The Big Heavenly Picture Today's Three-minute Bible Study Print, Study and Apply Title: The Big Heavenly Picture -------------------------- Date: 8/16/2002 Keywords: "heavenly picture" "sin" "snake" Welcome to eXXit, the web site designed to help you stand strong in the face of sexual temptation. Passages* John 3:13-15 13. “If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? 14. “No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven: the Son of Man. 15. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life. Numbers 21:5-9 5. The people spoke against God and Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this miserable food.” 6. The LORD sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. 7. So the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, because we have spoken against the LORD and you; intercede with the LORD, that He may remove the serpents from us.” And Moses interceded for the people. 8. Then the LORD said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a standard; and it shall come about, that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, he will live.” 9. And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on the standard; and it came about, that if a serpent bit any man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived. Questions 1. Study the passage from Numbers and relate it to what Jesus is explaining to Nicodemus in John 3.   2. What was required by the children of Israel in the desert in order to be saved from the poisonous snakes?   3. What is required for us to overcome sin’s bite?   Practical help Yesterday we considered what it takes to believe “heavenly things.” Today, you have the opportunity to test your progress on believing with the most important spiritual truth you will ever encounter. In verse 14, Jesus makes a claim about Himself that you should not miss. He is saying He was sent to this world for a purpose. Jesus is not just another man. John, the writer of this Gospel, makes it clear that Jesus is divine in origin. You and I cannot claim this. We have no evidence or proof of divinity. Jesus is stating that He will prove who He is by doing something similar to Moses’s serpent-on-a-stick. Jesus will take on our sin so we can take on his sinlessness before a holy God. There is no other way for us to get to heaven. That’s the Bible’s claim, not mine. So that’s the big heavenly picture. But there's more. The same power that saves you eternally is also available to rescue you from daily temptations such as porn. Look up, and live. eXXit homepage Index of three-minute studies Copyright 2002 by eXXit *"Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, © Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission." ---