April 12, 2016
My 2016 Ongoing Journey: Exploring
Matthew to discover what following Jesus and becoming more like him would look
like.
Matthew 14:1-12
~ This passages comprises one scene in a real-life drama of corruption
and disgrace. Herod Antipas, Jewish puppet of Rome, threw a party. During the
festivities, Herod's step-daughter danced for the crowd. First century Jewish
historian, Josephus, says her name was Salome; tradition says she was about
fourteen, and names her performance a "dance of seven veils": very
erotic and suggestive. Mark says it "delighted Herod and his
guests". The results of that perverted scene defy the imagination. In his
state of "delight", Herod offers the girl anything she wants; so she
asks her mother, "For what shall I ask?"
Herod had divorced his first wife and had taken Herodias
(who was his niece) while she was still married to his half-brother. John the
Baptist had denounced the whole arrangement, and Herodias harbored a grudge.
What follows is a gruesome story. Every child somehow,
sometime, asks, "What shall I ask of life? What is it you want me most to
do and to be? I'll take my cue from you." And that's what Salome does.
Herodias had no concern for her daughter. She was
self-seeking and hate-filled, and in a position at least of indirect power. She
was willing to use even her own daughter to achieve her goals. Apparently
without flicking an eyelid she made her daughter an accessory to murder:
"Bring me the head of the Baptizer!"
Salome is the most tragic of all the characters in this
drama, her youth and innocence manipulated by her scheming mother. And early in
life Salome learned to use her assets to exploit the weakness of others.
What a critical moment when a child looks to us and asks,
"What shall I ask of life?"
And, children are much more likely to “do as I do; not as I say.”
If I am following
Jesus, the child will be guided by good example as well as by good word.
That's the way it looks through the
flawed glass that is my world view.
Together in the Walk,
Jim
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