actually see much less of it now than we did 10 or 20 years ago. But a couple of decades ago, this scripture was held up on posters by avid Christian sports fans for nationwide TV viewing audience to see. Do you remember what it is? It's perhaps the most well known Bible passage of all as a result. But what is the history to this famous verse? What precipitated Jesus using these words in a conversation with Nicodemus? As I said, the Bible is an amazing piece of literature that is coherent from start to finish.

The sermon today is titled, “Nicodemus and the Serpent in the Wilderness.” Nicodemus and the Serpent in the Wilderness. We're going to once again see how the Old and New Testaments are one seamless account of the Word of God. Of course, delivered by the Word Himself. We will study the background to this very famous scripture. And as we go along, I'm going to build a case. I'm going to do it logically, which I tend to do, logically, and build a case as to why Jesus spoke those words to Nicodemus. And so, this famous scripture's being quoted a lot in our culture in the United States during the 20th and 21st centuries, I believe you know which passage I'm talking about. But I want to give some background and biblical history to it.

When the state of Israel declared its independence, in its declaration of independence, on May 18, 1948, they concluded by saying, “We place our trust in the ‘rock of Israel.’” In fact, during the opening prayer today, the rock was addressed in the opening prayer, if you listened. The expression, the rock of Israel, is used a lot in the Bible as referring to God. There's a hymn sung by many Churches, “Rock of Ages.” The words of this hymn have their roots deeply in the Bible. And they also relate to our subject today, “Nicodemus and the Serpent in the Wilderness.” Let's turn to John 5 and read Verses 45 through 47 for a moment. In John 5, Jesus confronts the spiritual leaders of His day.

John 5:45-47 “Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you, Moses, in whom you trust. For if you believe Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?”

So here, Jesus says, “Moses wrote about me.” What did Moses say about Jesus? The Jews honor Moses, but they, to this day, have not accepted Jesus Christ. Jesus said, “If you believe Moses, you'd believe me.” And obviously, they have not followed through on that. The words of Moses accuse religious leaders of both Jesus Day and guess what, the words of Moses accuse our leaders today as well, including religious leaders.

I'm going to turn to 1 Corinthians 10 and read the first four verses here now. 1 Corinthians 10. Because whether you're ethnically an Israelite or not, the Israelites are the forerunners of Christianity. They're the ancient Church in the wilderness, is what they were called. They're part of, shall we say, Church history. Israelites are part of our Church history. 1 Corinthians 10:1, let's read the first four verses here.

1 Corinthians 10:1-2 Paul says to the Corinthians, “Moreover, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware that all of our fathers were under the cloud or passed through the sea, all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.”

The Israelites were, in effect, baptized into Moses. The Red Sea Crossing was a type of baptism. We are now baptized, of course, into Christ. But the ancient example was a parallel. And as you keep reading the account in the Old Testament, the Israelites come most likely on the day of Pentecost to Mount Sinai. And God performs miraculous signs and then they receive the law, The 10 Commandments. And then, they receive the Book of the Covenant after that. And finally, ratification of the agreement was made between God and Israel. So this would be a type of receiving of the Holy Spirit today which we find in a parallel on Pentecost of AD 31. The experience at Sinai and the ratification of the Old Covenant is a type of the receiving of God's Spirit, because the purpose of the Spirit is so that we can actually have God's law in our hearts and minds, not just physically. Written in our hearts, as Jeremiah 31 and Hebrews 8 explain. We see how the wilderness experience is, in effect, a type of the Christian walk today. Today, we are walking through a spiritual wilderness. Notice Verse 3 now.

1 Corinthians 10:3-4 “All ate the same spiritual food and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them and that rock was Christ.”

Yes, the rock of Israel. We know they were filled with spiritual food and the physical food, manna. Because manna is a type of Christ, the bread of life. And that rock was Christ. Jesus Christ was there was a pre-iconic Word of God. God was not only leading them, but protecting them from the rear. The spiritual rock that followed them. He was leading them and protecting them from the rear. At times, the pillar of cloud protected their rear flank from advancing enemies. And in scripture, we see God protecting people as their rear God.

