Look Up and Live

4 From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; but the people became impatient on the way. 5 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.” 6 Then the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died. 7 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. 8 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.” 9 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.

This is one of the best known scriptures of the Old Testament. I think it’s also one of the weirdest. But these are weird times in the world. We are on the precipice of promise, yet there are behaviors among us that threaten the progress we could and can know.

Consider the context of these ancient people.

The book of Numbers recounts the 40 years of wilderness wandering the Israelites experienced following their liberation from Egypt.

Today's scripture is the last of the "murmur narrative” or ‘complaint stories” that run throughout the wilderness narrative.

God chose an unlikely leader to shepherd the Israelites; God sent Moses back to the place he fled because he killed a man. God appointed one who had taken a life to usher millions to new life.

For these people, God orchestrated their liberation from bondage, provided protection day and night from threats in the desert, made provision for their needs, and even provided parameters/commandments for better life in community.

Despite the efforts made on their behalf, there were complaints and disobedience.

In today’s text, Moses is leading the people ‘by the way of the Red Sea’. Moses is taking an indirect route for the safety and survival of the people but they become impatient along the way. The just want to get to the promised land. Protection and provision are still being made but the people want to do what they want to do and to be where they want to be NOW.

We can identify with their impatience. Afterall, how many times have pressed to get something done faster.

We live in a faster-food, have-it-your-way economy. When we actually have to wait or go a circuitous route, we get cranky.

How annoying is it to see your destination but the path is blocked by road construction...social constructs…or even cantankerous personalities?

Moses had to take the people around Edom because their cantankerous king refused to let them pass through the land of Edom. So the detour was to insure the people would reach their final destination. But the people grumbled.

This time was different. In their impatience, the people "spoke against God and against Moses" (v. 5). This time the Israelites complain directly against God, not just Moses. They have been pressing against boundaries and this time went way out of line.

“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.”

"There is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food.” There is no food, yet they detest the food they complain about not having.

God has provided for their needs, not for their wants. [Hmmm…let that hang heavy in the air]

God has heard the whining before. God has also witnessed the indiscretions, the mistreatments among the people, the faithlessness and disobedience. God has heard the disparaging commentary, the second-guessing of Moses, when Moses was simply doing what God was leading him to do.

What’s going on with the people and their attitudes?

The people were preoccupied with their own desires, their indiscretions and self-expressions. Much like today, people make choices to meet immediate needs or desires without considering the bigger picture of which they are apart.

We can get caught in the venemous vortex individualism to the point where we strike out against anyone who does not think or move as quickly or in the direction we would like.

In their impatience, the Israelites struck out with venemous words from their venemous hearts. This time they bit the hand and heart of their protector and provider.

6 Then the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died.

God had been patient with this wayward but promising people.

The poison among the people was disobedience and their inclination toward self-gratification.

This poison remains in the world today.

Self-gratification drives people to seek thrills at the expense of others; to consume more than they produce; to promote competition over cooperation; to look out for their own good rather than the common good; to seek to be served rather than to serve.

Self-gratification seeks control and power; it feeds that which will ultimately bite back.

God sent poisonous serpents among the people. Vipers among a brood of vipers, to use the words of Jesus and John the Baptist.

The attitudes among the people were killing the concept of community and covenant God was putting forth.

The text says ‘many Israelites died’. I wonder if those who died were bitten based on their choices.

God sent the serpents in response to the direct complaint against God. It appears the God of grace was giving the people what they deserved. The snake bite was a consequence of their choices.

We are free to choose; but we are not free from the consequences of our choices.

Literally, feeling the consequences, 7 the people confessed to Moses, “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. God gave instructions and offers the people a symbolic anti-venom. God did not remove the serpents, but provides a solution. The poisonous serpents are not the problem, the poisonous people are the problem and a vital part of the solution.

Moses doesn't produce a bronze snake on a stick that does the healing. This is not a magical idol.

God provides the healing and forgiveness.

The snake is a symbol of their sin.

Healing and forgiveness would come through confronting their sin—looking at what was killing them.

Forgiveness and healing would come through personal action. No one could do this for them. The person who was bitten had to look up and live.

Forgiveness and healing would come through trusting the remedy God provided. The God they had complained against!

As Timothy Merrill of HomileticsOnline puts it, “How poignant that must have been. In their confession and repentance, God simultaneously shows them their sin and his grace. Problem and the solution in the same bronze serpent. Max Lucado says, "To see sin without grace is despair. To see grace without sin is arrogance. To see them in tandem is conversion." https://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/btl_display.asp?installment_id=93000126

Sin and grace in one symbol. Problem and solution in one moment. This was the work of God in response to the sin of God’s people.

Here were are among God’s people…still self-gratifying, still willful; still sinful and in need of grace. And God has provided for our forgiveness and healing, for our redemption and salvation. All we have to do is look up and live.

Look up to Christ and live.

[Jesus said,] “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. 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 3:14-17

When we look up at the cross and consider our Suffering Savior, we see the symbol of our sinful choices, the consequences in his suffering and God’s grace in our redemption through Christ.

As we look up to the cross of Christ (the crucifixion), as we confront, confess and repent of our sin; turn and trust in the forgiveness, grace, and love expressed through his sacrifice, we move to a different place in our relationship with God. We experience conversion.

The Gospel of John reminds us that Jesus is the way to eternal life; he is the savior of the world.

Healing does not come without confronting/uncovering the issues.

Forgiveness does not come without recognition and confession.

But unconditional, saving love provides space to confrontation and confession without condemnation.

This purposeful, practical agape love is the heart of the gospel message. It is God’s love that welcomes the wounded, weird, wacky and willful with the desire to bring forth better live for all.

God extends this love through all time. It is love that values and demands accountability, responsibility, and faithfulness in relationships, new and old, casual or sustained, with one another and with God.

During the Season of Lent, we reflect, repent and renew of commitments to God and others.

This is a time to pause and recognize our choices that do not please God, the poisonous attitudes, perspectives and practices that are killing us or those around us; and there is healing in our recognition.

We confess our sin to God in our personal and communal prayers and confessions. There is healing in our confession.

We look upon the reality of our forgiveness, the grace of Christ given to us at the cross. The ultimate healing is found in our Savior, whose physical death on the cross cures the spiritual death from our sin.

As Rev. Dr. Derek Weber says, “Numbers isn’t about a snake, and it isn’t about worshiping an odd sort of idol. It’s about acknowledging that you need help. You need a savior. And it is about obedience to the one who will rescue you from what is killing you. If you just look up and live.”

Look up and live! Amen