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Welcome to Mariners Church Weekend Message Podcast. Inspiring people to follow Jesus and fearlessly change the world. Discover your purpose and get connected by visiting MarinersChurch.org or click the link in the show notes.
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Well, good morning, church. Good morning. Happy fourth of July weekend. Did we have fun blowing stuff up last night? Did we have fun? Yeah. Yeah. Well, now you're here with bang. And so we're gonna keep blowing stuff up. If we haven't met, my name is Steve Angley. I'm one of the pastors. It's an absolute joy to be with you here this morning. Hey, quick show of hands. Raise your hand if you own or you know someone that owns a rubber duck. Not a trick question, but yet you own. Okay, follow up question. Raise your hand if you regularly talk to or you know someone that regularly talks to their rubber duck. Yeah, not. Not too many of you. And in fact, even if that was like your thing, like your hobby, your favorite thing to do in the entire world, this probably should not be the moment of your great reveal. I don't recommend that you go post this and announce this on Instagram anytime soon. And in fact, if you found out that you saw me walking down the street talking to a rubber duck, followed by my four kids, like little ducklings talking to their own rubber duck, you should probably call the police. That's what you should do. You should probably call the police. But what if I told you that talking to a rubber duck was actually a proven method for problem solving? Rubber duck debugging, or rubber ducking, is a concept that first emerged in the software engineering world. One of the authors from a book called the Pragmatic Programmer, tells a story about a man named Greg who was one of the best software engineers that he had known. And he noticed that anytime Greg would run into a coding issue, sure enough, Greg would pull out from his backpack his yellow rubber duck and he would begin to explain. Explain the coding issue. And the author writes, the act of explaining, step by step, what the code is supposed to do often causes the problem to leap off the screen and announce itself. So verbally processing to a rubber duck actually solve problems. Strange, bizarre, odd. But effective. I share that because this morning, as we dive into and continue our series in the Book of Numbers, we're going to actually see God resolve a problem in the lives of people in a really bizarre and strange way. But when we get underneath the hood of this story, we're actually going to find out it's actually about God's bizarre and strange love for you. But I'm Getting ahead of myself. First, let's find out what the problem was in the lives of God's people. Numbers 21, verse 4. Then they set out from Mount Hore by way of the Red Sea to bypass the land of Edom. But the people became impatient because of the journey. The people spoke against God and Moses, why have you led us up from Egypt to die in the wilderness? There's no bread or water and we detest this wretched food. Then the Lord sent poisonous snakes among the people and they bit them so that many Israelites died. Okay, so God's people grumbled against God and so God sends poisonous snakes to bite them. And now they're dying in the wilderness. So welcome to church. Just a totally normal passage in the scriptures. Wow. Okay, what's going on here? Is God overreacting? Because, you know, my four kids, they complain all the time and I haven't locked them up in their room with a poisonous snake yet. Like, what's actually going on here? Well, I think the text told us that what's happening is that the people are not innocently bringing up a request against to God as much as they are actually accusing God's character. They're. They're not innocently bringing up a request to God as much as they're assuming the absolute worst about God. We know this because of the, the series of their accusations. Do you notice what it said? They said, why? Why have you led us up from Egypt to die in the wilderness? There's no bread or water and we detest this wretched food. So do you notice the layers of accusation? So first they accuse God of having murderous intentions. They're like, you brought us out here so you could kill us yourself. I mean, that's intense. But secondly, they accuse God of being negligent. They're like, you're an awful provider. Do you notice their contradiction? Do you notice how they contradict themselves? They're like, you don't provide us with any food. You don't give us any food. We hate the food that you give us. It's nonsensical. It's illogical. They're not making any sense because that wasn't their goal. Their goal was not to make sense. Their goal was to accuse God of not making sense. This is character assassination. And at its finest, this is a full frontal assault on the very nature and character of God. This is not backstabbing. This is front stabbing. And for what? Because God rescued his people out of oppression and walked with them step by step for 40 years in the journey and this is how they repay God. Back in 