Tuesday of the 5th week of Lent
First reading – Numbers 21:4-9
This episode in the book of numbers represents our spiritual life. The people lost patience. They spoke against God and against Moses. They questioned their own liberation. They gave more importance to the taste of food than the taste of the liberation given by God. Then they were bitten by fiery serpents which brought death. Seeing the death, people repented and confessed. Lord gave the remedy to make a fiery serpent and to put it on a stand. If anyone was bitten by a serpent, he looked at the bronze serpent and lived. Our spiritual life is the same. We lose patience because things are not happening according to our wish. And our wish is to give importance to what is tasteful to me. It’s not about the will of the God but it’s about my taste. I want things as I like. This is the moment of losing our patience and sin against God. We don’t understand the grace of God, the love of God, the liberation which God gave us. We undermine all these. When we undermine these divine things, these sacred things, that is the moment when we are bitten by the fiery serpent which brings death. The fiery serpent is our own freedom which choses mundane things over divine things, earthly things over heavenly things, abominable things over sacred things. This brings death. Everything loses its meaning. A dissatisfaction, a discontent prevails in the heart. We become moody and angry. We spread darkness around. That is the moment we go to the Church for the repentance and confession, for communion. There the same fierce serpent becomes the point of salvation. The same our freedom raised above the earthly things to chose divine things. Let’s reflect: Lent is the time to recognize the right use of our own freedom despite difficult moments.