Sermon Tone Analysis

Pray

Introduction

Now that our Essentials series has finished, we’re turning our attention towards Easter and the journey to the cross.

Next Sunday is Palm Sunday and Paul is due to be back.

After that it’s Easter Sunday so Easter is almost upon us, which means that today we’re going to look at the crucifixion of Jesus.

But we’re not going to look at the crucifixion from one of the gospels - we’re going to look at the crucifixion as it is detailed in Numbers chapter 21.

Now, you might be thinking, what’s this got to do with the crucifixion?

And this passage isn’t even a crucifixion - there’s no crucifixion detailed in Numbers 21.

And you would be right to think the latter - Numbers 21 does not detail a crucifixion…but this passage in Numbers 21 has a LOT to do with the crucifixion of Jesus… it is a foreshadow of the crucifixion - a foreshadow that took place hundreds of years before the actual event and it just shows the rich history of the bible and how so much of the Old Testament points forward to Jesus Christ.

Pause

So, before we look at the passage, I would like us to think of drugs… not narcotics, but medication.

And I want you to think of all the different diseases that are out there, and all the different sicknesses that we can pick up.

Take, for example, bacterial infections....chest infections, ear infections, throat infections… pick an infection.

Now, how are bacterial infections treated?

Well, what we do is we take antibiotics and the antibiotics kill the infection in our body and we get better.

And when you think about it, that’s pretty amazing stuff - that scientists have discovered, or in this case, stumbled upon, a drug that can kill bacterial infections.

This is groundbreaking stuff right here....so much so, this discover won a Nobel prize.

Now, today it’s so commonplace that I think the marvel has gone out of it slightly.

But, what would be better than a drug that could kill bacterial infections?

What about having bacterial infections AT ALL!

Wouldn’t that be MUCH better than having to take antibiotics?

Wouldn’t it be better not to have any infection in the first place rather than to rely on drugs or medication to make us feel better.

Well, at the minute we’re stuck with taking this groundbreaking medicine because bacterial infections aren’t going anywhere soon.

Pause

Now, keep that thought in the back of your head when we look at the passage in Numbers.

Let’s read it again...

So the Children of Israel were slaves in Egypt.

They were put under immense torture and suffering and they cried out to God and God heard their cry and delivered them from Egypt through his servant Moses.

He led them through the Red Sea and he fed them in a place of desolation and wilderness - where there WAS no food - by giving them Manna and quail to eat.

Hardly a banquet, but they were being provided for in a miraculous way every single day.

But, being sinful humans, the Israelites got fed up with this and they complained ABOUT Moses, their leader, and against God.

So God has enough of this.

And he sends snakes - firey serpents as one translation puts it - venomous snakes - as a punishment for their complaining.

So what God is doing is he is condemning their sin and their complaining and grumbling against God and Moses.

He’s sending judgement and condemning them to death because of their sin.

Of course, they realise that they’ve overstepped the mark and they come running back to Moses - we’re sorry.

We’ve sinned, please help us.

In fact, the words they use are this...

But that’s not what God does.

He doesn’t take the snakes away.

That would be a much easier thing to do, you’d think, but God doesn’t do it.

Instead, he provides a way out - he provides a way for the punishment and condemnation of their sin to be quashed.

And he tells Moses to put up a bronze serpent on a pole and mount lift it up for all to see, and anyone who has been bitten and looks at the pole will live.

So rather than take away the thing that kills them, instead they have to look at the image of the very thing that kills them in order to live.

And it required faith and humility to do that.

Pause

Now, let’s go to the other passage we read and let’s read it again...

The event in Numbers was a foreshadowing of what was to happen to Jesus, and Jesus points it out when he has this chat with Nicodemus.

But how does that event in Numbers relate to the crucifixion?

Well, let’s compare and contrast the two events...

First of all...At the cross, Jesus was lifted up for all to see.

He was raised up from the ground on a pole and it was for the same reason why the bronze serpent was lifted up.

Because the serpent provided a way out for the death that the snake bites caused.

Without the bronze serpent they had no hope in their hopeless state.

And Jesus provides a way out for the death that sin causes us.

And without the crucifixion of Jesus, we have no hope in our hopeless state.

So in Numbers, the snake was the means of salvation and hope in the midst of hopelessness and despair.

And in the same way, the Jesus’ death on the cross IS the means of salvation and hope in the midst of hopelessness and despair.

Pause

Secondly, in the story in Numbers, the thing that saved them was the image of the very thing that was killing them.

With us, it’s our sin that is killing us and sending us to Hell, and Jesus, who knew no sin became sin on the cross.

He became the very thing that was killing us…but he also is the very thing that saves us, because Jesus didn’t just become sin, he defeated sin through his death and resurrection.

Pause

Thirdly, and here’s where we need to go outside of the Numbers story…because the bronze serpent is mentioned later on in the bible.

After the Children of Israel arrive in Canaan and they settle, they get restless again and they look around and see that other nations have a king.

So they say to Samuel - hey Samuel, everyone else has a king; we want one too.

God says to Samuel, ‘that’s not a good idea’, but they insist that they want a king, because THEY KNOW BEST, and God gives them want they want.

They have a series of kings, and the whole nation goes to pot because their leaders are NOT following God’s laws…in fact they’ve no interest in God at all and most of them are allowing the nation of Israel to worship other gods if they want to.

One such thing they worshiped was....guess what… a bronze serpent on a pole.

We see this in 2 Kings 18, when Hezekiah comes to power.

He’s a good king and he tries to bring the nation back into favour with God.

So he destroys all the shrines and idols that the nation was worshipping...

So let’s think about what happened here...

The Israelites were bitten by firey snakes which killed them.

God provided a way out.

He didn’t take away the cause of their death, but instead provided a means of salvation and hope in the midst of death.

And as you read this story, the HOPE is that these guys will fall on their knees and worship God for saving them.

BUT NO - that’s NOT what happened!

These guys are so incompetent that instead they worship the bronze snake, as if the bronze snake had anything to do with their salvation....as if the bronze snake was somehow magical.

It was GOD who saved them.

The bronze snake was a means for salvation, but it was God who was doing the saving.

But they didn’t get it and instead they worshipped the bronze serpent and even gave it a name!

But when it comes to Jesus’ death on the cross - it’s as if God knew that we still wouldn’t ‘get it’ so he sent his one and only Son to be the person who would be lifted up for our salvation so that if we decided to worship the one on the cross we’d still be worshiping God.

It’s like God is saying, ‘I’m giving this to you on a plate…Go ahead, worship the one on the cross…in fact, that’s the right thing to do, because the one on the cross isn’t any human, he is God incarnate, dying for your salvation.

So please, go ahead and worship him.’

Pause

But here’s where the similarities end...

Because in the story in Numbers, the people sinned…God sent condemnation in the form of death by venomous snakes…and then came salvation in the form of a bronze serpent lifted up on a pole.

That’s the order...

Sin

Condemnation

Offer of salvation