November 9, 2007
The Great Pandemic
READ: Numbers 21:1-9
Even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. —John 3:14-15
In March 1918, Albert Gitchell, an Army cook at Fort Riley, Kansas, was diagnosed with the flu. Before the year was out, it had spread around the world, killing perhaps as many as 40 million people. This highly contagious virus became a pandemic—a global epidemic.
One physician reported that patients would rapidly show flu-like symptoms, develop the worst type of pneumonia he had ever seen, and then suffocate within hours. Fortunately, the influenza disappeared as mysteriously as it had begun. But doctors remained baffled by its cause and were helpless to find a cure.
Ancient Israel also suffered a devastating plague, but they knew its cause and asked Moses for a cure. They were ungrateful and complained about God’s provision of manna. In righteous anger, God sent serpents whose poisonous bite left a lethal wound. He then told Moses to make a bronze serpent and put it on a pole. All who looked at it were healed (Num. 21:1-9).
Centuries later, Jesus spoke of this as a symbol of His death on the cross: “Even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:14-15).
Have you trusted Jesus to heal your soul?
On that cruel cross of pain,
And those who look in faith to Him
Eternal life shall gain! —Johnson
