Introduction

Things change! Don’t they? I found that out the hard way when, soon after passing my driving test, I had to head to Dublin for a concert, and against my parent’s advice, I decided I would be the one driving because I wanted to! I had a Sat Nav, so it would not be a problem, and it wasn’t a problem until the concert was over. I was trying to make my way out of the city centre, navigating with maps on a Sat Nav that was three years out of date in a city that had recently changed everything to a one-way system! We don’t often see change happening, and when we realise it – it is usually at the moment we least want to experience it- we realise things have changed. Change is hard, even when things are constantly changing. I remember the joy I had when I started studying in Dublin for the ministry. I no longer had to use that wretched old Sat Nav, but I could use Google Maps on my phone to get to the Church of Ireland College. Change happens around us, even when we don’t see it and think we want it.

Our reading from the book of Numbers is a passage that, at its most basic level, is all about change and how we (as humans) often react to it. The people of God had been enslaved for centuries by Egypt; they had been beaten and broken, and in their prayers, they cried out for rescue. They longed for someone to come and lead them into something better, something different – something more. Yahweh, the God of their ancestors, heard their cry and took it upon himself to rescue them from their slavery and lead them into a promised land by the hand of Moses. Yahweh would be their Protector and guide from the old into the new (change); all they had to do was trust him.

If we are honest, I don’t think we don’t like change because it is always a process and often a hard one. The change process can frustrate us, especially in today’s instant world, where we are so used to things happening instantly. This is true no matter who we are, and when we live, we are blessed to see how true it is at the beginning of our passage from Numbers 21. Remember the context: a people who had been enslaved for 500 years are now walking free under the care and protection of the Lord of the Universe. As they are on the journey God is leading them on, we are told they became impatient and began to speak against God and Moses! What was their complaint? They missed being enslaved people in Egypt because at least there we had something to eat and drink:

“Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no food or water, and we detest this miserable food.”

During the change process that God was leading them on, they decided they would instead go back to what was – because they knew it! It was the most hideous of sins because it spoke against God and all that he had done for them, and in their silliness, we see the reality of the human condition. What is it? We often want all the good that will come from something without any of the work required to get there. We want to be fit and strong without ever going to the gym; we want to lose weight without watching what we eat; and we might want to enjoy the beauty of a whole and vibrant church without changing anything for the people who will join us! Change is challenging because of what it requires from us – moving from what was to what must be.

” God never said that the journey would be easy, but He did say that the arrival would be worthwhile” – Max Lucado.

I. The Prelude of Salvation (Numbers 21:4-9)

The Problem: Sin and Its Consequences

The Israelites’ journey through the wilderness was a journey of Salvation; God said he would lead them out of Slavery into the freedom and beauty of the promised Land, and all they had to do was trust Him fully that he would be their provider, rescuer, defender and sustainer through the process of Salvation to the promised land. Trust and follow was all they had to do, but because the Human heart is inclined away from God, it was something they could never do. We are all sinners who are disposed against God and trust our own devices and desires, even as he leads us into the promised land of life with Him eternally. We see the process of Salvation and the change it must bring in the people God is calling to be with him in our passage from Numbers and our reading from John – that Redemption is a beautiful thing because it changes every aspect of who we are as Sin is wiped away and a tricky thing because it should also change all we exist for as well.

The Provision: A Symbol of Salvation

The Wilderness wondering of the people of God was a journey of redemption to Salvation where God would remove from them all the idols that sin and make them ready for life, and it was a journey that showed us that we needed help from God even while we were on it. The people are judged for their sins and rescued from that judgement by the gracious God after they recognise their sins. How does God rescue them? With the most obscure method, a Bronze snake is lifted high, and anyone who looks upon it will be healed by faith. An obscure act of salvation that finds its explanation at the coming of Jesus. Let us be clear that the bronze serpent being lifted has no power to save in and of itself; it is a mere statue, and it acts for us as a foreshadowing of how God would work in the world. The serpent being lifted is a Symbol of Salvation, a sign of what will come. It was by serpents that judgement came upon the people, and it was by a serpent being lifted that judgement would be dealt with. Our sin deserves the wrath of God, yet, by faith in Christ’s work on the Cross, what our sin deserves is dealt with “The cross is the place where wrath and mercy meet.” – R.C. Sproul.

