3/15/15-4 th Sunday in Lent

Transcription

1 3/15/15-4 th Sunday in Lent Numbers 21:4-9 From Mount Hor the Israelites set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; but the people became impatient on the way. 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 detest this miserable food." Then the LORD sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died. The people came to Moses and said, "We have sinned by speaking against the LORD and against you; pray to the LORD to take away the serpents from us." So Moses prayed for the people. And the LORD said to Moses, "Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live." So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live. John 3:14-21 Jesus said to Nicodemus, "Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. "Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God." Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness. This is what Jesus said to Nicodemus in this morning s Gospel lesson. Jesus says he is just like the serpents that bit the Isrealites, after they complained to God. Jesus is just like the serpent Moses then put on a pole that everyone had to look at in order to be saved. The people listening to Jesus would have understood the reference Jesus was making to the serpent story we hear this morning from Numbers. When I first read this Gospel lesson I didn t actually recognize the reference. I had to look it up, then of course, I read the rest of the lectionary text and there it was in our Old Testament reading. Leave it to the people that put together the lectionary to actually make sense and combine stories that are helpful. 1

2 But for the people listening to Jesus, they would have understood it they didn t need to look it up. This serpent story was part of their shared history. It would have clicked for them. For them it would have been like if I used a story and referenced Cinderella. Almost all of us know exactly who Cinderella is and know the basic details of her story. We may not remember the entire story, but we can conjure up images of a glass slipper, a mean step-mother, some step-sisters, and a prince. When I say it we all basically know who I am talking about. When Jesus said, just as Moses lifted up the serpent, they would have immediately remembered the story of Moses lifting up the serpants. And so what happened with these serpents that Jesus mentions. What happened is that after Moses frees his people from the land of slavery, bringing them out of Egypt, they head up into the hill country. They are walking, a lot, it is hot, it is the desert, they are tired, and they are dirty. So everyone feels grumpy and is angry. So the people start complaining about Moses and they particularly start complaining about God. They whine to Moses why have you brought us out of slavery, out of Egypt into the wilderness where there is no food, no water and the food we do have is terrible? This is my favorite part of their whining, they complain that there is no food in one breath and then in the very next breath say that the food is bad. So clearly there was food, they just didn t like it. They whine that it would have been better to stay in slavery. God hearing all this whining sends poisonous serpents to bite the Israelites and many of them die from these bites. Now this sounds particularly terrifying. I am not afraid of snakes, like I am spiders, but I would just prefer snakes to hang out in their area, I ll hang out in mine and how about we do our best not to hang out. So there are all these snakes hanging around and the Israelites come to Moses, beg for forgiviness and ask him to take the snakes away and save the people who have been bitten and 2

3 they promise not to complain anymore. So Moses prayed for the people. And the LORD said to Moses, "Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live." So Moses makes a serpent of bronze, and puts it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live. What I find interesting about this story is that the Isrealites, in order to be saved from death, they had to look upon the symbol of their sickness they had to look at what was causing their own death. Moses had to put up a poisonous snake on a pole, and so as not to die from a poisonous snake bite, they had to look at the snake and then they would be saved. And so why does Jesus say that, just like Moses lifted up the serpent, so must the son of humanity be lifted up? Why would Jesus say that? We have our answer in the next two lines of the Gospel reading - For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. John 3:16, possibly the most famous Bible verse ever. The signs at baseball games, the t-shirts, the tattoos when you ask almost anyone if they know any Scripture verses by heart this is the one that they mention. John 3:16 has been called the Gospels in miniature and the best summary of the Christian hope and story. God so loved us that God sent God s only son, not to condemn us, not to keep us in slavery, but to set us free. That through Jesus all of us and the entire world would be saved. But what is important about this, that I think is often missed, is that we have to look at, really look at Jesus so that we can be saved. To find healing, to find 3

4 salvation, we can t look away from what Jesus did we have to face death, we have to face the cross in order to find full healing. Just like the Israelites had to look at the serpent in order to live they had to look at the very thing that was causing such pain and death, they had to look at it in order to be saved. We have to look at Jesus, we have to look at Christ on the cross, we may want to look away, but we have to bear witness to the brokenness that put him up there. We can t just walk past Good Friday and only focus on Easter. The Christian story is one of triumph over death, it is one of salvation but every year we go through Lent, we walk the path of Holy Week, we sit at the Stations of the Cross, we have Good Friday, and we look at what is up there. And sometimes life feels more like Good Friday then Easter. When the weight of our problems and hardships keep us from Easter because all we see is our own sin. And then there are those of us that refuse to look at the hard things in our own lives, that refuse to even see our own sins, as if we don t have any. As if we are somehow perfect. But both of those extremes are not what Jesus is asking of us. We can t just gloss over the things that cause sin in our lives and pretend we are ok, because sin is there. And Jesus is not asking us to spend our entire lives only focused on our own sins. And Jesus is telling us in order to get past it, in order to be saved we have to look at it, we have to see that it is there and once we look up at Jesus, then we can be set free. And let me be clear, Jesus loves us, all of us no matter what sins we have committed, what dark recesses in our heart remain. Because we all sin, we all have 4

5 it, and we sin over and over and over again. But what comes to mind for me when I think about Jesus saying he is just like that serpent is that the truth shall set you free. The Israelites were whining about their station they whined about the food and being brought out of slavery. They said to God what are you doing to us? You have brought us out of slavery and the food is terrible. Which seems horribly selfish I mean they were brought out of torture and slavery and they complain about the food. The truth for them was that they needed to see their sin, they needed to look at the serpent and realize that they had access to healing. And for us, our truth is that we all have sin in our lives and we can be set free. The serpents, for the Israelites a symbol of death and pain, became a symbol of hope and healing, it could set them free. The cross, once a symbol of execution and a symbol of all that was scary about the Roman Empire, for us is now a symbol of hope and new life, the cross can set us free. We don t have to spend our lives focused on the cross, nor can we ignore it. But we can spend this season of Lent knowing that sin is real, that the cross is real and when we get through it, because Easter always comes, then we can rest and we can be healed. 5