“So Where’s the Good News?”

Sixth Sunday after Pentecost

Sunday July 12, 2009

2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19

Psalm 24

Ephesians 1:3-14

A few months ago, the Dave Matthews Band released an album entitled “Big Whiskey and the Groogrux King”.  The first single from the album was a song called “Funny The Way It Is”.  The song ponders the strange and ironic juxtaposition of events that are occurring at every moment of life – how experiences of joy and sorrow, of celebration and of tragedy, of hope and despair, of life and death are all happening at the same time, in every moment.

The song begins,

Lying in the park on a beautiful day,
sunshine in the grass, and the children play.
Siren’s passing, fire engine red,
someone’s house is burning down -- on a day like this?

The evening comes and we’re hanging out,
On the front step, and a car rolls by with the windows rolled down,
And that war song is playing, “why can’t we be friends?”
Someone is screaming and crying in the apartment upstairs.

Funny the way it is, if you think about it
Somebody’s going hungry and someone else is eating out
Funny the way it is, not right or wrong
Somebody’s heart is broken and it becomes your favorite song

Funny the way it is, if you think about it
one kid walks 10 miles to school, another’s dropping out
Funny the way it is, not right or wrong
On a soldier’s last breath his baby’s being born.

 

The song offers a strange but insightful meditation on the nature of reality.  In any given moment, of any given day, the entire spectrum of human experiences are all being played out simultaneously.  Joy and sorrow; celebration and tragedy; hope and despair; life and death – funny the way that all of these various experiences are happening at the same moment, at every moment of every day.

Today’s Gospel reading presents us with a similarly strange juxtaposition of events and experiences.  In order to fully appreciate this juxtaposition, it is necessary to keep this passage in its wider context in the 6^th chapter of Mark.

In the passage immediately preceding today’s reading, we are told how Jesus had sent the twelve disciples out into the world, and how their initial journeys were met with tremendous success.  Verses 12 and 13 – which are the verses immediately preceding the beginning of today’s reading – states, “So [the disciples] went out and proclaimed that all should repent.  They cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.” The disciples had been sent into the world to hasten the coming of God’s kingdom of love – and things were going very well indeed.

The power and the promise of that kingdom continued throughout this 6^th chapter of Mark, as in the passage immediately after today’s text as well, when we read of the feeding of the five thousand, of the story of Christ walking on the water, and of his healing of the sick at Gennesaret.  The final words of this 6^th chapter of Mark sum up the incredible power that Christ was able to demonstrate – and the good news that he revealed in his deeds as well as his words.  “Wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed.” 

This 6^th chapter of Mark, therefore, is a chapter filled with good news – good news of the disciples’ power to cure troubled spirits and sick bodies; good news of thousands of hungry people being fed; good news about the One who had the power to walk on the water and triumph over life’s most difficult storms; good news of sick people experiencing healing and restoration.

But, sandwiched in between all of these good news stories, there is another story.  And it is a story in which it is rather difficult to find anything approaching ‘good’ news.  

Today’s passage recounts the horrific details concerning the brutal and horrific execution of John the Baptist. 

So what had John the Baptist done to deserve this terrible fate?

He had spoken truth to the powers of his day.  He had dared to challenge the personal moral actions of King Herod.  As the text informs us, and as historians such as Josephus confirm, Herod Antipas had married Herodias, and was therefore in a rather complicated and morally questionable marital relationship.  John the Baptist had dared to declare that Herod’s actions were unethnical.  And, as a result of John’s outspoken views, not only did Herod’s wife Herodias hate John, but Herod himself had ordered the imprisonment of John.

And things only got worse from there.

