The Bungee Cord 7-1-24

Hello,

Do you know what an ophiophilist is? I am not one!

My wife and I were moving some wood that we had cut and split, preparing for the colder weather. The stack of wood had been there over a year, and so we were moving it into our woodshed to be accessible in the winter. About half-way down the stack, we picked up a couple of logs, and something moved…or should I say, slithered. It was a young snake, a garter snake, maybe a foot long. Although it did cause my wife and me to jump a little, due to its size our response was more of a twitch accompanied with a giggle, and we kept on working. However, after moving a couple more logs, there was another slither, and this time the snake was about three feet long. We deduced it was an adult girder snake, and after the snake moved further into the pile, we resumed our work. But that was not the end of it. We moved a couple more logs and “Hello”, another snake. This time it was not a garter snake but was patterned (see the picture that we took of the snake). Not being a herpetologist, a studier of snakes, we weren’t sure what kind of snake we had uncovered. We had heard that copperheads are in our area, so we looked “copperhead snake” on our phone, and sure enough, there was a strong resemblance. Thinking that it might be a copperhead, and not wanting to get it angry, we decided our wood moving was done. I am not an ophiophilist, a snake lover.

But I do know someone who is an ophiophilist: God. I know this about God because, I have found myself snake-like slithering in dark and decaying times of my life, and God has found me. He has found me when I have acted out with biting venom towards those with whom I am angered. He has found me when I have squeezed the life right out of those who are kicked in the teeth over and over again as I have done nothing to change the systemic sins of our world. He has found me when my mouth is a rattle that defensively shakes when my deeds have caused pain and hurt to those whom I love, and those whom I will never know. I, a snake, find myself being found over and over by God as God is at work in God’s world, and here’s the amazing thing: God does not flinch. Instead, God reaches down into the decay and rot that I have caused and takes ahold of me with transformational grace and mercy. That is exactly what God did in Jesus. God reached down into this world in order to gather into his grip all the slithery, sinful snakes and make them a new creation….children of God. You see, God is an ophiophilist, a snake lover….a lover of sinners.

People are often shocked when they see someone exhibit snake-like actions, saying,

“How could a person ever do such a thing?”, and they reflexively pull away from that person. They stop talking to them. They block them from their phone and internet. They walk to the other side of the street when they seem them coming. But in Jesus we have seen that God is not shocked when he finds us slithering, after all we are sinners/snakes, and more important than that we have seen that God does not reflexively distance himself from us, but instead embraces us, forgives us, and loves the snake right out of us.

God is an ophiophilist, a lover of snakes/sinners, an ophiophilist whose love for us is so great that he doesn’t leave us as snakes who spread venom and poison throughout the world, but transforms us snakes/sinners into children of God who wiggle through life spreading God’s grace and mercy.

I am not an ophiophilist….but thankfully, God is!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

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