LifeLink Devotions for Tuesday, November 19, 2024

The news is rarely encouraging. We let politics, inflation, gas prices, and injustice bum us out. It can ruin our day.  

Then suddenly, like a light bulb going on in our head, we realize how quickly the things of the world can captivate our thinking and turn our eyes from their intended focus on the wonderful hope we have in Jesus Christ for eternal life. We make plans for personal provisions and security, when Jesus has already provided for all that and more. We have far too many momentary lapses into looking at the world instead of looking above for the Lord.

In Numbers chapter twenty-one the Israelites continue their seemingly endless pattern of complaining, consequences, and correction. They need another trust lesson from the Father. This time God uses poisonous snakes as the teaching tool. To rescue them from this infestation, God had Moses make a bronze snake and place it on a pole, so that anyone who looked at it would live. Notice that God’s solution was not to take away the snakes or to stop the venom from being imbedded in the flesh of the people, but rather it was to stop the effects of the venom in their lives by looking to Him. 

What an incredible picture of our lives today in Jesus Christ. Jesus Himself uses this story to depict His own crucifixion in John 3:14-15. He said’ “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.” Jesus tells us that if we look to Him as the people looked to the snake on the pole, we too will live, even though the Serpent still attacks and attempts to sink His fangs into our lives, poisoning us with the venom of the world. Satan has not been removed from the world, but the sting of his venom – death – has been removed.

We are tempted to look around us at all of the serpents that are coiled to strike us with their poison. They have disguised themselves to appear beneficial to us, yet their venom is deadly. However, when we are looking at our Savior Jesus, their venom is powerless. The snake of inflation cannot interrupt the flow of God’s provision. The snake of dependence upon oil cannot overpower our dependence upon the anointing oil of the Holy Spirit. The snake of war and injustice cannot take away our peace and justification in Christ. The snake of broken relationships cannot destroy the permanence of our relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

Take your eyes off of whatever snake is coiled to strike you right now, and look at Jesus. “In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade – kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.” (1 Peter 1:3-5) He is our Hope and our Salvation. In Him we have life, and it is eternal and abundant. The snakes cannot invalidate your inheritance, so don’t let them infect your inclinations. Instead, “Incline your heart unto the Lord” (Joshua 24:23). He is faithful and will not fail.

Pastor John