He lost his head. It happens. 

It happened in Jesus’ time and it’s happening in our time. It makes me wonder if we all come to moments in our lives when we lose our head. Maybe the question isn’t whether we will lose our head but what are we willing to lose our head for. 

That’s the difference between John the Baptist and Herod in today’s gospel (Mark 6:14-29). We often hear this story as being about the beheading of John the Baptist but here’s what strikes me about today’s gospel. John wasn’t the only one or even the first one to lose his head. Herod also lost his head. His head was the first to roll. 

All throughout today’s gospel Herod is losing his head. 

• He takes what he wants without regard for other people. He lost his head.
  He married his brother’s wife.
• He thinks he can do whatever he wants and the law does not apply to him. He lost his head. John, however, tells him, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.”
• He fears the truth tellers. It’s a consequence of losing his head. “Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man.”
• He’s overly invested in his public image, how others see him and what they think and say about him. “He was deeply grieved” when his wife’s daughter asked for the head of John on a platter; “yet out of regard for his oaths and his guests, he did not want to refuse her.” He lost his head.
• He brags about his power and wealth and uses them to reward those who please him and punish those who confront him. He lost his head. He offered up to half his kingdom to the dancing daughter of his wife and he imprisoned and beheaded John the Baptist.  

I haven’t done all those things but I know what it’s like to be Herod. There have been times when I lost my head. I suppose that’s happened to you too. For me fear, frustration, guilt, grief are often ways in which I lose my head. What about you? When have you lost your head? How did it happen? What was going on?

When Herod loses his or her head others suffer. We see that throughout history. We experience it in our relationships and families. It’s in the news most every day.

John the Baptist, however, loses his head because he called out Herod for what he’d done. He’s a truth teller. John puts principle above personality. He holds the king accountable to the law. He speaks truth to power and he pays the price. Herod, however, speaks power to truth. He executes John in an attempt to silence the truth he doesn’t want to hear. 

John chose truth. Herod chose power. Both lost their heads. 

Truth or power? It’s a choice we make every day. It’s the tension in our country these days. It’s the conflict throughout the world. Will we speak truth to power or will we speak power to truth?

Both John and Herod have a relationship with the truth as do you and I. I wonder what that relationship is for you today. Whose voice are you listening to? When have you been John and when have you been Herod? What truth is guiding your life and where is it taking you? For what are you willing to lose your head?

I’m asking myself those same questions and I don’t have any good, easy, or clear answers for myself or you. Most days I’m not even sure any more what truth is. And I don’t think I’m the only one who isn’t sure. Maybe you aren’t either.

Is truth found in the law, our constitution, a Supreme Court decision? Is it in our scriptures? Is it whatever the loudest and most powerful say it is? Is it determined by my needs and best interests? Is it whatever is scientifically provable? Does it have to be historically accurate? Is it the majority opinion? Is it whatever I want it to be and say it is? If you say it enough times does it become true? Is truth absolute and fixed or is it changing and relative? Can there be more than one truth? 

What is truth? 

For most of my life I thought truth was a fact that could be proved, a proposition to be believed, a destination to be arrived at. But what if it’s not any of those things? Jesus said that he is the truth. “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.”

What if truth is more about a relationship than a fact? What if it’s not a proposition but an action, a way of being and living? What if it’s not a destination but a starting point? What if truth isn’t something we believe in but something we do? What if truth both reveals something and calls us to do something?  

Let me give you a couple of examples of what I mean by that. Last week I met with and assisted a woman who, among other things, told me that she was taking half the dose of her diabetes medicine every other day because she can’t afford a full does every day. She has to choose between her medicine and food for her children. Do you hear the truth in that? Do you hear the truth being revealed about our health care system and our care for one another? Do you hear the truth asking us to change, to do something, to make difference? 

As you know, yesterday evening there was an attempted assassination of Former President Trump. It was a moment of truth. It once again revealed who we have become as Americans, the state of our political process, and how we handle our differences. It once again revealed our willingness to use violence to get our way. It revealed Herod among us. And it’s calling for truth tellers and change. It’s calling for us to speak up and do something. 

Truth is not partisan. Policies, agendas, and goals are partisan and self-interested, but not truth. Truth is bigger and more generous than that. If it’s not setting people free it’s probably not truth. 

We say we want the truth but I’m not sure we can handle the truth. Truth would ask to stand in a place of vulnerability and uncertainty – the same place John the Baptist stood and died. It would confront us with the Herod in our lives. It would hold the pain of the world before us. It would ask something of each of us. 

It would not offer “the answer” but it might offer us a way forward. If we think we have “the answer” we probably do not have the truth. Maybe truth is a question to be followed and lived. Maybe truth only gets revealed in places of vulnerability and uncertainty and not in places of power. 

Can you handle that? Can I handle that? I don’t know. I just don’t know anymore. It means we can no longer seek a truth that is convenient and comfortable. We’d have to stop settling for half-truths. And we can no longer presume to have the whole truth. Instead, we must follow and live with the questions.

I don’t know if we can handle that. But I know this; you and I showed up today. My guess is we came asking something and maybe looking for something –  a truth of hope, peace, nonviolence; a truth of courage, perseverance, strength; a truth of life, love, compassion, healing, reconciliation; a truth of a future worthy of our children and grandchildren.

What question is truth asking you to follow and live with today? How far are you willing to follow that question? Is it worth losing your head over? 

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Image Credit: By Emmanuel Tzanes, Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons.
Featured Image: By anonymous – Art UK, Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons.