Of Prophets and Power (Matthew 14:1-21)
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Transcript
Good morning my name is Spencer I'm one of the pastor's of Mill City Church we were excited about the prospects of being in this room it's be able to worship together after months of being apart but as maybe you saw on Facebook or on email or through word of mouth because a few people that are important to pulling off Sunday mornings either tested positive or didn't I get there negative Cova test results back we decided to push it back and to continue to live stream which is a little bit disappointing.
But we're not crushed and the reason that we're not crushed is because our hope is not bound up in being in the same room on a Sunday morning our hope is bound up in Christ we believe as a Church that Jesus is better than everything else which means that our hope and our joy and our longing is bound up in him and because of that we get to be a Gospel centered community on mission which for this morning means in our homes that we get to either sing songs we get to have the Scripture read over us we get to sit under the authority of God's Word and as we leave.
Today we get to continue to be a Gospel centered community on mission and our community groups our community groups our smaller groups our smaller parts of our Church family meeting together and we are finally meeting together in different homes throughout the city and we're practicing as best we can social distancing and safe meeting efforts but if you want to know more about our groups and be able to join in with some of them we invite you to look on our web site and our community groups tab and you can get plugged into a group through that also.
If you are part of our Church family we invite you to continue to give with a giving tab on our website that's the easiest place to give also you can drop checks or money in this building throughout the week so I want to pause and pray for our Church family's been affected by this virus so I'm gonna pray that God will pair of hearts for worship and I'll read from Psalm 95 so let me pray father you are our our great physician got a pray that you would heal the people in our Church that have been affected by this virus I pray that you continue to protect our Church from this.
God I pray that as we are in our homes this morning as we are singing songs as we are sitting under your word that you would speak to us so God prepare our hearts for worship in Jesus name Amen our own Ernie from Psalm 95 verses 1 through 6 to call us into worship oh come let us sing to the Lord let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation let us come into his presence with Thanksgiving let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise the.
Lord is a great God and a great king above all gods in his hand are the depths of the earth and the heights the mountains are his also the sea is his for he made it and his hands formed dry land oh come let us worship and bow down let us kneel before the Lord wherever you are listing together this No my heart to say never ceasing call for songs of yes my save me Jesus Jamie nice when rather was in light of the world party Oh hasn't lost its hello Steven Kim me from his here gah we thank you.
For the ability to come into your presence this morning and to worship you we're thankful that even though we're meeting all across the city today we can still be in your presence Lord we ask that you would speak to us this morning as people who want to follow after you who want to chase after you faithfully to be obedient we pray that you would speak to us this morning that you would fill Chet with your spirit Lord that as we sit under the authority of your word you might change us we ask these things in.
Jesus name Amen well good morning my name is Chet Phillips I'm one of the pastors with Mill City Church of KC if you will grab your Bibles and go to Matthew chapter 14 we're making our way through the Gospel of Matthew and today the story we're going to look at is a little bit distinct in the Gospel of Matthew in that it doesn't zoom in on Christ we've been following Jesus what he teaches what he does and this story is gonna be primarily about John the Baptist.
But as we read through this story it functions as a case study in what Jesus has been teaching it functions as a case study in portraying the Kingdom of Heaven in that we see that Jesus has been teaching that blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake that blessed are those who mourn that the kingdom is like a treasure that was hidden in a field and when a man discovered it he went and enjoy sold all that he had that he might purchase that field this idea that the kingdom is valuable in that it's worth everything that you would give up.
For it and that those who know and love and follow the King in his kingdom will have difficulty and so as we read the story of John the Baptist I think we're gonna see those things put on display and my hope for us this morning is that we would gain both courage and correction from this story if you will join me in praying God we thank you for your word we thank you for faithful Saints who have gone before us we pray that we might live out our faith daily and that we might make it to the end of our days trusting you and pursuing your kingdom above all else we ask that you would.
Speak to us through your word this morning in Jesus name Amen chapter fourteen verse one says at that time Herod the Tetrarch heard about the fame of Jesus now this is not is actually the third Herod we've run to run into in the Gospel of Matthew this is not here the great who was king when Jesus was born this is not his this the tetrarch's brother Herod Archelaus who was over half of the kingdom when Jesus returns and they moved to Galilee this is herod the tetrarch it's Herod Antipas you know he rules over a quarter of this area.
