Good morning Everyone! Thanks for being faithful in reading God’s Word and for your comments!!
Numbers chapter 21
When the king of Arad attacked Israel and captured some of them, the Israelites turned to prayer which resulted into God responding and helped them defeat King Arad and his army. When I read this I thought, “Wow, they didn't even whine and complain.”
But the next paragraph I read they are complaining and whining. They wanted to get where they were going and get there fast. But out of respect to Edom they went the long way around to get where they had to be. As a result they grew impatient and whined and complained against God and Moses. They sinned.
It seems we get impatient when things don't go our way or if something takes longer then we think it should. It's like traveling in a car on a trip. You can't wait to get where you are going. But a car accident occurs a few miles ahead and stops traffic for miles. You end up at a standstill and you end up very frustrated and impatient and whining and complaining. Then eventually you get a chance to get off at a different exit and go the long way to get where you're going rather than wait for the road to be cleared off. It takes you well out of your way and we complain because it just added an extra hour or two of travel time.
Once in Corry I was sent the long way around town to get to the church because of a road block set up due to a problem. I remember complaining about having to go way around the extra half mile to get to where I was going. What happened was I ended up seeing a man on the side of the street having a problem. I stopped and helped him and ended up praying with him.
- Why did God let that happen? That day it was because he needed me to help someone and pray for him.
- Maybe it is to teach us patience.
- Maybe God wants to teach us to be joyful in situations because being joyful is the way of showing we trust God despite all of the “inconvenient” circumstances.
- Maybe the results we are looking for can be better reached a different way versus our way.
When things don't go our way, I would say let's pray and ask God to change our attitude and change our expectations. Pray we can be joyful versus impatient, whining and complaining, so that we see our distraction as a new adventure with God verses a total mess up with our life. Let's see what good could come from it (God teaches us something) or for someone else (God use us to minister to someone in need).
But I also found interesting is when God punished the Israelites with the deadly snakes. They prayed for God to remove the snakes but God's answer was to not remove the snakes, but he did provide a way to keep them alive. The snakes acted as a constant reminder to not complain.
Sometimes when we go through hardships we sin against God and we get disciplined by God and face consequences that hurt us. We end up praying for God's intervention and He forgives us but he lets us suffer consequences that are uncomfortable enough that it acts as a reminder to not make the same mistake twice. If God takes away all consequences all at once, we are more apt to make the same sin again because we didn't learn anything from it.
For me today, my prayer is God help me to not look at impatient situations has negative occurrences. Instead help me to have joy, and trust you are at work bringing about a new plan or a new teaching moment or a new opportunity to minister to someone in need.
V 1-3: Don’t you love how God works – Israel’s first victory came at Hormah (means complete destruction), the place where they were previously defeated (Numbers 14:45). As they start to battle their way through the Promised Land, a couple of things have changed. They believe God can help them; they trust Him to help them; they took the steps He showed them. We need to do the same with our battles with sin. Would they sin again … yes, and so will we.
It wasn’t the serpent on the pole that healed the people but their belief that God could heal them. Jesus referred to this incident when He explained to Nicodemus about being born again in John 3:14, 15. He said all believers could be saved from the sickness of sin by looking to His death on the Cross. We don’t have to climb the pole and hang there with Him. We just have to look to Him. “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.” Col 2:6. We looked to Him when we were saved and that’s what we get to do each and every day. (smile on my face; joy in my heart!)
Before we feel sorry for the Amorites, remember back in Genesis (15:16) and Abraham’s story. God knew the Amorites would grow more wicked. He gave them 400 years to repent and they did not. At the right time He punished them. He is a just God.
I was a bit confused on why GOD would have a snake statue built.
would that be considered an idol?
My thoughts today are not so much on patience, but ability.
I had an eye opening experience this week , and I realized I’m not always going to be able to run around a play with kids as gym coach, I’m getting older. So I’m going to give myself up more and more.
I am thankful for all I have.
It has always seemed somewhat strange and mysterious to me with how God handled the situation with the bronze serpent and I find it interesting that the serpent on a pole is still used as a symbol in the medical field today. God had commanded the people to not make any carved images or have any idols and yet here He tells Moses to make this fiery serpent to put on a pole for the people to look at in order to live if they got bit. God could have just removed the serpents, but He chose to have the people do this instead. I think that it was a reminder of their sin and the curse. They had used their mouths to complain about having to eat the manna and Satan had appeared as a serpent similarly using its mouth to deceive Eve and the serpent was cursed to eat the dust of the ground way back in Genesis 3.
The bronze serpent that Moses made would be destroyed by King Hezekiah years later in 2 Kings 18:3-5. “And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done. He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan). He trusted in the Lord, the God of Israel, so that there was none like him among all the kings of Judah after him, nor among those who were before him.”
It sounds like the bronze serpent had become an object of worship. We can take the things of God and turn them into idolatry so we need to be careful not to worship the tools or the people God uses. Instead we should give all the honor and glory to the one true God alone.
This incident from Numbers 21 is also referred to in the New Testament when Jesus shows that this bronze serpent was pointing to Him in leading up to what I think is probably the most famous verse in the Bible, John 3:16. As a symbol of sin and the curse, the serpent was lifted up and put on a tree.
Check out Galatians 3:13. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”—
The Israelites had to look to the bronze serpent in the wilderness in order to be saved from death just like we have to look to Jesus in faith for Him to take away our sin and punishment.