2012, the BBC released a report about a lifeguard who was flying fired for leaving his zone and station to rescue a drowning man. So as you can imagine, there was public outcry. How could you fire a lifeguard for trying to rescue a drowning man? But what's happening in our story would be akin to. As if the man who was rescued from drowning, as if he's the one who fires the lifeguard himself. As if he's rescued from drowning, then is given housing and food for 40 years. And then concludes, hey, Mr. Lifeguard, you're awful. Life was better when I was drowning in the ocean. You're fired. That's a little bit of what's happening in our story. It's a slap in God's face. How could they respond this way to God? How could created things respond to their creator in this way? Well, there's different theories are proposed to try to explain. One of these theories is that it's circumstantial that it's circumstances. So this theory says, hey, you know, even the best of people, I mean, you put them in a bad circumstance and they'll turn pretty bad. Now, to be fair, their circumstances were bad. We know this because of the hint that was given in the first line of the passage that we just read. It read this way. Then they set out from Mount Hor by way of the Red Sea sea to bypass the land of Edom. Now, for you and I, boring geography for them. That was an emotionally loaded statement. So maybe this visual will help. So right now, they're around Mount Hor. You see that yellow star? That's where they are. And they're headed to the land of Canaan. Which means after 40 years, they see the light at the end of the tunnel. They can smell it. It's right there. And guess what? There's a shortcut. There's a shortcut through the kingdom of Edom, called the King's Highway. But this kingdom of Edom, that is, they blocked off this passage, which you can read about in the previous chapter, which meant that God's people had to go back down south. They had to backtrack and go all the way around Edom. Okay, can we just be humble and confess this morning, you and I are not even the best people when we need to make a U turn on the freeway. Can we admit that? Like, how do you think I react when after a busy, chaotic morning getting my kids ready for school and we're just about to make it on time and then one of my kids say, oops, I forgot my lunch. How do you think I react? How do you think I react as a godly dad, as a pastor who loves Jesus and wants to serve his people? Here's how I react. I say, then you must starve. You must pay for your crimes against humanity is how I react. So they backtrack. So some will say, see, it's circumstances. But, see, I think God would offer a different diagnosis. See, God in his infinite wisdom, would not say circumstances. God would say it's a condition, that it's a spiritual condition of the heart. And that's why God sent these snakes. He didn't send these snakes as some petty form of retaliation. No, no, no. God was actually trying to pull back the curtain to let him know what was actually going on. He wanted them to know that there were deeper spiritual realities at play. Namely, that long before these snakes and ever showed up in the wilderness, that they had already been bitten, they had already been poisoned, that there was spiritual venom already coursing through their souls and their hearts. How do we know this? Well, for the people in the story, this concept of a snake would not have been new for them. In fact, if we go all the way back beyond their history, all the way back to the very beginning of humankind, the history of humankind in the garden. We know that there was a snake in the garden. There was a snake in the garden. So God had created a perfect and beautiful world. We know that he created Adam and Eve. He placed them in a garden with unlimited provision and his very own presence. But then when the serpent appeared, remember what he did? He started assassinating God's character. Remember? Hey, you guys good here? You guys happy? Are you sure you're happy? Is Amazon prime working here? Yeah. Did God actually say. And when Adam and Eve believe the serpent's lies, and when they sinned, when they sinned by biting the fruit, in that moment, sin bit. Sin dug its fangs into their hearts and their souls, poisoning them and all of humanity and killing every single one of us spiritually. We have all been spiritually poisoned, every single one of us. And that explains our strange, insatiable thirst. Have you noticed that for human beings, nothing is ever enough? Nothing is ever enough for us. We can never be happy, satisfied, or content. And in fact, here's how bad it is. We don't even think God. God is enough for us. This has been the condition of every single generation of humanity since the fall in the garden. And in fact, every new generation arises with new ideas. And ways to be happy with brand new technologies to accelerate our joy. And it's never ever enough. Why? Because we've been spiritually poisoned. That is our condition. It's not circumstance. If anything, our circumstances simply reveal and expose our pre existing underlying condition. And that's why God sent these