Apart from Christ, we are all already condemned by divine judgment, and the venom of sin works through the veins of our souls to pull us toward ultimate death. The call of Numbers 21 and John 3 is to look at the Son on the cross—to look at the character of God, to look at what our sin deserves, to behold the only possible means of salvation—and to live!

Jesus is the last Adam (1 Cor. 15:45), the Serpent-Crusher (Gen. 3:15), the prophet like Moses (John 6:14), the New David (Matt. 22:42–45), the long-awaited Shepherd (Ezek. 34:23; John 10:11).^[1] To this list, should we add the greater, true, or last serpent!? If you recoiled with blood boiling horror at this reptilian image, then you have good biblical instincts—but you also have a problem. Jesus compared himself to a snake in John’s gospel. In John 3:14–15, Jesus says, “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.”

What does Jesus mean by comparing himself to this serpent in Numbers 21, and how does it relate to his death on the cross? In order to read John 3 correctly, we will travel back into the wilderness to examine Numbers 21. After seeing what the serpent on the pole means in context, we’ll come back to John’s gospel to see how Christ on the cross fulfills that serpentine scene.

Look and Live (Numbers 21:4–9)

Let’s rehearse what happened in Numbers 21:4–9 as we seek to understand the significance of the serpent:

⁴ From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom. And the people became impatient on the way. ⁵ And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.” ⁶ Then the LORD sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. ⁷ And the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, for 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. ⁸ And the LORD said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” ⁹ So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live. (Numbers 21:4–9)

When God’s people continually rebel in the wilderness, they show a sinful preference for Egypt that manifests in a lack of faith in Yahweh (Num. 11:5, 18; 14:2–3; 16:13; 20:5; 21:5). Every time they are grumbling, the green grass on the other side is Egyptian bluegrass.^[2] This leads us to expect that God’s response in Numbers 21 might have something to do with Egypt.^[3] The people’s reason for preferring Egypt and questioning Yahweh’s plan (Num. 21:5) is that they reject the very manna that God has provided to sustain them.^[4] Their cynical response to God evidences a distrust and dissatisfaction with God’s plan and provision. God responds immediately by sending seraph (ESV’s “fiery”) serpents in Numbers 21:6.

Why seraph serpents? Currid rightly suggests that the serpents point to “Egyptian symbolism,” particularly the upright cobra that was worn on Pharaoh’s headdress (see a picture and discussion here).^[5] Naselli correctly infers, “It’s as if God said to the complaining Israelites: ‘So you miss Egypt? Here you go. Have some snakes—the signature animal that Egypt idolatrously venerates.’”^[6] When the Lord’s serpent swallows Pharaoh’s in Exodus 7, Garrett helpfully comments, “YHWH has co-opted a major symbol of the power of Egypt and of the pharaoh personally. The spiritual guardians that Pharaoh thinks he can depend upon are actually under the direct control of YHWH.”^[7]

How does the Egyptian symbolism function for the serpent upon the pole? Fretheim gets it right when he says, “Deliverance comes, not in being removed from the wilderness [or even in the removal of the snakes!], but in the very presence of the enemy…The death-dealing forces of chaos are nailed to the pole.”^[8] The serpent has multiple dimensions which all contribute to the life-giving event: (1) polemical, (2) visual, and (3) vertical.

Polemical

A polemical argument is one directed against a particular opposing viewpoint. In this case, there’s a major polemical dimension (literally[!]) against Egyptian symbolism. The “pole” in Numbers 21:9 is the same Hebrew word that is used to describe a military standard—the insignia of an army that is visible from far away due to it towering above the troops (see, for example, Isa. 5:26; 11:10, 12; 13:2). Currid rightly suggests, based upon an analysis of standards in ancient Egypt, that “the raising up of the bronze serpent on a standard may also be a symbol of Yahweh’s vanquishing Egypt.”^[9] By fixing the serpent on a standard, Moses proclaims that Yahweh—and not Egypt—has the power to save (Num. 11:23 cf. Isa. 59:1);^[10] for, Yahweh is a victorious warrior (cf. Exod. 15:1–18) displaying a token of his defeated enemy. Thus, the polemical dimension highlights Yahweh as the exclusive savior, the victorious warrior. To ignore or distrust Yahweh’s offer of salvation is to set oneself against the victorious warrior (Num. 21:5), the only means of salvation. It is to side with the creature rather than the Creator. Thus, the serpent “image also symbolized the destruction of Egypt (which had occurred during the Exodus plagues) and of those who wished to return to Egypt and her ways.”^[11] In other words, the judgment remains for those who continue in unseeing unbelief.

Visual

Looking (Num. 21:8–9) is the means by which one receives Yahweh’s salvation. This Hebrew term sometimes communicates the idea of “trusting” when people are the subject (Gen. 15:5; 19:17; 1 Sam. 16:7; Ps. 34:5; 119:18).^[12] Milgrom rightly points out the need for obedience in looking: “Only those who heeded [God’s] command to look at the snake would recover.”^[13] The latent concept of trust is also suggested by people’s confession of sin and request for the intercession of Moses as their mediator (Num. 21:7): they are turning from their sinful preference for Egypt and turning to (i.e., trusting) Yahweh for deliverance.

Vertical

Finally, the vertical dimension of the serpent’s placement upon a standard is easily overlooked. Gray helpfully observes that the Hebrew word translated in Numbers 21:8 as pole (nēs) “is generally used of a conspicuous object round which people, especially troops, mustered…here it seems to mean…a pole sufficiently high to be conspicuous.”^[14] Simply put, there is symbolic significance that the serpent—by being placed sufficiently high—is removed and distanced from the people (vertically). God symbolically answers their request in Numbers 21:7 to “take away” the serpents—not by removing the physical serpents but by removing from the people their preference for Egypt and the judgment he set upon them. Naselli helpfully comments on this dimension: “Lifting the snake on a pole symbolized that God would draw the curse away from his snakebitten and faith-filled people.”^[15] In other words, the salvation Yahweh offers symbolically depicts the removal of the judgment he sent upon them in the form of serpents.

To recap, the salvation provided by Yahweh in Numbers 21 is polemical, visual, and vertical. Polemically, the uplifted serpent indicates Yahweh is the victorious warrior who delivered them from Egypt, making himself the exclusive savior. Visually, the call to look and live must be obeyed; ignoring and disbelieving the salvific gift of Yahweh will result in death because the people were bitten already (John would say “condemned already”; John 3:18). Vertically, the uplifted serpent symbolizes Yahweh’s removal of his judgment for all who obediently look. Therefore, this episode in Numbers 21 shows the people’s sinful preference of something other than God (Egypt), their unbelief, and God’s provision of salvation from divine judgment. These are some of the very same themes we’ll see as we turn to Jesus’s allusion to Numbers 21 in John 3.

As Moses Lifted Up the Serpent (John 3:13–21)

The apostle John presents Jesus’s being lifted up in death as the necessary and exclusive means by which God saves sinners from sin, unbelief, and the judgment thereof.^[16] The allusion to Numbers 21:4–9 in John 3 draws upon peoples’ sinful preference for something other than God, unbelief, and salvation from divine judgment. Let’s consider the passage:

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