And water miraculously came out of the rock for the Israelites. And you can once again see the typology. Water coming out of a rock, the Holy Spirit coming from the rock of Israel. They receive the Holy Spirit, the water of life that proceeds from the Father sent by Jesus Christ. And we request the Holy Spirit in Jesus' name. So again, they ate the spiritual food and all drank the same spiritual drank. They drink of that spiritual rock that followed them and that rock was Christ. It's very clear, isn't it? Look at Verse 5.

1 Corinthians 10:5 “But,” there's always a but, “with most of them, God was not well pleased, for their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.”

What follows here is a very important lesson. That generation of Israel blew it in spite of all that God did for them. And it's a reminder to us, we too have to be careful to stay the course, to stay with our commitment and to appreciate what God is doing for us, as we go through a spiritual wilderness in this world. And in fact, that's exactly what is said next.

1 Corinthians 10:6 “Now these things became our examples to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted.”

So yes, the spiritual lesson is for us, is what Verse 6 tells us. Then notice Verse 9.

1 Corinthians 10:9 “Nor let us tempt Christ as some of them also tempted and were destroyed by serpents.”

We're told let's not tempt Christ. Don't get into an attitude where we're not appreciative of His blessings and act in a way where we go to the edge of the cliff in our lifestyle. To see how close we can get to the edge without falling over, morally even. And then, they were destroyed by serpents. In the Bible, the devil is pictured as a serpent, so serpents can be symbolic of sin. The bite of the serpent can reflect the venomous attitude of people biting with their words.

And so, these verses in 1 Corinthians 10, of course, referring to the wilderness journey and what happened in Numbers 21. So that's where we're going to go next as we build this case, Numbers 21. It's a very interesting account. So let's go back to the Old Testament and see what Paul was writing about to the Corinthians. Remember, the Old and New Testaments are one seamless account of God's salvation for humanity.

Numbers 21:4-6 “Then the Israelites journeyed from Mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea to go around of the Land of Edom. And the soul of the people became very discouraged on the way. And the people spoke against God. Or the people used words against God and against Moses. And said, ‘Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there's no food, no water, and our soul loathes this worthless bread.’” This manna. Verse 6. “So the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people and many of the people of Israel died.”

Of course, this is a very sad account in Israel's history, in shall we say, ancient Church history. The Israelites were being sustained miraculously. They were free. They were no longer slaves like they'd been in Egypt and many of them would have remembered the hard bondage they had to deal with under pharaoh. They called the manna “this worthless bread”. Their attitude was so bitter. And when we think of the parallel of Jesus being the bread of life, and the rock that sustained them, the Israelites are harboring a very dangerous attitude. So the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and many died. This was happening at around 1408 BC. This is late in their wilderness journey. They'd been wandering for quite a bit of time, almost 40 years, 1408 BC.

Yes, they're living in the Sinai Desert. It's not, you know, Florida. But they're living as free people. They don't have oppression. They don't have slavery and they're being taken care of. Their clothes didn't even wear out for 40 years. And their food is available day by day. But still, we see this bitterness. And so, obviously, the punishment comes. It's a punishment for sins of an evil tongue, their words against God and against Moses, as we saw in Verse 5. Then of course, the people realized, oh, no, we've done it again. It's kind of the story of Israel. We've done it again. We need to have control of ourselves and not let ourselves get into this rotten attitude. So in a sense, they repent.

Numbers 21:7-9 “Therefore the people came to Moses and said, ‘We have sinned. 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.” And here, Moses is a type of Christ interceding for them here in this story. Verse 8, “Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole. And it shall be that everyone who is bitten when he looks at it shall live.’ So Moses made a bronze serpent and put it on a pole. And so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.”

Various pieces of art have been created to symbolize this event. There's a brazen serpent monument on Mount Nebo in Jordan created by Italian artist, Giovanni Fantoni. Similarly, on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome, Michelangelo painted a mural of the Israelites' deliverance from the plague of serpents by the creation of the bronze serpent. It's a very famous story. The bronze fiery serpent symbolized the punishment they were getting for their sin. The bite. The burning sensation of a snake bite was pictured by the bronze or the cup shining in the sunlight, that look of fire.

