The Joshua Victor Theory

Sermon Outline: 1.       Most famous Bible verse, John 3:16—back up two verses and Jesus explains His cross in relation to the bronze serpent, Num. 21:4-9. Grumbling against God and Moses > God sends serpents > people repent > God sends a cure. Bronze serpent—likely detestable for them to look at—yet God’s Word attached to it made it their cure. Look to it and live. So why does Jesus match His cross to this story? Look to Him (believe in Him) when He is raised up, and live. Cross is detestable to many. See there our own sin. Romans meant it to be degrading to the crucified, deterrent to the public. 2.       Sin is our poison, burning wounds, consciences. All “snake-bitten.” Poison is fatal—there is only one cure—Christ crucified. Jesus became “snake-bitten” for us. Old-fashioned remedy for snake bite—suck the poison, draw out the poison. But when the “fangs” of the serpent, the devil, struck Jesus and tried to poison the p...

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Today the sermon will be based on both the Old Testament reading and the Gospel reading. In the same passage of John 3, where we find the famous verse “For God so loved the world…”, Jesus compares His death on the cross to this unusual OT story of the bronze serpent. Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Forty years of wandering in the desert had been God’s punishment to the Israelites for their lack of trust in God to bring them into the Promised Land. Forty years of regrets and a generation of adults who were unable to enter the Promised Land because of their rebellion. Yet also forty years of provision for their needs—God’s heavenly gift of manna, the bread from heaven, and quail to feed them, His miraculous provision for their water and clothing—all by God’s grace, despite their quarrelling and rebellion. Yet here in the middle of it all, after lea...