Being the Anti-Herod

Sermon for July 11, 2021
Mark 6:14-29

Today’s Gospel reading is one of the strangest of them all.  First, it’s a flashback, and we don’t come across those very often in Scripture.  Second, it’s the only reading in the Gospel of Mark in which Jesus is not the main actor or subject.¹  Third, its placement is just weird.  It’s sandwiched between two stories about Jesus and his disciples doing amazing, marvelous work for God’s kingdom – miraculous work, even.  Just before today’s reading, Jesus gives his disciples “authority over the unclean spirits” (6:7) and sends them to cast out demons and heal the sick.  Then comes this flashback about the death of John the Baptist.  And just after that, the disciples return to report the amazing things they’ve done, and Jesus feeds thousands of people from five loaves and two fish.  

So, what’s going on here?  Why do we get this bloody flashback in the midst of miracles?

Let’s look at today’s story.  Herod hears about the disciples healing people with the same holy power that Jesus wields, and Herod’s afraid.  First, he’s afraid because someone else is exercising more power than he has.  Herod’s called a “king,” but he was actually the Romans’ puppet governor of Galilee and Perea … which, together, were about 15 percent of the size of the Kansas City metro area.²  So, Herod isn’t nearly as powerful as he pretends to be.  Second, he’s afraid because he killed John the Baptist, and he fears that this even-more-powerful Jesus is John the Baptist risen from the dead.  Herod is a Jew, after all, and he’s aware of God’s sovereignty at least on some level.  So, he’s afraid that God, through Jesus, is going to take him down.

Then Mark’s Gospel spends 12 verses on this flashback that shows us what a tragically broken character Herod really is.  He puts John the Baptist in prison because of his wife, Herodias, who wants John dead.  Herod and Herodias are married contrary to Jewish law, and John the Baptist has been making a public stink about it.  But despite John’s inconvenient truth-telling, Herod finds John oddly compelling.  In fact, the story says, “Herod feared John, knowing he was a righteous and holy man, and he protected him” (6:20).  Herod “liked to listen to him,” the story says (6:20), probably first out on the streets, later in the protective custody of Herod’s prison.  There was something in John’s preaching that captured Herod’s heart and mind, like a story that makes you uncomfortable but draws you in anyway. 

Finally, Herod’s wife, Herodias, has had enough, and she finds a way to get rid of John by playing on Herod’s greatest weakness.  More than anything else, Herod worships his own status.  So, he throws a banquet to impress his courtiers and the local leaders, and he makes a stupid, drunken promise to his wife’s dancing daughter to give her anything she asks.  The young dancer goes to her mother, and the two of them cash in on Herod’s mistake, demanding that he bring in the head of John the Baptist as the banquet’s last dish.³  Herod has come to his moment of truth, and he fails, choosing to honor his own status over the kingdom of God.  In case you’re keeping score, that’s called idolatry.  And God’s not a fan.

So, there’s our Gospel story, the good news starring Herod.  What a poor excuse for a main character.  Well, maybe that’s why this flashback is here, sandwiched between stories of Jesus and the disciples bringing miracles to life: Herod is the anti-disciple, choosing idolatry over God’s kingdom.  And the moral is:  Go, and don’t do likewise.  End of sermon.

Or, maybe not.  Let’s do a little thought experiment.  What if Herod had made a different choice?  What if he had stood up to Herodias?  What if his dancing stepdaughter had asked for the head of John the Baptist and Herod had said, “No”?  He’d come to his fork in the road, and he could have taken a kingdom turn.  He could have stood before his courtiers and the local leaders and said, “No, that would be wrong.  It’s not worth killing someone because I made a dumb promise.”  And then, what if Herod had kept going in that kingdom direction, telling his guests that he actually found John the Baptist’s call compelling – that, as a Jew, he was interested to see how this messiah thing was going to play out.  “After all,” Herod could have said, “John the Baptist is right that the people out there need a lot more love than they’re getting now.” 

