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Christ was lifted up in two likenesses. In the likeness of sinful flesh, sin was judged. In the likeness of the serpent, Satan the ruler of this world, was judged. And because both fell, the believer stands in righteousness and carries the authority.
John 3:16 was never a standalone verse. This verse attached immediately before it is how we as believers enter into eternal life.
John 3:14 opens with “And Moses lifted up the serpent” which is finishing a thought, not starting one. Read John 3:14-16 in its entirety:
“And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.16 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.”
“Must” in verse 14 is a divine necessity, not an option. But why be lifted up at all?
In Deuteronomy 21:23 it states “he who is hanged is accursed of God” meaning a body hanging on a tree was the visible sign of a curse. And in Galatians 3:13 it states that “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us. To absorb a curse, He had to be raised on wood, publicly, under the sign of it.
Death came through Adam, but Grace, which is life, came through Christ.
Romans 5:12 states “Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin” and then Romans 5:21 states “so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord”
Sin came first, opening the door for death to enter the world. Then Grace came, opening the door for Life to enter the world. This life is eternal, that cannot be overcome by death.
We all sinned in Adam because Adam sinned, born into death’s dominion. Christ came, full of Grace and Truth, that through Him we could be redeemed and restored back to God. He absorbed the curse, breaking its power that anyone who looked upon Him could live.
Just as Adam received the curse into himself, through Christ we receive Life into ourselves.
The First Likeness: sinful flesh, sin judged
The law was given to expose sin but it did not provide a way to overcome sin. God created man good and upright (Ecclesiastes 7:29), but through Adam man was born in a fallen state. The sinful nature is what Scripture calls the flesh.
Paul states in Romans 7:18
For I know that in me(that is in my flesh)nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find”
This is why Christ was raised in the likeness of sinful flesh, yet without sin, to condemn sin in the flesh: “For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh” (Romans 8:3).
The law could diagnose the venom, the poison of sin, yet could not draw it out.
This is why Jesus states that He didn’t come to do away with the law but to fulfill it. “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21). He did not become the sinner, but the sin offering.
This brings us to the fulfillment of Romans 8:1, that “there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus”. We are free to no longer walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
Sin was judged, and we were set free to live.
The Second Likeness: the serpent, Satan judged
In Numbers 21:4-9 the Israelites complained against God and Moses impatient with the long journey and with the provisions God had made for them. The judgement of this were “fiery” serpents sent among them, which bit the Israelites and caused death. The venom represents sin: it killed the body as sin kills the spirit.
The Israelites, overwhelmed by suffering and fear of death, came to Moses confessing their sin and begging for the serpents to be removed. Moses interceded on their behalf.
“Then the Lord said to Moses, Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live. So 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.” Numbers 21:8-9
God did not remove the serpents. He lifted up a serpent with no venom in it. Anyone who looked upon the bronze serpent, the figure of death without the sting of death, lived. This is the prophetic display of Jesus being lifted up as the bronze serpent. The serpents remained in the camp, and the bites kept coming; what was broken was the power of death.
This is a display of 1 Corinthians 15:55: “O death, where is your sting? O Hades (the grave) where is your victory?”
Christ was the bronze serpent lifted up, that anyone who looks upon Him will live.
What hung on Mose’s pole was the image of the enemy, publicly for all to see. This is a prophetic display of Colossians 2:15: “having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it”.
In John 12:31-32 He states:
“Now is the judgement of this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out. And if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.”
The serpent is represents the devil, Satan, the ruler of this world. This is why Jesus is able to comfort us with His Words in John 16:33:
“These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”
And because the ruler of this world has been judged (John 16:11) we overcome the world. No longer being of the world and the satanic system, but in the world as children of light.
Because the sting of death is removed, the tyranny of sin and dictatorship of the ruler of this world no longer has power over us. We are free and no longer slaves to it.
Christ having “disarmed principalities and powers” (Colossians 2:15), and having “raised us up together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:6), has given us “the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you” (Luke 10:19).
We have received grace and the gift of righteousness, therefore we reign in life. Surviving life is no longer our definition of living; reigning in life is our definition of living. For we reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ. (Romans 5:17).
Just as God did not remove the serpents from among the Israelites, the sinful nature and the devil were not removed from us. Rather, the sting of death was removed and the power of sin and the devil was broken. We are no longer under its dominion, but under the dominion of life through Jesus Christ. Temptation and sin no longer rule us. If we sin, we look to Christ and we will live. If we fall, we look to Christ and we will rise again. When an Israelite was bitten, he turned his head. We turn to Christ in repentance, and we are forgiven, healed, restored.