Introduction
Weakness is big business. In the year of our Lord, 2023, in a time when everything in society is cast in terms of power and power struggles, showing off your weakness is much to your advantage. Of course we don’t use the language of weakness. We use the language of oppression, struggle, and disadvantage. If you can show that you sit at the intersection of multiple oppressed groups then you are automatically supposed to have an outside voice and the right to ignore anything coming from those who “have cultural power.” Which essentially translates into being able to ignore anything a straight white man has to say. In our day, displaying your weakness is its own kind of power play.
And many folks, even Christians, have reacted against this in a manifestly unhealthy way, willing to embrace any form of power. We will prove we aren’t weak by the sort of vulgarity, abuse, or crass self-interest we are willing to tolerate and even celebrate. And this is also an error.
As Christians, those who hold the Bible as our highest authority, we need to realize that there is a type of weakness which is inherent in our nature, and which we must not only learn to be okay with, but to embrace if we are to honor God; namely, our creaturely weakness. We have limitations, limits, and frailties when it comes to how many hours are in a day, how much energy we are given within those hours, how much we’re able to learn and know. And then, this side of the fall, God has put the most authoritative limit on us all: death. So our bodies are not only limited by being creaturely, but they are positively decaying, breaking down, and headed for the grave. And we can ignore this fact, or run from it, or embrace it as reality on this side of Eden. Limits and weaknesses are part of what it means to be human.
But not all weaknesses are simply the result of our humanity. Some of our weaknesses expose sins for which we are responsible. And that’s what we’re going to find in our text this morning. A weak man who believes he is great, and thus coddles his weakness.
Text:
14 King Herod heard of it, for Jesus’ name had become known. Some said, “John the Baptist has been raised from the dead. That is why these miraculous powers are at work in him.” 15 But others said, “He is Elijah.” And others said, “He is a prophet, like one of the prophets of old.” 16 But when Herod heard of it, he said, “John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.” 17 For it was Herod who had sent and seized John and bound him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, because he had married her. 18 For John had been saying to Herod, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.” 19 And Herodias had a grudge against him and wanted to put him to death. But she could not, 20 for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he kept him safe. When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed, and yet he heard him gladly.
21 But an opportunity came when Herod on his birthday gave a banquet for his nobles and military commanders and the leading men of Galilee. 22 For when Herodias’s daughter came in and danced, she pleased Herod and his guests. And the king said to the girl, “Ask me for whatever you wish, and I will give it to you.” 23 And he vowed to her, “Whatever you ask me, I will give you, up to half of my kingdom.” 24 And she went out and said to her mother, “For what should I ask?” And she said, “The head of John the Baptist.” 25 And she came in immediately with haste to the king and asked, saying, “I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter.” 26 And the king was exceedingly sorry, but because of his oaths and his guests he did not want to break his word to her. 27 And immediately the king sent an executioner with orders to bring John’s head. He went and beheaded him in the prison 28 and brought his head on a platter and gave it to the girl, and the girl gave it to her mother. 29 When his disciples heard of it, they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb.
The Scene
Verse 14 opens, “when King Herod heard of it.” When he heard of what? Well, what we read of last week - the ministry of Jesus throughout all of Galilee. He had ministered some in Nazareth, but was rejected by his own, and so he went out into the surrounding villages and towns, and even more remarkably, sent out the 12 and did mighty works through their hands.
The rest of that verse tells us Jesus’ name had become known, and you might well imagine why - miracles, healings, the raising of the dead - word gets around when that sort of thing starts to happen.
And the theories as to who this could be start to rage - is Elijah? No; but maybe he’s a prophet of old - the same kind of prophet Elijah was. Hey, we had a prophet around not that long ago - John the Baptist! It could be John the Baptist being raised from the grave! Mark tells us one of the people who thought Jesus might actually be John was King Herod, the tetrarch or puppet-king in Galilee.
Mark then does something interesting, in that he cuts away from the Jesus story to fill us in about how and why John the Baptist died. The last time we saw him in Mark’s gospel was at the baptism of Jesus in chapter one, but now he’s being referred to as dead: so Mark decides to fill you, the reader, in on what is going on.
And what went on is not a great story. John didn’t go out in some sort of blazing glory - not chariots of fire like Elijah, not even blood on the altar as for Zechariah. Instead, he is jailed. And jailed not because of telling people about Jesus the Messiah, but jailed for calling a public official to account. The Herod in our story is Herod Antipas, the son of Herod the Great. When Herod the Great died, the area he governed was split into three, and his sons came to the various thrones. Herod Archelaus, Antipas’ older brother, was an awful ruler who had been deposed and then died by the time of Jesus’ ministry. Another, Herod Phillip I, had been married to a woman named Herodias. They divorced, and then Herod Antipas had taken Herodias as his wife.