That definitely would have stopped the party.  It also would have cost Herod his wife.  It probably would have cost him his position as Rome’s puppet ruler.  But I’ll bet Herod would have slept a lot better at night.

So, why does Harold choose the path he does?  What makes idolatry a good option in his eyes?  Maybe it’s just inertia; it’s always easier not to change.  But maybe there’s more to it than that.  I think Herod is hopeless, and I think he’s afraid – afraid of where the road less traveled will take him.

We’re all tempted toward idolatry one way or another, tempted to honor something that isn’t God rather than honoring God’s claim on us.  That’s true for us as individuals; it’s true for us as a church; it’s true for us as a society.  We can always choose to play it safe and rest on how far we’ve come.  Or we can listen to the voices of prophets – people like John the Baptist – people whose truth rubs us the wrong way. 

We probably all have those people, or those points of view, that challenge us – challenge our priorities, or our place in society, or our worldview.  But even if their message is challenging, we find ourselves listening anyway because we know there’s something in there we need to hear.  Prophets don’t have to be 100 percent right about everything.  Although John the Baptist certainly gave good advice about repentance, I’m not sure I’d follow his lead in terms of wardrobe or diet, wearing animal skins and eating locusts.  But when prophets call us to turn our hearts toward God’s ways rather than following our own temptations to stay put, we can figure that’s a message we’re supposed to hear.

This isn’t just about choosing to turn from evil toward good.  It’s also about choosing to go farther instead of being satisfied with how far we’ve come.  That applies both to our own practices of following Jesus and to our journey together as a church. 

Here’s an example.  For many years, St. Andrew’s has seen itself as a strong Outreach church, meaning we care for “the least” of Jesus’ brothers and sisters in need (Matthew 25:40).  Years ago, we felt good about a partnership with a school in Haiti where we provided bare-minimum salaries to pay more-or-less qualified teachers.  Years ago, we felt good about filling backpacks with food for the weekend for kids at Benjamin Banneker Elementary.  Years ago, we felt good about donating our Christmas Eve offering to local efforts to feed hungry people.  Those were all good things to do, no question about it.  But we knew we weren’t supposed to stop there.  When we came to forks in the road, we kept heading in a kingdom direction. 

Now, we support living wages for qualified teachers at the school in Haiti and offer a hot lunch each day. Now, a number of St. Andrew’s people are putting themselves out there to build relationships with families at Benjamin Banneker Elementary. Now, we feed and clothe hundreds of people downtown through the Free Store at Christmas, in addition to giving our Christmas Eve offering away. In each of these cases, we could have chosen to rest on success.  But in each of these cases, a prophet or two had a vision of the kingdom of God made manifest among us.  And in each of these cases, we listened to those persistent voices calling us to be the body of Christ in the world even more fully than we knew how to be.

So, who is John the Baptist for you – personally and collectively?  What is a message that challenges you but that you keep coming back to hear?  As individuals and as a church, what do we need to take up, or what do we need to set aside, in order to work miracles we’d never dreamed we could?  

As followers of Jesus, and as his body living and active in the world, we bear the power to heal and cast out demons.  We bear the power to serve as Jesus’ hands and feet, passing along the bounty God multiplies from five loaves and two fish.  But to do that, we have to flip the script from today’s reading.  As Herod chose to be the anti-disciple, we’ve got to choose to be the anti-Herod.  We’ve got to choose not to rest on how far we’ve come.  We’ve got to take risks that will challenge us and maybe let go of things we’ve always clung to.  We’ve got to let the prophet out jail, and bring him to the table, and together take the banquet of the kingdom on the road.

1.      New Interpreters Study Bible, note on verses 6:14-29, p. 1819.

2.      Herod’s territory of Perea was about 550 square miles, and Galilee was about 720 square miles.  So together, their areas were about 1,270 square miles.  The Kansas City metro area is about 8,500 square miles.

3.      New Interpreter’s Study Bible, note on verses 6:24-25, p. 1819.