Jeremiah 31: 31 - 34; Psalm 51; Hebrews 5: 1 – 10; John 12: 20 – 33
A sermon by The Rev. Gene Tucker, given at St. Mark’s Church, West Frankfort, IL; and at St. James’ Memorial Church, Marion, IL; Sunday, April 2nd, 2006
Have you ever thought about the mysteries we encounter in life every day? Sometimes, we experience things we think we really understand, but when we think about it a little, we see that we really don’t know all that much about them at all.
For example, growing up in Nebraska farm country, I used to stand as a young boy by the windmill that pumped water up from the ground into the tank where the cattle came to drink. I would watch the stiff Nebraska wind drive the windmill’s fan around and around, raising and lowering the shaft that made the pump work.
Now, even at that early age, I knew about the force of the wind, and I think I even knew a little about air molecules and so forth. But to tell you the truth, I don’t think I know, even today, much about how the wind is created, and how the various high and low pressure systems interact with one another to create wind. Even the most knowledgeable scientists will admit that there are still many mysteries to be unraveled about the wind and the weather.
But, even if we don’t understand all the deep mysteries that surround us, we can observe enough to know that something works the way it does. We can see the effects, even if we don’t know why or how of it. Going back to the illustration of the wind, we may not understand everything about the wind, but we can see very well what the wind can do.
That is a very basic definition of a mystery: “something that’s true, but we don’t know exactly why.”
Jesus’ death on the cross for our sins is a truth that we Christians proclaim in our faith….Sunday by Sunday, we say so in the Nicene Creed, which we will say in a few minutes this morning. But, we don’t know everything there is to know about the “ why” and the “how” of Jesus’ passion, as it relates to our salvation. Hold onto that idea for a minute, and let’s turn our attention now to our Gospel reading from John, chapter 12….
Jesus describes His coming death, now just a few days away (we are near the beginning of Holy Week), by offering two examples in our text for today that will describe something about the reason for Jesus’ death, and the effects this death will have on the world….
Using the example of a seed which is planted in the ground, Jesus makes it clear that the reason for His death is the same as the function of a seed: the seed’s entire reason for being is to be planted, to give up its own identity and its own life in order to give new life to the world. So, Jesus’ entire reason for coming to this earth is to give up His life, in order that new life may come into the world.
Turning to the effects that Jesus’ death will have on the world, He makes a mysterious comment, saying, “I, when I am lifted up, will draw all people to myself.”
This is not the first time Jesus has used this phrase, “lifted up.” Back in John, chapter three, verses 14 – 15, in speaking to Nicodemus, Jesus says, “just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.”
Jesus is making a very clear connection to an incident that happened during the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. Since it may help us to understand the effects that Jesus’ death will have, let’s remind ourselves about this incident, as we read it in The Book of Numbers, chapter 21….[1]
The Israelites were being attacked by poisonous snakes. So God told Moses to make a snake out of bronze and put it on a pole. Anyone who had been bitten would be saved from the effects of the bite and from certain death if they only looked at the bronze snake.
Having to look at the snake on the pole produced several effects on the Israelites:
- They were driven by their need for deliverance…As we used to say in the Army, “there are no atheists in foxholes.” If the danger is great enough, people will overcome their natural tendency to doubt.
- But that wasn’t the only thing they had to do: having been driven by their extreme circumstances, they then had to have faith that this piece of metal on a stick could deliver them. Although Scripture doesn’t tell us so, it’s reasonable to think that the Israelites probably thought to themselves, “what sort of a nutty thing is this?....that piece of bronze can’t possibly save anyone who’s in need of deliverance from the bite of a snake.” And, no doubt, that line of thinking prevailed until someone got bitten, and, in the extreme distress of feeling the snake’s poison beginning to work on their body, they decided to look at the bronze snake on the pole. It was then that they knew that looking at the pole worked….One by one, as they saw a person, and then another person, and then another being delivered, they knew it worked just as God had told them it would.
