Mark 6:14-29

Martyrdom of St. John the Baptist | August 29, 2021 | Sermon Text: Mark 6:14-29 | by Pastor Dave Brooks |

While this summer has given us much—too much, maybe—upon which to focus, those of you who are sharp-eyed or sharp-eared will remember that we heard this story from Mark about the execution of John the Baptist just a few weeks ago. Dinner and dancing one moment, death and dismemberment the next.

Yet it is a helpful thing, this sort of turning around to look again at an event that many people would prefer to move past quickly and leave in life’s rear-view mirror. Like what we heard and learned about Jesus’ mother Mary two weeks ago, we are meant to look closely at the ending of John’s life. Rather than rolling down life’s highway, this day calls to us like one of those markers posted on the shoulder of the road, beckoning us to come back, hear or read the story of what happened, and take time to reflect on how this moment in time reflects God’s work in the world.

Do you remember how all this began? You were there—sorta. Before John was born, Mary went into the hill country to visit her cousin Elizabeth, an older woman who was well along with her first child—a child no one expected. As they lay eyes on each other, both women break out in song, and the child growing in Elizabeth leaps—dances for joy at the sound of Mary’s voice.

Yes, John’s life begins in dancing and song.

After he is born, he is given the name John. It’s not a family name, rather one his parents had received angelic instruction to bestow. John—a name meaning “God is good.” John’s father Zachariah, mute throughout the pregnancy, gets his voice back the moment John’s name is confirmed at the bris— the Jewish ceremony that originates with Abraham. In that moment, a moment meant to help people remember that God is faithful, always and forever, Zechariah begins singing. He sings a song celebrating the coming Messiah. But he sings as if the Messiah has already come, singing with joy for what the Messiah will bring and do. But Zachariah’s song is not one of political or military victory—it gives no nod at all to the kinds of plans humans make—rather, it is a song that declares that God is going to make it possible for us to worship him, serve him, be with him honestly, fully, without any enemy being able to stop that. John, who will be the prophet of the coming king, is not to rally together resources but announce forgiveness of sins, not to circle the wagons, but to give light to those who are in darkness.

And John does it. Calls men and women to repentance. Sounds the trumpet for the one who is coming. Alerts everyone that they should stop shuffling around all crooked and start walking the straight and level way of the king. He tells what he knows and does what he must until one night the music, the singing and the dancing stopped.

But then…Mark says that placing John in the earth only meant things really got going. For even as John was dying—as Mark tells the story—Jesus sends out the Twelve. They go with good news, calling men and women to repentance, sounding the trumpet of new opportunity for life, alerting people that the Messiah is coming—coming to them, coming with real freedom, real joy, real purpose. God’s plan has been put into motion, and men and women go to their neighbors, their friends, their co-workers to tell them about the forgiveness of sins, to give them light in darkness, to show them the dawning of God’s day.

Please understand why we talk about those the Church calls saints. It is not really about them. We wouldn’t be talking about John, or Mary, or Peter if God had not proven faithful. We wouldn’t be talking about Augustine or Basil or John Chrysostom if God had not sent good news. There would be no giants of the Church at all! It is not so much that the names that come down to us through the ages were extraordinary; it’s just that they had an extraordinary God. And now that extraordinary God is on the move for us, and through us and with us.

In his remarkable book Ordinary Saints, author Robert Benne points out how sainthood occurs in each of us as we pursue the things of God amid the things of the world. In the world each of us and all of us face political, military, and economic forces that are far larger than our small lives. We live with the shrill terrors of pandemic, environmental collapse, shadowy terrorism, and other equally challenging fears. The story of John the Baptist is honest in that sometimes those forces, those terrors do what they do, and people die. Like John, like Mary, like all God’s People we live, says Benne in the in-between of a world that cannot, that will not restore itself and the God who will restore all things. So we move forward in hope, practicing the things of the Kingdom, doing what our Lord Jesus teaches us. We tell what we know and we do what we can because we trust him—and we find, in that trust and in our doing, the song and the dance have never ended. Amen.

Pastor Dave Brooks

Raleigh, NC USA

Pr.Dave.Brooks@zoho.com