July 13, 2003

"Grace or Disgrace"

I got a great story off the Internet this week. It was about a man who was hired by a church to paint the exterior, and this man made a habit of stretching his profit on a job by thinning out his paint with a little turpentine. He was almost done with the church painting using this thinned-out paint when a thunderstorm came rolling in and began to pour down, washing all the paint off the church. To really add injury to insult, a bolt of lightning crashed down and knocked the painter right on his back. Well, the man could spot divine intervention when he saw it, so he cried out to God, “Oh Lord, I’m sorry I cheated the church. Tell me, what should I do?”

And a voice boomed out from the thundercloud, “Repaint. Repaint, and thin no more.”

Okay, I will admit it’s rare when God intervenes quite that quickly and directly when we do wrong, but what I want you to remember as we go through this morning’s lesson on Herod and John the Baptist: God never gives up trying to reclaim us, even when we go over to the enemy camp.

Here’s an important question I have to ask this morning: How many of you are into soap operas? My mother used to love two soap operas above all others, “Search for Tomorrow” and “The Guiding Light.” Soap operas for most people are what we call a guilty pleasure, like a heart surgeon who loves chili dogs. We know they’re dumb, we know they’re time wasters, we know they’re no good for us, but we love them anyway. That’s what these so-called reality shows are, dressed up soap operas. I say so-called reality shows, because it’s hard to think of them as reality when everybody is better looking than anybody I know in person. Sorry, folks, but it’s true.

If you’re a fan of reality TV, don’t worry, I’m not going to get on your case this morning, but if you like soap operas, I do call your attention to one of the greatest sources of soap opera material ever put on paper. We call it the Bible. From Adam and Eve and the apple tree onward, the Bible is loaded with juicy stories of sex, murder, revenge, theft, corruption in high places, jealousy, betrayal and just plain rotten people. Have I got your attention yet?

The differences is that in the Bible, the stories are told to teach a moral lesson, and the bad guys get what’s coming to them in the end.

One of the most bizarre soap opera stories of all time comes to us in today’s gospel lesson, the story of Herod and the murder of John the Baptist.

Now I just want to sketch out a little history for you, so you can understand this story. Herod the Great was the king at the time of Jesus’ birth. He was the king who ordered all the young boys in Bethlehem to be slaughtered, in hopes of killing the baby Jesus. But he didn’t discriminate. Herod killed anybody who got in his way, including his own sons, so it’s something of a miracle that some of his sons grew up to be rulers themselves, including Herod Antipas, Philip and Aristobulus.

Now stay with me. Aristobulus had a daughter named Herodias, and she was quite the little conniver. She married Uncle Philip and had a daughter, Salome, with him. But when she decided that Herod Antipas was a better catch, could lift her higher in society, she dumped Philip and took up with him. Catch this—both Philip and Herod married their niece, and Herod had stolen her away from his brother.

Sounds like Peyton Place already, right? But wait, it gets better. John the Baptist was known as the last prophet, and prophets have this way of telling us the truth and making us very uncomfortable doing it. He was the only one who could get away with telling Herod the truth, and let the king have it between the eyes: “It is sinful to marry your brother’s wife.”

And ever after, Herodias held a grudge against John and wanted to kill him, but Herod kept him safe. John was getting under Herod’s skin, you see. When he heard John preach, he didn’t really understand the message, it upset him, yet he enjoyed listening to him. That was grace nibbling away at his conscience. Herod was caught between two forces. He and his brothers, they were Jews, at least in name. Jews had a highly developed sense of right and wrong, and John kept beating on him, you’re wrong. You’re sinning.

John felt that Herod had a responsibility to set an example for his Jewish people, an example of Godliness even in the midst of the Roman occupation, perhaps especially in the middle of the Romans

But Herod also didn’t like being told what to do. He was the king, and like most kings he was surrounded by yes men—all except John, who kept saying no. Herod threw him into prison, but he called it “protective custody.” It’s easy to imagine Herod sneaking down to the dungeon to visit John from time to time, maybe just to check on whether the message had changed any.

