For God so loved the world that... well... you know.

You know, I had intended to make a particular joke on Sunday, and I missed it. Occupational hazard of being an outline preacher.  The joke I wanted to make was about the GEICO ads, and about how they had generated an honest-to-goodness sitcom, called 'cavemen,' which honestly wasn't that good.

Okay, maybe that sounded better in the original Hebrew.

But here's the deal, is that for a long time GEICO ads were about brand recognition, increasing visibility, and getting their name out there and so on.  But now their name is out there, and out there to the point that now their commercials are getting oddly self-referential.  Take, for example, the strange phenomenon of the GEICO ad in which the beginning of the ad, not the end, states that 15 minutes can save you 15% or more on car insurance.  That used to be the end of the ad, now the ads end by saying 'GEICO, 15 minutes can save you.... well... you know.' 

Do you get this? The ads have become so pervasive and so well known that now, they don't even have to bother with the slogan anymore.  It's a masterpiece of marketing, in which the slogan is understood before the ad has even begun.

Now, compare that with John 3:16.  The most well-known, well quoted verse in all the scriptures.  It's the sort of  thing that shows up constantly, and we have it on pencils, bracelets, Bible covers, laptop cases, posters, and a great deal of other things that I can't even think of right now.  And it's like the GEICO slogan by now, where you could start by saying 'For God so loved the world that.... well..... you know.'

John 3:16, everybody knows that.  But do you know the rest of the issues? It's not just a matter of John 3:16 and the rest of the Bible can go hang.  There's way more to the story, and we do it a disservice by condensing it into one verse.  And the great thing about context is that Jesus basically

demands it in this passage.  If you take a second to look at the reading from Sunday, you'll notice that Jesus begins his discussion with Nicodemas by hearkening back to  the events from the book of Numbers.  Yes, even Jesus himself seems to think that you need context for what happens in Holy Scripture.  But it's more than that, it's about what the context says. 

When Jesus talks about John 3:16, he does so in light of the Old Testament, where there were people who had been bitten by serpents in the wilderness, and who were dying.  Their only hope was to look upon the bronze serpent that Moses had erected up in the wilderness, so that they might live.  They'd been bitten by snakes, and their only hope was to look upon the serpent on the pole, and survive.

Now, skip ahead a few thousand years, and this is still us, you know.  It's not enough for us to say 'John 3:16, for God so loved the world that..... well..... you know.'  What is he saving us from?  He's saving us from the same old snakebites we've always had.  From our first parents until now, from Adam and Eve until the present, we have been plagued by being bitten by the same old serpent, the devil.  He continually bites us and scourges us, and we have been wandering around with the threat of death hanging over us this whole time.  We are winding towards destruction, doomed to die from the venom of this same serpent unless something changes.

And this is the thing about snakebites, which is that you're not just going to buck up and get better.  Dealing with sin isn't a matter of us looking at each other and saying 'gosh you should just smarten up and not be sinful anymore.' It's not that simple, neither with snakebites, nor with sin.  Anyone who claims that you can just decide not to sin, that you can just decide to keep God's commandments if you just try harder, well, they're in denial about what sin really is.  it's an infection.  It's poison. It's a killer. 

You know this, because as Paul found, sin drives you to do what you don't want to do.  It pushes you into being a person you don't want to be.  You make decisions you'd rather not make, you do stuff you'd rather not do, and all in all you're pushed into circumstances that you don't want, because you are a sinner, and as a sinner, you are infected by, and being killed by sin.  And that's what snake venom does, you know.  The toxins in snake venom push your body into places it doesn't want to go, and makes it do things you don't want it to do.  This is how it kills you.  This is how you die, is that your body's processes are pulled around by a chemical that forces it to do what you don't want it to do.

And this is us.  with sin.  We know what we want to do, we are well aware of what we want to accomplish, we know what is the right thing to do, and yet we seem to be pushed into what we don't want to do, and it is killing us.  What's your solution? Trying harder? Doing better? Telling your muscles to stop involuntarily contracting? Or is it to take the antivenin that is offered.

That's what Jesus provides to us at the cross.  He provides life to any and all who might look upon him in faith and believe that he is the cure for our sin. 

Now, if I may indulge in a moment, I remember the most excellent movie of all time being released, 'snakes on a plane.'  Yes, the title is the plot.  And in that movie, you had a bunch of people who had been snakebitten, and who needed antivenin.  But the way the plot worked out was that the various

people who had been bitten needed specific antivenin, corresponding to the specific snake that had bitten them.  It was a major plot point, which meant that they had to hang onto the various breeds of snake to identify them to the scientists and eggheads on the ground.  But the deal with John 3:16, is that God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  No matter your sin, no matter what the sin is that is plaguing you, no matter your level of guilt or shame, the solution is the same.  To look upon Christ, and to live.  To believe in the one who came to vanquish sin, to suck the poison out of your wounds and to give you life abundantly. 

Good Friday, Holy Week, they're all about this - that the Son of Man must be lifted up, that whoever believes in him should have eternal life.  Look up on him.  Gaze upon him.  And live.