So there's two tetrarch's Herod Antipas and Herod Philip the second and then one brother has half of a kingdom so a little bit of favoritism there a little bit of power just play it out a little bit differently but we got one brother with half a kingdom two brothers with a quarter of a kingdom and that's the one we're messing with right now is Herod the Tetrarch it says when he heard about the fame of Jesus he said to his servants this is John the Baptist who has been raised from the dead that is why these miraculous powers are at work in him.
Okay so this kind of just jumps us into the middle of Herod he just jumps in and what he says about Jesus so he hears about Jesus he hears that he's doing miraculous works and his assumption is oh this is John the Baptist raised from the dead now if you've been following along in Matthew that's a little surprising because we haven't been told that John the Baptist is dead yet that's actually the story we're about to read but Matthew tells us at the beginning he's dead.
And then tells us how that happens the last time we saw John the Baptist was in chapter 11 and he was in prison and if you'll remember that - that we read that John the Baptist was in prison and you didn't even question it we didn't tell us why he was in prison but I guess because he's a Baptist it just seemed plausible and we moved right along but that he's in prison we find out why in this story and we find out how he died.
And so before we get into that let's look at this Herod the Tetrarch oversaw the death of John the Baptist and when he hears about Jesus his assumption is one based in fear that oh no John the Baptist must have risen in power and he must have come back that I've made a mistake because we're gonna see later that he thinks he's a prophet he's gonna say oh no I've made a mistake he's come back and he's more powerful than he was earlier that's not true that's not who.
Jesus is but that is the way Herod responds in a bit of guilt and a bit of fear but let's keep going it says verse 3 for Herod had seized John and bound him and put him in prison for the sake of Herodias his brother Philips wife and when you first read that you think but I guess that's nice he's doing something for his brother Philips wife maybe he's you know a big fan of his brother and then it keeps going it says.
Because John had been saying to him that's Herod it is not lawful for you to have her so now the story takes a twist into a darker area Herod has taken the wife from his brother Philip now this is Herod Philip one who is not a Tetrarch not haired Philip two who is a Tetrarch Herod Philip one was the person who was going to he was the oldest in the line but he just kind of backs out because Herod the Great had this this you know personality flaw where he kept killing all of his children that could potentially become king.
And when he made it down to Herod Philip won Herod Philip once said you know what I don't want to be king I don't want any power and he went and lived as a private citizen and he married his niece so Herodias is named after her grandfather who is Herod and she married her uncle Herod Philip won but then her other uncle Herod Antipas the Tetrarch takes her and there it's it's a little unclear as to whether or not this was just a power move or.
If they actually loved each other if they had met at some family functions you know as you do when you go to like a family reunion and you scope out who's Muriel here and you think well there's my niece / yeah there's my niece / sister-in-law maybe I'll start dating her and that's what happened and so he takes her and then John the Baptist comes and says you ought not to do this and I love what the Bible does here because this does this in a couple of different places the Bible does not refer to her as Herod the Tetrarch s-- wife although she was.
Because he had married her he refers to her as his brother Philips wife because the Bible doesn't care what kind of sinful mess you play out it's gonna stick to what's real and this should be still Herod Phillips Herod Philips wife and not his brother Herod the Tetrarch so John comes and says what you've done is unlawful and he comes to a man in power and speaks directly to him and says you ought not to have done this and he is assuming that there is a law that is greater and above Herod Antipas that he's speaking to a Tetrarch who is perfectly within his rights to arrest John eventually perfectly within his rights to have.
John executed but John says no there's a law that is above you and that regardless of what human institutions we have right now there's a law that you ought to adhere to you see the Scriptures are clear that God hates injustice and oppression and the wrong use of rule and power and that consistently throughout human history power has been used not to care and tend and provide for those underneath it but it has been used to be abused and to oppress.
Now that's clear but currently in the situation we're in culturally as soon as you say that which is clear and true there are a lot of other things that also need to be said which is the Bible is not anti Authority its anti unjust Authority oppressive Authority but there ought to be good authority and even as believers in the midst of unjust Authority we are meant to speak truth to it but to submit to it and it gives us a very complicated position that we have to walk out.
But it's a poor understanding of the Bible and a poor understanding of sinful human nature as taught by the Scriptures to say either all power is good and incorruptible or all power is bad and not to be rid of and we have to stand in the middle which makes our position more difficult to hold and we can potentially make everyone mad at us but that's fine as long as we're holding on to truth and that's the situation John Zym he is arrested thrown into jail.
