Thus it is now. The sinner is called simply to look to Jesus. He is not told to look to ordinances—to look to churches—to look to men or angels. There is no help in any of these, and therefore he is not called to look to them, but exclusively to Jesus, whose death and resurrection form the eternal foundation of the believer’s peace and hope. God assures him that “whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” This should fully satisfy the heart and conscience. God is satisfied, and so ought we to be. To raise doubt, is to deny the record of God. If an Israelite had said, How do I know that looking to that serpent of brass will restore me? or if he had begun to dwell upon the greatness and hopeless nature of his malady, and to reason upon the apparent uselessness of looking up to God’s ordinance; in short, if any thing, no matter what, had prevented his looking to the brazen serpent, it would have involved a positive rejection of God, and death would have been the inevitable result. Thus in the case of the sinner, the moment he is enabled to cast a look of faith to Jesus, his sins vanish. The blood of Jesus, like a mighty cleansing stream, flows over his conscience, washes away every stain, and leaves him without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing; and all this, too, in the very light of the holiness of God, where not one speck of sin can be tolerated. But ere closing our meditation on the brazen serpent, it may be well just to observe what we may call the intense individuality which marked the bitten Israelite’s look at the serpent. Each one had to look for himself. No one could look for another. It was a personal question. No one could be saved by proxy. There was life in a look, but the look must be given. There needed to be a personal link—direct individual contact with God’s remedy. Thus it was then, and thus it is now. We must have to do with Jesus for ourselves. The Church cannot save us—no order of priests or ministers can save us. There must be the personal link with the Saviour, else there is no life. “It came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten _any man_, when _he_ beheld the serpent of brass, he lived.” This was God’s order then, and this is His order now; for “_as_ Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even _so_ must the Son of Man be lifted up.” Let us remember the two little words “_as_” and “_so_,” for they apply to every particular in the type and the Antitype. Faith is an individual thing; repentance is an individual thing; salvation is an individual thing. Let us never forget this. True, there is, in Christianity, union and communion; but we must have to do with Christ for ourselves, and we must walk with God for ourselves. We can neither get life nor live by the faith of another. There is, we repeat with emphasis, an intense individuality in every stage of the Christian’s life and practical career.