Wandering In the Wild: Love

John 3:14-21

Jesus answered, “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. Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

“And this is the judgement, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”

When my youngest son was in junior high he had an assignment to create a business plan for a start-up company of his choosing. Mikkel decided he was going to open a restaurant called, “Dessert First.” He was convinced there was a market for a place that skipped the meal and started with what everyone actually wanted. He reasoned: “Why save the best for last when you might be full by then? Start with dessert, then serve the meal.”

At a young age he’d already tapped into our proclivity for a quick fix and the desire to skip to the best part — just the sweet stuff please.

Today’s gospel reading feels a little bit like dessert first. The few verses come at the end of a much bigger story and the verses are often whittled down even further, to just one. You know the one. Say it with me: ‘For God so loved the world that God gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”

Martin Luther described this as the Gospel in miniature. It’s likely the most widely known verse of the whole bible. So well known, we don’t even need to say or hear the words — just John 3:16 — and we know. Put John 3:16 on a sign and everyone in the stadium or at the political rally knows. Pulling this verse out of context though means missing the fullness of what God offers in Jesus Christ.

The verse is part of a conversation that Jesus has with Nicodemus, a Pharisee, a leader, a legal-expert in matters of religion. He approaches Jesus when no one will see — no chance to be judged or critiqued. Under the cover of night he asks Jesus about God. They proceed to have a long and perplexing conversation about birth, light, Spirit and belief. Then Jesus says, “Just as Moses lifted up the serpent, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.”

It seems like an odd thing to say — until you do a little digging. 

In the Old Testament Book of Numbers (Chapter 21) we find the Israelites wandering in the wilderness. They are weary. It’s been a long and difficult journey. They’ve lost patience… again. This time their complaint is about the miserable meals that are the diet of desert living. God met their previous grumblings with compassion and grace. Not this time. 

This time God sends poisonous snakes that bite. And people die. This raises all kinds of questions about God, questions worth wrestling with but in the interest of connecting the story to today’s Gospel reading, we’re going to keep the focus on what happens next.

The Israelites repent of their sin. They ask Moses to pray on their behalf. So Moses prays and God gives the remedy. At God’s instructions Moses makes a bronze cast of a snake and raises it up on a pole. When the people cast their gaze up at it, they are healed, they live. They face what they fear most and God, motivated by love, transforms the threat of death into the very thing that offers healing and new life.

It may sound strange but it is a familiar remedy. You can’t open a paper or turn on the news or read a tweet without hearing about the COVID vaccine. Turns out vaccines are a great way to protect against getting a disease. It’s counterintuitive for sure — to be exposed to the disease is what protects you from it. We may not understand it completely, but we don’t need to for it to work.

Nicomedus is an educated man but he is baffled by the conversation with Jesus. So Jesus invites Nicodemus to change perspective, look up, and embrace the mystery of God’s profound love. “Just as Moses lifted up the serpent, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.”

Jesus is both pointing back to a story Nicodemus would know, the story of Israel who in order to be saved looked up at the very thing they feared most, and pointing forward to the cross where this time, for the sake of the whole world, God will transform sin and death with healing and new life. 

Like Israel in the wilderness, we are prone to grumbling. We sin, go our own way. We lose sight of God’s way of peace. We refuse to love. We’re indifferent to suffering. We resist change. We’re quick to judge. We resent the other. We fear death. We need God to save us. And so God comes.

“For God so loved the world that God gave God’s only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.” Those who look to the cross with desperate clarity about their need for God will be transformed by God’s great love revealed in Jesus. 

There are no shortcuts to the Resurrection. There’s no quick fix to avoid the harsh realities of this life. The only path to hope and new life is by way of the cross. You don’t need to understand how it works in order to receive God’s love revealed there. Only keep your gaze upon the cross. For there Jesus is lifted up for the whole world to see; there, sin and death are defeated and God’s gift of healing and salvation in Christ is given for you. This is the way of love.

Amen.