Snakes and such

Interesting title, I know. But it's 2:20 on a Thursday and I'm wanting to head home for the weekend. Unless the people installing our DSL have done something unusual (like installed it) I won't be online until Sunday. Needless to say, this is a disclaimer for anything that sounds a bit disconnected. But at least my lesson plans are turned in, printed, and papers are graded. Whoohoo!

Last Friday at church we read from Numbers 21 and John 3. In Numbers we heard about the Israelites complaining to God for the lack of food and water. Granted these are rather important things to have, but hadn't God delivered them from their slavery and supplied everything they'd needed up to this point? What, they wanted it on a silver platter? The vicar told us that in Kuwait there are 4 types of snakes you'll one into in the desert. Only one of them is NOT poisonous. That would be the leaf-nosed cobra. (No, that's not a picture of him.) If you happen upon on in the desert how do you tell if it's the one that won't kill you? You don't bother...you RUN!

A couple of men in our congregation have jobs that take them into the desert daily. There are thousands of holes in the sand and at certain times of the days the snakes will leave their holes and be lying around in the sun. When God sent the snakes to bite the Israelites did he have to yell very loudly? Doubtful... they were already there. They just had to go up. (BTW, snakes don't have ears so I doubt He bothered to waste His breath. LOL)

So the Israelites were in the desert, surrounded by snake holes, and they decided that they didn't need God and his supplies? Did they honestly think they'd have fared better on their own? Well, they found out, didn't they? Snakes bit them and in order to save themselves they had to look at the snake on the cross.

In John, Jesus mentions that as the serpent was lifted up in the wilderness, the Son of Man must be lifted up. Notice something...Moses made a cross. The serpent was draped around it. In order to see the snake they had to look at the cross. They couldn't see the snake without seeing the cross as well. Where do we Christians look for our salvation? To the cross. To Christ Who died upon it for us. All we have to do is look to Christ and we're healed. Even though we whine and belly-ache about everything, Christ still died for us. Not only that, He still saved us 2000 years before we were even born. He didn't just save the people who had sinned against Him back then. He saved us who wouldn't be born for another 2000 years. How could we have possibly done anything to earn our salvation if we weren't even born for another almost 2 millenia? What a truly wonderful gift that is!