snakes in the wilderness, because he wanted them to know what their true condition was. Some Bible scholars have said that one of the effects from the bite of a certain kind of snake in this region in the wilderness would have been an intense, insatiable thirst. See, the thirst in the wilderness was supposed to mirror the intense, insatiable spiritual thirst of humanity. The poisonous bite in the wilderness was a mirror of the poisonous bite from the garden. The death in the wilderness was an echo of the death that already happened on account of the fall. We have a problem. We have a spiritual problem. We have a sin problem, and we desperately need a cure. Now someone's here this morning and maybe you're exploring this thing called Christianity. We're glad you're here. And maybe there's a part of you asking like, are you sure we have a problem? Because like, I get the people in the story, but they're like ancients, they're primitive. But look at us today. We have so much more modern knowledge. We're so much more advanced and sophisticated than people back then. But are we really, like, are you really happy, satisfied and content all the time? Are people around us always happy with our unlimited options and our Amazon prime, which in five years is going to become Amazon now? We're never happy. And in fact, I wonder if that's exactly what the people in our story may have thought. See, the people who were being bitten, they were largely comprised of the second generation of God's people in the wilderness. The first generation, all those who grumbled and complained, the vast majority of them had pretty much died off. This was now a near rising generation. And they may have thought, just like you and I, we're not going to be like them. We're going to be way more sophisticated and spiritually advanced than they are. But you know what? They were just like like them. They were just like them biologically, they were just like them spiritually. And you and I today were just like them in the wilderness, going all the way back to those who fell in the garden. We have a sin problem and we need a cure. And here was God's cure for them in the wilderness. The people then came to Moses and said, we have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you. Intercede with The Lord, so that he will take the snakes away from us. And Moses interceded for the people. Then the Lord said to Moses, make a snake image and mount it on a pole. When anyone who is bitten looks at it, he will recover. So Moses made a bronze snake and mounted it on a pole. Whenever someone was bitten, he looked at the bronze snake and he recovered. Show of hands, anyone work in the medical field? Show of hands, anyone in the medical field? Yeah. If you do, this symbol, this visual of a snake wrapped around the pole probably rings a bell for you, right? Because this symbol or this insignia is a sign that we see all over hospital or medical related things. And it's actually the oldest sign, and it's symbolic of healing. It's the oldest sign, sign of healing that we have today. So for us, this is not strange at all. This is very common. But think about how strange this must have been for our people in the story, because they're dying. They're dying from the bites of the snakes. And then they see their wise spiritual leader, Moses, making an image of a snake, the very thing that's killing them, putting it on a pole and says, hey, guys, you guys want to live? Look at the thing that's killing you. It must have been absolutely disorienting and baffling for them in the wilderness. Wait, Moses, let me just get. Because I know you hear from God. So let me just get this straight. You want me to look at a picture of the very thing that's killing me right now? Oh, the thing that ruined all of humanity? That's what you want me to look at? To be healed. And in fact, it gets worse. In the garden, after the serpent deceived Adam and Eve, do you remember what happened to the serpent? It got cursed. The serpent got cursed by God. The serpent was a cursed thing. So you want me to look at the cursed thing to be cured. So to be cured of this poison? Look at the cursed thing. That would have been one of the most bizarre, bizarre and baffling things that people had ever heard. It would have sounded like foolishness, utter and complete foolishness. And yet, for those that looked, that foolishness was power. Power to heal and rescue. And this power and foolishness has everything to do with you today and the heart of the Christian faith. So approximately 1500 years after this bizarre event, one of the earliest thinkers of the Christian faith, by the name of Paul, he would describe the core message of the Christian faith in this way in First Corinthians 1. For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. But it is the power of God to us who. Who are being saved. So Paul is saying the core message of the cross, which is the core message of Christianity, which is centered on the cross, it looks foolish, but it's actually power. Well, what happened on the cross? What happened on the cross? Jesus was lifted up. Jesus, the Son of God, the Son of man, was raised up and lifted up on the cross, just like how the bronze serpent was lifted up on the pole. In fact, Jesus himself makes this very connection. John 3. Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of man must be lifted up so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. So Jesus is saying, just as the bronze serpent was lifted up to give life, the Son of man must be lifted up to give eternal life. But how could Jesus make this comparison? He's nothing like the serpent. I mean, they're exact opposites. The serpent was a liar. Jesus has never lied. The serpent, he came to kill, steal and destroy. Jesus came to give life and life abundant. They're nothing alike. So how could Jesus make this comparison? Here's why. Because of the spiritual template that was laid forth in the wilderness. Do you remember what that spiritual template was? The spiritual template that looked foolish but had power. Here it is. That the cursed thing can become the cure. That the thing that is cursed by God can become the cure. And when Jesus our Savior was lifted up on that cross, he was cursed. Jesus was cursed by God when he was lifted up on that cross. Why? Because he absorbed in his life all the spiritual poison that was flowing through our hearts for all of our sins. You know, your really big sins, the ones that you hope no one ever finds out, or the little ones, the ways that we've hurt other people, the things that we regret, the things that we don't regret but probably should because of sin's deceiving power. All of it was laid on Jesus. See, the spiritual poison flowing through us was injected into Jesus spiritual bloodstream. But in turn, Jesus righteousness, his goodness and perfection gets injected into our spiritual blood bloodstream. His life, his righteousness, his perfection. It becomes the antivenom, the antidote, the cure for you and I. Paul, put it this way. In second Corinthians 5, God made the one Jesus who did not know sin to be sin. For us, he was cursed so that in Jesus we might become the righteousness of God. The one that was cursed becomes the cure. Jesus was spiritually cursed that he might become your spiritual cure. That is the Gospel, that's the good news of the Christian faith. It looks foolish, but it has power. And here's the relevance for you and I this morning. If you have placed your trust in Jesus, this means that this morning you can be fully satisfied in knowing that you can rest fully in his love. You're already secure in his love. You've already received his love in full. So rest, relax, and be at peace. See, someone walked into church this morning, and you walked in, kind of feeling like you've had to tiptoe around God. See, you've been throughout the worship and the announcements, you've been kind of looking over your shoulders, feeling a little antsy and anxious because you actually don't know how God feels about you this morning. And here's why. Because you screwed up recently, you messed up, or you've been living in a way where you know your life has been inconsistent with the way that a follower of Jesus should be living now. Conviction is good. I mean, we shouldn't live our lives in sin and feel no remorse. So conviction and repentance are beautiful things. But if we're not careful, we can actually listen to the second lie of the serpent, which says, hey, because you did those things or didn't do those things, I think God feels differently about you. I don't think God feels the same way anymore. And you will never say this out loud, but you can actually think, I don't know if I deserve God's love right now. I mean, I mean, I'm at church after blowing stuff up last night, but I just don't know if I deserve God's love this morning. I don't know if I deserve his love. And here's the good news for you. I agree with you. You don't deserve it. You don't deserve his love. None of us deserve God's love. But that's the point. That's the point of God's grace. He gives it to you anyways. God pours out his love in full for you anyways. That's the point of God's grace. You have his love in full already. And how he's demonstrated that the ultimate proof, the ultimate evidence that you already have his love is that he was already raised up on the cross. The cross is the ultimate proof that you have his love. Now, if a moment ago you. You didn't clap because you're not sure, let me prove it to you. Okay, so you remember this passage we read earlier where Jesus compares himself being raised up to the bronze serpent being raised up. Do you know what Bible passage follows immediately afterwards? It surprises a lot of people. It's the most famous passage in all the Scriptures, John 3:16. For God loved the world in this way. He gave his one and only Son so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. Jesus is saying, here is the ultimate demonstration that God has already poured out his love for you in full. Here's the proof. Here's the sign. Here's the evidence. Jesus was raised up on the cross. And you think that because you sinned and failed him recently, he. He's going to feel differently about you this morning. He's already given you his son. He's