Today's Gospel

Gospel
Jn 3:13-17

Jesus said to Nicodemus:
“No one has gone up to heaven
except the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man.
And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert,
so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.”

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,
so that everyone who believes in him might not perish
but might have eternal life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world,
but that the world might be saved through him.

The first thing that caught my eye in this reading was Jesus statement that "No one has gone up to heaven except the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man". Why would He say that if there are examples in scripture of people being taken to heaven? eg Moses, Elijah, possibly Enoch? Haydock's commentary says that Jesus was showing that He is Devine - He descended from heaven..no one else has done that.

Oh well I just read Saint Augustine's comments on this scripture and now I have been awed by his meditation on this passage.

As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in Him may have eternal life.

My first thoughts about this passage are the physical aspect of this passage. When Israel was in the desert complaining to Moses about their suffering, God sent snakes to punish the people. God told Moses to make a snake and put it on a pole and the people will be healed when they look at the snake on the pole.

This was one of the passages that I've seen Catholics point to when defending the crucifix. Not very deeply but I think I remember someone pointing to this scripture and saying "this sound a lot like a crucifix".

The whole idea of looking at a man holding a pole with a bronze snake mounted on the top to heal you from a snake bite seems kind of ridiculous to a rational thinking person. But these are the kind of story's that are littered through out the Bible. This is the history of God's dealings with man that we trust in by faith. It seems very far fetched to a 21st century man living in the USA but this is what comes with being a Christian. Some Christians mock other Christians for believing in wild far fetched ideas about all kinds of things but maybe they are forgetting some of these story's that are all scattered throughout the Bible.

Now on to my exegeses of this passage. As we look to Christ on the Cross and trust in God's mercy so to did the Israelites look to God's mercy when they repented of their sin and looked to Moses holding the bronze serpent mounted on the pole. This was a foreshadowing of the the crucification of Christ on the cross. Amazing how God takes the failing of the people to foreshadow an event that is yet to occur.