The gospel today shows the interconnection of scripture, the need to repent and to be

centred on God. It includes one of the most famous verses in the Gospels, John 3:16.
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in
him shall not perish but have eternal life.
The verse, however, is a commentary on the bronze serpent incident. The story is that of
the Israelites in the wilderness in Numbers 21.
They were angry and asked Moses:- why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in
the wilderness? God then sent a plague of snakes and many died of bites. The people
repented and went to Moses confessing their error. Moses prayed and he is told by God:Make a serpent and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is
bitten, when he looks upon it, shall live. Moses made a serpent of brass and put it upon
a pole and it came to pass that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent
of brass, he lived.
Christ draws the parallel between the serpent on a pole and himself; He must be lifted up
like the serpent in the desert. As looking upon the serpent - an image of the evil that was
afflicting Israel - was the means to get healed so looking at Christ impaled by the same
evil also brings healing.
Does Christ then become an image of evil? A verse from St Pauls second letter to the
Corinthians is shocking. For He has made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that
we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. (2 Corinthians 5)
Christ is showing the death of evil on the cross. He is taking our lost nature and
redeeming it.
St Gregory the Theologian said this about Christ and the Serpent:[The bronze snake was] not as a type of Him
that suffered for us, but as a contrast; and it saved those that
looked upon it, not because they believed it to live, but because it
was killed, and killed with it the powers that were subject to it,
being destroyed as it deserved. [Death is] overthrown by the Cross;
slain by Him who is the Giver of life;
[Christ] you are without breath, dead, without motion,
even though you keep the form of a serpent lifted up on high on a pole.
(St. Gregory the Theologians Second Paschal Oration, XXII)
Christ would also know of another passage. It should be read with the narrative in
Numbers.

For the one who turned toward it was saved,not by what was seen,but by you, the
saviour of all. For you have dominion over life and death; you lead down to the gates of
Hades and lead back. (Wisdom 16)
It was not the seeing of the Serpent as such that saved the Israelites from snake bite.
Rather I think that it was because they obeyed the will of God. Turning to the bronze
serpent was to turn to God. This was their obedience, and the serpent being erected on the
pole followed their repentance remember.
There are three points, therefore, to draw from todays reading.
It shows the interconnection of both biblical covenants. Scripture is coherent and
consistent, that is, with itself and with the Tradition of the Church. We need to read
Scripture in the light of the Churchs Holy Tradition.
Secondly, we need to turn constantly to Christ. Ignoring the snake on the pole would be
to die of snake bite. Ignoring Christ and Him crucified is to risk far worse.
Thirdly, our lives need infused with constant repentance. Christ has destroyed death and
the power of evil; he dealt with it in His passion. We have to repent to allow this salvation
to work within us. Of course the whole of salvation for each one of us is worked out in
terms of what God did and does for us and through us.
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only begotten Son, that whoever
believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

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Katya
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