Exodus 7:9-12

Exo. 7:9-12. Moses' rod, when cast unto the earth, became a serpent. So Christ, when sent down to the earth, appeared in the form of sinful flesh; he was made sin for us. So Christ was represented by the brazen serpent that was made in the form of the fiery serpents that bit the people. Moses's rod, when on the ground in the form of a serpent, swallowed up the serpents of the magicians. So Christ, by being made sin, he swallowed up the devils, the parents of sin, when he appeared in the form of sinful flesh, and for sin he condemned sin in the flesh; by being made a curse he destroyed the curse; by suffering the punishment of sin he abolished the punishment of sin; and at the same time that, being made sin, he destroyed sin and the devil, and so swallowed the serpents in that sense. So he received and embraced sinners (that are in themselves serpents) by his love and grace, so that they became as it were his pleasant food, and so he swallowed down serpents. In this sense God's people are represented as his pleasant food; they are represented as the wheat in opposition to tares, and as his good grain in opposition to chaff. See Isaiah 6:13. "But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return and shall be eaten; as a teil-tree, and as an oak, whose substance is in them when they cast their leaves, so the holy seed shall be in the substance thereof."