Can you handle God's Truth?

From sermon at Ascension, Towson - July 15. Mark 6:14-29; Amos 7:7-15

When Herod first hears about Jesus, he has a flashback, and he wonders if John the Baptist has risen from the dead. Because there are so many similarities between John and Jesus. Both are radicals. Both are prophets, proclaiming God’s message outside the religious and political establishment. Both are poor men, relatively powerless in the world. And both John and Jesus scare the bejeebers out of Herod.

Herod recalls the night John met his demise. Here’s what led up to it. Philip and Herod were brothers. They were also both uncles to Herodias. Philip married Herodias and they had a child together, a daughter. Herod was married at the time, too. Well, Herod and Herodias got the hots for one another, and they decided to divorce their spouses, one of which is Herod’s own brother, so they could marry each other. (This is like something on an episode of The Jerry Springer Show, right?) 

So that’s what John’s ranting about. And Herod doesn’t know how to shut him down. But his wife does. When Herod offers to give his stepdaughter anything she wishes after performing what must have been one amazing dance, she consults her mother for advice. Backed into a corner, Herod grants her wish, the head of John the Baptist on a platter.

You can see how that might be the sort of thing that would haunt Herod. (It haunts me, and I’ve only read the story in the Bible.) So, hearing about Jesus leads to this traumatic flashback for Herod. And this story of John speaking God’s truth and being killed for it, serves for us, the readers of Mark’s gospel, not as a flashback, but as a flashforward. A foreshadowing of what’s about to unfold in the story of Jesus. 

There’s something for us to learn, as well, as people who follow in the way of Jesus… who followed in the way of John… who followed in the way of the Old Testament prophets… We come from a long tradition of people who were called to speak God’s truth to a world that finds that truth threatening. 

Today’s first reading is from the prophet Amos. It talks about a plumb line that God puts in the middle of Israel. A plumb line is something people use in construction to make sure walls are built in a straight line. 

Amos says that God has a plumb line, too. It’s the line of God’s righteousness, and God’s people are judged according to how their lives line up with God’s righteousness.

Jesus introduced a plumb line of his own. He called it the Kingdom of God. The challenge for us as Christians is to take the vision of the Kingdom of God as it’s revealed to us by Jesus, lay it alongside the ways of the world and ask, how do they line up? 

Now, the only way to get a handle on what the Kingdom of God looks like is by studying the Scriptures. And when we study the Scriptures, we learn just how radically different the Kingdom of God is from the ways of the world. 

We live in a world that rewards people based on their merit and insists people get what they deserve, but in the Kingdom of God, people receive grace, which has absolutely nothing to do with what they deserve. Our world insists strength is shown by exerting power over others; in the Kingdom of God, strength is shown in service and giving yourself for others. In the world around us, when someone hurts us, we strike out and hurt them back; in the Kingdom of God, we respond to hatred with compassion—we turn the other cheek and pray for our enemies. 

And the really big thing we learn when we study the Scriptures, in particular the way of Jesus, is that God has a bias toward the bottom. God sides with the poor, the outsiders, and the oppressed. As people who are affluent, well-positioned in life, and who benefit from the status quo, that’s not something we want to hear. 

When we lay the ways of the world around us alongside the ways of the Kingdom of God, we can’t ignore the disparity or look the other way. We see God’s truth. How do we respond to it?  

Now this is hard for most of us. But I don’t know if you realize what a struggle it is for those of us who preach. It’s the sort of thing that has me tossing and turning on Saturday nights.  

I want you to like me. It would feel so good to stand before you week after week and tell you funny stories, and talk about my grandkids and my cat, and assure you that God doesn’t want any of us to change. 

I really don’t want to ruffle your feathers or become a source of anger for you. And that presents me with a dilemma. Because I can’t preach whatever I want to. I’m called to proclaim the truth of the Scriptures to you. And I work as hard as I can to do that—praying that the Holy Spirit will guide me. 

I know that many people have been conditioned to believe that preachers aren’t supposed to talk about politics from the pulpit. I’m not sure where that idea comes from, but it couldn’t have come from anyone who actually reads the Bible. When you read the message of the Scriptures—and I’m not talking about snacking here and there, but really feasting on the whole enchilada—a major theme of the Scriptures is speaking truth to power. 

That’s how it all started for God’s people when a motley group of slaves sought freedom from their oppressors. It was the message of the prophets in times of corruption and years of exile. During Jesus’ time, Israel was living in subjugation to the Roman Empire. That political reality colored everything Jesus said and everything he did. 

Partisan politics, that is endorsing a certain political party or candidate, has no place in the church. But addressing the political world is another matter. When we consider the witness of Jesus and his followers, seeking faithfulness to that story and relevance to our own, we have to ask, how do we faithfully respond to our own Empire?

This isn’t just a struggle for preachers. It’s a struggle for all of us as God’s people. And it’s a struggle for the Church as an expression of Christ’s presence in the world.

We don’t have the option of remaining silent so that people will like us. We may be considered offensive at times. We may be considered impolite. Like Amos. Or John the Baptist. Or Jesus. We may not get invited to many parties and when we are, we may end up the main course. 

That’s what happens when you lay the Kingdom of God alongside the Kingdoms of this world. You notice the difference and it’s not something you can live with.