So if a person had sinned and punishment came, the Israelite would look up at the bronze serpent on the pole and he or she was healed. They're in, effect, forgiven of the sin. God was teaching something here about faith. Because it is totally illogical to think that looking at a bronze image could heal anyone from a snake bite. But that is exactly what God told them to do. It took an act of faith in God's plan for anyone to be healed and the serpent on the stick was a reminder of their sin, which brought about their suffering. Now you know your New Testament, right? You already see the typology here that's going on. The serpent is a type of sin. You put the serpent on a pole. You lift it up. People look up at it when they're bitten and they're healed. So let's go to 2 Corinthians 5:21. And we see this typology in 2 Corinthians 5:21. Talking about Jesus Christ here. Paul tells the Corinthians in Verse 21.

2 Corinthians 5:21 “For He made Him who knew no sin, Jesus who knew no sin, to be sin for us. That we might become the righteousness of God in him.”

Jesus Christ died on an execution stake on an elevated area, crucified to be sinned for us. So people were looking up at Him. And today, in effect, we too look up metaphorically to Him and we accept Him as our savior. He became sin for us too. Now notice John 19:36 and 37. I want to go there next as we continue to build our case. John 19:36. Speaking of the crucifixion of our Savior.

John 19:36 “For these things were done, Christ was crucified that scripture should be fulfilled. Not one of His bones shall be broken.”

And again, another scripture says, “They shall look on him whom they pierced. They will look up at Him.” The Israelites looked at the serpent, the symbol of sin. But Jesus Christ was different. He was totally innocent. He became sin for us. He took upon himself all the possible penalties of our sin. And because of His sacrifice, He is now our living savior. We come to Him now as our intercessor as Moses interceded for Israel. And we have healing through Him, like the Israelites were healed. We have physical healing, yes, but ultimately we now have spiritual healing. The healing of our mind being led by the Holy Spirit. And at the end, we have resurrection from the dead through Him, the ultimate healing.

But now, for ancient Israel, the story takes a sad turn. Took a sad turn for centuries to come. And fortunately, they did what you find them doing throughout the Bible. They take something that should be a memorial, a positive reminder, and they turn it into something adulterous. Evidently, the serpent Moses made was not gotten rid of after the event. It was kept around to remind them of what happened. Seemed like a good idea. And they decided to make a kind of charm out of it and had adulterous rituals in connection with it. We too have to be very careful to avoid that kind of behavior, turning everyday things into idols. We shouldn't have any kind of thing or idea or goal that comes between us and God, that's more important than God. We have to put God first and not allow some modern day idol to distort our relationship with God.

Let's see what happened. Let's go to 2 Kings 18. 2 Kings 18. We go from ancient Israel wandering the wilderness in the 15th century BC, to second kings and the late 8th century or early 7th century BC, 700 years later. And here in 2 Kings 18, we're in the middle of the reign of Hezekiah, the righteous king. He ruled roughly from 716 to 687 BC. So 700 years after the event in the wilderness with Moses, we read this.

2 Kings 18:4 “So Hezekiah removed the high places and broke the sacred pillars. He got rid of all the idols. He was a righteous king. He cut down the wooden image and broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made. For until those days, and for 700 years, the children of Israel burned incense to it and called it Nehushtan.”

You could imagine after all those centuries, a serpent on the pole had been kept around as some kind of charm or idol. They already had, as we know, the golden calf episode at Mount Sinai. And later, Jeroboam erected two golden calves himself, went overboard, doubled it. And sadly, Israel slipped off into adultery time and time again. And throughout the nation, people were observing adulterous practice. And surrounding these practices were many connected immoral ceremonies. This shows how easy it is to take the good things of God and twist them into adultery.

We must never worship the tools or the people God chooses to use, but always bring the honor and glory to God alone. The Jewish Mishna and the Talmud both say of the bronze serpent, “The people should look up to the God of heaven, for he's not the serpent that either brings to life or puts to death, but it is God.” So as you know, the Mishna and the Talmud were created to try and stop the Israelites, the Jews in particular, for going back into sinful behavior. So they wrote down hundred and hundreds of rules and regulations to make sure they kept the Sabbath without sinning, and they wrote, “Look up to the God of heaven, not to the serpent.” So nobody would do that again. If you're interested, that's in Mishna RH 38b and the Talmud RH 29a. It's there. See, in the course of time, the people lost sight of the symbolic meaning and regarded the serpent itself as the seat of the healing power. And they made it an object of worship so that Hezekiah found it necessary to destroy it.

