A Tale of Two Feasts

Since we are back to online streaming and there is no real audience here, I am going to ask Jason edit in some cheers and “amens.” Or maybe some would prefer boos and hisses when I’m done. In all seriousness, though, would you pray with me?

I’d like you to have a look at the following images.

As you do, I want you to do 3 things:

Interpret what you see

Name the emotion you feel

Choose a likely response that you would have if you could do something about the situation

As an example, my interpretation of this little girl sharing breakfast with a doll in a high chair is something like “nurturing.”

I feel endearment.

My response to that situation might be something like, “Honey, you are taking such good care of baby.”

So, here we go. Let’s start with masks.

IMAGES #1 & #2

On the left are 2 masked policemen carrying off a businessman from a bus who refused to wear a mask.

The image on the right is features an umasked, female, grocery shopper who was shouting at other masked shoppers and masked employees. She was crying out, “I command you in Jesus’ Christ’s name to get off this aisle so I can buy something,” calls several people demons, and, finally says, “I’m buying something! Have respect.”

https://www.fox29.com/news/woman-without-mask-commands-demon-customers-to-leave-grocery-store-aisle-until-shes-done-shopping

What is happening here?

Government overreach?

Religious fanaticism?

How does an immaterial object, like a mask, suddenly become a lightning rod that is imbued with moral quality?

For some, wearing the mask is demonstrating love to one’s neighbor. While to others, it represents repression, people living in fear, or duplicity because of the unintended harm that has fallen on millions of people.

IMAGES #3 & #4

On the left are 3 women representing the “Wall of Moms.” One wears a shirt that says “Happy Momma” but “Happy” crossed out and replaced with “Angry.” Another’s shirt says “Mom is Here.”

On the right we see government troops in full tactical garb. One is approaching the camera with his firearm ready while the other is dragging a woman by her backpack while she reaches back toward the camera.

Apparently, not even the protestors are unified. According to one news source, the Portland Wall of Moms has been accused by another protestor group for “anti-blackness.”

What do you see when you see the protestors? The federal police?

Where have we come as a country that moms are organizing to protest?

https://nypost.com/2020/07/30/portlands-wall-of-moms-group-accused-of-anti-blackness/

Image #5

Finally, we have the iconic image of President Trump holding up a Bible in front of St. John’s Church after dispersing the crowds with tear gas so that he could safely make his way there for the photo op. You may recall that this took place during the protests following the murder of George Floyd.

According to one news source, right before this, President Trump called state leaders “weak” and then said, “We’re going to do something that people haven’t seen before,” and added, “but you got to have total domination, and then you have to put them in jail.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2020/06/08/timeline-trump-church-photo-op/?arc404=true

What do you see in this image?

Has he reestablished biblical values, or is he assaulting the idea of truth?

Is America finally becoming “great” again?

Is President Trump protecting us from our worst fears or is he the cause of them?

How can we look at the same thing and come up with such wildly different conclusions?

Friends, our struggle is not over masks, walls of moms, or photo ops.

No, it is over the narratives, deep beliefs, and fears that we nurture and refine regarding our present condition and our future hopes.

It is motivated by an abstract, archetypal “them” and “they” who seek to perpetuate injustice or to install a new world order that we project onto real people and real groups. And this is dangerous.

https://www.wired.com/story/please-please-please-dont-mock-conspiracy-theories/

Do you resonate with this at all this morning?

Are you confused about what is true, how to love those in your lives who are “crazy,” and how to go on in this chaos?

If Jesus were physically present with you, what would he would say that he sees in these images?

What would he reveal to us about our narratives, deep beliefs, and fears?

The good news, friends, is that Jesus has compassion on us; he alone is our Good Shepherd who feeds us in impossible places if we will follow him.

Last week, Rick reminded us that power in the kingdom of God does not operate like the worldly power to which we are accustomed.

It is not like the power of domination and incarceration advocated by the President, just as it is not like the power driving the persistent derision and opposition of the President, the efforts to burn down buildings, to chase our neighbors down grocery aisles calling them demons, or to kneel on anyone’s neck.

Friends, we are paralyzed in this country and we all need healing.

There is no one righteous in this, no not one.

What we see, impacts how we feel, which affects what we do.

Where do you and I need to see differently this morning?

How can we see differently?

Just as these images capture this intersection of seeing, feeling, and doing, Matthew offers us this morning two portraits of power and leadership that are epitomized at the kind of feast offered by each “king.”

The question for us this morning is, at whose table are we feasting?

Since our Gospel reading does not include the portrait of Herod Antipas, allow me to read it now.

The New International Version Chapter 14

At that time Herod the tetrarch heard the reports about Jesus, 2 and he said to his attendants, “This is John the Baptist; he has risen from the dead! That is why miraculous powers are at work in him.”

3 Now Herod had arrested John and bound him and put him in prison because of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, 4 for John had been saying to him: “It is not lawful for you to have her.” 5 Herod wanted to kill John, but he was afraid of the people, because they considered John a prophet.

