Year 4, Day 136: Numbers 21

Theological Commentary: Click Here 

Discipleship Focus: Protection

• Protection: In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray that God might deliver us from evil – even the Evil One.  Sometimes we need God’s protection from the sin around us.  Sometimes we need protection from the sinful people around us.  Other times we need protection from the sin that lies within ourselves.  In any case, Jesus’ point is clear.  We need protection from the Father to make it through each and every day.

In Numbers 21, we clearly see an example of the people that need to be delivered.  Yes, they need to be delivered from the snakes.  That’s the point of the bronze serpent.  It allows them to be delivered from the poisonous bite of the serpent.

However, I think this story truly goes a bit deeper.  The Hebrew people really needed to be delivered from themselves.  After all, what is it that brought the Hebrew people to the point of needing deliverance in the first place?  They grumbled.  They grumbled against God and they grumbled against Moses.  Their own self-centered bitterness drove a wedge between them and God.

How often do we truly need to be delivered from ourselves?  How often do we dig our own pits into which we fall?  How many days could we genuinely pray, “Lord, protect me from my own self today?”  I don’t know about you, but that prayer is a useful one for me on most days!

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