him and
lifts him up. "Look yonder; look right there under the hill!" But the
boy does not see anything; he says--"I do not see anything; what is
it, mother?" And she says: "Keep looking, and you will see it." At
last he catches a glimpse of the glistening serpent; and lo, he is
well! And thus it is with many a young convert. Some men say, "Oh, we
do not believe in sudden conversions." How long did it take to cure
that boy? How long did it take to cure those serpent-bitten
Israelites? It was just a look; and they were well.

That Hebrew boy is a young convert. I can fancy that I see him now
calling on all those who were with him to praise God. He sees another
young man bitten as he was; and he runs up to him and tells him,
"You, need not die." "Oh," the young man replies, "I cannot live; it
is not possible. There is not a physician in Israel who can cure me."
He does not know that he need not die. "Why, have you not heard the
news? God has provided a remedy." "What remedy?" "Why, God has told
Moses to lift up a brazen serpent, and has said that none of those
who look upon that serpent shall die." I can just imagine the young
man. He may be what you call an intellectual young man. He says to
the young convert "You do not think I am going to believe anything
like that? If the physicians in Israel cannot cure me, how do you
think that an old brass serpent on a pole is going to cure me?" "Why,
sir, I was as bad as yourself!" "You do not say so!" "Yes, I do."
"That is the most astonishing thing I ever heard," says the young
man: "I wish you would explain the philosophy of it." "I cannot. I
only know that I looked at that serpent, and I was cured: that did
it. I just looked; that is all. My mother told me the reports that
were being heard through the camp; and I just believed what my mother
said, and I am perfectly well." "Well, I do not believe you were
bitten as badly as I have been." The young man pulls up his sleeve.
"Look there! That mark shows where I was bitten; and I tell you I was
worse than you are." "Well, if I understood the philosophy of it I
would look and get well." "Let your philosophy go: _look and live_."
"But, sir, you ask me to do an unreasonable thing. If God had said,
Take the brass and rub it into the wound, there might be something in
the brass that would cure the bite. Young man, explain the philosophy
of it." I have often seen people before me who have talked in that
way. But the young man calls in