Herod may have been intrigued with John the Baptist, and the text informs us that Herod was, in fact, quite interested in what John had to say, but Herod’s interest in John the Baptist did not seem to extend as far as actually protecting him.  Rather, we learn that Herod gave in to the pressure exerted upon him after Herodias’ daughter came and danced for Herod and for his guests at a party held for Herod’s birthday.  This young dancer, whose name by tradition and by history was named Salome – but whose name is not actually given in any of the biblical texts –was told by Herod that she could have anything that she wanted as an expression of his gratitude for her dancing.  As the story is told, the girl was prompted by Herod’s wife Herodias to ask for the head of John the Baptist.  Not wanting to suffer any public disgrace, Herod ordered John’s execution, and John the Baptist’s head was brought on a platter. 

Quite a birthday party…

The fact that this story, as gruesome as it is, is found in the middle of Mark 6 is rather strange.   In the wider context of these great stories of faith, of successful encounters with sick and troubled people, of wonderful stories of hungry multitudes being fed and wonderful miracles being performed, we read this terrible story about John the Baptist’s execution. 

It’s like the Dave Matthews Band sings, it’s funny the way it is.

Funny how all kinds of good things can be happening in the world – good news can be proclaimed, troubled spirits can be calmed; hungry people can be fed; sick people can be healed.

And yet, at the same time, courageous, righteous, innocent, holy people – men like John the Baptist, who faced difficulty simply for having the courage to tell the truth -- can be brutalized, persecuted, and executed. 

Funny the way it is.

Well, perhaps not funny, but certainly troubling.   

And things have not changed all that much.

We still live in a world in which great beauty and great brutality co-exist, in the very same moments of time.    Every time that we turn on the news, we are reminded that while we are going about the daily, often enjoyable activities of our lives, there are many who are suffering and dying in those very moments. 

Even in this very moment, as we sit here in peace, this juxtaposition of extremes is happening. 

Consider.

At this moment, a hungry child is starving to death.

At this moment, a child is being abused.

At this moment, a woman is being raped.

At this moment, someone’s father is being slaughtered in some act of ferocious violence.

In a world such as this – where such brutalities are happening, even in this peaceful moment – how can we speak about good news?  Where is the good news in a world filled with such violence and hatred?  Where is the good news in today’s reading from Mark 6? 

The good news, in today’s reading from Mark 6, is that this story of such terrible brutality is not the end of the story.

Consider, after all, how today’s reading ends.   After John the Baptist was beheaded, some of his followers came to take care of his mangled remains.  As our passage ends, we read, “when his disciples heard about it, they came and took his body, and laid it in a tomb”. 

Not much good news in that.

But even as we read these words, we hear, in them, a foreshadowing of another story about another individual who, like John, was taken by his disciples after he had been killed, and laid in a tomb. 

And the difference between John and that other individual was that that other story did not end in the tomb. 

Rather, in that other story, the tomb was only prelude. 

And that is the good news of Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen Messiah.  That is the Gospel. 

And this good news is not only about what happened on the cross two thousand years ago.  This good news is a message that continues to have a profound relevance to our lives, and to our world.

After all, it might be funny, in this world, that great joy and great sorrow co-exist, that beauty and brutality happen at the same moment, that love and hatred, justice and oppression, life and death occur simultaneously. 

But the good news is that what is is not what shall always be.

Rather, that other tomb has given us a glimpse of how the story is going to end. 

And the end of the story is this – the powers of suffering, of violence, of despair, of hunger, of brutality, of injustice and of death will not last forever. 

And it is this truth that lives at the heart of our journey, through life, as followers of Christ.  We are called to embrace this truth, and to seek to believe it until we are so completely shaped by this good news, until we live and breath and proclaim, in this world, that the funny “way it is” is not what is always going to be. 

Rather, what is going to be, what is going to last forever is life; love; joy; reconciliation; grace; forgiveness; justice; truth; beauty; love – not just for us, but for all people.

And how do we know this? 

Because the powers of death, hatred, evil and brutality took their best shot; they tried to snuff out the power of life and love; they tried to nail it to a cross.

And three days later, the tomb was empty.

And that is good news.