II. The Parallel of the Cross (John 3:14-15)

Nicodemus approached Jesus under cover of night and asked him about the things of God. In response, Jesus challenged Nicodemus to realise that one can see the Kingdom of God through a miracle of grace. The miracle of new birth! It is imagery that Nicodemus struggles to get his head around as he tries to understand something beyond this world through the lens of this world. A process that leaves him with a sore head as he asks: “How can anyone be born when he is old?” Jesus responds by explaining the new birth of the kingdom of God by faith through the Holy Spirit, and Nicodemus’ sore head becomes a migraine as he ponders: “How can this be?” In response to this question, we enter into Jesus’ passage of speaking, as he has rebuked Nicodemus’ lack of understanding because he chooses to think only with the lens of the flesh rather than heaven. You have the wrong glasses on Nicodemus and the wrong filter on them because you will not see or understand the things of heaven without the lens of heaven.

Christ, Our Bronze Serpent

Thus, while outworking how one can and will be born again by the Spirit, Jesus draws a direct parallel to the strangest act of salvation in the Old Testament – the lifting up the serpent to bring rest from wrath. Nicodemus wanted to know how anyone could be born again; Jesus has already made it clear that it is not a self “new birth” but by the Spirit, and makes clear how it will be possible. It makes it clear that it will not be. Draw parallels between the bronze serpent and Jesus being lifted on the cross. Through Jesus’ work on the Cross, we can know salvation and be born again. Thus, just as all who in the wilderness turned from their sin and looked up to the bronze serpent held high for Mercy from God and received it. So will all who look to the hill of Calvary where Jesus was lifted upon the Cross to bear the wrath of God for our Sin. There is only one way to know the beauty of life with God – by turning from our sins and changing into what God is calling us to be by looking in faith to the saving work of Christ on the cross. An act that saves us and begins the journey of Salvation where God, by his Spirit, will change us from what was into what He wants us to be.

The Call to Believe

So we look to the Cross of Calvary, and then what? We believe (3:15) and receive the gift of eternal life by believing. “Believe” is not just in our head, nor at some level of our heart, but with every fibre of our being. To believe is to have faith and consider accurately what we seek. In the wilderness, it was not the Bronze snake that saved the people, nor even their looks, but their faith in the promise of God to look, and by their looks, that they would receive Mercy. Thus, in the same way, it is not looking to Cross nor imagining it in our heads that will save us. Instead, it is what it symbolises. Jesus explained that the New Birth would come through the Salvation work of God and by believing in it. It is this simple: we can know the beauty of eternal life and joy with God by faith in his Son. Yet, it is most profound because such faith, with its eternity in sight, will transform us today as we are moved to be like Christ. By faith, we find the one all humanity has been looking for; as Elisabeth Elliot says, “Faith does not eliminate questions. But faith knows where to take them.”

III. The Power of Love (John 3:16-17)

Is there a better-known verse in all the Scriptures than John 3:16? Even in our secular world, many still know and find some sense of joy in the 11 words of this verse. Perhaps Psalm 23 still captures the mind of the winder world with Christian imagery, yet it is John 3:16 in its succinctness that is well known and known well. From celebrities tattooing it on their eyelids for Sports games to TV Stars painting it down the side of their truck, John 3:16 is constant in our culture. Even in our normality, for each of us who have grown up in the Church or around the Church through Christian assemblies, Sunday Schools, Holiday Bible clubs, or Christian books, we have at some point come into contact with the beauty and truth of John 3:16. A verse that has been described as the Gospel in a nutshell, a verse that shows us God’s motivation.

God’s Motivation: Love

Why did God send his Son to bring mercy and deal with our most significant problem? Because he needed us for something? No! Because he missed Human Company? No! Because someone made him? No So that humanity might say nice things about God? No! Why then? Because of his love for the world. Jesus came into the world to save it because God loves the world he made, not simply or superficially. The love expressed in verse 16 is Agape love, which you could describe as love that relates and understands, an Empathic love. God looked upon the state of the world and the effects sin had on us and us, and he was moved to do something about it because only he could. It was out of love that God rescued the Israelites from slavery, and it was out of love that God would rescue all who look to the Cross of Christ and believe in him from the eternal slavery of Sin. God saved us because he loves us. God makes a way where there is no way for us out of Love. By faith, God begins the process of Sanctification so that we will be changed from that which was dead to that which is eternally alive because of Love. Even when it becomes hard, we can trust because we know God is only motivated by love.

