Walking in the Manifested Triumph over the serpent
It has always been God’s intention for us as believers and followers of the Lord to walk in victory, and by the authority of the Lord.
Thus to walk in the reality of Psalm 91: Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge, Even the Most High, your dwelling place, 10 No evil shall befall you, Nor shall any plague come near your dwelling; 11 For He shall give His angels charge over you, To keep you in all your ways. 12 In their hands they shall bear you up, Lest you dash your foot against a stone. 13 You shall tread upon the lion and the cobra, The young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot.
Thus to walk in the manifested truth of Colossians 2: 15 Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it. Indeed we have been called, and empowered by the Blood to stand our ground (Ephesians 6) as we wrestle the forces in the heavenlies. We have been called to be more than conquerors (Romans 8:37) because He loves us.
God’s intention for us to walk in victory and to walk in hope is underlined by Psalm 23, and also Numbers 21 which speaks of the bronze serpent. 4 Then they journeyed from Mount Hor by the Way of the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; and the soul of the people became very discouraged on the way. 5 And the people spoke against God and against Moses: “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and our soul [c]loathes this worthless bread.” 6 So the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and many of the people of Israel died. 7 Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord that He take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. 8 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.” 9 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.
We may wonder why the Lord commanded Moses to put a snake on the pole, because for some it would seem that the snake is the saviour of the people. This was not the intention of the prophetic action. Let us revisit Genesis 3: 14 So the Lord God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this, You are cursed more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you shall go, And you shall eat dust All the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.”
It is clear from the word of God that the one who will ultimately trample the Serpent and thus destroy the work of the devil is the Lord Himself, in the form of the Messiah Jesus. For the Lord is called the Last Adam or the Second Adam (1 Corinthians 15:45), for indeed all believe in Him shall be saved (John 3:16). Adam had one nature - that of a human. He had the possibility of disobedience and did disobey God. The Lord Jesus is last man to be without a sin nature. His nature was both human and divine. He was the second man - the man from heaven. As the God-man He could be the suitable sacrifice for the sins of the world. Thus it was always God’s intention for the sinless man to be born – God Himself – supernaturally conceived in a woman yet birthed naturally to be both divine and human. And this coming of the Lord – the Mystery revealed – will crush the work of the serpent, and thus surely He shall deliver us from the snare of the fowler (Psalm 91). Indeed, by this Psalm we learn 4 He shall cover you with His feathers, And under His wings you shall take refuge; His truth shall be your shield and buckler. 5 You shall not be afraid of the terror by night, Nor of the arrow that flies by day, 6 Nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness, Nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday.
Psalm 91 speaks of the reality of Deuteronomy 28 which speaks of the blessings, under the conditions “you diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God, to observe carefully all His commandments which I command you today, that the Lord your God will set you high above all nations of the earth. 2 And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, because you obey the voice of the Lord your God.” Remember, chapter 28 also deals with curses, meaning those who walk in the ways of rebellion, thus the ways of the cursed serpent of Genesis 3.
So God’s intention has always been for the serpent to be crushed by the Lord, and for those who remain and dwell and abide in the Lord shall walk in victory. Thus, Psalm 91 now makes more sense: 13 You shall tread upon the lion and the cobra, The young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot. Remember, both David and Samson killed a lion, so this all speaks of those who as servants of the Lord overcome dangers, threats and attacks.
In Numbers 21, the people were devoured by fiery serpents because they were rebelling and mocking God. So God told Moses to raise up a snake on a pole, as a spiritual declaration the day is coming that on a pole – thus a cross – the One will hang of whom it was spoken in Genesis 3, who will crush the head of the serpent. He is of course Jesus. And so it says in John 3: 14 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. 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
Indeed, for those who abide in the Lord they shall also walk in the reality of Romans 8: 37 Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. 38 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
We also need to understand that Jesus’ death on the cross was also a triumph over paganism, thus the way of the Serpent. After all, an enormous body of evidence proves that the cross was up to about 300AD [at the time of Constantine] not a Christian symbol, but has its roots in rank paganism. So, with this in hindsight, what was the significance of Jesus death on the cross? Let us also take note, briefly, that there is a lot of debate regarding if Jesus died on a cross, or on a stake. There are even arguments if it was in the shape of a T, or a V or a X.
There were different methods of impaling people – upside down, or upright, and on various forms. Fact remains, Jesus died on what is regarded as a type of cross, whatever the shape or whatever His position. What is important is that Jesus didn’t just die for our sins or to conquer death, He IN FACT died on a pagan “symbol” [the cross/stake], which can be regarded as a possible pagan temple, so that by His Blood the power and deception of paganism was also destroyed! Jesus wanted to die on a cross because it was the symbol of paganism at the time, so that when He conquered the cross and death, He also conquered paganism [the religion of Satan].
When Jesus hung on that cross and rose from the grave, He made a statement that He is the victorious Living God and only those who believe in Him will be saved and will receive eternal life. His death on the cross was not merely the greatest act of love, but it was a very powerful act of triumph over Satan’s work, as mentioned by Paul in Colossians 2. Jesus’ death on the cross set us free from the deception of Satan and his lies and trickery.