6 On Herod’s birthday the daughter of Herodias danced for the guests and pleased Herod so much 7 that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she asked. 8 Prompted by her mother, she said, “Give me here on a platter the head of John the Baptist.” 9 The king was distressed, but because of his oaths and his dinner guests, he ordered that her request be granted 10 and had John beheaded in the prison. 11 His head was brought in on a platter and given to the girl, who carried it to her mother. 12 John’s disciples came and took his body and buried it. Then they went and told Jesus.

According to Matthew, it is this news that causes Jesus to withdraw by boat to a “deserted place.”

Unfortunately, I don’t have time to go into the differences between the four Gospels, but here is a visual of the area of Bethsaida, which appropriately means “house of food provisions.”

RELIEF MAP

This relief map nicely contrasts the low pasturelands of Bethsaida with the higher surrounding elevation, which explains how Jesus could ascend a “mountain” to pray.

2 PHOTOS OF GALILEE

The next two slides feature photos of the area.

MAP OF GALILEE

As this map demonstrates, there is a pragmatic reason that he went to Bethsaida; He wanted to leave the territory of Herod Antipas.

You see, John was killed because he was a political threat to Herod, and Josephus, the Jewish historian who mentions John’s ministry and execution, agrees.

John was a threat because of the crowds who followed him (Josephus), and because he denounced Herod’s marriage to Herodias (Gospels), a political problem that ended up leading to war with King Aretas IV because Herod divorced his daughter to marry Herodias.

Herodias was Herod Antipas’s niece and his half-brother, Philip’s wife, whom she divorced to marry Herod.

She was around 40 at the time of their marriage and she had a daughter, Salome, who is the one who danced before Herod and his company.

According to the Mosaic Law, this marriage was prohibited (Lev 18:16; 20:21), and this is presumably why John criticized them.

So, while many of you may be wondering why I had to get political in my sermon, I hope you see that the Gospel is political and makes political claims.

We are usually good at allowing the Gospel to critique our political opponents, but we have a difficult time allowing it to critique us.

Enough of the context, then, let’s get to the meat of these two portraits of power.

I am convinced that Matthew intends for us to read these two portraits together, to compare them, and to identify at which table of power we are feasting. Let me explain:

This next slide compares Matthew’s presentation of Herod and Jesus.

TWO LEADERS & THEIR POWER

Herod is accurately called “tetrarch,” usually he is called “king” in the Gospels, and he hosts a feast || Jesus is the new Moses feeding the people in the wilderness and he offers a foretaste of the Messianic banquet expected at the end. He also has compassion on the crowd. Earlier Matthew 9:36 says the people were like sheep without a shepherd, indicating that they might as well be leaderless. Matthew is showing Jesus to be the Good Shepherd that the people need.

Herod hears reports about Jesus’s power || Jesus hears of the power of Herod by the killing of John

Herod addresses his slaves || Jesus address his students (disciples)

Herod seizes power, that is, John, and in a way, the Mosaic Law || Jesus gives power to others

Both host a feast

A crowd looks at a woman dancing || Jesus looks at a large crowd

TWO LEADERS & THEIR POWER

Herod passively receives pleasure from his daughter || Jesus actively demonstrates compassion on the crowd by healing their sick

Herod gives up power to Salome through oaths || Jesus shares his power with his students

Herod is ironically powerless and imprisoned by his honor || Jesus is free from needing honor

Herod’s self-serving leaves him sorrowful while one person’s hatred is fed, his wife, Herodias’s, as she feasts on John’s head || Jesus’s serving of others leads to everyone’s satisfaction

Herod’s place of feasting & abundance leads from life to death || Jesus’s place of scarcity and starvation leads from death to life

But there’s still another twist to come. Many commentators note Matthew’s intentional patterning of the feeding of the 5,000 after the Last Supper.

Here in the wilderness, Jesus hosts an “open table.”

The parallels include:

JESUS’S “OPEN TABLE EUCHARIST

Evening had come

Everyone reclines

Jesus takes, blesses & breaks bread

He then gives it to the twelve

Everyone eats

Yet, Matthew also suggests Eucharistic parallels between Herod’s feast that hosted by Jesus.

THE DISTRIBUTION

The comparison is between the distribution of the elements, between the “head” and the “bread.”

The executioner gives the head to Salome and she in turn gives it to Herodias on a serving platter, the one who is hungry.

Jesus, of course, gives bread to the twelve and the they give it to the crowds.

Matthew even draws parallels in the cleanup after the meals.

THE CLEANUP

John’s disciples “take up” his body for burial || Jesus’s disciples each “take up” a basket full of leftovers.

My concern in this is not that you equate the political leader of your displeasure with Herod although Matthew is clearly painting him in a bad light. That’s far too easy.

My challenge to you is much harder, that you evaluate where and on what are you are feasting.

Does that table and that food lead to death or life?

If we are honest with ourselves, all of us have either been or have the potential to become Herods.

But more likely, we may all find ourselves as his friends, gaining pleasure in the exploitation of others.

Or as his wife, desiring the demise of those we detest.

Friends, we are paralyzed by our disdain for “the other side,” of “they,” and “them.”

Will you let Jesus heal you? Will you let Jesus feed you? Then, put down the platter with the head on it, repent, and come to Jesus.

Amen.