As we begin this last week of December and move toward the new year to come, we shift from having a “John the Baptist” Christmas into a time of endings and beginnings learned from the rest of John’s story. To be honest the next couple of days don’t really fit into the celebratory tone of Christmas week.
As we had read a few weeks back, John had been put in prison by King Herod – a different King Herod than the one who reigned at the time of Jesus’ birth. It was King Herod the Great who ruled over Judea and Galilee at the time that Caesar Augustus was issuing his decree of taxation and the magi were journeying from the east to see this child who was born King of the Jews. It was Herod’s son, Herod Antipas who now threw John in prison because the desert preacher continued to condemn his illegitimate marriage to his own brother’s wife – a woman named Herodias.
It is Mark’s Gospel that sheds more light on John’s arrest, incarceration and subsequent condemnation. According to Mark, there was division in the palace’s master bedroom on the fate of John. On the one hand King Herod obviously wasn’t happy that John was publicly calling him down in front of the thousands who came out to hear him preach and be baptized in the wilderness. Such condemnations among a morally conservative nation like Israel were a political liability to his reign. On the other hand Mark supplies us with the interesting detail that Herod actually protected John in prison because “he knew him to be a righteous and holy man.” In fact Mark goes on to tell us that while John’s passionate words “puzzled him, he liked to listen to him.”
With this being the case, how does John go from religious and political prisoner to yet another martyr for the faith? Enter Herodias – the above mentioned illegitimate wife of Herod Antipas. It’s clear that she liked her exalted status as queen, and was furious that some backwoods self-proclaimed prophet had the nerve to air her dirty laundry for all Judea to see. The key phrase that clues us in on what’s about to go down in John’s story is when Mark writes: “So Herodias nursed a grudge and wanted to kill him.”
Now I’m going to gently tread water here and bring my wife into the subject for a moment, because if I say what I’m about to say, I’m sure I could be accused of being yet a “male chauvinist pig.” But in talking with my beautiful, intelligent and very much female wife about this very subject, she gave her opinion that while women may not typically be as outwardly aggressive as men, they really know how to nurse a grudge. There she said it. It may match my experience as well, but I’ll gladly defer to her obvious expertise in all things womanly.
And if it is indeed the case that this grudge of Herodias is key to what’s about to happen, then what does that leave us to say about Herod Antipas? I’ll use my own observation here and say: “Herod was whipped!” The truth of that statement is about to be played out at an upcoming birthday party. Herod will back himself into a corner and be masterfully manipulated by the very woman to whom he has pledged his love. There will be a moment when he must make a key decision – a life and death decision – and at that very instant, will he stand for what God wants or the “god-substitute” whom he has married and allows to have more influence in his life than any other? We’ll find out tomorrow. In the meantime, we might want to ask ourselves: “Are we listening to the true and living God in our lives, or the god-substitutes of our culture and their lies capturing more of our attention and allegiance?
As we had read a few weeks back, John had been put in prison by King Herod – a different King Herod than the one who reigned at the time of Jesus’ birth. It was King Herod the Great who ruled over Judea and Galilee at the time that Caesar Augustus was issuing his decree of taxation and the magi were journeying from the east to see this child who was born King of the Jews. It was Herod’s son, Herod Antipas who now threw John in prison because the desert preacher continued to condemn his illegitimate marriage to his own brother’s wife – a woman named Herodias.
It is Mark’s Gospel that sheds more light on John’s arrest, incarceration and subsequent condemnation. According to Mark, there was division in the palace’s master bedroom on the fate of John. On the one hand King Herod obviously wasn’t happy that John was publicly calling him down in front of the thousands who came out to hear him preach and be baptized in the wilderness. Such condemnations among a morally conservative nation like Israel were a political liability to his reign. On the other hand Mark supplies us with the interesting detail that Herod actually protected John in prison because “he knew him to be a righteous and holy man.” In fact Mark goes on to tell us that while John’s passionate words “puzzled him, he liked to listen to him.”
With this being the case, how does John go from religious and political prisoner to yet another martyr for the faith? Enter Herodias – the above mentioned illegitimate wife of Herod Antipas. It’s clear that she liked her exalted status as queen, and was furious that some backwoods self-proclaimed prophet had the nerve to air her dirty laundry for all Judea to see. The key phrase that clues us in on what’s about to go down in John’s story is when Mark writes: “So Herodias nursed a grudge and wanted to kill him.”
Now I’m going to gently tread water here and bring my wife into the subject for a moment, because if I say what I’m about to say, I’m sure I could be accused of being yet a “male chauvinist pig.” But in talking with my beautiful, intelligent and very much female wife about this very subject, she gave her opinion that while women may not typically be as outwardly aggressive as men, they really know how to nurse a grudge. There she said it. It may match my experience as well, but I’ll gladly defer to her obvious expertise in all things womanly.
And if it is indeed the case that this grudge of Herodias is key to what’s about to happen, then what does that leave us to say about Herod Antipas? I’ll use my own observation here and say: “Herod was whipped!” The truth of that statement is about to be played out at an upcoming birthday party. Herod will back himself into a corner and be masterfully manipulated by the very woman to whom he has pledged his love. There will be a moment when he must make a key decision – a life and death decision – and at that very instant, will he stand for what God wants or the “god-substitute” whom he has married and allows to have more influence in his life than any other? We’ll find out tomorrow. In the meantime, we might want to ask ourselves: “Are we listening to the true and living God in our lives, or the god-substitutes of our culture and their lies capturing more of our attention and allegiance?
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