3/23/10 c-blog, WHEN YOU LOOK AT THE CROSS, DON'T SEE WOOD, SEE JESUS, st. Basil 8a M: "in listening to first reading, bronze serpent..was not an object to be adored, it was a sign of God's care for His people, if they had faith in Him, they would be cured. Look at cross. Don't see wood..see Jesus...John's gospel very simple, "I am". Very clear that Jesus is God. Leaders were disturbed by His teaching.Jesus was more than..He was God...don't adore the cross, its only a reminder what Jesus has done for us...remind us of what Jesus has done.."
Numbersm 21:4-9 "From Mount Hor the children of Israel set out on the Red Sea road, to bypass the land of Edom. But with their patience worn out by the journey, the people complained against God and Moses Why have you brought us up from Egypt to die in this desert, where there is no food or water? We are disgusted with this wretched food!†In punishment the LORD sent among the people saraph serpents which bit the people so that many of them died. Then the people came to Moses and said “We have sinned in complaining against the LORD and you. Pray the LORD to take the serpents away from us. So Moses prayed for the people, and the LORD said to Moses Make a saraph and mount it on a pole, and whoever looks at it after being bitten will live.Moses accordingly made a bronze serpent and mounted it on a pole, and whenever anyone who had been bitten by a serpent looked at the bronze serpent, he lived."
Responsorial Psalm 102:2-3, 16-18, 19-21 R.       (2) O Lord, hear my prayer, and let my cry come to you.
John 8.21-30: "I am going away and you will look for me, but you will die in your sin Where I am going you cannot come. So the Jews said He is not going to kill himself, is he, because he said, 'Where I am going you cannot come? He said to them, 'You belong to what is below, I belong to what is above. You belong to this world but I do not belong to this world. That is why I told you that you will die in your sins. For if you do not believe that I AM, you will die in your sins. So they said to him, Who are you?I have much to say about you in condemnation. But the one who sent me is true, and what I heard from him I tell the world. They did not realize that he was speaking to them of the Father. Jesus said to them, When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will realize that I AM, and that I do nothing on my own, but I say only what the Father taught me The one who sent me is with me He has not left me alone, because I always do what is pleasing to him. Because he spoke this way, many came to believe in him."
