Thursday, September 22, 2022
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Herod would not let go
Jesus is coming, and even Herod the Tetrarch knows it.
Herod was greatly perplexed. Some said John was raised from the dead. Others said Elijah had returned.
This was not an easy time for the poor old king. All his sinning catching up with him, the women in his household dissatisfied about his attentions, and all with his growing interest in things spiritual. John the Baptist had occupied a great deal of his time. The king seemed to like this crazy mongrel who wore hairshirts and spit on their ceremonies. His appetite was whetted, and now there was someone else.
Herod said, “John I beheaded. Who then is this about whom I hear such things?” And he kept trying to see Jesus.
In spite of his unholy beginnings, King Herod felt some spiritual tuning in his second half of life.
This poem might have fit the king, if he would have taken time to listen to his inner voice, or perhaps even to write down some of what he heard:
A Holey Time
Most days I invite a space,
a hole in my day,
in my life
to listen,
to be with God,
to be with myself,
to ask God
“What is it you wish for this day,
for this life you have created,
that you sustain,
that you love?”
And sometimes a clear answer comes,
a direct answer I mean,
but most often the answer is silent accommodating
and loving and of freedom
(perhaps more than I wish)
the answer is a question,
a mutuality,
a kiss,
a presence,
a gentleness and quietness.
“Well, what are you hoping for?” God asks.
And I wonder why God trusts me so much
when I feel sticky with self interest
and ego and unfreedom,
holding an incredibly small view of existence
and what is important –
Oh God I beg you,
make the hole in my day,
my heart and my life
bigger,
that it may be filled,
that all of me may be filled
with you.
– Clarence Heller
What power-hungry dictator could go on hurting others if he took some time to pray this prayer? “Well, what are you hoping for?” God asks.
Jesus asked Blind Bartimaeus, “What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus’ question echoes down through the ages to me. David, Jesus asks, what do you want me to do for you?
He would have asked Herod, surely. He might have reminded the king of Proverbs 21 (“like a stream is the king’s heart in the hand of the Lord; wherever it pleases him, he directs it”). But then he would have asked after the king’s heart.
Well, what are you hoping for? What do you want me to do for you?
That story didn’t happen. At the beginning of Jesus’ passion, on the night when he grew still and received whatever God had for him (“not my will, but yours be done”), Pilate sent him to Herod, who was delighted to see him. But Jesus performed no miracles. He said nothing. Herod joined his soldiers and dressed Jesus in a purple cloak, mocked him, and sent him back to Pilate.
Vanity of vanities! All things are vanity. What profit has man from all his labor under the sun? One generation passes and another comes, but the earth abides forever. The sun also rises, and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises once again.
Surely Herod knew his scriptures, knew the verities of Solomon and the certainties of Ecclesiastes. He couldn’t hold on to his life. Even as king, how could he be in charge of what God made and God took away? He sang with all the Jewish people, “Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, king of the universe …”
You turn us back to dust, saying, “Return, O children of men.” For a thousand years in your sight are like a watch in the night. We are like new grass: in the morning it springs up new, but by evening it is dry and withered.
Herod’s humility failed him. His pedigree as a child of God, fearfully and wonderfully made, held fast, but he would not be captured by it. He stayed ahead of God, rather than letting God lead. Finally, he could not honestly pray:
May the favor of the Lord our God rest on us and establish the work of our hands for us. Yes, establish the work of our hands.
 (Ecclesiastes 1, Psalm 90, John 14, Luke 9)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
#