Meanwhile Herodias waited for the right time to get her revenge, and here’s where the story really gets good.

Herodias set up a birthday banquet for Herod, invited exactly the right people who wouldn’t try to stop her, got her husband drunk and then brought out the entertainment—Salome. Let’s be honest here—she has Salome do a strip tease, and I’ll just let your imagination fill in the blanks. And Herod? He acts like many a drunk does under the spell of a pretty woman—he acts like an idiot. He promises Salome anything, “even half my kingdom.” I’m betting here that he wanted a little more than a dance from his stepdaughter.

Salome goes off to consult Mommy Dearest and comes back with her request: “Skip the real estate transfer, give me the head of John the Baptist.” Whap! Stone cold sober. That was Herod.

You ever have an experience like that? Something just slaps you in the face and wakes you up?

   Back in college, I was just getting started on my drinking days, and most Saturday afternoons were devoted to beer parties. This was one of those Saturdays, and I remember sitting around half drunk when a friend came in and asked me if I knew that two of my best friends had been in a car wreck. Hit by a drunk driver. Same thing. Whap! Stone sober, and suddenly you feel like the biggest jerk on two feet. Because I had just driven back from the party in that condition. No, I didn’t have an accident, and no, my friends weren’t seriously hurt, thank God. I just want you to imagine how Herod felt—like a total moron. Set up by his wife in front of all his “friends.” Made a drunken fool of himself over his own daughter. Asked for a teensy-weensy favor: murder one of the most popular prophets in Israel’s history.

Now here’s the crossroads moment, folks, here’s where Herod could have chosen to do the right thing. He’s still the king and can do anything he wants. He might lose face with his friends, and he’s surely going to have one angry woman on his hands in Herodias. But he’s heard the word of God preached by John. He knows right from wrong. He simply must choose the right path out of his dilemma. And this leads to the first lesson we can take away from this story, the same lesson our mothers taught us when we were kids: Clean up your own messes.

Herod had two choices, right? Keep his promise to Salome, or save the life of a holy man. Well, actually, he had a third choice. He could actually solve the original problem, and get rid of Herodias, who was causing all the problem and wasn’t really his wife at all. Sometimes this is how grace presents itself to us—at these crossroads moments, when we must choose between good and evil, God opens heaven’s portals and drenches us with grace so that we not only will make the right choice at the moment, we will go back and fix the problem that had led us to a perilous crossroads in the first place.

If Herod had just quietly sent Herodias and Salome out of his palace, would that have been an easy choice for him? No way. Would he have looked like a big man among his drunken pals? Of course not. Would John have told him “You have to humble yourself before God?” Absolutely.But could he have turned his life around with the help of grace? You bet.

Second lesson from this soap opera: don’t let the wrong influences make your choices for you. What do we know about advertising, gang? We know corporations spend billions of dollars a year trying to influence consumers like you and me on our choices. Actually, they don’t want people much older than 35, because we’re supposedly set in our ways. But there are all kinds of influences weighing on us every day, and isn’t it a fact that one possibly negative influence that most of us face is our reluctance to look bad in our neighbors’ eyes?

There were two brothers in Georgia in the 1950s. One decided that in trying to change the culture of the day, he would work against segregation. The other worked as an attorney for a prominent law firm. Both were Christians and attended church regularly. But as the first brother worked against segregation, he and some of his friends got into trouble with the law, and he asked his brother the lawyer to defend them. The brother refused, saying he could lose his job. The first brother pressured him, reminding him of his Christian duty. But the lawyer replied, “I will follow Jesus to the cross, but it is his cross. I have no need to be crucified.”

To which his brother replied, “Then you are an admirer of Jesus, but not his disciple.”

