How to get to Heaven

They Looked, and They Lived
An Ancient Cure for Snakebite
(Numbers 21:4‑9 and John 3:14‑16)

Moses was the leader of a mass migration. After 430 years of slavery, several million Jews were set free by God's Passover miracle, and they were going home to the Promised Land.

The Jews became discouraged during their long journey through the desert because they were hot, thirsty, and tired of the food supplied by God.

That's when they made a bad mistake.
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They started complaining against God (who protected them) and against their leader Moses. God sent poisonous snakes into the camp; many people were bitten and died. "Therefore the people came to Moses and said, 'We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and you; pray to the Lord that He take away the snakes from us.' So Moses prayed for the people" (Numbers 21:5‑7).

God told Moses to make a snake out of bronze, then put the bronze snake on a pole and lift it high in the air. And God said, "It shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live" (21:8).
And God's servant obeyed. "Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it on a pole; and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived" (21:9).

Imagine our being there with Moses about 3,400 years ago—discouraged, rebellious, snake-bitten, and dying in the hot desert. Then we confess our sins and look at God's only cure for our snakebite. Immediately we're forgiven and cured! And we worship God.

Now imagine that you and I are sitting in a house with Jesus, some 1,400 years after Moses. We see and hear Jesus teaching a man how to trust God and receive forgiveness. Attentively we listen as Jesus says this:
"And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so, must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." (John 3:14‑16)
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God provided the antidote for snakebite—giving physical healing to those who looked at the brass snake, which Moses lifted up on a pole.
God also provided the antidote for sin—the spiritual healing that comes from the forgiveness of sins for those trusting in Jesus, who was crucified, and died and was buried, and rose from the dead.
God says, "Believe!" And His Word testifies of Jesus, "To Him, all the prophets witness that, through His name, whoever believes in Him will receive remission of sins" (Acts 10:43).
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Forgiven?
Some are unsure that their sins have been forgiven.
To reaffirm—or to become sure of—your forgiveness in Christ, I invite you to pray this prayer between you and God:
'God, I come to you in the name of Jesus. The snake-bit Jews believed what You said and looked at the bronze snake for healing. I believe Jesus was crucified, that He died for my sins and was buried, and that He rose from the grave—and that whoever looks to Him for the forgiveness of sin is forgiven. I look, I believe, and I call to you, God, in Jesus's name—and I live! Thank you for your forgiveness! "[2]
 

[1] Illustration by Ellen West
[2] “You can know for sure you will go to heaven,” https://peacewithgod.net/steps/; accessed September 5, 2022.

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