Snake Salvation?

Sincerely wrong

“Snake Salvation” has to be one of the strangest programs on TV. National Geographic Channel follows two snake-handling preachers from Kentucky in their quest for spiritual ecstasy.  They lead highly emotional religious services that include dancing while holding snakes. At least 100, perhaps more, snake handling holiness churches exist in the United States. They claim the practice is commanded by Jesus, based on this passage: "And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover." (Mark 16:17-18, KJV)

Some like to poke fun at these people. I don’t. They are earnest in their quest to please God.  Their congregations are tiny and impoverished, no megachurches there; so it can’t be money or fame that motivates them. There is a kind of euphoria evident in their ‘worship.’  The charged atmosphere, repetitious music, anticipation of danger, the shared ritual – all combine to produce a trance-like state that alters brain chemistry.  Mix that emotional high with religious conviction and yes, some kind of experience of God’s Spirit, and you find that they have a compelling reason to do something most of us see as quite weird.

The greater tragedy is their misunderstanding of the Scripture that turns a promise of God’s sovereign protection into a command to put themselves into a place of tempting the Lord by ‘proving’ their faith!  One of the preachers declares emphatically, “If I don’t handle snakes, I am disobeying God and will go straight to Hell.”  In this, more than anything else, they are sincerely wrong!  Faith is not proven, it is accepted as a gift of God. We are called to ‘live by faith’ but not to prove anything to God, others, or ourselves.  Rather, faith allows us to live within the embrace of our loving Abba. No amount of snake handling can prove a person worthy of the favor of the Lord.

The fact is that there is only a matter of decrees of fanaticism between the Kentucky snake handlers and many others who claim to be Christians.  We might not dance with rattlesnakes to prove the depth of our faith, but many of us work hard at doing good, giving more, going to church, reading a set amount of the Bible every day, carefully noting minutes in prayer – not as a means of loving Him, but as a religious duty.

In whom does your faith find its foundation?

Does it rest on God and His promise or your attempts at religion?

Before you wave off the snake handlers as silly men, deluded fools, or ignorant bumpkins; ask God if there are shadows of their error in your Christianity.  Then, put your faith in Him! For the ‘just will live by faith!’

Here’s a word from the Word. "And so, dear brothers and sisters, we can boldly enter heaven’s Most Holy Place because of the blood of Jesus. By his death, Jesus opened a new and life-giving way through the curtain into the Most Holy Place. And since we have a great High Priest who rules over God’s house, let us go right into the presence of God with sincere hearts fully trusting him. For our guilty consciences have been sprinkled with Christ’s blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water.  … So do not throw away this confident trust in the Lord. Remember the great reward it brings you! Patient endurance is what you need now, so that you will continue to do God’s will. Then you will receive all that he has promised. “For in just a little while, the Coming One will come and not delay. And my righteous ones will live by faith. But I will take no pleasure in anyone who turns away.” (Hebrews 10:19-22,35-38, NLT)