Again the people murmured. Numbers 21:6, "And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died."
Moses sought God's consult and God proposed an interesting anecdote. Numbers 21:8, “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.”
Moses did as directed and when those who had been bitten looked upon the serpent lived.
As an aside, Nachash is the ordinary word for serpent. The word saraph which seems to mean "burning one," stands (by itself) for a serpent. [The Pulpit Commentary]
Serpent(s) are referred to throughout the Bible, 34 times in the Old Testament and 15 times in the New Testament.
The first mention is in Genesis 3:1 where Satan in the guise of a serpent seeks to cause Eve to question God. Last mention is Revelation 20:2, "And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years." After the thousand years there will be those having a fallen nature, "after that he must be loosed a little season."
The shedding of blood as a covering/ atonement for sin is found in Genesis 3:21, "Unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins, and clothed them." Earlier God had given a hint of a requirement for a future sacrifice, Genesis 3:15, “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.”
In Genesis 4 Abel’s blood sacrifice of a lamb was acceptable God while Cain's offering was not. Cain killed Abel, another type of blood sacrifice brought about by jealousy. Genesis 4:10, "And he said, What hast thou done? the voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground.”
Fast-forward hundreds of years to the time that Jesus spent instructing his disciples and, in this case, Nicodemus. John 3:13, “And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.” Here Jesus is alluding to his divine nature.
John 3:14, “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up:” The act of Moses in lifting the brass serpent was prophetic of Jesus being lifted up on the cross. Jesus carried our sin to the cross and provided us with the gift of justification before God.
Jesus, the ultimate blood sacrifice, cried from the cross, “It is finished.”
Before Jesus uttered “It is finished' from the cross he suffered complete abandonment by God. Our righteous God could not look on Jesus as he was our propitiation for sin. Matthew 27:46, “And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” No Abba, Father, rather my God. Fulfillment of Psalm 22:1, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?”
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