To modern ears, we hear this and probably think, maybe a little weird, but not really a big deal. But flip ahead in Mark to see what Jesus says on this matter. Mark 10:2-12:
2 And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” 3 He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” 4 They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away.” 5 And Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. 6 But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ 7 ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, 8 and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. 9 What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”
10 And in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. 11 And he said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her, 12 and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”
The biblical baseline, Jesus’ baseline, is pretty clear: divorce dishonors God. There are times when, due to sin on one or both spouse’s part, the marriage ends (because of your hardness of heart, Jesus says). But this is not an excuse to pretend the marriage never happened and to just run into the arms of the next person you see: indeed, Jesus says to initiate a divorce and then marry someone new is a form of adultery.
And Jesus’ teaching wasn’t new, he is simply explaining in more detail the creational purpose of marriage. Now Herod has added to this, because to marry his brother’s wife - even if they were divorced - is seen as a violation of Leviticus 18 where God told Israel something to the effect of: “don’t marry your mother, sister, aunt, or any other near relative: it’s an abomination and gross and yuck” (Will’s paraphrase, 2023). John called Herod on the carpet. Now get this: it isn’t Herod who gets mad. It’s Herodias, the wife. And so to appease his wife, Herod locks John up. But he won’t kill him.
Herod’s Weaknesses
And that gets us to the meat of this story. Herodias is nursing a grudge against John and wants him dead (v19). And I don’t think we have to psychologize the text too much to assume she probably also has a grudge against her husband who won’t do anything about this raggedy prophet who is placing her in the same category as the prostitutes down on the corner. Antipas isn’t sticking up for her honor, so what kind of man is he? Surely a woman of such beauty and brains deserves better. But she is a woman who knows how to strike when a moment presents itself.
Verse 20 tells us such a moment came when Herod was throwing himself a birthday party. This banquet was quite the deal: nobles, military commanders, all the leading men. The wine would have been flowing freely, the food brought out in abundance. And then came the entertainment - Herod’s step-daughter, Salome.
Sexual Depravity
And here we see the first of Herod’s weaknesses in this text: what 1 John 2:16 calls, “the lusts of the flesh.” In verse 22 it says Herodias’s daughter came out to dance, and it pleased Herod and his guests. This was not a tap dance that got a polite round of applause. Rather, what happened is that a young teen girl, Salome, was sent by her mother to perform a suggestive dance that manipulated the girl's step-father into making an extravagant oath.
If that doesn’t strike you as disturbing and disgusting, I’m not sure what will. But that’s the picture laid out before us in this text. And the plot of Herodias only works because of Herod’s weakness in the area of his sexual desire. He gives himself over to whatever pleases him, even if that happens to be a young girl born of his own wife.
Men, you may not be a 1st century puppet king, but the same temptations face you today. The lies of adultery, fornication, and pornography are that you are in control. You are finding a way to express your power and to gratify your desires. That is what our world sells as freedom and greatness, and has for thousands of years. Even wise King Solomon was conquered by the lusts of his flesh. But our lusts lie. Where sin promises power, it steals it instead. Where sin promises control, it breeds chaos; both internally and relationally. Sexual sin will ruin you.
But like Herod, many men stand weak and helpless in the face of temptation, ready to give away half their kingdom to a scantily clad girl.
Fear of Man
The second weakness we see in Herod is the fear of man. After telling Salome that he would give her whatever she desired in v22, he reinforced that with a vow in v23, adding that it could be up to half his kingdom. This promise reminds us of Xerxes' promise in the book of Esther. But while Esther used her influence over the king to save her people, Salome has no idea what to do. So she asks mom. Herodias reveals her self-interest, because rather than doing something which would advance her daughter’s standing or security, she uses her daughter to get revenge. The girl says, “for what should I ask?” And her mother replied, “the head of John the Baptist.”
Now Herod is in a tough spot. Verse 20 tells us that Herod knew John to be righteous and holy, and that while he did not understand his righteous and holy commitments, he was glad to hear him speak. And he sought to keep him safe. Even if “safe” meant locked up where Herodias wouldn’t be able to dispatch any shady fellows to get rid of him.
But now Herod is in a pickle. He has made a public vow, and the response he received was the head of the prophet he knows to be righteous and holy. What should he do? We see at the end of v26, “because of his oaths and his guests he did not want to break his word to her.” The Lord hates a lie, right? Herod is rationalizing. He knows killing John would be wrong, and he genuinely takes no pleasure in it. This phrase “exceedingly sorry” is from the same word Jesus uses in the garden of Gethsemane, “my soul is exceedingly sorrowful.” Herod is torn up about this.