already given you his son. There's nothing else that he withholds. He's already given you everything. There is not a drop or an ounce of his love that he's withholding from you. This morning, in this moment, for those of you who've trusted Jesus, he's already proven that he loves you with his entire being. And you can rest in that. Because Jesus was lifted up. Yeah. Now someone is still like that. Sounds beautiful. I agree with it intellectually. Here's why I just can't experience it. It's because my faith just feels so small and my sin feels so great. Okay, let's rubber ducky this thing. Okay? Let's process this aloud together. Okay? Let's solve it. Let's go back to our story for a moment. Let's use our imagination and have some fun. Don't you think? There were all kinds of people that were cured that day at the camp, for example. There was probably someone. They got bitten by the smallest snake in the camp. They received the smallest amount of poison, little sin. And when this person looked at the bronze serpent, they looked with utmost confidence. Small sin, great faith. Were they healed? Yes, they were. But now there was probably some dude, and it was a dude for sure who was the unluckiest guy in the camp that day. Why? Because he got bitten by the largest snake in the camp. He got the most amount of poison that day, like three gallons minimum. Three gallons minimum. Just coursing through his veins. Okay. And he's cynical and he's pessimistic and has the fever. And as the thirst is settling in, he's like, this is ridiculous. I'm not. I'm not looking at the snake. I'm not looking at the snake. But eventually he reluctantly glances. Was he healed? Was he healed? Was he healed any less than the person with great faith and small sin? No. Why? Because the power does not lie in the intensity of your faith. The power lies in the one who was intensely faithful. It's about Jesus. Yeah, but what about my great sin? It's really great. And where your sin abounds, God's grace and love abounds all the more. So you got small faith, you got great sin. Bring it to him. He can handle it. He's an amazing savior. Okay, now someone's like, this is great, but it sounds too good to be true. I'm exploring the Christian faith. This feels really passive right now. Where's my contribution? All the other faith systems, there's. There's earning involved. Where's my earning? Let's. Robert, Ducky, the thing again. Let's process out loud together. In our story, when God commanded Moses, hey, tell the people to look. Was there any other action required besides looking? No. God did not say, hey, Moses, tell the people they gotta look. But before they look, they gotta suck out as much of the venom from their bitten areas as possible. They gotta work really hard. Like 85% of the poison needs to be sucked out first, and then they can look. He did not say that. He did not say. They need to run as close to the pole as possible. So those who are far off in the camp, sprint. Sprint with all your might. And then look. He did not say that. All God said was look. You know what's crazy? He did not even qualify the quality of the looking. God did not say look. Intently gaze for 30 seconds without blinking. Nothing. Just look. And in the same way we're invited, just believe. Just believe in the precious Jesus who was lifted up on the cross. You're like, did you say behave? I did not say behave. Belief. Oh, so it's 99% believing, but, like, 1% behave. It's 100% belief. Because here's why. For all of humanity who. Who has been bitten, we know what behavior we bring. Nothing. Zero. We bring a big fat zero. Zero percent behaving. But when we look up at the precious Jesus, who is our savior, 100% forgiven. And in this moment, you are 100% loved. You are loved with a strange, bizarre, unusual love. And I think there's only one way God's people can respond, and that's the same. And celebrate. So, people of God, let's all stand together to our feet. He is a beautiful, powerful savior. Let's sing. Sing and give him praise. All right. Extend your hands, please, and let me pray a prayer of blessing over you as we go. Jesus, I pray you'd bless your sons and daughters this week that you would remind them that you are gentle and approachable and that you love them. Cause your face to shine on them. I pray they will experience your mercy and your joy this new week. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen. Go in peace. Have a great week.
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Thanks for tuning in to the Mariners Weekend Message Podcast to support the ministry of Mariners Church. You can click the link in the show notes or download the Mariners app at your favorite app store. If you've been navigating God's wisdom with us through this year's annual read and would like to hear personal reflections from pastors in your community, check out the Gospel Every Day podcast. Imagine feeding your heart, mind and soul with the kind of practical wisdom that will change your life. If you haven't picked up the annual read yet, visit MarinersChurch.org or download the Mariners app for more information on where to find it. Sa.