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"For He hath made Him to be sin for us, Who knew no sin, that we might be made the
righteousness of God in Him" (II Cor. 5: 19-21).
Numb. 21: 8 is the O.T. equivalent of John 3: 16:--
"And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be
lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life"
(John 3: 14, 15).
By the time Hezekiah came to the throne, the brazen serpent, preserved by Israel and
carried by them into the land, had become an idolatrous image:--
"He removed the high places, and brake the images, and cut down the groves,
and brake in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made: for unto those days the
children of Israel did burn incense to it; and he called it Nehushtan--a brass thing"
(II Kings 18: 4).
The symbol of Israel's redemption had degenerated to the level of the obscene
Asherah, and idolatrous images. If Satan cannot blot out a truth by denial, he will ruin it
by fleshly prominence. Where the symbol of the cross is most prominent to-day, the
reality of its teaching is lost. The apostate church abounds in crucifixes, images and
incense, but where is the glorious doctrine of the cross of Christ? How can we tolerate
the wearing of crosses as ornaments, when we remember of the dreadful truth for which it
stands? What a sad thing for people of any time, when the grandest symbol of their faith
has to be destroyed as "a thing of brass" in order to save them from idolatry.
The apostles, writing to different companies of the church, warn of idolatry, and we
are not so removed from all spheres of temptation but that the warning should be
remembered by ourselves also.
We will next consider the remaining items indicated in the structure which deal with
the opposition of Edom, Arad, Sihon, Og and Moab.