When you are sick someone needs to bring you medicine. When you are really sick, hiding it or trying to push through the symptoms makes things worse. Medicine takes the sickness away so that you can get back to playing, learning and living. We were all sick with sin even before we were born and still in our mom’s belly. We were really sick with sin, which made us sad, impatient, selfish and not listen to our parents when they tell us good things. Jesus took away our sins so that we get to go to heaven and get to play, learn and live a life that is happy, patient, kind, helpful, loving and respectful to our parents.
The remedy for sickness does not always make sense to us. We grumble when medicine does not taste good, even questioning its healing ability based on the flavor; the phrase “It tastes like cough syrup,” is not a complement. The remedy God prescribed for Israel in our Old Testament did not make sense. The Israelites needed healing because they grumbled against God, so he sent venomous snakes to bite them, and many Israelites died.
Then, the people when to Moses confessing their sins and asking for him to pray that the Lord would take the snakes away. God’s response is recorded in Numbers 21, 8 The Lord said to Moses, “Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.” 9 So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived.
The remedy made no sense because a bronze snake on a pole has no inherent medicinal properties, but something else made even less sense, God’s promise. Israel confidently blamed God for the situation they were in, but they did not trust God to provide, love and guide them into the promised land. Their sin caused a restless, grumbling against God, which God punished. And then, God healed them making God’s grace the remedy that made no sense.
We follow the same pattern as Israel. In our New Testament reading from Ephesians 2, Paul wrote, 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. These words God gave to Paul to write down are timeless; their truth stretches back to convict Israel of restless grumbling against God who delivered them, and forward to convict us for the cravings of our flesh.
Though we foolishly focus on outward differences, we are all made of the same sinful flesh. Our sinful brain and heart house our sinful thoughts and feelings, which control the muscles in our lips, tongue, hands and feet leading them to do sinful things. Gratifying your cravings may happen in private or public, you might never talk about them or you might overshare, you may work hard to rationalize your sin or you might say “I’m sorry” and “forgive me” to put up a good image, but inside you doubt and worry because you keep going back to your sins.
Your craving may be for someone else’s spouse who would fulfill you, to have someone else’s children or parents rather than your own, or to have a relationship or identity outside of God’s intention with Adam and Eve, male and female. Submitting to these cravings leaves you with doubt that your spouse, kids, family, friends, brothers and sisters in Christ, pastor and God would love you. These cravings, sins and doubts leave you feeling alone facing God’s wrath but remember all of us have these cravings and sins. You are not alone.
The pattern of sin was broken for you by Jesus. The remedy for God’s wrath against you for gratifying the cravings of your flesh is Christ for us, as we read in Ephesians 2, 1 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins… 3 … Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. You are not alone.
God made you alive with Christ. You are included in God made “us” alive when “we” were dead, and “you” have been saved. Because of his great love for you, God chose you to be saved when you were dead, submitting to, not struggling against, but submitting to, engaged with and caught in sin.
Just like God saved the Israelites when they were caught in their sin, God came to save you through his Son, Jesus. In our Gospel reading from John 3, we hear what the bronze snake foreshadowed, 14 Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him. Jesus broke the pattern of sin by being lifted up on the wooden cross to die for our sins. He was the remedy for our restlessness, grumbling, sin and death.
He was the fulfillment of the passage on the banner we hang up during the season of Lent from Isaiah 53, 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. God’s remedy makes no sense because the wrath of God against our sins was assigned to someone else, which fulfilled another verse from Isaiah 53, 9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.
Without gratifying sinful cravings, Jesus was the innocent sacrifice given for us because of God’s love as we read in 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. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. You have been saved through Jesus.
You have been reassigned from death to life. When we are restless with our lives like Israel, it is so tempting to grumble against God, blame him for our circumstances, then work to fix ourselves or change our circumstances, but we cannot reassign ourselves a new identity to escape our restlessness. God’s word teaches that we all ought to be uncomfortable with ourselves because of our sinful cravings and sins, and that we cannot save ourselves because we are dead in our sins. God’s Word also gives the comforting message of God’s work for us and on us. The new life, identity, forgiveness and belonging we all need only came to us by the pierced hands and mutilated flesh of God.
You are God’s handiwork. When you are restless, grumbling, gratifying cravings and struggling with your identity, the remedy you need is found in Ephesians 2, 8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Your rest is in God because he gave you the gift of faith in Christ who saved you from all your sins past, present and future.
The work to save you is done, no wondering. You have a list of reasons to be thankful in Christ. You have good things to crave in Christ. You have been reassigned an identity by the expert hands of God who set the border of the seas, coded the metamorphosis of the butterfly and put the rainbow in the sky.
These verses from Ephesians 2 describe the Christian life. The Christian life is a struggle between drifting away from God back to the unsustainable cravings of sinful flesh, confusion and false hopes, and back to people driven cures for spiritual death and disconnect from God. In those moments, you need God’s healing.
These are moments of repentance to God who gives the healing through grace, mercy, forgiveness and peace. The Christian life is also embracing the new life God has given you. It is living out the good works prepared for you by God. It is the life described in our Gospel reading from John 3, 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God. Your life is in Christ because God chose to perform a reassignment on you in Christ by grace through faith. Point others to the light, to Jesus, to the Word of God, it is the only place to find grace, love, identity, life and purpose.
You need medicine when you are sick. You need Jesus for your sins. Our sins make grumbling and gratifying our flesh common, and they keep us from talking about Jesus. God has given you life, defeated the devil and provided you with the truth. Talk about difficult things like fleshy cravings, sin, death, the devil and lies of the world because like the rest, we all have sins; we all need healing and hope. The Bible, Bible study, gathering together for worship and having a personal professional pastor will point you to boast in God’s saving grace, 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Give thanks because your reassignment came from God. Amen.
Gunnar Ledermann
I’m passionate about Rockwall’s vibrant community and actively engage with local non-profits and community organizations, including the Rockwall Chamber of Commerce, the City of Rockwall, and the Downtown Rockwall Association. My background includes a bachelor’s degree in Classical Languages and a master’s degree in divinity. Currently serving as a pastor at Divine Peace Church in Rockwall, I also enjoy spending time with my wife, Marinda, and our three children.
