Lifted Up: Snakes and Salvation on the Journey Home [Lent 2A - John 3:1-17]

The Rt. Rev. Jeremiah Williamson

John 3:1-17

 

Lifted Up: Snakes and Salvation on the Journey Home

Christ Church, Duanesburg

 

There is no place like home…and that is what they missed.  They missed having a place to call home – a place where you can hang your clothes, where the kids can roam the neighborhood with their friends, where the crops you plant are the ones you harvest.  And they did not have that, any of that.  Because they were lost in the wilderness – somewhere between what was and what they desperately hoped would be.

 

Their patience was thin to the point of threadbare.  And yet Moses decided they should take the scenic route…again.  The people, those tired and tattered wilderness people, did not respond well to that suggestion.  In fact, they lose it.  They lose the little bit of patience they still had.  They lose all self-control.  They lose their sense of decorum.  And they lose their last confidences in Moses and his navigator: the God who plotted their course out of Egypt.

 

The book of Numbers tells us that the people spoke against God and against Moses, saying: “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.”  Because sometimes in a fit of rage, and when life feels unsettled, folks don’t always make a lot of sense; they can’t always think straight. 

 

While the words didn’t communicate a terribly consistent thought – no food but also miserable food – the feelings did.  And the people had a lot of feelings.  They were angry and sad and frustrated and grieving and probably even a little bit hopeful but also scared that the salvation they celebrated on this other side of the Red Sea was nothing but a dead end.  And because of all those wild emotions pulsing through their souls, they had to speak up.  And so they did.

 

Things were so miserable that they were starting to grow nostalgic for Egypt.  Egypt: where they lived as slaves.  Egypt: where they were abused, where their babies were killed, where they cried out so loud that their cries of agony pierced the heavens.  Egypt.  They were so miserable that they thought that they missed Egypt.

 

And that was before they wandered into a snake pit.  There are approximately 4000 snake species in the world.  Most are not poisonous; most do not bite.  The Israelites found the kind that are poisonous and love to bite.  This did not improve their opinion of the wilderness. 

 

But it did change their tune.  They quickly transitioned from bitterness to bargaining.  They still had all the old problems.  They were still lost in the wilderness.  But the snake thing was a more urgent crisis.  And it brought them to their knees – probably literally, definitely spiritually.

 

The wilderness season was not an easy time for Moses either.  It is difficult to be in leadership in the good times.  There were a lot of not-so-good times in the wilderness.  Moses led them out of slavery and still spent most of his life fielding complaints and weathering attempted coups.

 

And because of the surly people, and because he was also in the wilderness, Moses also very much felt frustrated at times.  Once or twice along the way, he might have even talked with God about a possible career change.  But when the snakes started biting, Moses stayed in the pit with his people.  To save them, Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness.

 

And in doing so, God transformed a symbol of death into a symbol of life.  The people found their salvation in a most unexpected symbol, in a most unexpected place. 

 

And we still do.  In this wilderness world, we find ourselves perpetually on the way, forever seeking the Promised Land.  And so, we are never quite home; we’re always a bit unsettled.  And so, and still, we trust that somewhere out there is our destiny – that place in which there are no more tears, no more death, no more wars, no more pain, no more sorrow.

 

We believe that God’s dream will one day come true.  We believe that the Kingdom will come.  And that love will triumph.  And that peace will reign – forever and ever.

 

But we are not quite there, not quite home.  We walk the wilderness path.  We live on the manna that falls from the hand of God – following the breadcrumbs, living on a foretaste of the banquet yet to come.  And, all the while, we struggle to be patient.  Because the desert days are long and the future is always just over the horizon.

 

And sometimes, in this life, in this world, we stumble across some snakes, some poisonous situations, some circumstances that try to suck the life right out of us.  And it brings us to our knees – where we see that Jesus already took those bites for us.  He came down from heaven to be with us in the pit, in the valley of the shadow of death.  And because our lives depended on it, he was lifted up on the cross, for us and for our salvation.  And in doing so, once again, and definitively, God transformed death into life.  Through the towering cross the world is saved.  Through the empty tomb is our ultimate homecoming.   

 

There is no place like home.  And we’re heading in that direction.  The Bible tells us that Jesus has already prepared the place.  But for now, we live with some homesickness.  And, while that can be frustrating, and while we do occasionally complain about the duration of the journey and the complexity of the route, even question the navigator, that same longing for home keeps us moving.  Until one day the journey will end – in the outstretched arms of Jesus’ saving embrace.