There are some days I feel the church gives us so much more packed into our readings than other days. Today is one of those "jam packed full of goodness" days!
Our first reading talks about Moses and the Israelites wandering the desert. I think I love reading about these people and this time because I use to think they were dumb. I could not understand how these people could act and speak the the way they did and they always seemed to be whining. I couldn't wrap my brain around how they were freed and then saw miracle after miracle yet they would forget so quickly!
I think I love these passages so much because I can relate to these people far more than I realized. How often do we forget how good God is or has been to us just to complain about a new situation? How quickly to do forget that he provides for us and is always there for us, never leaving or forsaking us?
How often do we praise something only to later turn around and complain about it and want something newer and more exciting? The people were provided food from heaven! Food that they were so thankful and happy for just to later to be "disgusted with this wretched food!"
As punishment for crying out agains God, The Lord sent out a punishment of serpents among the people biting them and killing many. Just like a little kid who was caught and punished, the people begged to be forgiven! They acknowledged they were sinning and begged Moses to save them.
I don't know if they were really sorry or just sorry they were caught, but regardless, they begged forgiveness and God listened. God's solution was to have Moses build a seraph and mount it on a pole and anyone who had been bitten just needed to look at it and they would be healed.
Today's gospel reading makes reference to this first reading from numbers. In John 3:14-15 we read
"And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert,
so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.”
Jesus was lifted up on a cross to heal us! His death was so that we may be healed of sin and suffering! He did not come to punish us like the serpents, he came to save and heal us!
God has given us free will! We can choose to look to Jesus for healing, or we can continue to look away and suffer sin and real death. We can put our faith, hope and love in Christ, or continue to live in the World and continue to allow the serpents among us to steal our life.
It is time to look to that cross! It is time to look to Jesus, the perfect sacrifice. He embodies ALL of God's love for us and was sent as the most precious gift the world has ever known. Accept that gift, look to him and be healed!
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