So the Misha says, “The people should look to God, not the serpent, because only God can heal.” Israel was a minority among the other nations of the day and they tended to copy and absorb the cultures around them in a self-destructive way. There was serpent worship in other cultures. Israelites kind of took it on with the bronze serpent. But God said, “No, Israel, you are to be an example for other nations to follow. You're not supposed to follow them.” God said, “You ought to be an example.” They were not to follow the example of the nations worshipping multiple other gods. No, the other nations were supposed to follow Israel and swim upstream with Israel and not go downstream.

Other nations were to better themselves to become more godly, not less godly. But instead Israel were the ones that were following the other nations. This is very important for us to understand, no matter in which culture we may function. Here in the 21st century in America, whatever country you're functioning in, if you're watching this message from abroad, keep in mind there are going to be certain points of agreement between the general behavior of our nation and the Bible. But there are also going to be conflicts. And when there's a conflict, the Bible is our standard, not what other people around us are doing, not what the, shall we say, heathen nations are doing, like Israel followed. So thankfully, Hezekiah was a righteous king and put an end to this particular form of adultery. Continuing Verse 5.

2 Kings 18:5-6 “He trusted in the Lord God of Israel so that after him was none like him among all the kinds of Judah, nor who were before him, for he held fast to the Lord. He did not depart from following Him, but kept His commandments, which the Lord had commanded Moses.”

Hezekiah was a great king because he trusted in God. The Hebrew word, nehhoshet, translated as nehushtan, used in Verse 4, is the element copper as well as two of its alloys, bronze and brass. So the Hebrew word for bronze or brass or copper is nehhoshet. It's also a play on words because the Hebrew word, nakhash, is used in Hebrew to identify the serpent that appears in the Garden of Eden. Some sources say the term, Nehushtan is a proper noun coming from either the word for snake or brass, and thus Nehushtan can mean the great serpent or the great brass. So it's a play on words. Nehushtan could mean the bronze thing or the serpent thing. And the children of Israel burned incense to it and called it Nehushtan. Finally, Hezekiah smashed it and that's the end of it. But for centuries, it had become part of adultery in the nation. So now, let's go to the four spiritual lesson and the background to Nicodemus and the serpent in the wildness. It's in John 3. When Nicodemus, a leader among the Pharisees, came to Jesus Christ, Jesus explained the significance of what we just read out of the Book of Numbers. Nicodemus went under the cover of darkness to talk with Jesus and Nicodemus calls Him rabbi or teacher. He understood Jesus was a teacher sent by God. Most Jews didn't want to admit it, but Nicodemus was willing at least to visit at night privately.

John 3:1-2 “There's a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, ‘Rabbi, we know you are a teacher come from God for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him.’”

And Jesus then tells Nicodemus the importance of conversion, of being born again, which is a shock to Nicodemus because he thought he was already in a sense converted. After all, he's a child of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He didn't realize that being a child of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is insufficient. “No, you have to be born again or born from above,” Jesus says. Even a person born as a godly Jew of that day had to be converted. And then of course, we see that in the Book of Acts, as the Church began in Judea, and many Jews became baptized and converted. In Verse 10, Jesus tells Nicodemus, “You would know this if you really knew the scriptures, Nicodemus, you chief rabbi you. You would understand this.” And now look at John 3:12.

John 3:12 “If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, if you don't get it, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” So even the basic instruction Jesus is giving is not sinking in. So how the deeper matter's going to sink in? In Verse 13, “Jesus then says to Nicodemus actually some very interesting words. He says, ‘No one is a sinner to heaven but he who came down from heaven. And that is a sign of man who is in heaven.’”

So Jesus is telling Nicodemus the son of man is in heaven, yet there He was talking to Nicodemus. “There's something to know, Nicodemus,” Jesus says. Jesus Christ has ascended. Jesus Christ, or the Word, comes and goes as He pleases. He appeared to Abraham and to Jacob. He actually wrestled with Jacob. Jesus Christ is the Word of God in the flesh. God is omnipresent and heaven didn't lose anyone when God became man and tabernacled among us in the ministry of Jesus Christ. We had a carpenter's son, a rabbi, who was both human and divine. So, therefore, He's still God even when, as a rabbi, He's here on Earth. He's the son of man who is in heaven, Jesus says to Nicodemus. It's a profound truth. It's awesome. It's the teaching of the New Testament that God became man. And in doing that, He's still God. But He limited Himself in being a man for those 30-something years. The man, of course, suffered and died, but then was resurrected to immortal life. The first human resurrected to immortal life. The first of the first fruits, as we say in 1 Corinthians 15. Now look closely at Verse 14.

