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"You shall not make for yourself a carved image - any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them" Ex. 20:4-5a).

The important point. Otherwise God would be contradicting himself when he commands the carving of images:

Numbers 21:8
The LORD said to Moses, "Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live."

Exodus 25:10-21

"You shall make an ark of acacia wood, two and a half cubits long, one and a half cubits wide, and one and a half cubits high.

Plate it inside and outside with pure gold, and put a molding of gold around the top of it.

Cast four gold rings and fasten them on the four supports of the ark, two rings on one side and two on the opposite side.

Then make poles of acacia wood and plate them with gold.

These poles you are to put through the rings on the sides of the ark, for carrying it;

they must remain in the rings of the ark and never be withdrawn.

In the ark you are to put the commandments which I will give you.

"You shall then make a propitiatory of pure gold, two cubits and a half long, and one and a half cubits wide.

Make two cherubim of beaten gold for the two ends of the propitiatory,

fastening them so that one cherub springs direct from each end.

The cherubim shall have their wings spread out above, covering the propitiatory with them; they shall be turned toward each other, but with their faces looking toward the propitiatory.

This propitiatory you shall then place on top of the ark. In the ark itself you are to put the commandments which I will give you.

You might want to look in 2 Kings 18:4 to see where Hezekiah broke the bronze serpent that Moses had made because the people of Israel were worshiping it.

He broke into pieces the bronze snake Moses had made, for up to that time the Israelites had been burning incense to it. (It was called Nehushtan.) Nehushtan sounds like the Hebrew for bronze and snake and unclean thing.

' The LORD said to Moses, "Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live." '

That has no relevance to the command against graven images to be worshipped.

The serpent in the wilderness was a type of Christ, as Jesus Himself stated.

John 3:14:

Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,