21:1-3
There has been much disobedience, Aaron and Miriam are now both dead, the people have been told they will wander in the wilderness for forty years. All seems lost, but now we enter a spell when victories start to come. Hebrews speaks of God disciplining His people as a Father disciplines a son. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but later it yields a harvest of righteousness (Heb 12:5-12).
The first victory came as a result of Arad attacking Israel. The king of Arad was a Canaanite. Initially it seemed as if he would win, for some of the Israelites were taken captive. Instead of their past practice of complaining whenever trouble arose, they turned to God and promised to devote the cities of Arad to destruction. This meant irrevocably dedicating them to God.
21:4-9
This better behaviour on the part of the Israelites was, however, short-lived. As the journey continued the people became impatient and returned to their old habits of complaining against God and against Moses. As many times before, they grumbled about having been rescued from slavery. In response the Lord sent serpents among them, and many died. Seeing what was happening they “repented” and pleaded with Moses. Moses went to the Lord and was ordered to make a bronze image of a fiery serpent. He then lifted the serpent up, and anyone who was bitten could look at the serpent and be healed. There are clear parallels with Jesus and the cross (John 3:14,15). Jesus was “made sin” (2 Cor 5:21), just as the bronze image was made to look like the serpents that were killing the people.
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