- Finally, as the effects of the snake-on-a-pole’s ability to save spread throughout the camp, this bronze symbol became the focal point for the entire camp. People could be saved only if they could see the pole, and only if they remained in visual contact with it. The pole not only gathered the people around it, but it also unified them in the process.
One final note before we leave this story: it’s worth noting that the symbol that
had the power to save was in itself a reminder of the very thing that was the cause of their destruction.
What lessons can we draw from this Old Testament account, so as to understand Jesus’ death? Since He connects the two so clearly, and since John records not only the Nicodemus conversation where Jesus used the phrase, “lifted up”, but also another incident in chapter eight, verse 28, where the phrase appears again, there must be something significant to the image, “lifted up”, especially since, in today’s reading, Jesus begins to use the first person, saying, “I, when I am lifted up, will draw all people to myself.”
To answer that question, it seems sensible to apply the lessons from the Wilderness experience to Jesus’ death and to its effects on us:
- Many times, we are driven to the cross of Jesus and to a realization of our own need for deliverance by extreme danger that threatens not only our physical life, but our immortal soul, as well….”There are no atheists in foxholes”, remember? Many persons have come to a personal faith in Jesus Christ after a lifetime of running away from Him….Often, these conversions come after a life of crime, or addiction to some destructive lifestyle or another. Failure after failure mounts us, threatening to poison us into physical death and into eternal separation from God.
Of course, for most of us, the saving that God does in our lives isn’t so dramatic as all that….most of us don’t live extraordinarily evil or destructive lives. But God’s salvation, made available through Jesus’ cross and passion, is real, nonetheless.
We would do well to pause here for a moment to acknowledge a widespread belief that permeates the society in which we live. It even permeates the church: it is the idea that “we really don’t need saving.” “We really aren’t all that bad, and certainly not bad enough to need redeeming from anything.” Surely, if we are honest about it, human history proves that we are all “fully trained sinners.” We cannot save ourselves from our own wicked and destructive ways. - We might be tempted to look at Jesus on the cross, and react just the same way the ancient Israelites did when they were told to look at the bronze snake: “how can a man on a cross save anyone?”, we might ask…..It makes about as much sense as a bronze snake on a pole being able to deliver someone from the venom of a poisonous snake. At this point, we return to the issue of mystery, the mystery of Jesus’ death on a cross being able to save….The reason it does save is because that is God’s design. We don’t completely understand it, but we know it’s true, because we can see it working….working in people’s lives.
Now the deliverance that Jesus offers is not just for the eternal life that is ours
when we accept Christ as Savior. It isn’t just “pie-in-the-sky, someday”. The salvation that comes through Christ begins in the here-and-the-now. It changes people from the inside out, in ways that no Dale Carnegie Course or etiquette school ever could. There is a marked change in every person who genuinely comes to faith in Christ. - Jesus’ cross becomes the focus of our faith life, just as that snake-on-a-pole drew the Hebrew people those thousands of years ago. No wonder Jesus said, “I, when I am lifted up, will draw all people to myself.” Every church is a group of people who have gathered around the cross of Christ, each one in direct relation to Christ and to His cross, passion, death and resurrection. Church unity is dependent on each member of the church being unified around that cross. Whatever convictions we might have on any number of issues, all of them must take second place to our primary relationship to Jesus Christ, lifted high on the cross to take away our sins in order to give us new life.
And so, we come full circle, realizing we are dealing with the mystery of God’s plan for salvation, for delivering us from ourselves and from the power of sin. We don’t know all the “whys” and “hows”, but we know Jesus delivers us by the effects of His working in people’s lives. Seeing God work in another person’s life through the power of Jesus’ death and resurrection, we become united in gratitude to God for His most precious gift, freely given to them and to us. And so, we become brothers and sisters in Christ, united in our focus on Him, and indebted through all eternity for the life that is ours in His death.
AMEN.
[1] The full account is found in Numbers 21: 4 – 9.
