When Hurt Becomes the Cure

Numbers 21:4-9; John 3:14-21

One of my earliest memories is of the time my family drove home and into our driveway after dark. When the lights of the car shown on the front steps, there stretched across the steps was the biggest snake I had ever seen. It was called a bull snake – but in my mind it could easily have been an anaconda – the biggest snake in the world! I was sure this thing was going to eat my dad when he got out the rake to take it into the field. Bull snakes are supposedly like black snakes – people say they’re good to have around. They eat mice and other pesky rodents. But every time I see a snake – bull snake, black snake, garter snake, or copperhead – it doesn’t matter; my reaction, with a little editing, is Dr. Seussian:

I do not like snakes, no matter where I am
I do not like them
Gregg, I am
I do not like them here or there
I do not like them anywhere[1]

They say God’s call is irresistible in a person’s life but if I had known how many snakes there are in North Carolina before I moved here, I may have gone to Chicago instead. I’m not alone in this fear. A 1999 Harris Poll said that nearly 40% of Americans listed snakes as that thing in life they feared most. Snakes beat out public speaking and spiders. Some of you are as afraid of snakes as I am – even though statistically speaking we’re much more likely to die of a bee sting than a snake bite. Some of you, more power to you, claim to have no fear of these slithering little rascals.

I’ve always found it a bit curious that one of the traditional symbols of the medical profession is two snakes wrapped around a pole.[2] You’ve probably seen it before at the hospital or doctor’s office. Now, there’s nothing about that symbol that says to me, “Yeah, I want to go there to get well.” Snakes and healing? It seems to be a real disconnect for me. How is it that something that kills (in the case of poisonous snakes) can actually be a symbol for healing? One answer to this question comes from the medical field: we know that sometimes a doctor has to hurt you (for example perform surgery), in order to make you better. Is there a spiritual application as well? Does the hurt sometimes become the cure?

We have two very curious passages from the Bible for today. One passage, from John’s Gospel, contains some of the most well-known words from Scripture: For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. But the rest of the Gospel passage, and the passage from Numbers that Jesus refers to, contains some pretty freaky stuff for snake-fearers like me.

A Pharisee named Nicodemus came to Jesus at night. It seems logical that Nicodemus was not trying to trap Jesus, but simply wanted to extend the messianic conversation a little further…and in a way where there could be genuine dialogue. Jesus was saying[3] and doing[4] some outrageous things. Nicodemus wanted to find out more. In the course of their conversation, Jesus told Nicodemus he needed to be born from above to experience the kingdom of God.[5] Jesus was telling Nicodemus, in religious terms, how to be saved! Jesus said to Nicodemus, “Believe in me. You won’t be forgotten. And you’ll live forever[6] with God.”

That’s pretty outrageous stuff but it gets even better! In the course of their conversation, Jesus reminds Nicodemus of a story from their shared Jewish past. It’s a wilderness story from the days of Moses. As the people wandered in the wilderness, they began to bellyache and complain. They whined and grumbled. “Why did we have to come out here? Are we there yet? They wished they were somewhere…anywhere…other than where they were. It seems God got tired of their bellyaching and self-pity. He sent snakes among the people and if they got bit, they died. “You Israelites think you’re so smart, well fine! See how well you do without me!”

Now, I don’t know how many wilderness folks were like me regarding snakes, but it’s fair to assume there were at least a few that were freaking out! These were not just snakes. They were snakes with a purpose! People were getting bit, those getting bit were dying, and I couldn’t help but wonder if some that died were dying of fear!

So the people come crawling back...to God and to Moses. God tells Moses to put a snake image on a pole. If people get bit they have two choices: look at the image on the pole and live; or take your chances using your own resources and die.[7] A symbol of the killer becomes the cure!

Jesus tells Nicodemus, “…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.”[8] What in the world was Jesus saying?

There is a famous plastic surgeon by the name of Maxwell Maltz. He wrote the best selling book, Psycho-Cybernetics.[9] Maltz gives us a glimpse in his book about how the hurt becomes the cure.

One day, a woman came to see Dr. Maltz about her husband. She told the doctor that her husband had been injured while attempting to save his parents from a burning house. He couldn't get to them. They both were killed, and his face was burned and disfigured. He had given up on life and gone into hiding. He wouldn't let anyone see him - not even his wife.

Dr. Maltz told the woman not to worry. With the great advances we've made in plastic surgery in recent years, he said, I can restore his face.

She explained that he wouldn't let anyone help him because he believed God disfigured his face to punish him for not saving his parents.

Then she made a shocking request: I want you to disfigure my face so I can be like him! If I can share in his pain, then maybe he will let me back into his life. I love him so much; I want to be with him. And if that is what it takes; then that is what I want to do.

Of course, Dr. Maltz would not agree, but he was moved deeply by that wife's determined and total love. He got her permission to try to talk to her husband. He went to the man's room and knocked, but there was no answer. He called loudly through the door, I know you are in there, and I know you can hear me, so I've come to tell you that my name is Dr. Maxwell Maltz. I'm a plastic surgeon, and I want you to know that I can restore your face.

There was no response. Again, he called loudly, Please come out and let me help restore your face. But again, there was no answer. Still speaking through the door, Dr. Maltz told the man what his wife was asking him to do. She wants me to disfigure her face, to make her face like yours in the hope that you will let her back into your life. That's how much she loves you. That's how much she wants to help you!

There was a brief moment of silence, and then ever so slowly, the doorknob began to turn. The disfigured man came out to make a new beginning and to find a new life. He was set free, brought out of hiding, given a new start by his wife's love. This is a dramatic expression of human love that gives us a picture, however faint, of the saving love of Jesus Christ, what we call the Atonement.

One of the basic tenets of the Christian faith is that Jesus willingly became what was killing humanity so we could be saved. Sin kills us. Jesus took all our sins upon himself on the cross. Paul wrote in 2^nd Corinthians 5:21, “For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” On the cross, Jesus became sin in his suffering…not a sinner, but sin…so that we might be saved. So when we look upon the cross in faith, we are saved.

Each month when we gather around the table, we remind ourselves that Jesus became our sin so that we might live…not just today but forever. He became our disfigurement so we might be beautiful.

Amen.

[1] I am butchering the poetic masterpiece, Green Eggs and Ham (Random House Publishing, 1960) with this revision.

[2] The traditional symbol of the medical profession, the serpent on a pole, is commonly known as the staff of Asklepios or the caduceus. The staff of Asklepios is really a single snake wrapped around a pole. The caduceus is a winged staff with intertwined serpents.

[3] See John 2:19 where Jesus talks about raising up the temple in three days.

[4] See John 2:1-11 where Jesus turns the water into wine.

[6] The expression, “eternal life,” is used in verse 15 for the first time in this gospel. John’s Gospel uses this expression seventeen times whereas the synoptics only use it sparingly. It’s obviously a very important expression from John.

[7] My revision of the re-telling of the Numbers story comes initially from Rick Brand’s sermon, “Like A Snake,” Lectionary Homiletics, Volume XVII, Number 2, p. 71.

[9] Maxwell Maltz, Psycho-Cybernetics (New York: Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing Group, 1989).