It’s been a tough winter in these parts. Most folks I talk to are glad for the promise of spring. Too many deaths, including the young and seemingly healthy who aren’t supposed to die. Relationships that just don’t seem to be working out the way we had envisioned they would. New jobs with big expectations and lost jobs with no prospects. Layer on some angry politics, a global economic crisis and the usual dose of seasonal affective disorder and you’ve got a banquet-sized recipe for despair. How’s a person supposed to muddle through?
This past Sunday’s readings included a strange tale. Israel was grumbling in the wilderness (not so strange, actually) and God decides to punish them by sending fiery/poisonous serpents into their midst. (Why do I hear my father’s voice when I read this story: “I’ll give you something real to cry about…”) The people are bit; some of them even die. Eventually, they go to Moses and beg for relief: “Ask the Lord to take away these snakes!” Moses takes their request to the Almighty. Rather than removing the serpents, however, God comes up with another idea. He tells Moses to fashion a snake on a stick…a likeness of their troubles to be held up over the folks. And God promises that, if the bitten and bothered look up to this fascinating display, they would be healed.
I wonder: What is it that we modern (or post-modern) human beings look up to when we are in the midst of suffering and death? What gets our attention when we are hurting the most? March Madness? The on-going political drama in Washington? That bottle of Jack Daniels in the cupboard? There are plenty of ways in which we are invited and encouraged to soothe our bitter woes. Too bad most of them are simply a matter of denial…ways to cover over the pain with emotions, loyalties and addictions that can’t ultimately save us.
Or…we can go face-to-face with death itself. “And I, when I am lifted up, will draw all people to myself.” Jesus makes that promise just days before his crucifixion…before he is raised like a snake on a stick to be a healing sign for those who are ready to look up and live. In Christ, crucified and risen, two things become clear: God does not abandon us, even in the face of death; and death (along with its minions of despair and fear) does not have the final word for us.
Oh sure…the snakes are still there. Winters like the one we’ve just had will continue to plague us. But we can find comfort in knowing that, through good times and bad, we are safe in the arms of one whom death cannot conquer, whom fear cannot poison, whom despair cannot stop. Even on SAD days, we say “thanks be to God.”
