“Addicted to the Cross

Fourth Sunday in Lent

March 10, 2024

Numbers 21:4-9

John 3:14-21

I’m beginning to come to terms with the reality that I’m a bit of a compulsive eater. Not anything extreme, but I find that when I feel yucky in my body, I try to fix it with food. Especially when I am anxious or sad, I turn to food to comfort and calm. Not surprisingly, I can rarely find a food or dish that actually offers what I’m looking for. And yet, though I know these things in my head, I will still reach for something to eat. Bored? Eat. Worried? Eat. Sad? Eat. Angry? Eat. Happy? Eat! It’s a battle inside that my best self seldom wins.

I can only imagine the challenges that people with severe addictions must go through. You can have all the right intentions and still undo it all in a second. And what makes food addiction so annoying is that food is a necessity. It’s socially acceptable to eat in public. It’s expected. In fact, it’s often encouraged. How many of our gatherings for church and other social events revolve around food? And so, the battle wages on.

So, it’s not difficult to put myself in the mindset of the Hebrews leaving Egypt. They’ve already been on the road for a while. They’ve complained of having no food, so God sent manna every morning to gather and eat. And God sent quail every evening to catch and cook. Manna every morning. Quail every evening. Lord, give me a steak and some ice cream, already! And maybe some Twizzlers. How long can someone eat the exact same thing every blessed day? Apparently, for forty years. Can you imagine?

I would complain, too. We have no bread! We have no water! Though God did provide both in abundant measure. And we can’t stand another day of this terrible food. So, God sends venomous snakes to bite and kill the people. Well, I suppose that might stop me from worrying so much about food, but it does feel like a bit of an overreaction. We already know that the desert is filled with venomous snakes and scorpions, so perhaps the narrator of this story is ascribing a bit more to God than necessary.

In any case, the people realize their mistake and ask Moses to pray to God to remove the snakes—to remove the consequences of their sin. Their sin being that they refused God’s grace and provision. But God doesn’t remove the snakes. Instead, God has Moses craft a pole with a statue of a venomous snake at the top. Those who are bitten must literally face their sinfulness in order to be healed. It’s not enough to keep rescuing the people time and time again if they don’t learn from the experience.

In the movie, “Four Good Days,” heroine addict Molly is told that she needs to stay clean for four more days in order to be prepared to receive a medicine that will help her through her addiction. This seems like an impossible feat. Her parents have nearly given up on her but stick it out with her anyway. At some point, her former middle school teacher asks her to talk about her experience to her class.

Molly tells about how, though she got straight A’s, never graduated high school. How she robbed her parents blind in order to get her next hit. How she sold her body for money. How she did unspeakable things to get through the day.

At one point, one of the girls in the class says, “I’m sorry, it’s just. . . . I would never let myself fall that far.” Molly’s response? “Do you know how many times I told myself that? That I’m not going to let myself steal to get high? That I’m not going to let myself lose custody of my children to get high?” How many times did she pray to God to remove the addiction? And it didn’t happen.

It's easy enough to think about all the things you would or wouldn’t when you’re comfortable, healthy, and in a good place. But when you’re in the midst of the challenges—when you’re a person living in Nazi Germany who doesn’t know who to believe; when you’re a Palestinian simply trying to keep your home; when you’re an addict in the throes of detox; when you just want to get through the day—all the logic in the world won’t crack the shell of sin.

This is what Jesus is telling Nicodemus, the Pharisee who went to visit him in the cover of darkness. Jesus has just finished telling him that one must be reborn in the Spirit in order to enter God’s realm and that the Holy Spirit blows where she chooses like the wind. We have no control over God—not even if we follow all of the rules. Because regardless how righteous we might be, we still bend toward sin.

Therefore, just like the snake lifted up on the pole during the Hebrews’ wilderness journey, the one sent from God must be lifted up. Just like the people who complained must look at the consequences of their sin, so must all of humanity reckon with the consequences of sin. Most scholars will translate Jesus’ death as being ‘for’ our sin, but the Greek in the phrase could just as easily be translated as ‘by’ our sin. Jesus died ‘by’ our sin. And God does not promise to simply remove the consequences—just as God didn’t remove the snakes in the wilderness—just as God doesn’t remove our addictions.

Instead, we must face the consequences of sin. Just as Molly had to face her family and see—really see—what her addiction had done. It had hurt the very ones she loved and who loved her the most. And whether our addiction is one of drugs or food or, more likely, addictions of comfort, convenience, safety, and self-righteousness, healing comes when we come face to face with the ones whom we have hurt. When we recognize what we’ve done—what we’ve been doing—and we ask for forgiveness. And we forgive.

Perhaps this is something the Roman Catholic Church does well—to keep the figure of Jesus on the cross so that we are reminded that our sin of self-satisfaction always leads to the death of the One who loves us most. But perhaps we might add other bodies to that cross—bodies of those we tend to forget we’ve hurt. The bodies of immigrants seeking asylum; the bodies of trans kids beaten or who died by suicide; the bodies of those who work in sweatshops so that we can have cheap clothes; the bodies of extinct animals who died out for our travel independence; the bodies of whole ecosystems destroyed alongside forests.

“For God so loved the world that God gave the Only Son, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.” We tend to read that as some formula for personal salvation. If I believe, I’ll go to heaven. But that’s not what Jesus is saying at all. “God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” The world. This is bigger than individual faith. This is bigger than individual sins. This is how our world experiences healing. By facing the consequences of our sin and changing our ways. Collectively. Communally.

Which means that belief isn’t about agreeing with the ‘fact’ of Jesus and his death. Belief is an action. It’s returning every day, every hour, sometimes every minute to face the cross and learn how to be better. To appreciate the gracious provision of life that God has already offered. Because—and I believe this with my whole heart—God has already made provision for every individual and all of creation to be reborn and restored and recreated on the last day. Our work here isn’t to somehow convince God not to give up on us. Our work, instead, is to not give up on each other. We’re already promised eternal life. The challenge is to live abundant life.

If it were not true, Jesus would have stepped off that cross and said, “Nevermind. It’s too hard. They’ll never change.” Jesus’ death was, ironically, a result of his life—a life filled with truth, with hope, with care and compassion—a life that we fear so much that we can’t let it live. And yet, Jesus calls us to follow him, for the sake of the world. Not because we think it will save us but because we are already saved. Because we need not fear death. There is more to life than safety and more to living than being comfortable. There is more to love than ecstasy and more to hope than being fearless. And God will do whatever it takes to reach us in the midst of our various addictions, even though it leads to God’s own death.

That is the good news of the cross.

Pastor Tobi White

Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church

Lincoln, NE