Because he told Herod something that was true he called here to repentance and if you remember John he he had a message of repentance that we are sinners in need of repentance in need of grace and he speaks it to a king it was indiscriminate if you met John he didn't matter what what race you were what color you were how poor you were he was going to tell you you needed to repent he sounds like a nice guy and he's going to tell it to everybody even Kings.
So he's arrested first five and though he that's Herod wanted to put him that's John and though Herod wanted to put John to death he feared the people because they held him to be a prophet so Herod had hit Herodias as wishes his his niece sister-in-law wife arrests John and he wants to kill John because that would be easier but he's afraid that people would there be a bit of an uproar there'd be a bit of an uprising so he just doesn't and he just keeps him in jail.
Verse 6 but when Herod's birthday came the daughter of Herodias danced before the company and pleased Herod so that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she might ask I was talking to an old Baptist pastor one time and I asked him why Baptists were so vehement used to be so vehement against dancing and his response was the last time someone danced in the Bible a Baptist lost his head I and I still don't know if he was joking or not.
But what happens here is that Herodias is daughter so this is Herod's niece grandniece and step-daughter she comes to his birthday party where if we're to assume and just kind of picture this we would you'd be in a pretty lavish Hall one of the most one of the nicest places in this area there'd be a fairly large gathering there would be a feast there would be drinking good food good drink celebration and it goes from just a good birthday party into debauchery and sin and it's fair to assume that at this point he is a bit intoxicated.
If not heavily intoxicated and his wife's his brother's wife if we're gonna stick with the way the Bible talks about it daughter comes in and dances for this group and it is most likely that this was a sensual dance she's brought in to entertain the men who are celebrating this birthday and Herod enjoys it so much is so pleased by this as he stares at someone drastically younger than him soaks it in lusts he's so pleased by this that it says he promised with an oath.
Verse 7 to give her whatever she might ask she dances he's in a very merry mood most likely intoxicated and he says whatever you want you can have it prompted by her mother she said give me the head of John the Baptist here on a platter now we don't know what prompted by her mother means we don't know if she was given the chance to go think about it if she went to go talk to her mom and come back we don't know.
If her mom really quickly called her over we don't know if this was actually the intended effect that her mom had had her go dance for us she'd already told her go do this there's a really good chance he'll offer you something as soon as he does what we want is the head of John the Baptist on a platter not just we want John the Baptist killed we want to celebrate with his dismembered body this is wicked as he watches her dance and lust after her he chooses to offer her whatever she wants and what she wants.
Because her mother wants it is the head of John the Baptist and the King was sorry but because of his oaths and his guests he commanded it to be given so at his birthday party he calls for an execution says he was sorry but the best way we can read that in this text is the reason he was sorry was that he had hoped to not have to kill John the Baptist because he thinks that might affect his position of power that.
If enough people if there's enough of an uproar this will cause some turmoil and he didn't really want that he just wanted him to be in prison he wished he could kill him but he didn't think he could get away with it and now because of his guest because of his promise he has to and his birthday party turns into an execution he sent and had John beheaded in the prison and his head was brought on a platter and given to the girl and she brought it to her mother.
So that the eyes that once saw the Spirit descend like a dove unto Christ the ears that once heard the voice of the father from heaven the tongue that once proclaimed repentance and hope and forgiveness are now put on display for the enjoyment of Herodias this is wicked that they would have had his head where they were so that they could drink and laugh and celebrate so that in this story verse 12 it says and his disciples came and took the body the headless body of John the Baptist and buried it and they went and told.
Jesus in this story if we're looking from an earthly perspective Herod gets to celebrate Herod gets to have fine food and drink and party and entertainment and John the Baptist spends his remaining days in a Cell and at some point heard the feet of people walking down to where he was kept in the prison heard the key turn in the lock some men walked into the room one with an unsheathed sword and as a party favor he lost his life in this story we have John the Baptist on the one hand and Herod on the other and they give us a beautiful picture case study of what.
Jesus is calling us to in his kingdom you see John the Baptist is faithful he makes his choices to be faithful he does what the Spirit has called him to that he's empowered by God to go and proclaim truth to whomever will listen that he calls everyone to repentance and not just generally but specifically and it works out very poorly for him that the end result of this is the loss of his freedom the loss of comfort and joy and pleasure and ultimately the loss of his life and Herod pursues whatever he desires and as best we can tell he gets it I think some people think was this really a sensual dance.
