Coptic Orthodox Answers

In the Father and Son, the Holy Spirit, One God. Amen.

Wecome to Coptic Orthodox Answers Deep Dive where we study together the Gospel of John. We have reached chapter 3, verses 1 to 11, where we saw how Christ met Nicodemus and how Christ was telling Nicodemus that for you to see the kingdom of God, you must be born again. You must be born of water and spirit, meaning baptism here. But Nicodemus didn't understand that, because in his mind or in the Jewish perspective, all Jews were going to heaven. But Christ was bringing this sad news to him and Nicodemus couldn't get himself to understand what these words really meant. So, we're about to continue chapter 3 with verse 12.

So in verse 12, Christ continues his discussion with Nicodemus. He says:

'' 12 If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? » (John 3:12)

Meaning, if I'm speaking to you about baptism, about being born again or born from above from water and spirit, and although this is a spiritual thing, but it happens here on earth and therefore, in this context, it's an earthly thing and these things you're not able to understand. So, how will you ever grasp if I speak to you about heavenly things, about the dynamics of the kingdom of God, of what truly happens there? Says you will not be able to imagine this. And truly, as humans, we are not able to imagine the dynamics of the kingdom of God. That's why St. Paul says, in 1 Corinthians, chapter 2:

'' 9 ...Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.'' (1 Corinthians 2:9)

Truly these things are unimaginable. And this is a source of comfort for us, because while we're still here on earth, it gets very difficult to always carry the cross with Christ. It gets very difficult to push the darkness and enlighten the darkness around us, and to pass on the eternal life that is within us to others. So, in times of trouble, in times of despair, we to cling to God and to cling, again, to these promises and truly they become a source of comfort for us. Now, Christ continues and says:

'' 13 No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven.'' (John 3:13)

So here, Christ is trying to establish His authority in front of Nicodemus. He's trying to proclaim to him who He really is, because He's telling him new mysteries and Nicodemus, again, is

not understanding. So, Christ is telling him: I am the only one that was in heaven. So, He says: No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven. So, you see me in front of you, because I came down from heaven. And if I came down from heaven, it's because I was in heaven, right? So, I am the Son of God. I am the Prophet. I am the Messiah. So, you need to believe all the mysteries that I'm telling you right now. And then, it says: that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven.

And this is very important, because when we believe about the unity of Christ, the divine nature and the human nature being in the one nature or μια φύσεις (mia fýseis) or the one person of Christ, we believe that, obviously, the divinity was not contained only in Christ's humanity. So, Christ's divinity, the Son of God's divinity, is in the entire cosmos at the same time that it is in His humanity, right? So, it doesn't mean that, because the divinity united with the humanity in the person of Christ, that His divinity is now limited by the body of Christ. Of course not! The divinity has no limit. The divinity is everywhere. And Christ, here, is saying the Son of Man who is in heaven, so, although you see me in front of you right now, I am at the same time in heaven.

So, it is very important for us to define the term Son of Man, because this term is of major importance. And for us to do so, we have to go back to the Old Testament, to Daniel 7. So, Daniel was having a vision:

'' 13 I was watching in the night visions, and behold, One like the Son of Man [and this is where the term comes from], coming with the clouds of heaven! ...'' (Daniel 7:13)

So here, in John, chapter 3, it says the Son of Man who is in heaven. In Daniel 7, it says coming with the clouds of heaven. So here, again, demonstrating the divinity, right?, of that person.

'' 13 ...He came to the Ancient of Days...'' (Daniel 7:13)

The Ancient of Days, here, meaning God the Father. So, we have both the Son of Man here in God the Son and the Ancient of Days, God the Father.

'' 13 ...and they brought Him near before Him [so, the Son before the Father].'' (Daniel 7:13)

'' 14 Then to Him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom...'' (Daniel 7:14)

So, He's giving authority. He's giving dominion, glory and kingdom. Who gets a kingdom? Only a king!

'' 14 ...[then] all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him...'' (Daniel 7:14)

And this king... all of these people, nations and languages will serve Him. Not only that:

'' 14 ...His dominion is an everlasting dominion,...'' (Daniel 7:14)

So, that kingdom lasts forever, so, obviously, it is not speaking of an earthy kingdom, but a heavenly one.

'' 14 ...which shall not pass away, and His kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed.'' (Daniel 7:14)

So, having established His authority being this divine person, the Son of Man from Daniel 7, Christ continues in verses 14 and 15 and says:

'' 14 And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.'' (John 3:14)

So, this divine person, the Son of Man, must be lifted up, which obviously means the cross.

