Numbers 21:4-9, (John 3:14-21)
Fourth Sunday of Lent
“Snakes. Why’d it have to be
snakes?”
So said Indiana Jones in the
movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark. I
will never forget sitting in the theatre to watch this movie for the first
time, hearing that iconic John Williams music, and watching with delight and
excitement as Indiana Jones, an archeologist, a professor, and an unexpected
swashbuckling hero, take on the bad guys. As an archeologist, Jones finds lost
treasures and rare antiquities, and the reason he must take on bad guys is to
prevent them from using archeological treasure for nefarious purposes. In Raiders, the “bad guys” are the
Nazi’s. The great irony of the story is
that Hitler – who wanted to wipe the Jewish people off the face of the earth –
wants to find one of the most sacred relics of Judaism, the lost Ark of the
Covenant. The premise of the story is
that Hitler would be able to use the Ark’s powers to win the war and rule the
world. Indiana Jones must find it before Hitler’s minions do.
Indy
and his friend and colleague, Sallah, find the location of the ark. It is
buried underground in some sort of ancient cavern. Looking down into the
cavern, Sallah asks, “Indy, why does the floor move?” Indiana throws a torch
down and there they are: snakes, hundreds and hundreds of snakes.
“Snakes. Why’d it have to be snakes?”
Indiana
Jones was terrified of snakes and seeing the movie that first time and trying
not to hide under my seat at the sight of all those snakes, I felt vindicated
that I share a phobia with a courageous hero like Indiana Jones. Because of
this phobia, it may seem strange that I chose to use this strange story from
the book of Numbers as my preaching text this morning. But here we are.
We don’t hear from the book of
Numbers very often in our lectionary cycle. Just as this story is strange,
Numbers as a book is also pretty strange.
It
is in Numbers that we read the story of the talking donkey. Yes, there is a
talking donkey in scripture. In the verses immediately preceding this one, God
helped the Israelites to overcome the Canaanites. But in the next breath, the
people forgot how God had helped them. In the opening verse in our story we
read that the Israelites leave Mount Hor for the Red Sea, “to go around the
land of Edom.” This means that they were still following Moses. They were still
being fed by manna and quail. But they were getting fed up with what they were
being fed. They were clearly tired of the lack of options on the menu. Once
again, the Israelites whined and complained.
“Why have you brought us up out of
Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and water, and we detest
this miserable food.”
If you think about it, this is a
pretty funny line. We don’t have any water. We don’t have any food. And, by the
way, the food stinks! The people had complained against Moses before, but if
I’m correct, this is the first time they’ve included God in their complaint. What
is God’s response? Snakes. And these were clearly not harmless little garden
snakes. These were poisonous, terrifying, venomous snakes. Why’d there have to
be snakes?
What
the NRSV translates as poisonous can also be translated as fiery.
I don’t know which sounds worse. Regardless of the translation, the snakes
slither through the people and bite them. People are dying left and right, and
those who are still alive quickly realize the error of their ways. They go to
Moses, proclaiming that they have sinned against God and against him. Please
Moses, ask God to take away the snakes. Moses prayed for them, and in response
to his prayer, God gave him the cure. Make a bronze image of a serpent and put
it on a pole. If someone is bitten, all
they have to do is look at this image of a serpent and they will live.
Perhaps
our first question about this story is why did the cure come from staring at a
serpent on a stick, rather than God just making the snakes go away. A second question
to ask is why are we reading this story in the first place? Let’s answer the
second question first.
The
reason we read this odd little story from Numbers is because Jesus refers to it
in our passage from John’s gospel. Just as the serpent on the pole was lifted
up and the people lived, so shall Jesus be lifted up on the cross so the people
may live. Then Jesus spoke perhaps the most well-known words in all of
scripture. “For God so loved the world…”
Now,
let’s consider the first question. What did snakes represent in the ancient
world? They were a personification of evil. Think about the serpent in the
Garden of Eden. One commentator wrote that the people have been thinking
poisonous thoughts and speaking poisonous words. They could not seem to
remember how God was with them, even in the immediate past. The longer they
wandered in the wilderness, the more poisonous those thoughts became. Perhaps
snakes are as much a metaphor for the people’s own venom in thought and word,
as they were literal serpents.
The Israelites had been wandering
for a long, long time. Older generations were dying, and new ones were being
born. For every moment that the Israelites recognized God’s saving presence,
there were many more moments when they didn’t. From their perspective, one that
was colored by wilderness wandering and a minimum of food and drink, Egypt
looked pretty good. Just as they forgot God’s presence, they also seemed to
forget exactly what their lives in Egypt really were. They were not halcyon
days of bliss; they were days of slavery and backbreaking work. God saved them
from that life. God called them to new life and made a covenant with them and a
promise to them to be their God and asked them to be God’s people. But in this
story they can’t see that. They don’t remember that. They don’t fully trust
that God is with them or that Moses knows what he is doing, until the snakes.
And how are their terrible wounds
from these terrible snakes cured? Debie Thomas states that the people are cured
of their wounds not by some magical means but by facing what had bitten them.
Their healing came when they faced what had made them sick. Healing came not
only when they looked up at a bronze image, but at the poison that resided
within them. That was the cure, that was when the healing began, by facing what
had made them sick, by looking honestly at what had poisoned them.
Jesus refers to this strange story
as an analogy to what God is doing through him. Although we don’t read the
beginning verses of this chapter, the setting is that Nicodemus, a pharisee,
comes to Jesus by night, presumably so that no one will know he is talking to
this controversial man, Jesus. And Nicodemus asks Jesus about the signs that
Jesus is doing, because he recognizes that God’s presence must be with Jesus,
otherwise he could not perform these signs and wonders. And in his answer to
Nicodemus, Jesus references this story from Numbers and makes this analogy.
“And 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.”
The Israelites were healed when they
faced the poison that was killing them. Perhaps that is also the healing power
of the cross. What is the cross but the representation of the worst of
humanity?! The cross was brutal. It was merciless. It was a terrible, terrible
way to die. It was suffering. It was pain. It was inhumane. It was
representative of the cruelty and the brutality that we humans show one
another. And Jesus would be lifted up on one. As Debie Thomas notes, looking at
the bronze serpent healed the people of the poison within them. Maybe when we
look at the cross, our healing begins by facing what is the worst in us. Maybe
our healing begins when we face, honestly, the consequences of our cruelty and
violence. Maybe our healing begins when we see the One who shows us again and
again what being truly human can be lifted up on the cross of our own inhumanity.
It seems to me that this is what
this Lenten season calls us to do – to face not only what keeps us from God,
but also what keeps us from one another, what keeps us from being truly human
to one another. Maybe if we can look up and face the cross and our inhumanity
with honesty, then maybe we can see that endless war solves nothing, that
violence begets only more violence, that dehumanizing some dehumanizes all, and
that the only real cure comes from love. That’s it. Love. For God so LOVED the
world, the cosmos, the entirety of creation, that God sent his only Son, not to
punish the world, but to show the world what LOVE really is and what LOVE can
do, so that whoever sees the Son and believes in the Son won’t suffer the
endless cycle of death and the hell we create on earth, but will have life,
abundant life. It’s all about LOVE.
Our healing begins when we face what
is killing us. Our healing begins when we see, really see how God loves so that
we can begin to love in return. On this day and always, look up at who is
lifted up and may we all be healed.
Let all of God’s children say,
“Amen.”
Amen.
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