HUGGING YOUR MONSTERS
From Numbers 21,
And the LORD said to Moses, "Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live."
Then in their trouble they cried | to the LORD
and you delivered them from | their distress.
From John 3,
And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15that w
hoever believes in him may have eternal life.
16For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
The setting is the wilderness. The people are the Israelites. The problem is, the people had grown weary of their long journey and tired of their one-item menu. Manna had been provided to them by God and although they were surviving, they were not thriving. What does any group of people do when things are uncomfortable (or too comfortable)? They grumble. They complain. They test God's patience.
The Lord had enough. Poisonous serpents appeared before the people. (Now THAT would add a little excitement to the day) The serpents bit many people, and the people were dying. Through the efforts of Moses on behalf of the people, God provided a solution to the poisonous problem.
A question: why was it an image of a serpent? Couldn't the image have been anything else (I mean anything else). What is the thinking behind making an image of the very creature that threatens you life?
God is letting the people know what it's like to hug their monsters. Rather than fleeing away from the scourge, the people are to run toward it (at least toward an image of it). The last thing a bitten person would want to look at is another snake! Yet this was the means of healing. This was the path toward wholeness. This was the way to pull the poison out of the people, and place it on something else. They were commanded to hug their monster and thereby be made new in the realization that God was hung up on a desire to heal and restore.
That desire becomes even more real and uncontainable when Christ Jesus, a human, is lifted up onto a pole. We are our own poison, and the crucified one takes the poison out of us. FOR. GOD. SO. LOVED. THE. WORLD. Look to Jesus. Now your Lord has become not a monster, but a Messiah.
Journaling prompt: write about your monsters and how God is leading you not around, above or below them, but through them.
Who around you needs your encouragement to "hug" their monster? You're part of their life.. might as well see that as an opportunity!
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