Bible Stories › When God Keeps His Promises
Bible story · Numbers 21:4–9
Look and Live
Read it yourself in the King James Bible: Numbers 21:4–9 ↗
“And the LORD said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.”
Numbers 21:8 (KJV)The Story
Israel was traveling the long way around the land of Edom, and the people grew impatient. They complained against God and against Moses. Why did you bring us out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There’s no bread, no water, and we hate this miserable food.
That “miserable food” was the manna God sent from heaven every morning.
Then fiery serpents came into the camp. They bit the people, and many died.
The people came to Moses. “We have sinned,” they said. Pray to the Lord to take the serpents away.
Moses prayed. But God didn’t take the serpents away. Instead, He gave a strange command. Make a serpent out of bronze and put it on a pole. Anyone who is bitten, if they look at it, will live.
So Moses made a bronze serpent and lifted it up on a pole. And whenever a snake bit someone, if they looked at the bronze serpent, they lived.
Reflection
The cure didn’t require strength, sacrifice, or medicine. It required a look. A bitten, dying person only had to turn their eyes toward what God had lifted up.
More Bible stories from Numbers. More about: Healing · Moses
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Day 9 of Book 6
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