Wise As Serpents
“Behold, I
send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents,
and harmless as doves”.
Matt 10:16
KJV
“The serpent” was
more subtle—more cunning than any beast. The serpent is the ‘shrewdest of all
the creatures’.
Now the serpent was more subtil than
any beast of the field which The LORD God had made…” (Gen 3:1 KJV)
“The serpent”
deceived Eve by his craftiness, and even since then, has corrupted the minds of
men, and deceives the whole world.
“The serpent” by its subtlety corrupts the minds of men,
but The Spirit of Truth guides us into
“all truth”.
Howbeit
when He, The Spirit of Truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth: for He
shall not speak of Himself; but whatsoever He shall hear, that shall He speak:
and He will shew you things to come (John 16:13 KJV).
Those who do not
belong to Christ cannot receive The Spirit of Truth.
Even The
Spirit of Truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not,
neither knoweth Him: but ye know Him; for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in
you (John 14:17 KJV).
“The craftiness of
the serpent” entails lies, worldly pleasures and desires. By these, Satan the
deceiver entices men with “the knowledge of good and evil”—which the world
calls “civilization”.
You know, after ‘the
man and his wife’ ate of the tree which was in the midst of the garden,
immediately, the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were
naked.
And when the woman saw that the tree
was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be
desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave
also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.
And the eyes of them both were
opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together,
and made themselves aprons.
Gen. 3:6-7 KJV
But, in chapter 2
verse 25, they were not ashamed of being naked.
And they were both naked, the man
and his wife, and were not ashamed (KJV).
“The serpent of old”
is the great dragon that was cast out of Heaven—his aim and objective are
against GOD Almighty, and he is working round the clock-day-and-night to bring
persecutions and tribulation against GOD’s people.
The dragon was cast out of Heaven, and he is the serpent,
called the devil—he is “diablo”—the master of all diabolisms (diabolical powers).
And there was war in Heaven: Michael
and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,
And prevailed not; neither was their
place found any more in Heaven.
And the great dragon was cast out,
that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world:
he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him (Rev.
12:7-9 KJV).
In John 12:31 we see that presently he is “the prince of
this world” and that judgment has already been decreed against him.
When the time comes
for the fullness of GOD’s wrath on this world, once again that old serpent shall be cast out—he shall be cast out into the
bottomless pit for a thousand years.
And I saw an angel come down from
heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand.
And he laid hold on the dragon, that
old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years,
And cast him into the bottomless
pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the
nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he
must be loosed a little season.
Rev. 20:1-3 KJV
And, after he is
released from his prison, he will go out to lead yet another rebellion against
the people of GOD, and against Jerusalem. But, he will be rearrested for the last time, and be cast into the lake of
fire and brimstone.
And when the thousand years are
expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,
And shall go out to deceive the
nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather
them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.
And they went up on the breadth of
the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city:
and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.
And the devil that deceived them was
cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet
are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.
Rev. 20:7-10 KJV
On the cross, the serpent bruised the heel of our Savior,
but after “The Son of Man” was lifted up
from the earth, Jesus Christ bruised his head—when He went to hell and took
over “dominion” from Satan.
GOD Almighty declared
this in the first messianic prophecy of the Bible before it fulfilled.
And I will put enmity between thee
and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and
thou shalt bruise His heel.
Gen. 3:15 KJV
This is why before
our Lord Jesus went to the cross, He declared:
“And I, if
I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me” (John 12:32 KJV).
After He was ‘lifted up’ He conquered
Satan for all time, He set
captives free, and He won souls for the Kingdom of GOD.
GOD gave “dominion” to man in Genesis chapter 1.
And God said, Let us make man in our
Image, after our Likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea,
and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and
over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
So God created man in His own Image,
in the Image of God created He him; male and female created He them.
And God blessed them, and God said
unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it:
and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and
over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
And God said, Behold, I have given
you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every
tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for
meat.
And to every beast of the earth, and
to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth,
wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.
