July 16, 2006

Mark 6:14-29

“The Opportune Moment”

Rev. Melissa D. Ramos

Our world today is filled with pressures of many different sorts. Everyday life for us is filled with pressures. The pressure of a busy schedule, just trying to get everything done and find your way to bed exhausted at the end of the day. The pressure to make ends meet financially.

For students, the pressure to achieve is in the air of junior and senior high schools. Students feel pressure to achieve in grades, in sports, in music, having the best transcript with the most extracurricular activities to unlock the perfect future. For older adults, there is pressure to make pensions stretch as medical costs rise and savings diminish. For those in middle of life, the pressure to take care of kids meets with having to care for parents at the same time.

We all face pressures of different kinds. And sometimes these worries and pressures can make us more susceptible to pressure of a more subtle, but more dangerous nature. The Scripture that we’ll be reading today is about moral pressure – about the forces around us that push us to do things that we know are wrong, but feel compelled to go along with and keep quiet about.

Sometimes the pressures of everyday life wear us down and make us more susceptible to moral pressure. When our resolve and our convictions are weakened by fatigue and by the grind of everyday life, sometimes we find it hard to stand by our moral principles.

Moral pressure is what executives at Enron faced when the company pressured them to keep quiet about falsified financial statements. The consequences for speaking up, for blowing the whistle would be severe, and going along with the deception was perhaps easier in the moment.

Moral pressure is what soldiers faced at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. Beating and degrading inmates was obviously immoral, but maybe it was easier for the military and medical staff to just keep quiet and hope the whole thing would go unnoticed and blow over. Maybe ratting on others in the ranks seemed too big of a risk.

Moral pressure is what members of the men’s Lacrosse team at Duke University faced. The jury is still out about what happened that night at a wild party of white upper-class ivy league guys from which two minority women left degraded and afraid. Maybe it was easier to keep quiet rather than to betray your teammates.

It’s easy to stand on moral higher ground when you’re looking at someone else’s life and decisions. It’s easy to say what should have been done in these situations. Someone should have refused to go along. Someone should have stood up and said “this is wrong.” Someone should have stopped it. And yet, it’s easy to say what someone else should have done. It’s much harder to be the person to really do it.

In the face of pressure, I would guess that all of us have done something we knew was wrong. Whether we call it peer pressure, or corporate policy, or family dynamics, I would guess that we’re all guilty to giving in to the pressure to go against our moral convictions.

It’s very hard to be the one person to stand up to moral pressure. There can be serious consequences, big risks in standing against moral pressure. It can mean risking the loss of your job, damaging a friendship, creating family conflict.

All of us in different times in our lives are presented with an opportune moment. A moment to make a witness for God and stand against moral pressure, or to go silently along with the crowd.

Today we’re going to read a story about two men for whom that opportune moment had come. One man stood up to the moral pressure, and another man who went quietly along with the crowd.

Let’s now turn to Mark :14-29

There are three main characters in this passage from the Gospel of Mark: Jesus, John the Baptist, and Herod. Although Jesus appears in the passage first, we need to begin with a look at the relationship of Herod and John the Baptist, and John’s tragic death at the hand of Herod’s men.

So who really is this character Herod? Do historical sources outside the Bible tell us anything about Herod and the death of John the Baptist?

History records several rulers by the name Herod. And it seems that the Herod referred to in this passage of the Gospel of Mark is a ruler known in history books as Herod Antipas. Herod Antipas was, during the time of Jesus’ ministry, the ruler of Galilee and nearby Peraea. Herod Antipas was not really a king, but part of a four-party ruling group called the Tetrarch. But Herod liked to be called a king. In fact, it was Herod’s active campaign to be recognized as a king that got him deposed from his rulership years later. At the time of this passage, Herod Antipas effectively ruled as a king in this area of Palestine, and so the Gospel of Mark calls him King Herod.

We also know from historians who wrote about this time period that Herod Antipas caused quite a social scandal in marrying a woman named Herodias, who also appears in this story. Herodias was married to Herod’s half-brother Phillip. And, although Herodias lived in a Jewish community, Herodias used her Roman citizenship to obtain a divorce from her first husband, Philip, so that she could marry Herod. This would have been forbidden in Jewish law, but Herodias took advantage of the rule of Rome to make her divorce legal.

Herod also broke Jewish law by marrying the wife of his brother. The book of Leviticus in the Old Testament (Lev. 18, 20) clearly states that to marry the wife of your brother while he is still alive is a violation of community ethics and standards.

The historian Josephus relates that the first husband of Herodias, Phillip, was the ruler of a the kingdom Petras, and Phillip is so angry that he goes to war with Herod over the snatching of his wife. So the marriage is an international scandal that costs the lives of many of Herod’s and Phillip’s countrymen.

The Gospel of Mark tells us that John the Baptist didn’t stand by quietly while all this was taking place. John publicly denounced Herod Antipas’ marriage to Herodias. This made Herodias angry and she wanted to get back at John. The Scripture says she wanted to kill him.

So this is how the lives of two unlikely characters, John the Baptist and Herod Antipas, become entwined. John did not stand quietly by while Herod’s poor choice put lives in danger and mocked Jewish law. John the Baptist was a prophet, and, although he was popular and well-respected in the Jewish community, his messages of repentance did not promote the status quo.

And Herod Antipas was riding on the status quo to maintain stability in his realm. As the local authority, Herod would have been on the lookout for local uprisings, especially after his unpopular marriage. One Bible commentator writes, “The large-scale popular enthusiasm for the preaching of both John and Jesus, and reports of (Jesus’) politically sensitive language about the incoming kingdom of God, could hardly fail to arouse (Herod’s) suspicion.”

