BREAKFAST BIBLE STUDY

The Brazen Serpent was a Minor Deity

Numbers 21:4–9, 2 Kings 18:4 (ESVA)

11/16/25

“Christian nationalism is about power, nothing more.” – Christian Pecker

Halloween season always gives me nightmares, but the nightmares go away when I remember that God controls everything, even demons and stuff. I remind Christian and Grace about this on our way home from a meeting about the clinic.

Even when Trump hurts farms and KFC Jr. tries to take away our medicine, I remember that God will fix everything.

“Is the clinic closing because KFC Jr. wants to sell supplements instead of doing real medicine?” I ask Christian and Grace.

“RFK Jr.?” Grace asks. “The clinic is closing thanks to budget cuts in the Big Bullshit Bill, but Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is just as much to blame.”

At first I was happy that the clinic is closing, because I hate shots, but then I remember that everybody around here needs the clinic. Now, we all have to travel farther for regular appointments, and if there are emergencies, we better hope that time and weather are not factors.

“At least we’re not starving and we’re up on our payments,” I tell Christian and Grace, “and we’ll get scheduled for our shots, and I’ll even be brave this time. We don’t have anything to worry about. I’ll even find a new doctor if that’s what it takes with the clinics closing and stuff. I think I know some doctors from Sioux Falls from my other timeline, when I lost some fingers. I can go check them out first if you want to make sure they’re still there. Our insurance is going up a whole bunch thanks to Trump and the bloody red wave, but we’re still covered. I’ll make the appointments and even drive us if you want, just don’t be scared about the money. I got us covered.”

“Cole, you’re afraid of doctors,” Christian said.

“I don’t like shots,” I said, “but then I had a bad dream about that snake that nurses wear on their uniform and found out it was from the Bible. It was a sign, I think.”

“The Rod of Asclepius isn’t from the Bible,” Grace said. “It may be connected tangentially, but it’s Greek in origin.”

“What rod?” I asked.

“The symbol that doctors and nurses like me wear,” Grace said. “It’s the snake wrapped around the pole. And don’t worry, I’ll make the appointments.”

The gravel road bumps a little bit because we have had our first snow, but the weather has been nice for November. The only snow left lingers in the ditches. Normally, I liked winter doctor appointments because snow days often meant rescheduling, but that is not why I wanted to schedule our appointments this year.

“I was scared about the shots,” I explain, “but then I found out that the Rod of Asparagus was actually from the Bible, and it’s a prefigure of Jesus on the cross.”

“You still get scared about the shots,” Christian said.

“But not that Rod of Asparagus,” I said. “It’s what Moses did in the desert. It’s a prefigure for Christ on the cross. I don’t think it has anything to do with vegetables.”

“You’ll have to enlighten us,” Christian said.

“Yep, Moses lifted it in the desert to tell the people Jesus was coming,” I said. “Jesus even says so in John 3:14-15.”

“I was afraid we’d run out of topics for Sunday,” Christian said.

“We have a whole bunch of miracles you guys haven’t ruined,” I said.

“Okay, Cole…but the evidence is pretty thin that the serpent prefigured Jesus,” Grace said. “John’s gospel was written decades after Jesus died. John sounds nothing like the other gospels. John’s Jesus sounds exactly like John. The voices are indistinct. But we are home, and I am tired. Can we save your Rod of Asparagus for Sunday?”

Since I knew what we were going to study for breakfast Bible study this week, I studied the passage beforehand. It goes like this:

“From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go round the land of Edom. And the people became impatient on the way. 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 we loathe this worthless food.’ Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. And 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. And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.’ So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.” Numbers 21:4–9

“It doesn’t really say it was about Jesus,” I tell Christian and Grace when I come to breakfast, “but it’s still a healing miracle, just like miracles Jesus did and just like Jesus was raised on a cross to save us all. It’s a prefigure that says medicine is okay.”

“I would think comparing Jesus to a serpent might offend some people,” Grace said.

“Oh, because of the serpent in the garden?” I asked.

“It’s sympathetic magic,” Christian said. “Throughout the region, snake deities served in healing rituals. Moses fashions an idol of a snake god to save his people. The snake deity likely emerged from the Canaanite pantheon, similar to Grace’s ‘Rod of Asparagus.’”

“Rod of Asclepius, who was a Greek demigod of healing,” Grace said.

“But that can’t be right. God said to have no other gods before him, so why would he have Moses make a snake god?” I asked.

“See how the story is problematic?” Grace said.

“Wait, maybe they weren’t worshiping the snake,” I said. “The bronze snake scared the real snakes away…and then they got better.”

“Not how the text reads. The brazen serpent had healing powers,” Christian said.

“Yep, from God,” I said.

“Maybe so,” Grace said. “But people clearly were worshiping the deity in Israel when the first four books of the Bible were compiled.”

“Are you sure?”

“Read 2 Kings 18:4,” Grace said.

I flipped to later in the Bible and read, “‘He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan).’”

“They worshiped it,” Christian said, “and it even had a name.”

“Because…maybe it was a prefigure of Christ,” I said.

“King Hezekiah destroyed a prefigure of Christ?” Grace asked. “Read the next verse. Hezekiah is highly regarded. He held fast to the Lord like no other.”

“Oh,” I said.

“The story of the brazen serpent is an interesting episode from Numbers,” Christian said, “but a little inconvenient for those who believe in a singular God and those who oppose sympathetic magic.”

“I don’t like magic,” I said. “I don’t care if it has sympathy. I don’t think it should be in public schools. Can’t it just be a prefigure of Jesus on the cross and how he was raised from the dead? See, Jesus was the only one who could raise the dead.”

“Elijah raised a child from the dead,” Grace said.

“Oh, yep, that’s a good one! But that was a prefigure, too,” I said.

“Little weird how he did it,” Christian said.

“He laid on the boy or something, kind of like CPR, right?” I asked.

“Miracles come in strange forms in the Old Testament,” Grace said.

“I thought they just prayed,” I said.

“Clearly not,” Christian said. “All these stories are rooted in earlier traditions. Some of these traditions caused problems for later believers, hence the destruction of the brazen serpent in Kings.”

“I bet God inspired the miracles just as they happened,” I said, “but people got confused and started worshiping the serpent or something way later. That makes the most sense.”

“I believe none of it happened in Numbers because magic and miracles aren’t real,” Grace said. “That said, I suppose we’re all entitled to our own beliefs.”

In state legislatures across the country, Christian fundamentalists are passing laws meant to force the teaching of the Christian Bible in public schools. From the posting of textually inaccurate iterations of the Ten Commandments on the walls of classrooms to the incorporation of the “Trump Bible” across multiple pedagogical disciplines, these laws and mandates are sweeping the reddest parts of this nation.

The height of hypocrisy is banning books in the name of “protecting children” while mandating one particular book rife with numerous acts of sexual violence and scenes of graphic violence and genocide.

Book bans are dangerous. The Bible is worth reading and exists online and in public school libraries across the country, but proponents of mandating its formal teaching in public schools need to know what it actually says.

Some themes in my books below might not be appropriate for children.