Men and
women, you who live far from God, under the bondage of sin, I am addressing
you, listen to me carefully for your good.
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In the
book of Numbers it is recorded an event which happened in the desert as the
people of Israel
journeyed toward the Promised Land. Here is what happened: “And they
journeyed from mount
Hor
by the way of the Red sea,
to compass the land
of Edom:
and the soul of the people was much discouraged because of the way. And the
people spake against God, and against Moses, Wherefore have ye brought us up
out of Egypt
to die in the wilderness? for there is no bread,
neither is there any water; and our soul loatheth this light bread. And the
LORD sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much
people of Israel
died. Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, We have sinned, for we
have spoken against the LORD, and against thee; pray unto the LORD, that he
take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people. 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. And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it
came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the
serpent of brass, he lived” (Numbers 21:4-9).
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As you can
see, we are told that because of the people’s murmurs, God punished the
people of Israel
by sending venomous snakes among them and many Israelites died. Then the
people recognized they had sinned and came to Moses asking him to pray for
them so that God might take those snakes away from them. Moses prayed to God,
who told him to make a fiery serpent and to put it upon a pole, so that anyone
who was bitten by a snake by looking at it might live. So anyone who looked
at that serpent put on that pole escaped death.
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The above
mentioned story – which occurred more than three thousand years ago – is a
shadow of the way of salvation which God ordained before the foundation of
the world and made manifest in these last times for us. In other words, it
shows what a man must do to escape the second death, which is the terrible
and awful punishment, yet right, that on that day God will inflict upon all
those who have died in their sins.
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What must a
man do to be saved? He must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now I will
explain to you as much exhaustively as possible what I have just said. Now,
the Scripture says that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans
3:23),
so you also have sinned against God and fall short of His glory. In other
words, you also are under the divine condemnation because of your sins. By
your wicked and abominable behaviour (or conduct) you have violated the holy
law of God, you have offended and despised God, who is holy and cannot
tolerate iniquity, and thus He is very angry with you, so much angry that if
you died in this spiritual state He would immediately throw you into hell,
where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.
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Know for
sure this, that this would be your end. The wrath of God is upon your head,
it weighs a ton. You are sinners, foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved
by all kinds of passions and pleasures, living in malice and envy, being
hated and hating one another, you call evil good and good evil. Maybe you
outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and
wickedness; you are like whitewashed tombs which look beautiful on the
outside but on the inside are full of dead men’s bones and anything unclean.
Don’t think that you are righteous and good, lest you deceive yourselves, for
you are rebels, you are transgressors. You are in the same condition of those
Israelites in the desert who sinned against God and God sent against them
fiery serpents which bit them. Thus you are sentenced to death; not the physical
death, which is a death that both the righteous and the sinners experience,
but the second death, that is, the lake of fire and brimstone, which will be
experienced only by sinners. Here is what the Scripture says about this
second death: “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and
murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars,
shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone:
which is the second death” (Revelation 21:8) where they will be tormented for
ever and ever. But I bring you the Good News that you can be saved from this horrible
end awaiting you. Yes, you have the possibility of escaping the eternal
condemnation, and there is only way to escape it, you must look at Jesus
Christ, that is, you must believe in Him. As the Israelites in the desert had
to look at the serpent of brass put on that pole in order to escape death, so
you must believe in Jesus Christ in order to escape eternal condemnation. Why
must you believe in Jesus Christ to have eternal life? Because He was made a
curse for us. In other words, because Jesus Christ bore the curse of God on His
body in that He was crucified, as it is written: “Cursed is every one that
hangeth on a tree” (Galatians 3:13).
He never committed a sin, He never said a bad word, yet He was hanged on a
cross as an evildoer. He was thus able to redeem us from the curse of the law.
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Here is
the fundamental point you have to understand: you are under the curse of the
law for you have not done all the things written in the law of God, as it is written:
“Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in
the book of the law to do them” (Galatians 3:10), and
Jesus Christ is able to redeem you from that curse for He became a curse for
all of us. Jesus Christ, the Righteous One, bore your curse. Therefore in the
story above mentioned, the serpent of brass represented the Son of God, for
just as the serpent in the Garden of Eden incurred God’s curse for he deceived
Eve into sinning, so the Son of God took upon Himself the curse of the law in
that He was hung on the cross. And now anyone who believes in Him, that is to
say, anyone who looks at Him, receives eternal life. Jesus compared His being
lifted up on the cross, that is, His death, to Moses lifting up the serpent
in the wilderness, when He said to Nicodemus: “And as Moses lifted up the
serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That
whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John
3:14-15). Therefore, do not hesitate, look immediately at Jesus Christ, believe in Him in order to obtain eternal life. Do not
think you can be saved from eternal condemnation by looking at yourselves,
that is to say, by relying on your works, for they will be of no use. You
must recognize you have sinned against God (as the Israelites in the desert
recognized that they had sinned against God) and you must look at Jesus
Christ. Salvation is not by works, but by grace, so that no one may boast
before God.
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And as in
the desert when those who had been bitten by the serpents looked at the
serpent of brass they lived, so when you look at Jesus Christ you will have
the assurance that you will live in the glory for ever. No more condemnation,
no more eternal torment in the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and
his angels, but the eternal glory in the Kingdom of God. And all
this by the grace of God, because of the merits of Jesus Christ. Not by your
sacrifices, but only by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, for He,
the Righteous One, bore our sins in His own body on the cross. There will be
no more condemnation for you, for all your sins will be forgiven through the
blood of Jesus Christ: this is what the Word of God teaches when it states
that there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans
8:1) for God has given them justification that brings life. Instead, if you
refuse to humble before God and to look at the Son of God, what is awaiting
you is eternal condemnation, an eternity full of torments and shame. That
will happen to you because of your pride and arrogance. When you die, you
shall be brought down to Hades (hell), thrown into this underground place,
where fire is burning. And then in the day of wrath and revelation of the
righteous judgment of God, when you rise again to be judged, you will be
thrown into the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone. Your arrogance
therefore will be your ruin, and you will see it with your own eyes. Today, I
have solemnly warned you for your good: do not harden your hearts.
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