All about the serpents

St. Anne’s Reston Virginia
Lent 4 (B), March 22, 2009
Leslie Ferguson, Seminarian
Numbers 21: 4-9; Psalm 122; Ephesians 2: 1-10; John 3: 14-21

A show of hands… Who here gets annoyed by questions you feel you should know the answer to but don’t? Do bible passages not make sense from time to time? I freely admit that there are things in my spiritual life that just don’t make sense to me as a rational, facts-oriented person. My friends are apt to hear me say, sometimes wagging a finger, “This doesn’t make sense; when I get to heaven and if I have an ‘extra’ I’ll ask God to explain it.” Maybe clarification is in order: I normally ask this question about topics that I don’t really believe are critical to my salvation like: Did Adam or Eve have a belly button? Just how many angels can dance the jitterbug on the head of a pin? Why did the writer of Genesis say “we” in the creation story?

I’m troubled and puzzled by today’s scripture passages on many levels. I’m troubled by the snake and the idol passage and not because I don’t like snakes, because I do. I’m also troubled by the “bumper sticker” passage in the gospel. I’m almost tempted to send these to two passages to my list of “extra” questions for God at my arrival in heaven, but I’m afraid to because: 1) today’s lessons may actually be essential to my salvation; and 2) the message was obviously important to the writers of our scripture because the story shows up in both the Old and New Testaments.

Why am I troubled? I’m troubled by my reaction to the lesson from the gospel and from Numbers. In the first case, I’m troubled by being “put off” by an overused cliché, or a passage that some see as cliché. In the second case I’m troubled by the presence of an idol and the apparent veneration of an idol – at God’s direction none the less. I think I know what it means to be faithful; and I think I know just how God will work with the Israelites; that’s why I’m gong to school right? So I think it’s best to look at Numbers and the most perplexing issue in the readings to me.

If we remember back, but not too far back, in the Israelites’ history they had another run in with an idol. The setting was a little different because the Israelites had just been delivered from the hands of the Egyptians in the Exodus and they were waiting impatiently for Moses’ return from the mount. In their self-reliance they fell back to their old ways and created an idol to worship as their god – the one they understood, the one they thought they knew well. The story is different now: the Israelites get impatient with God again and grumble at what they perceive as maltreatment by God. So what does God do? He lets them know part of his power by sending poisonous snakes to kill them. Then, in order to save them he tells Moses to create an idol and have those who have been bitten by the snakes look on it so they would not perish. I just have to say: What!? What signal is God sending? I thought he punished for “worshiping idols” and now he’s saving by having them look on the idol to bring health and wholeness.

Idols had been around for the Israelites for a while and their last recorded attempt to honor an idol landed them in the desert for 40 years. Now arguably, this story may have been told by the Israelites just because there were a lot of legends and mythology in the Ancient Near East regarding snakes and snake gods that wielded great and awesome power. Hence, the Israelites would have been working from a familiar story with a god working through the power of the serpent. They “knew” the story of the saving nature of the serpent, or so they thought. But still, with all the other things I know about God protecting the Israelites from their own shortsightedness, it doesn’t make sense to me to have an idol nearby that could lead them astray.

The other part of the reason I can’t ignore or put off these passages is my sense that there’s something more in God’s plan regarding the snake idol; otherwise it wouldn’t have shown up in John’s gospel. There we see the snake idol passage used to introduce the passage about Nicodemus today. I think Nicodemus’ story is the key to my understanding today – something in that passage about Nicodemus and Jesus’ interaction is the message that God has in store for me and hopefully for us all. Some scholars have postulated that Jesus’ statement to Nicodemus is a challenge to Nicodemus to change his view of what God and the Messiah might be, to open his eyes to a new understanding of the Christ. Nicodemus believes he knows what the Messiah will do and be – he’s assured by his training and education, he’s self-reliant. By the end of today’s gospel we see Nicodemus realize that his preconception was flawed, he really didn’t know what it meant to live a life where his mind was open to the workings of God. Nicodemus is called to have an open mind about the power of God.

Now the snake story starts to become clearer. The story isn’t about the idol per se; it’s about the power of God working in ways that God wants, not the way that we expect. It’s not clear what the Israelites think about God in their time but the writer shows them as people who were fairly headstrong and self-reliant in their understanding of what is right and necessary for them as opposed to trusting in the things that God was already providing for them. Thus, God’s action in Numbers took something that was “known” and translated it into something miraculous – something that really showed what God is capable of. God’s power can now be understood in a new way.

How my eyes have been opened by this revelation. It was almost like God was talking directly to me. I don’t know how many of you know but things are not anywhere near peaceful on campus these days what with layoffs, the loss of beloved staff, and stories of hard times for priests and graduating seniors all across the country. And there has been much personal turmoil over all of this and more. However, what has become clear to me through all this is that I need to open my eyes to the message that God is sending me each and every day in scripture and in community. I’m starting to understand that if I keep my view closed to new potential I’ll be “left behind” or not fully find my way with God. I now realize (again) that I don’t need to and probably won’t get “it” right without changing my view to see God anew in and around me.

How does this apply to us, right here and right now? We are almost smack dab in the middle of Lent. Remembering back to Ash Wednesday we are called to practice repentance (BCP pg. 265). It may not be obvious but these passages tell me a story about repentance, at least as illuminated by a philosopher named Hammond who said: “repentance is a change of mind, or conversion of sin to God.” It is in our repentance, our changing of our mind to be more like God that we better understand God’s active participation in our lives, both individually and communally. Now is the perfect time to hear stories about God’s power working in unexpected and “untraditional” ways.

I think these stories appear in our communal life at this exact time for a reason. In this Lenten season we are being challenged to look at our lives afresh and anew. We need to ask ourselves: Where we are being challenged to convert ourselves to the mind of God both individually and corporately? Where are we being made anew in our vision of God at work in and through us? How are we being challenged to move from self-reliance to reliance on the grace-filled nature of God?

We can either try to imagine a God that we know and control and probably get frustrated along the way. We can imagine a God that is totally different than we ever knew before and probably end up not finding God’s presence her and now. Or else we can reshape our vision to see God working in and around us in an “old place” and in an amazing way. My prayer today is that we continue to convert our minds from sin to God and continue on our path to Easter this year, being open to a living, dynamic, and self-changing relationship with God.

Amen.