Well the reality is he's staring at what history tells us her name is Salome the daughter of Herodias she actually marries her uncle Herod Philip - and so she like her mother if she gives birth to any children would give birth to sons and daughters that are also her first cousin and we listened to that and I'm not going into all this family history stuff to make our Church members from Kentucky feel homesick we listened to that I'm trying to point this out.
So that we might see that the the way they ran their family and their life was so that's actually not all that uncommon that they would intermarry in royal families but the reason they did it was to not share power with any other bloodline it's not uncommon at all throughout history to intermarry between royal families they didn't usually do sisters mother to parent son daughter stuff but they did a lot of cousins nieces and nephews that kind of thing because they wanted to keep power in their family and not only is there power that is being kept.
But you can see that across the board even against their own brothers and sisters they're grabbing whatever they desire so that they might have it so this family and Herod are based off of the pursuit of their own passions the fulfillment of their desires that they would keep what power they have that they would maintain their position this is why they take spouses this is why the inter marry this is why they murder one another this family is wicked but the reality is they line up pretty.
Well with what culture currently tells us we ought to do that you are the sum of your desires that if you have a desire that it's meant to be fulfilled that if you have a desire if you have a passion that's who you really are no we draw the line our culture is not promoting incest their culture is not promoting murder and harming others but we're not far back because the reality is you're told well if that's what you want that's who you are.
Look inside and find your deepest desire and that's who you really are and and how dare anyone tell you you can't do what you want and if anybody tells you that they're the enemy I thoroughly enjoyed the movie wreck-it Ralph and then the second one came out and I watched it and that's the whole premise of the movie is that if someone pursues some desire of theirs and it's ultimately harmful and you try to stop them you're a monster that's the premise of the.
Second wreckit-ralph movie you become a monster and you destroy everything if you try to stop someone from pursuing what they want and that is the Gospel occurring according to our culture that you are designed to pursue your desires and if you fulfill them you are the sum of your fulfilled desires and you think oh my goodness that's out there in the culture but the reality is that's in the Church how many times have we heard how many times have we said why no just.
God wants me to be happy I just know that he wants me to be happy I know he wouldn't tell me not to do something that makes me happy John you fool don't you know don't you know you're supposed to be happy don't you know that as soon as you met some pushback don't you know that as soon as they imprisoned you you should change everything don't you know that Jesus never meant for you to have to subvert your desires to be faithful.
If the reality is that God just wants us happy here and the way that's defined is by what is comfortable and what is nice here John is a failure he didn't get it doesn't John know God wants him to to die of old age wealthy and comfortable then he know that's God's intended desire the reality is we would do well to go out as faithfully and as beautifully as John the Baptist does you see John the Baptist testifies that he believes that there is something better than what he can.
See and touch and he believes that there is a God who tells us to subvert our desires for a greater purpose there's a pastor his name's Wang Yi he was arrested in 2019 in China he was a pastor of underground churches in China home churches in China and he wrote a document and he gave it he to leaders in his Church and he said if I'm ever arrested and kept for more than 48 hours I want you to release this he and several others in his Church were arrested all of them have since been released except.
For pastor Wang Yi and he has been sentenced to nine years for some sort of a governmental subversion charge and it's possible we'll see him eight years from now and it is quite possible we won't see him this side of eternity but this is a quote from that letter that he wrote he says as a pastor my disobedience is one part of the Gospel Commission you see John the Baptist because he believed what he believed and because he was sent forward and faithfulness he's arrested and it's a bit of disobedience to man-made rules.
But obedience to God so pastor Wang Yi says as a pastor my disobedience is one part of the Gospel Commission Christ's Great Commission requires of us great disobedience the goal of disobedience is not to change the world but to testify about another world all acts of the Church are attempts to prove to the world the real existence of another world the Bible teaches us that in all matters relating in the Gospel to the Gospel into the human conscience we must obey.
God and not men and for this reason spiritual disobedience and the bodily suffering are both ways we testify to another eternal world and to another glorious king the reality is every choice we make we get the opportunity to look like John or to look like Herod you see Herod did whatever he possibly could to defend his position to silence the voice of God in his life and John walked forward in faith believing that there was something beyond here there was a resurrection there was a life beyond the one he had and Herod lives as.