But being torn up by a hard decision is not a virtue in itself. Andie is reading the C.S. Lewis book Prince Caspian to our family right now. And last night we were at the portion where the children and Trumpkin the dwarf are lost on their way to meet Caspian. And on their way, when they have a choice to go left or right, right seems the obvious choice. But Aslan appears to Lucy - and only Lucy - indicating they ought to go left instead. Peter agonizes over whether to do what makes sense or to trust what his sister saw. But he agonizes, and then makes the wrong decision. They go the wrong way and cost themselves much time and effort, only to have to go back and do what they should have done to start with.
But Herod can’t back up here. You can’t reverse course on an execution. He agonizes, and then, because he fears what his company will think, he has John beheaded.
Are you driven by the fear of man? Are you concerned about what your mom will think, or your spouse, or your kids, or your coworkers, or your friends? Do you allow that fear to be a driver of decisions in your life? This, again, sells itself to us as strength. Herod could sleep easy that night knowing he was “a man of his word” - even in hard times. “People will respect me” he might say to himself. But is following through on a drunken promise to murder a prophet really an indication of strength? Is it better to have man’s approval, or God’s?
Guilty Conscience
The final weakness of Herod we see in this text results from the others: he now has a guilty conscience which is chasing him. He’s seeing ghosts. He doesn’t even consider Jesus for Jesus’ sake, instead he assumes John must be back to haunt him. “John, whom I beheaded, has been raised” (v16).
Do you have sins in your past that haunt you? Is your conscience driving you mad? When you are burdened with a guilty conscience you blow all sorts of events and statements out of proportion, and you aren’t able to analyze decisions and relationships in a clear and rational way. If you somehow manage to deaden your conscience either through long years of ignoring it, or through substances, then you are weakened even further - now you don’t know that you need to be saved. Guilt is a weakness we all know, that if left undealt with, will ultimately destroy us eternally.
Where can a guilty conscience go to be made clean?
John’s Strength
The contrast between the figure of Herod and the figure of John in this text is striking. Though John is totally “off screen,” what is relayed to us is important. How did John speak to Herod? Bluntly and forthrightly. “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.” He calls Herod to repent, just like he had called people in the wilderness to repent when he was baptizing folks by the Jordan river.
And here’s the thing: Herod heard him gladly. One thinks of the comment of Benjamin Franklin concerning the 18th century evangelist George Whitfield. Franklin, who was not a Christian, was once asked “why do you go and listen to Whitfield, considering you don’t believe a word he says.” To which Franklin replied, “no - but he does.” Herod, likewise, didn’t receive the truth personally. But he was willing to listen. There are many in our day who think we can win a hearing with the world by softening the edges of our message, by only saying things that are easy for people to understand. The example of John says this is nonsense. John, unlike Herod, had a backbone.
To proclaim the Christian gospel takes backbone. My job and your job is to tell people of their sin. At times that is even going to mean naming specific sins. Because until and unless specific sins are recognized, we have no idea what we would need a Savior for. Jesus did not die for some vague general category of action called “sins.” He died for your pornography use. He died for you yelling at your kids. He died for your drug use. He died for you fudging on your taxes. He died for your gossip. He died for you kids disobeying your parents. Jesus died for real sins. And so if anyone is to be saved, they need to be made aware of their sins.
That boldness does not equate to self-righteousness. The minute we start thinking about specific sins, we should start to see our own specific sins. What sort of sexual sin are you guilty of - either with your body or your mind (Matthew 5:28)? When have you been blown over by the winds of public opinion (or what you guessed public opinion might be)? And what of your past sins are eating away at you right now?
So long as you are living in sin you will be weak. And again, one of the lies of this world, one of the lies of the devil, and a lie you flesh tells you constantly is that when you surrender to temptation you are being strong and free in making that choice. But that is utter nonsense. Jesus says that whoever lives in sin is its slave (John 8:34). Herod’s life makes that abundantly clear.
But you can know the same Savior John knew. And if you trust in Jesus’ substitutionary death in your place on the cross, then you will be set free from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2). You are given a Spirit-endowed strength to say no to sin. Instead of being ruled by the desires and works of the flesh, you can put those deeds to death by the power of the Holy Spirit (Romans 8:13). You do that by reading, meditating on, and obeying the word of God. You do that by constantly seeking him in prayer to help you. True strength comes from acknowledging your weakness before God - and then by faith living in the strength that he supplies.
Do not identify yourself by your weaknesses. You have weaknesses and struggles, true. But if you are in Christ, then what you are is a Spirit-filled child of the living God. So live in the strength that he supplies. The danger of weakness is that it can fool us into thinking that things “just are what they are.” But if you are in Christ that is not true! The Spirit has the power to turn you from your sin and to give you growth in grace. What defines us, most deeply, is not our weakness, but God’s strength. God’s grace gives us spiritual backbone.