John 3:14-15 “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”

Jesus is giving Nicodemus a prophecy of how He, the messiah, would die. What Moses did in the wilderness was a type of what people have experienced today who have forgiven and healed, what we now experience. And biblically, the serpent is a symbol for Satan. Yet the New Testament tells us that this raised bronze serpent is a type of Jesus Christ, who's lifted up in crucifixion. And that looking to his sacrifice gives us life. Jesus told Nicodemus this bronze serpent was a foreshadowing of Him. The serpent, a symbol of sin and judgment, was lifted up from the Earth and put on a tree or a pole, which was a symbol of a curse. Jesus, too, became a curse for us, became sin for us.

If you want to make a note of it, Galatians 3:18. We read this.

Galatians 3:13 We read, “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us, for He's written, ‘cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.’”

That's actually a quote from Deuteronomy 21. I'm going to read to you Deuteronomy 21:22 and 23, if you want to turn over there.

Deuteronomy 21:22-23 “If a man has committed a sin deserving of death and he's put to death and you hang him on a tree, his body should not remain overnight on the tree, but you shall surely bury him that day so that you do not defy the land which the Lord your God is given you as an inheritance for He, who is hanged, is accursed of God.”

And so, Jesus became accursed for us when He was put up on that tree or that pole. So that's where the quote comes from in Galatians 3:13, from Deuteronomy 21. As I mentioned at the beginning of the sermon, the Bible is an amazing piece of literature that proves itself time and time again as the inspired Word of God. It's a seamless message from genesis to revelation and it ties in the gospel of the kingdom and the message of salvation from start to finish. A few minutes ago, we read John 19:37 about their look on him, who they have pierced. Once again, that's another Old Testament passage and a prophecy found in Zechariah 12.

Zechariah 12:10 We read, “I'll pour in the House of David and on the inhabitance of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and supplication. They will have a look on me, whom they pierced.” So it's a messianic prophecy. “They will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn.”

In the fullest sense, when we repent of our sins, we look for Jesus Christ to redeem us from our sins. We too think about our Savior who is pierced through with a sword, something we especially focus on during the Passover season. He was pierced through with a sword. He bled and died for our sins. We're then given the opportunity to have eternal life, to be healed in the complete fullest sense from Him hanging on that pole. One of the biggest questions asked and probably one you're asking right now is how could a seemingly satanic symbol come to represent Jesus? You're wondering about that? Why would God use a serpent to represent Jesus?

The devil, remember, was the original sinner and the instigator of sin among our first human parents, Adam and Eve. So that being so, we can view the serpent as a symbol of sin or the sinful nature mankind has acquired from Satan. In sacrificing Himself for us, Christ bore our sins and all its penalties. And as we read a moment ago in 2 Corinthians 5:21.

2 Corinthians 5:21 The Bible says, “He became sin for us.”

And as sin separates us from God, Christ bore our sins and endured His ultimate penalty of death. Thus in bearing our sin, Christ could be depicted with the image of a raised serpent, which represents sin. And when we look upon Christ death by crucifixion for our sins and His resurrection from that death into new life, we can have the penalty for sin removed and also be granted a new life to be born again, to be raised again. Let's read this again from Verse 14 straight into Verse 16.

John 3:14-15 “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of man be lifted up.” It's a parallel. “That whoever believes in him should not perish” like the Israelites did, “but have eternal life, for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

Verse 16 is the one that a great number of people know. But it's often not read in the full context of the preceding verses. Now you know the back story to it. Moses and the Israelites in the wilderness is the background that leads up to that verse, the sacrifice of our savior lifted up and crucified on a pole for all to see. The experience of the Israelites in the wilderness points to that truth, which is so vital, so essential.

John 3:16-17 Again, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His son into the world to condemn the world, but that through the world, through Him, that the world through Him might be saved.”

The Israelites were saved and we can be saved. What a wonderful truth brought out here in the Gospel of John. This is the background to a famous scripture that everybody seems to know who watches football on television, but they don't think about it or even know the back story, the history, they just stick a placard up. See how the Bible ties both Old and New Testaments together seamlessly? It's all one story of salvation for us. Every time we open the Bible, there's more to learn. So may we all keep studying diligently the very Word of God.