King Herod is like this attorney. He admires the prophet John the Baptist, but not enough to put his power and prestige on the line to protect him, not enough to become his disciple, not enough to change his life. He had taken an oath, and that oath was more important. Avoiding looking bad in front of his pals was more important than doing the right thing. And Mark points out that people were like that with Jesus: They heard about his great works, they heard about his miracles, they admired him, they even thought he was John the Baptist come back to life, they just weren’t willing to change their life. Other pressures were more important.

Mark asks us the question, how do we respond to pressure? We can respond like Herod and fold up like a broken card table, or we can refuse to yield to it, and seek the will of God instead.

Final lesson: God still gets the last word. This story reminds us that Kings and generals and all the great and mighty of the earth make their plans, but we still face a final judgment that we cannot influence or escape. Picture in your mind the immediate aftermath of John the Baptist’s murder. Salome is shocked, appalled, sick to her stomach that this request had been granted. She had just danced naked for a bunch of hooting savages, a dumb kid who had blown her chance to ask for a chest full of gold. Instead she gets a bloody head with flies buzzing around. She’s not happy.

Herod knows he has made a deal with the devil. He’s still stuck with this very weird, very evil wife, he’s just had a truckload of guilt dumped on his head for murdering a prophet and he’ll have to deal with the anger of the people who loved and respected John. He’s not happy. Even Herod’s drunken pals aren’t happy. The party shut down early, and Salome never did another dance. Who’s the only one happy? Herodias. She goes to bed that night laughing into her pillow—“Well, that’s one prophet who won’t call anybody a sinner again.”

Nevertheless, the problem with a sinful lifestyle is that it leads to ruin, for kings and queens or for common folk like you and me. Only the way of God leads to eternal life. Remember I said that in the Bible soap opera stories the bad guy gets what’s coming to him? Let me tell you how the story ended for Herod.

He only appears once more in the Bible: in the Gospel of Luke Jesus is led before Herod to be tried on the morning of the crucifixion. Herod is glad to see him, because he’s heard about the miracles Jesus has performed. He wants this Jesus to do tricks. But Jesus refuses to answer any questions, and an angry Herod mocks him, puts a robe on him and sends him away for Pilate to judge. Again, he could have done the right thing. God gave him one final chance to change the last chapter of his story, but he kicked that chance away.

Instead, here’s what happened. Another king comes along and drives Herod off the throne. Herodias convinces hubby to go to Rome and appeal to the emperor. But who’s the emperor at that point? Caligula, maybe the only man in the world who’s crazier, more wicked than Herod and his blushing bride. Caligula is a guy who once had his horse crowned emperor. Not only doesn’t Herod get his kingdom back, he is sent into exile, and eventually history records that both Herod and Herodius commit suicide. What a waste, but sadly appropriate—their lives had done violence to others, and now were ended by violence against themselves.

My friends, God has so much more in mind for us than this. This is what Paul said to the Ephesian church about God’s will for us: “Because of his love God had already decided that through Jesus Christ he would make us his sons and daughters—this was his pleasure and purpose.”

Herod’s choices were terrible, right down the line, from birth to death. God tried to call him back by grace, and he steadfastly headed down the road to ruin. Praise God, he never gives up on us, no matter how far down that road we travel.

Let me close today with this poem, called “Answered Prayer,” which is attributed to an anonymous Confederate soldier.

“I asked God for strength, that I might achieve; I was made weak, that I might learn humbly to obey.

“I asked for health, that I might do greater things; I was given infirmity, that I might do better things.

“I asked for riches, that I might be happy; I was given poverty, that I might be wise.

“I asked for power, that I might have the praise of men; I was given weakness, that I might feel the need of God.

“I asked for all things, that I might enjoy life; I was given life, that I might enjoy all things.

I got nothing that I asked for, but everything I had hoped for.

“Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered. I am among all men most richly blessed.”

When we come to the crossroads of our lives, may God give us grace to make the right choices. Amen.