Facing the Man in the Mirror or Off with His Head - Mark 6:14-29

This is a message I gave at Spirit Garage on July 12, 2009. The scripture is the story of the Beheading of John the Baptist. I address Responsible Power - Speaking the Truth to Ourselves. Songs sung that morning included: "What I've Done" by Linkin Park and "Come On Up to the House" by Tom Waits. Gotta admit my old Evangelical United Brethren roots are showing. :)

Herod was a haunted man. When Jesus’ fame began to spread throughout the land, people compared him to all the great prophets. But for Herod, Jesus was the mistake that haunted him and some say, cursed him, the rest of his life. He thought Jesus was John the Baptist return from the dead.

Now it’s important to understand the deep dysfunction of Herod’s family, to understand the paradox of a man like him caring enough to be haunted by one man’s death at all. Herod Antipas was the son of Herod the Great who was a very cruel, insecure ruler. Herod the Great is the one who ordered the death of all the children under the age of 2 years in Bethlehem when Jesus was born. It was a popular saying in his time, “It was better to be Herod’s pigs than his sons.” As a Jew, Herod would not eat his pigs, but he did kill most of his sons if they threatened his rule in any way. The few who were left, including Philip and Herod Antipas, were all conniving, sniveling, people-pleasing, weak rulers who were bent on not only robbing the scraps from Rome but from each other.

Herod Antipas was married to an Arabian princess. When he went to visit his half-brother, Philip, in Rome he seduced Philip’s wife Herodias. Herodias was the niece of Philip and Herod Antipas. Her father was their half-brother, whom Herod the Great had assassinated. Herodias agreed to leave her husband, take her daughter Salome, and move in with Herod Antipas. Herod Antipas made the plan to divorce his wife when he returned. His wife found out and told him she was going on a holiday, which was really an escape back to her father’s kingdom where she told daddy what her husband had done. This made the Arabian king very mad and so he saw this as an opportunity to resolve some of the border issues he’d been having with Herod anyway. Eventually a war occurred between the two territories and Herod lost badly. This is where the curse of John the Baptist comes into play. It was popular folklore that the defeat of Herod was retribution for the meaningless beheading of John the Baptist.

So why did Herod imprison John the Baptist in the first place? By shaming the king with the truth about his affair with Herodias, who was both his sister-in-law and niece, John inadvertently aligned himself with Herod’s enemy, the Arabian king. Imprisoning John was a political move to shut him up before he riled up the masses. On the other hand, Herodias took things more personally. She felt the best way to shut up a prophet is to cut off his head but she couldn’t because Herod liked John and protected him. Maybe he did this because John’s honest truth-telling was a virtue Herod never knew and lacked the character to possess. It perplexed him.

If this story isn’t twisted enough, in dances the young step-daughter who gives a “pleasing” performance on Herod’s birthday. Historical records say the girls’ name is Salome and she was probably14years old or younger at this time, so it is hard to say how provocative this dance really was. Nonetheless for a princess to perform a public dance was quite unheard of. When Herod promises her anything she wants, even half his kingdom he is blowing his ego up a bit. Herod didn’t really have that kind of power to give because he was a symbolic puppet ruler for Rome. To give half your kingdom was a figurative saying that was used another time in the Bible. The biblical book of Esther tells of another royal banquet, a drunken king making a vow to a beautiful young woman, promising her up to half his kingdom. Beautiful Esther uses this opportunity to save her people and stop the acting out of a decree to destroy, kill and annihilate all the Jews. On the other hand, Salome runs to her mother who uses the opportunity to harm John the Baptist and please her appetite for revenge, a dish best served cold and on a platter. I imagine a little girl in awe of this royal banquet, with vulgar sweetness, skipping with excitement and her own embellishments to pronounce “I want the head of John the Baptist, on a platter.” I wonder how she responded when she was handed the head on a platter. Did this image haunt her like it haunted her step-father?

The topic for this morning is responsible power. Power is the ability to effect change or exert control over either things or people, subjects or objects. Herod is haunted by his exertion of power to destroy John. John is a prophet which means truth-teller. He told the truth to power and lost his head. What do we lose or gain when we speak the truth? Next week, Pastor Rob will address responsible power in relationship to society and justice. But I feel one cannot speak the truth to power socially until one has faced their internal power. I’m talking about facing the man in the mirror.

I was watching a news show this week that interviewed a psychologist with a theory about Michael Jackson’s numerous plastic surgeries. A photo of Michael Jackson when he was younger was aged and the result was the spitting image of his father, who had been quite abusive and pushed his career. The psychologist posed that when MJ looked in the mirror he saw his father and hated the image in the mirror so much, he wanted to change what he saw literally. When you look in the mirror, what truth about yourself, what weakness, what hidden fault do you want to erase from sight?

Who wants to face their own ugliness? Who wants to admit the messes they’ve made? We have the power of choice and like Esther or Salome; we can choose that which helps or that which harms ourselves and others. It is overwhelming to admit we are a mess and it can feel that no one, let alone God, will want us if they knew the truth. We set impossibly frustrating expectations to get our acts cleaned up and to stop feeling like “damaged goods” before receiving the love intended for us. When we’re good “God material” then we’ll get spiritual. This usually leads to quiet hopelessness and practices to drown out the nagging feeling we’re missing something with alcohol or work or responsibilities. On top of that we can manipulate the truth into unrecognizable creations, like Michael Jackson’s face, but in the end it’s still you and until you accept yourself and your mistakes as forgivable, let alone lovable, you will live as a victim of self-imposed crucifixion. Get down off that cross and use that wood for some good. There is no shame and humiliation greater than the cross of Jesus. It’s all been done for you. You don’t need to crucify yourself or become your own personal savior. Stop waiting to get pretty for God. Jesus is attracted to the unattractive.

Here’s more good news, we are forgiven then we can repent. Repentance literally means “turn around,” or “walk a new path.” In the Roman Empire, when an emperor died and a new one took his place, the word went out to all the Roman legions “Repent and believe in the new emperor!” The Gospel writers utilized this popular saying to mean “turn from the path you are on and align yourself with God!” (Bethlehem Lutheran Church, 7-5-2009) Repentance is a transformative choice about where you will invest your energy and focus in life.

Forgiveness enabling repentance is one of the great paradoxes of our faith. The honesty of facing the truth about yourself leaves you vulnerable, needy and exposed. You are loved and embraced in that moment. You are forgivable. You don’t have to wait to clean up the damage before you come to God because God’s here already and knows full well what you’ve done. You have the power wallow in what you’ve done or make a change. So, come on up to the house and join the holy truth-tellers party. We’re a raucous bunch and can sometimes lose our heads, but everyone’s welcome.