Snakes on the Plain – Looking at Death to Say Yes to Life

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(Feb 21, 10 – Mike Nichols)
There is more than a cheesy title here. One of the most famous passages from the Bible (John 3) explains itself by this mysterious passage from Numbers 21: When the Canaanite king of Arad,… heard that Israel was coming… he attacked … and captured some of them… Israel made this vow to the LORD: “If you will deliver these people into our hands, we will totally destroy their cities.” ³ The LORD listened to Israel’s plea and gave the Canaanites over to them. … [Israel]… traveled …to go around Edom….grew impatient…spoke against God…you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the desert? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!”  Then the LORD sent venomous snakes among them; they bit the people and many Israelites died. ⁷ The people came to Moses and said, “We sinned when we spoke against the LORD … Pray that the LORD will take the snakes away… 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.”  So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, he lived.

What do snakes, poles, death, and a late night conversation with Jesus, have to do with life? That’s what we hope to make sense of today, the first Sunday of Lent. 

 

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