Indeed the Gospel of Mark says that Herod’s men arrested John and put him in prison. But here is the curious thing. The Scripture also says, “Herodias had a grudge against John and wanted to kill him. But she could not, for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man. When Herod heard John, he was greatly perplexed; and yet he liked to listen to him.”

Isn’t it interesting that Herod’s wife Herodias is pressuring Herod to kill John. But Herod won’t do it at first because Herod fears John and knows that John is a righteous and holy man.

Herod recognizes that John has spiritual power. In John’s life of integrity and witness to God, John has a spiritual power that intrigues Herod and frightens him. Herod likes to listen to John speak about God, but can’t seem to make up his mind what to do with John.

Although Herod commands all the political and military power, he fears John because Herod recognizes that, although John has no social status or claim, John has spiritual power and commands moral authority.

And so the story continues. The Scripture says in verse 21, “But an opportunity came.” In Greek the phrase translates more literally, “An opportune moment came.”

The opportune moment arrives on Herod’s birthday. Historians record that Herod was known for his lavish parties. The daughter of Herodias comes in to dance for Herod and his all-male dinner party. The Scripture leaves to our imagination what kind of party this was. Herod is likely drunk and makes a foolish oath to the young and pretty daughter from Herodias’ first marriage – he offers to grant her any wish she might ask.

The daughter consults her mother, and now Herodias grasps hold of the opportune moment to exact revenge on John the Baptist for speaking out against her marriage to Herod. Herodias sets her daughter up to ask for the head of John the Baptist.

The opportune moment also arrives to Herod. He has made a foolish oath in front of all his dinner guests and is now caught in it. Does he stand up for John whom he knows to be a righteous and holy man, or does he cave in to the pressure of his wife’s plot and the opinion of his dinner guests?

We know the answer. Herod shows himself to be a coward. He orders his men to behead John. The opportune moment came to Herod to do the right thing, and it passed him by.

This is a disturbing passage of Scripture. This is not a happy Hollywood ending. We want everything to turn out right for the good guy. But instead the hero, John is killed. And not only that, but killed in a humiliating and degrading manner. John’s death becomes an evening’s entertainment for Herod’s birthday celebration.

And we wonder, “Why did God allow such a thing? Why didn’t God intervene? Why didn’t Jesus do something?” But perhaps the answer to that question lies at our doorstep and not God’s. In the Garden of Eden we chose the freedom of knowing and doing both good and evil. For God has granted us the positive and negative consequences of our choices as people of freedom.

And, in fact, Jesus does do something. It is exactly for this kind of corruption and sin and misuse of freedom that Jesus was sent into the world.

One thing this Scripture makes clear is that when you stand up for what is right and good and just, not everyone will call you blessed. The world pressures us to conform to its corruption, and doing the right thing is usually risky, and sometimes very costly.

For Martin Luther King, Jr. the cost of speaking the truth was the loss of his life in Memphis, Tennesee. Maybe the risk or cost is something less dramatic. Perhaps to stand up against moral pressure might make us worry about losing our job and putting ourselves in a financial risk. Maybe standing up against moral pressure might mean putting a friendship or relationship at risk, and that’s also a hard choice.

For Herod Antipas, he was faced with the risk of damaging his relationship with his wife Herodias. He didn’t want to lose face in front of all his dinner guests, political leaders and friends. But Herod learns the hard way that to give in to moral pressure, to do something we know is wrong is in the end even more costly than the risk of standing up against it.

Let’s go back to the opening verses of the Scripture. This is where Jesus comes in. Jesus’ teachings and deeds of power have been talked about all over Galilee, so that even Herod Antipas has heard of him now. People all over Galilee are speculating about how this Jesus really is. Some say he is Elijah returned, some say a prophet like those from of old. But what does Herod make of Jesus? Who does Herod think Jesus is?

Verse 16 says this: “But when Herod heard (about Jesus), he said, ‘John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.’” Herod is speaking out of fear. Herod knows he did evil by killing John, by caving in to the moral pressure of his wife and dinner guests. Now his choice is haunting him. He is afraid that John has come back from the dead to take revenge on him.

Herod now recognizes that spiritual power is stronger than political or military power. Even though John is dead, Herod still fears him. For even though John’s life is over and gone, his integrity and witness to God live on.

Herod has the chance to meet Jesus face-to-face later on, the Gospel of Luke tells us about this meeting. Wouldn’t you think Herod would ask for Jesus’ forgiveness? Wouldn’t you think he would confess? Jesus has the authority to forgive sins, and Jesus would have forgiven Herod. But instead Herod mocks Jesus. He puts a purple robe and crown of thorns on him.

Herod is afraid. His guilty conscience is tormenting him, and the only defense he has against integrity, against the spiritual power of witness to God, his only defense is to make fun of it. People made fun of Jesus, I believe, because they feared him. People still make fun of Jesus and of faith in Christ because of their fear.

But what a weak defense mockery is against the power of Christ. People mocked Jesus, but they couldn’t kill him. The politicians and leaders of the day put Jesus on a cross, but he came back from the dead to offer life to all who believe. Jesus lived a life that witnessed to all the power of God. Jesus witnessed to a God who offers the promise of resurrection, and there is nothing more powerful than the power of God over death.

The story of John the Baptist, although tragic, is one that is still being told, not because of how John died, but because of how he lived. The power of John’s witness to God endures beyond his earthly life. John made the most of every opportunity to live a life that reflected God’s character, God’s holiness, God’s love for a broken and fearful world.

And the question which this text puts before us, is this: At the end of our life, what will endure? At the end of our life, what will our witness be? When the opportune moment comes to us, what will we choose?