And God saw every thing that He had
made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the
sixth day.
Gen. 1:26-31 KJV
Man lost this “dominion” to Satan in chapter 3.
As a result of “the
Fall of Man”, ‘man’ fell short of glory.
For all have sinned , and come short
of the glory of God (Rom 3:23 KJV).
In this crucial case
concerning mankind; it resulted in ‘the pain of childbirth’ (Gen. 3:16), the
certainty of hardship and labor, and the consequence of natural death (Gen.
3:17). Physical death was appointed to mankind—and death entered the human-race
as a result of man’s disobedience to and violation of “the Adamic Covenant”.
And The LORD God took the man, and
put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.
And The LORD God commanded the man,
saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
But of the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof
thou shalt surely die.
Gen. 2:15-17 KJV
Hebrews 9:27 states:
And as it is appointed unto men once
to die, but after this the judgment (KJV)
Even since after “the
Fall of Man”, ‘men’ still desire to eat of the fruit of “the tree of knowledge
of good and evil” which prevents and disqualifies ‘man’ from receiving the free
gift of eternal life.
The carnal mind only
hungers for worldly pleasures: “Lust of the flesh”, “lust of the eyes”, “the
pride of life” (I John 2:16) and “worldly wisdom” (I Cor. 3:19). All of which
are “the vain glory of life”.
After the serpent’s
deception on the “woman”, GOD cursed the serpent and ‘reduced it to the dust of
the earth’.
He brought it with all of its delicate nature ‘beneath
all other beasts of the field’.
And The LORD God said unto the
serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and
above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt
thou eat all the days of thy life:
Gen. 3:14 KJV
When the people of
Israel spoke against GOD and against Moses in the wilderness, He passed
judgment on them by sending “fiery serpents” against them—many of the people
died of serpent’s venom.
And the people spake against God,
and against Moses, Wherefore have ye brought us up out of Egypt to die in the
wilderness? for there is no bread, neither is there any water; and our soul
loatheth this light bread.
And The LORD sent fiery serpents
among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died (Num.
21:5-6 KJV).
The following verses
reads:
Therefore the people came to Moses,
and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against The LORD, and against
thee; pray unto The LORD, that He take away the serpents from us. And Moses
prayed for the people.
And The LORD said unto Moses, Make
thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that
every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.
And Moses made a serpent of brass,
and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any
man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived (Num. 21:7-9 KJV).
As Prophet Moses
lifted “the bronze serpent” in the wilderness, even so was “The Son of Man”
lifted up on the cross that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but
have eternal life.
“Behold, I
send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as
serpents, and harmless as doves” (Mt. 10:16 KJV).
To be “wise as serpents and harmless as
doves” is to walk in the Wisdom of The Spirit and not to be cunning and deceitful
like the devil—“the old serpent”.
The way of ‘the
serpent’ is deceitful, his words are lies and poisonous.
“The
Son of Man” conquered sin and death by the cross—He conquered hell and the
grave, He conquered Satan—and He acquired “dominion”—He acquired “dominion”
over all GOD’s creation.
He acquired “dominion”
over the whole earth.
He acquired “dominion”
over hell and the grave (‘under the earth’ – the under-world).
At the time He went into Heaven after His resurrection, GOD The Father “put all things under His
feet”.
Thou madest Him to have dominion
over the works of thy hands; Thou hast put all things under His feet:
All sheep and oxen, yea, and the
beasts of the field;
The fowl of the air, and the fish of
the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas.
O LORD our Lord, how excellent is
thy Name in all the earth!
Psa. 8:6-9 KJV
Now, He is crowned with glory and honor (see Psa.8:5).
Now, “all things are under His feet…”
All beasts of the field—including the
serpent, are under His feet.
He became “The Firstborn over all creation” (Col.
1:15-17) before He came to the earth as “The
Savior of the world”—triumphing by the cross, and brought forth as “The Firstborn from the dead” (Col.
1:18).