If everything that he can see and everything that he can touch he better enjoy it now he better get what he can get now and every choice we make we get to choose along those same lines am I gonna be faithful at the expense of my comfort at the expense of nice things here I'm not gonna be faithful with my money I'm gonna be faithful with my time these are small decisions and big decisions am I gonna listen to the voice of.
God and walk forward and what he's calling me to even if people don't like it don't want to hear it even if that work it makes me seem weird or am I gonna do what hair does and try to defend my position against the call to repentance so that I might enjoy what is here so that I might be driven by my passions the end of the story is that the disciples of John go and tell Jesus that John has been beheaded.
Jesus just tries to go off by himself he can't at first and then eventually he gets to and he goes in prays and it seems at first that Jesus doesn't really do anything you feel a little bit like Lazarus the sisters in the Gospel of John who say to Jesus if you'd been here this wouldn't have happened he knew he was in prison but he doesn't really seem to do anything he knows he's in prison and later he finds out that he's dead all he does is go off by himself he seems sad about it.
But just like Jesus you could have done something and the way that Matthew has written this is to show us that Jesus didn't do nothing he ultimately did everything seemed Ashley writes this out in a way that he highlights how John the Baptist goes before Jesus and how Jesus joins John the Baptist in suffering see John the Baptist is handed over to a ruler so is Jesus Jesus was handed over to Pontius Pilate he actually does at some point go in front of Herod Antipas John the Baptist was seized and bound.
Jesus was seized and bound Matthew writes out using the exact same greek words they feared to kill John the Baptist because the crowd held him to be a prophet feared to kill Jesus because the crowd held him to be a prophet John uses the same phrasing they take John and ultimately when he is sentenced to death the one who does the sentence sentencing seems to regret it a little bit than the same with the Jesus and the way Matthew wrote this up he intentionally frames it.
So that you might see that John came before Jesus and ministry and he goes before Jesus and death and that Jesus joins John in death and when he does Herod's greatest fear about John comes true it comes true about John because it first becomes true about Jesus Jesus Christ is killed but he rises in power and because Jesus rises in power so does John the way this started we're here it said oh no John's risen from the dead John has risen from the dead.
Because Jesus rose John gets to rise that what was sown perishable is raised imperishable and then what is sown in dishonor is raised in glory and what is sown in weakness is raised in power that's the reality of this situation is that John looks like on earth he failed but in the kingdom of heaven he is ushered into glory eternally because he believes that Jesus is who he said he is Jesus is the Lamb of God who's come to take away the sins of the world and that.
Jesus Christ is king a glorious king of a more glorious Kingdom and so he lives in a way that testifies to it my question to us is do we look like John the way you speak the way you act the way you spend your money the way you spend your time do you testify to another world that is beyond this one or do we look like Herod and I will tell you as Americans even American Christians it's very easy to look like here it to make our decisions based off of what is enjoyable and what is.
Now and what do I desire and have others cosign it the greatest tragedy in this story is not that John the Baptist loses his head that is a victory and a triumph that will never be taken from him the greatest tragedy in this story is that Herod succeeds in silencing the voice of God Herod succeeds in resisting the call to repentance John offered him Grace and Herod rejects it and my hope for us my prayer for us is that we would live as.
If we believed there was a better Kingdom coming and that we would reject our passions and desires where they are out of line with God's kingdom so that we might have something better that we would gladly sell everything we have that we might buy the field that we might have the Kingdom that he's laid out for us let's pray God we thank you for your grace I thank you for your love that you would send Jesus to join us and suffering that we might join him in victory and we pray that you would help us to.
See our sin and to hear the voice of God in our lives that we would yield to the work of the Spirit that we might repent and that we might be faithful we pray that you would bless our Church with saints who live out their days as John did following your will regardless of the cost and ending faithful the Savior yes watching Jesus phenol thought you had better change the Jesus ha before the master Jesus paid it all all to him I owe 2,000 stayin here be lighter Oh.
Jesus paid it all to him all right so the only announcement that I have is that we are gonna continue to walk in wisdom and evaluate evaluate week by week whether we'll be in here together next week so just be looking out for updates to see if we'll be here next week and then we'll announce those and God willing we'll be here in the same room and be live streaming as always let me close this with a benediction from Romans 15.
Verse 13 may the God of Hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope amen you guys have a great day you.