'' 15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.'' (John 3:15)

So here, again, we find that Christ goes back to the Old Testament and John makes it a point to refer to the Old Testament, again, because he's speaking partly to the Jews and also to the Gentiles, and he wants to demonstrate that this Christ, this divine person, had to be crucified. That was part of His mission here on earth. But let us dive deeper into this story. In Numbers 21, it says:

'' 4 Then they journeyed from Mount Hor by the Way of the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; and the soul of the people became very discouraged on the way. 5 And the people spoke against God and against Moses [So here, we have a people that are in rebellion against God and this has been happening over and over and over again. So, the people said]: ''Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and our soul loathes this worthless bread.'' 6 So the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and many of the people of Israel died. 7 Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, ''We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord that He take away the serpents from us.'' So Moses prayed for the people. 8 Then the Lord said to Moses, ''Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.'' 9 So Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it on a pole; and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.'' (Numbers 21:4-9)

So here, we have a rebellious people that over and over and over again were in rebellion against God and all they sought was food and drink and material things. So, fiery serpents were sent. These people were bitten. They started to die. And now, they are repenting. And now, they want to be saved, but then repenting is not enough for them to be saved, so what happens is that they ask Moses to intercede for them in front of God and Moses does so.

So, God responds and says: Take a fiery serpent, put it on a pole, and when people watch this fiery serpent, although they are in the process of dying because they're already bitten, when they watch, they will be healed. They will be restored. They will be saved. And here, there's a beautiful, deep, hidden mysterious message that the Word of God wants to relay to us. Let us see what St. Cyril has to say regarding this portion of Scripture. He says:

''For the remedy of one bitten, was to look at the serpent put before him, and faith along with the sight wrought deliverance [so, faith along with the height wrought salvation, wrought healing]... It represents in act as it were a type, the whole Mystery of the incarnation. For the serpent signifies bitter and manslaying sin, which was devouring the whole race upon the earth.'' (St. Cyril of Alexandria)

So, as serpents were going and biting the people, people are dying. And that's what sin does. Sin is killing people. It's destroying the entire human race.

''The Word of God then was made in the likeness of sinful flesh [meaning Christ, when He took flesh, or the Son of God when He took flesh, He resembled us in everything except for sin], that He might condemn sin in the flesh, as it is written, and to those who gaze on Him with more steadfast faith, or by search into the Divine doctrines, might become the Giver of unending salvation... His being lifted up from the earth, as Himself says, by His passion on the Cross.'' (St. Cyril of Alexandria)

So, what happens is when Christ is put on the cross, then He dies. And as He dies, He tastes death and then He destroys death itself. And when He destroys death itself and He's raised up in glory, He restores humanity and therefore gives life to humans again. And that's why, when people in this story were looking at the fiery serpent, the fiery serpent itself was dead. They were saved. They were brought back to life. They were healed. They were restored, because this serpent was dead. The serpent, obviously here, a type of Christ or a symbol of Christ. So, because Christ died on the cross, He killed death, was raised, I also can live once again.

St. John Chrysostom also notices something very nice. He mentions how St. John the beloved discusses, in the beginning of the chapter, baptism or the topic of baptism, and then he moves on, in verses 13 and 14, to the cross of Christ. And he mentions how the baptism and the cross are linked; they're intertwined. Because when we are baptized, it is a mystery: we share in the cross, the burial and the resurrection of Christ; we participate in these events. And that's why St. Paul, in Romans 6:4, he says:

'' 4 Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death...'' (Romans 6:4)

So, we, as humans, are buried with Christ through baptism into death, so, into His death, and:

''...as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.'' (Romans 6:4)

So also, we have gained the newness of life, the resurrection from the dead, because we participate with Christ in His cross, burial and resurrection. And this happens in the mystery of baptism. So, baptism is a participation in all of those events.

Now, a small side note on the story of the fiery serpent. Often, people are bothered by the violence that we see in the Old Testament, but there are reasons for that. Unfortunately, we see these stories through our own lens, but we have to go back to the people of the time to truly understand why things happened in the way they happened. I'm not gonna address this subject here in this video, but we do have a full series on our YouTube channel called Old Testament Violence, so I definitely invite you to listen to this series if that subject interests you.

Now, another crucial point is the meaning of the word believe. So, in verse 15, it says:

'' 15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.'' (John 3:15)

What does that mean? Does that mean if I believe, if I have some sort of mental activity and now I put my trust in God one way or another, that means that I will not perish but have eternal life? Is that what St. John is trying to say here? Let's dig deeper a bit into that one.

So, when we look at the word believe in the Gospels, we find that in the Gospel of John, we have the word repeated 98 times. In Matthew, only 11, in Mark, 10, and Luke, 9. So, it's very obvious that St. John, writing at the end of the 1 st century, wants to emphasize on belief. But why is that? For us to understand, we have to go back to St. John's time and the background and the context he was living in.

So, St. John wrote the Gospel at the end of the 1 st century where still the Church was being attacked by the Jews who did not believe that Christ was the Son of God. So, they're still attacking the Church and they're telling the Church that you are worshipping a cursed crucified man, you're not worshipping God and therefore, you need to repent and come back to Judaism. So, St. John's emphasis is on belief, because he wants to tell them ultimately, it's a question of believing or not believing. This is the question. And this is why he is emphasizing on the term believe and he repeats it 98 times in his Gospel. We can also see the emphasis in John 20 at the end of the Gospel. He says:

'' 30 And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book; 31 but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.'' (John 20:30-31)

So, he's saying: This is the purpose of me writing my Gospel and that's why I'm writing to show you His divinity. He is God. Please, therefore, believe that He is the Son of God, that you may have eternal life. St. John also demonstrates, in his Gospel, that believing is not enough. So, in chapter 2, which we've already covered, in verse 23, it says:

'' 23 Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did. 24 But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, 25 and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man.'' (John 2:23-25)

So, because He knew what was inside of them, and because He knew that their belief was not a real belief, He did not commit Himself to them. He did not enter into a relationship with them, if you wanna put it that way, because He knew that these people are part of those that will cry out Crucify him! Crucify him! at the end, although at that moment, they actually did believe.

I mean, the term believing must go beyond the idea of a mental activity. Like, even St. James in his Epistle, when he says: Do you believe there is one God?, he says: You do well, but even the demons believe and tremble. So, the demons believe, of course, they believe even more than we do, but they lack that fellowship, that discipleship. And although they tremble, there's no salvation for them, right?

We can't really say, you know... Let's say we can imagine an atheist or anybody of any kind of religion, they'll come thence just says with his lips, you know, I believe that Christ is Son of God. Does that mean he's automatically saved or she's automatically saved? That doesn't make much sense. Even Matthew 25, when Christ puts the goats and the sheep, right?, the sheep at the right hand and the goats on the left hand. And then, the goats on the left hand tell Christ: Lord, Lord... so, they believe... Lord, Lord, when it is that we have seen you and we have not done these things?, implying that if we had seen you, we would have recognized you and therefore, we would have done these things. They have faith, yet they are not saved. In... even in Matthew 7, Christ says: Not anyone that says to me Lord, Lord will make it into the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.

So, the word believe goes beyond just a mental activity. When the Bible talks about believe, whoever believes on the name of the Lord shall be saved, the emphasis is not about, you know, calling on on the name of the Lord and therefore you'll be saved. The emphasis is on whoever, meaning the Gospel is for all nations. But whoever truly believes, in the sense that

they truly become a disciple and truly follow God and everything that He has said, then live a righteous life, right?, give themselves up to God in one way or another, right?, these are the people that truly believe and therefore, Christ will commit Himself to them and will be one with them. And therefore, these people will taste heaven.

I'm not, here, trying to say who's going to heaven, who's not and all, all of these things. This is not my business at all. My point is to demonstrate what is the Gospel really saying, right? That's my point here. So, when we read the Gospel, we have to understand it properly. So, in John 8 as well, he says:

'' 30 As He spoke these words [so, as Christ spoke these words], many believed in Him [so, the people believed]. 31 Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, ''If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed.'' '' (John 8:30-31)

So, after believing, there still is a requirement of abiding in God's word, meaning fulfilling everything that He says as much as you possibly can. And by doing so, I remain in His image and therefore, if I am in His image, I am in communion with Him. That's how it works.

So here, most people were... were fight or discuss between faith and works, faith and works. To Orthodox Christians, we cannot separate faith and works. Like St. James says: I will show you my faith by my works. It's real life. So, any mental activity that goes on here has to be here as well and that has to be demonstrated in my life. And that's how, as Christians, we live the Gospel.

Remember: Know your faith, live your faith, and teach your faith. And glory be to God forever and ever. Amen.

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Remember: Know your faith, live your faith, and teach your faith.