Sure, we’ve all heard of John 3:16. Nowadays, most people know about the verse, not the verse itself. The context to it is even less fresh on people’s minds. It’s used on billboards and game signs, and is an easy shoo-in for any sermon. However, it’s become a meme, a thing that shows us more how we use it than what it meant 2000 years ago when John first penned the verse. It gets hype for good reason but removed from its context and storyline, forced into different sermon contexts, it becomes less than what it was meant to be.

Un-Proof Texting John 3:16

We are not talking about John 3:16 today. When one understands and accepts the context, and doesn’t let their deep-rooted assumptions get in the way, John 3:16 means exactly how it reads: God loved the world enough to give His son so people could be saved from their darkness and have life. For those who dissent from plain language and have to dance around word definitions, John 3:16 remains a thorn in the side of their perfect theology.

Instead of talking about John 3:16, we’re going to look at the two verses just before. It’s important to remind ourselves that chapters, verses, and section titles were not in the original scriptures – they were implemented much later for the sake of reference. The Bible is not a reference book or an educational manual. People spoke fluidly. Thoughts blended and flowed into one another. Proof-texting and selecting key texts to reframe the entire Text has caused immense damage over the centuries without us realizing it. Understanding John 3:14-15 restores some of its structure, as well as depth and color.

In the sentences just before, Jesus said, “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” (John 3:14-15). To understand what Jesus means he must be lifted up as Moses lifted up the serpent, we need to understand Moses lifting up the serpent.

Numbers 21 – Grumbling Snakes

That story happened in Numbers 21. For this story, an important context is the nation of Israel, when they were being freed from Egypt and on the other side of the Red Sea, were faced with three tests in the desert. Each one dealt with water or food. Each time, they complained and grumbled against each other and leadership. Instead of looking out for each other and trusting they were on this journey together, they turned against each other. This lesson would come up more before they could enter the Promise Land – Numbers 21 is one of those times.

The people, just after having a victory over Arad, were heading from Mount Hor to the Red Sea when they again became impatient. They whine to Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food” (Numbers 21:5). We demand our needs are met by others when we think it is not our fault.

At this point, these people had ample warnings, signs, and victories. This situation wasn’t new. In response to their bickering and whining, God sent “fiery serpents among the people.” “Fiery” serpents means venomous and more. The imagery is gorgeous and harsh. Their behavior was toxic and poisonous – they were the snakes. God never wastes an opportunity to teach, if we’re willing to hear it. When we are so centered on ourselves that our uncomfortable becomes other peoples’ problems, when we bicker, complain, push, demand, and strive, we’re snakes.

Snakes Hiding in The Story

Fiery serpents, in Hebrew, is the word for seraphim. Let that image reshape your image of Isaiah 6, when seraphim with 6 wings fly around the throne room of God singing His glory – no more pudgy toddlers with harmless bows. Serpent imagery begins early in the Bible. The first serpent questioned the intent and provision of God, tempting Adam and Eve to break their trust in God’s good intentions and take for themselves the power and role of God.

In the book of Exodus, when Moses is resisting the idea of facing Pharaoh to redeem the Israelites, God turns Moses’ staff into a serpent as a sign. When Moses does face off with Pharaoh, there is a battle between the Jew’s staff and Pharaoh’s. Aaron’s staff turns into a serpent. Then Pharaoh summoned his wise men and sorcerers who all in turn also turned their staffs into snakes. If the story stopped there, it’d feel like a stalemate, maybe a defeat. Then Aaron’s staff/serpent swallowed all the other serpents/staffs.

In Genesis 3, the serpent is the downfall of humanity. In Exodus 4-7, it’s snake versus snakes, and God’s snake literally ate the rest. In Isaiah 6, winged fiery serpents fly around the throne room of God, singing His praises and cleansing the sin from Isaiah’s lips. The snake is still a part of God’s creation – it’s still a part of us. The question is how do we use ourselves in this world, with others. We’re powerful, burning, creatures – we ought not take our own power for granted.

Crucifying The Serpent

Back to Numbers 21: the people had repeated an old mistake. They should’ve known better. So, the Lord sent venomous snakes among them. When the people decide they’d learned their lesson, “the Lord said to Moses, ‘Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.’ So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live” (Numbers 21:8-9). Moses would, in form and function, crucify a bronze snake.

The divine solution to the plague of serpents was to make people look at a suspended bronze serpent. Bronze would have been associated with the Tabernacle instruments, like the altar and basin. He put the problem on a pole and told the people, “Look!” When we sin, when are impatient, when we are so focused on what we don’t have or do, when we’re caught up in our agenda, and there isn’t room for others in our narrative, we’re snakes, just like Genesis 3 and Numbers 21. We are always the last ones to realize our sins. Dealing with the effects they’ve had on people and our lives is a lot for any of us to swallow.

Stepping on Snakes

James said our tongues are “a fire” and “full of deadly poison. With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God” (James 3:9). When we make other humans the enemy and the problem with Creation, we become a snake questioning God’s intent and plans. Our words and lack thereof, as well as our behavior and interactions with people, become a game of shrouds and will.

However, we are still human. We are as we are. The snake was never removed from Creation – it was created and put here for a reason. It is still good, able to fly to the heights of God’s Throne room. So it is with us. We screw it up quickly and often, and we don’t realize the world we keep handing off to our kids. Jesus said, “Be shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves,” in Matthew 10:16. All of this snake imagery, including when, is about us making sure we use Truth for Love, not doubt for self-promotion.

Jesus had to be lifted as the serpent in the wilderness so Jesus could make all people look at their sin, face it, and see what it does – to see what power we have to kill the Son of God with our uncontrolled insecurities and arrogance. It also invites us to consider the good on the other side of dying to ourselves: resurrection and new birth. We are made in the image of God, to be free and active agents in truth and love. However, the power to create at will also means the power to destroy. Such power is only reserved for one other being – God.

Looking At The Cross

Whatever the redemptive work of the Cross is, it’s at least in part this – facing ourselves and the outcomes of our lives. It’s an echo of Genesis 3:15, where God told Eve that her offspring would crush the head of the serpent. Shame is a real, real thing we all like to pretend isn’t as big of a deal as it is. It’s huge and we’re good at pretending it’s something else. I speak personally, knowing how shame daily gets in my way. The only way past shame is ultimately exposing it. When people looked at the bronze serpent in Numbers 21, they looked at the venomous result of their sin.

When we look at Jesus on the cross, it’s about us facing ourselves. I’m not He. If I were to be on a cross, it’d probably be because I deserved it. And that’s kind of the point. We don’t think our actions have as much determinantal effects as they do.

For the same reason, inversely, we don’t believe in the good and love we are capable of. Our lives become a routine of maintaining our comfort. We become so natural at avoiding ourselves because of the pain of looking at our honest selves. Sometimes, God has to die before we get to His point.

“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.”
– John 3:17