Those who believe in Jesus will not be led astray by the teachings of demons (1 Timothy 4:1), and will not get sucked into all kinds of false religions, sects or cults. Can we imagine this? Here Jesus hung on the cross, and He showed the world that the work of Satan [paganism] has no power over Him for God is all powerful, all mighty and all glorious. Wow! What a statement. What a declaration! They nailed Jesus to a pagan symbol, but Jesus overcame the works of the devil and crushed it once and for all. This is why is says in Galatians 5: Amplified Bible (AMP): 5 In [this] freedom Christ has made us free [and completely liberated us]; stand fast then, and do not be hampered and held ensnared and submit again to a yoke of slavery [which you have once put off].
We are thus reminded that the Name of Jesus is above all Names, and there is no one greater or more wonderful than the true Lord (Colossians 1). Where the cross was once a pagan symbol, now it has become a symbol of Jesus’ victory over all, and such victory remains for us all who remain in Him to the end.
In Exodus 7 we read: 8 Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, 9 “When Pharaoh speaks to you, saying, ‘Show a miracle for yourselves,’ then you shall say to Aaron, ‘Take your rod and cast it before Pharaoh, and let it become a serpent.’ ” 10 So Moses and Aaron went in to Pharaoh, and they did so, just as the Lord commanded. And Aaron cast down his rod before Pharaoh and before his servants, and it became a serpent. 11 But Pharaoh also called the wise men and the sorcerers; so the magicians of Egypt, they also did in like manner with their enchantments. 12 For every man threw down his rod, and they became serpents. But Aaron’s rod swallowed up their rods.
Glory to God! Even in the days before the release from slavery, God openly manifested the truth of Genesis 3 that the true authority of God shall always triumph over the work of darkness! For those who walk in the Light of the Lord they shall fear no evil for the Lord “prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies” (Psalm 23).
We see the victory in the life of believers manifested in Mark 16: 14 Later He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table; and He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen. 15 And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. 16 He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned. 17 And these signs will follow those who believe: In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new tongues; 18 they will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
Here the Lord alluded to the picking up of serpent that will not harm. This is unlike the scenario in the wilderness when the people were attacked and bitten by the snakes. So here Jesus reminds the people that if they remain in Him they shall be victorious for He has ALREADY crushed the head of the serpent.
Let us also read: Acts 28: 3 But when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks and laid them on the fire, a viper came out because of the heat, and fastened on his hand. 4 So when the natives saw the creature hanging from his hand, they said to one another, “No doubt this man is a murderer, whom, though he has escaped the sea, yet justice does not allow to live.” 5 But he shook off the creature into the fire and suffered no harm. 6 However, they were expecting that he would swell up or suddenly fall down dead. But after they had looked for a long time and saw no harm come to him, they changed their minds and said that he was a god.
Yes, the serpent bit Paul but nothing happened, for it is what Jesus said in Mark 16! This was not merely about being bitten by a serpent, but this was a triumph of victory over the snares of the fowler, and the ways of the enemy. For there is liberty for those who seek and serve the Lord above all else!
In Deuteronomy 32 we read of Israel’s sin and apostasy. 17 They sacrificed to demons, not to God, To gods they did not know, To new gods, new arrivals That your fathers did not fear. 18 Of the Rock who begot you, you are unmindful, And have forgotten the God who fathered you. For their sins of disobedience we read: 23 ‘I will heap disasters on them; I will spend My arrows on them. 24 They shall be wasted with hunger, Devoured by pestilence and bitter destruction; I will also send against them the teeth of beasts, with the poison of serpents of the dust.
Indeed, Deuteronomy 32 speaks of the opposite of Psalm 91. It speaks of being given over to the dangers of beasts and serpent, to pestilence and bitter destruction. For those who thus rebel against God, such is the fate for we give the Serpent legal ground to attack, to devour and to bite. This was also the case for the rebellious nations in Micah 7: 15 “As in the days when you came out of the land of Egypt, I will show them wonders.” 16 The nations shall see and be ashamed of all their might; They shall put their hand over their mouth; Their ears shall be deaf. 17 They shall lick the dust like a serpent; They shall crawl from their holes like snakes of the earth. They shall be afraid of the Lord our God, And shall fear because of You.
Jeremiah 8 also speaks of the peril of false teaching, and the judgment that will befall the people because of their rebellion and iniquity. 17 “For behold, I will send serpents among you, Vipers which cannot be charmed, And they shall bite you,” says the Lord. It is thus clear that we when we are not abiding in the Lord, we are in danger of being ‘bitten’, thus devoured by the fowler. It comes down to legal right, and mocking God.
Jesus in Matthew 23 said of the Pharisees and Sadducees in verse 33: Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell? They were thus behaving like children of the devil, busy leading people astray and away from God. They were the embodiment of the religious spirit, yet the Truth of the Gospel has crushed such work. Indeed, for those who walk in the liberty of the Spirit and the truth of the Gospel, they are not bound by the devilish work of religion or traditions that binds, enslaved and cages.
Take note of Paul’s strong warning in 1 Corinthians 10 (NKJV): 10 Moreover, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware that all our fathers were under the cloud, all passed through the sea, 2 all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ. 5 But with most of them God was not well pleased, for their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. 6 Now these things became our examples, to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted. 7 And do not become idolaters as were some of them. As it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.” 8 Nor let us commit sexual immorality, as some of them did, and in one day twenty-three thousand fell; 9 nor let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed by serpents; 10 nor complain, as some of them also complained, and were destroyed by the destroyer. 11 Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.
Let us thus remain obedient to God, to His Will and follow in His Ways of the Kingdom. For then we shall be victorious, and we shall triumph over the works of the devil and we shall not be caught in the fowler’s snare. We shall walk in the truth of Luke 10:19 Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.
Amen