God moves into the world because he is motivated by his love for the world, me, and you. The question is, do we know this love in our lives? Are we those who believe in Jesus because of the Love of God, or are we still striving for our strength? Then, if we are secure because of love and delight in knowing God, who is motivated by love, we must ponder whether our motivation and movement into the world are inspired by love. As we have received and grown, we delight and go in. The people of God are to be people who know Love and make love into the world so that people can speak of us. The Church family that we are a part of For God so loved this part of the world (Belfast) that he sent the people of St Pauls & St Barnabas out into their part of the world so that people could encounter Jesus. If we have begun the faith journey by love, we must grasp that nothing is static. Love saves us and moves us out because the purpose of Christ’s coming is Salvation and making it known.

The Purpose: Salvation, Not Condemnation

Jesus’s coming is to make salvation known to all people. What is salvation? It is the restoration of that which was broken! The Salvation of Christ takes that which was broken, destroyed, and dead because of our Sin and restored it to its whole and beautiful state. We are enteral beings made to dwell and delight with God who only knows death by Sin; the Salvation won by the Cross and brought by love restores what we were made for – life with God.

Discuss God’s desire for the world’s salvation through Jesus. The first coming of Jesus was to bring Salvation, not condemnation, so that everyone who believes in Jesus will know the Joy of eternal life. That means once we know this beautiful truth, we go out into the world where God has placed us so that others can come to know this restoring relationship. As we walk the road of Salvation, empowered by the Holy Spirit who will outwork our salvation in Scantification, then as the Spirit bears fruit through our whole life worship and loving of one another (as Christ commanded), people will naturally encounter the same love of God, and be drawn by the Spirit into the same Love, as we get “God’s work done in God’s way will never lack God’s supplies.”( Hudson Taylor) because God loves us and delights in our making his love known. Why do we do this? Because it is the call of the great commission, the natural outworking of our Kingdom life and in response to the urgency of the hour because although the Son was not sent to bring condemnation, there will come a day when he will come again in love to Judge the sins of the world and condemn evil to its final resting place.

IV. The Practice of Faith (John 3:18-21)

The Division: Belief and Unbelief

In the canvas of life, a vivid division emerges, painted in the hues of belief and unbelief. This dichotomy isn’t just theoretical; it’s a lived reality that influences our decisions, interactions, and, ultimately, our destiny. John’s Gospel draws this line distinctly, not to segregate, but to invite us in with this gospel truth.

As we stand in our everyday normal, this division is ever-present. It’s in our daily choices, responses to life’s challenges, and how we perceive those around us. I urge you to ponder deeply: Where do you stand? Are you walking in the light of belief, trusting in the transformative power of Christ’s love, or are you lingering in the shadows of unbelief, hesitant to step forward? This isn’t just about affirming a set of doctrines but embracing a way of life that acknowledges Christ as Lord in every aspect of our existence and teaches us to delight in the love that God has sent.

The Evidence of Faith: Coming to the Light

“But anyone who lives by the truth comes to the light so that his works may be shown to be accomplished by God.” This verse encapsulates the essence of genuine faith. Living by the truth isn’t a passive stance; it’s an active, daily decision to align our lives with the light of Christ’s teachings. Then, by the Holy Spirit working in us, Christ’s truth will illuminate our paths and guide our actions. In the heart of Belfast, where every street holds opportunities to grow God’s kingdom and share his love, our faith must be the beacon that lightens the darkness of this world. It demands transparency and a willingness to be seen for who we indeed are, and our deeds reflect the love and grace we’ve received. As Francis Chan profoundly states, “Our greatest fear should not be of failure but of succeeding at things in life that don’t matter.” In our pursuit of faith, let us not be sidetracked by the fleeting glories of this world but focus on living out our faith through actions that reveal God’s work in us. This is how we testify to the truth of our belief, not just in the sanctuaries and quiet corners of prayer but in the bustling streets of our city, among the people God has called us to love and serve.

Conclusion:

As we journey together, we’ve traversed from the wilderness of rebellion to the cross of salvation, encountering the profound love of God that transcends time, culture, and geography. In the heart of this city, amid its bustling life and complex history, this message of Calvary Love calls us to a deeper faith. A faith that is not merely professed but lived out in the light of Christ’s truth. Let us, therefore, embrace this call with courage and humility in the power of the Holy Spirit and allow our lives to display the love that has transformed us. As we depart from this place, let us carry the light of Christ into every corner of our city, knowing that in Him, we find the strength to face change, the grace to overcome, and the promise of eternal life. May God use us as one body and individual disciples to be a testament to the world of his love and Glory made known Supremely on Calvary, where he dispelled darkness and made it possible for all of us to understand His marvellous light.