Conviction Without Conversion

Mark 6:14-29; Matthew 14:1-12; Luke 9:7-9
Gerrit Buddingh’ | Sunday, May 10, 2020
Copyright © 2020, Gerrit Buddingh’

Introduction

My theme this morning is “Conviction without Conversion,” meaning that you can be fascinated with religion, you can even enjoy good preachers and preaching, you can even come under some type of conviction of sin, and yet remain untouched and unsaved by the gospel.

We have before us this morning the gospel of Mark’s divinely inspired account of the cruel and barbaric murder of God’s faithful servant, John the Baptist. Mark tells us this melancholy story of John’s slaughter by Herod Antipas in greater detail than do Matthew or Luke.

There are important lessons to be learned from this passage, and I hope, by the grace and power of God the Holy Spirit, to shoot them as barbed arrows into you, for that is where I am aiming.

So we will consider, first, the cast of characters; second, John the Baptist’s message; third, serving Christ can be dangerous; fourth, Herod’s guilty conscience; fifth, Herod’s confession; and, sixth, lessons to be learned.

I. The Cast of Characters

First, the cast of characters, under which we will first consider John the Baptist. There are only two passages in Mark’s gospel that do not deal directly with Jesus, and each of them is about John the Baptist.

We are first introduced to the ministry of John the Baptist in Mark 1:1–9. There we are told of John’s sudden appearance in the Judean wilderness. John is different, even eccentric, in certain ways. Elsewhere we are told that John lived out in the boondocks—out in the Judean wilderness and along the Jordan River. His lifestyle was purposely recalling the asceticism of the prophet Elijah (2 Kings 1:8) and some of the other Old Testament prophets, as we are told in Zechariah 13:4. John was clothed in coarse, camel’s hair garments and ate a simple, insect-based diet of locusts and wild honey.

John’s appearance on the stage of history is the fulfillment of several Old Testament prophecies, such as Isaiah 40:3 and Malachi 3:1, as well as the word spoken by an angel of the Lord to his father Zechariah, when his father was serving in the temple as priest in Jerusalem. We can find that in Luke 1.

So we see that John is a God-called and Holy Spirit-anointed preacher, chosen by God in eternity past for a special mission. Not only is John Jesus’ cousin, but, more importantly, he is the “forerunner” of the Messiah. In a real sense, John the Baptist becomes the last prophet of the Old Testament, and the first or last martyr of the New and Old Testaments, respectively. He is a true man of God and a very powerful and charismatic preacher. Christ himself testified, “Among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist” (Matt. 11:11).

He is called by God to prepare the way for the coming of Jesus the Messiah, and he does so boldly and fearlessly, openly preaching repentance and baptism for the remission of sins. In this, John is unlike most antinomian preachers who fill pulpits today. He is not afraid to talk about turning away from sin, about hell and about God’s wrath, and about turning in submission to God and then doing what is right in God’s sight.

John points people to Jesus the Christ. As we heard last week from Rev. Broderick, there was and still is a variety of opinion as to who Jesus is. Whenever his name is spoken, people have strong reactions about him—either to embrace and serve him as Lord or to reject and vilify his name. The reason for this is that the sinless and holy character of Jesus is a challenge to sinners and to their sinful nature. You either love him and are saved by him, or you hate him, only to be judged by him and sentenced to hell.

John is also a humble man. He is fully satisfied with the place and the work assigned to him. Despite his own fame and stature being eclipsed by Jesus, John, without rancor, says of Jesus, “He must increase, and I must decrease” (John 3:30). And I must ask you: Is this your attitude? Are you and your wants and desires subordinated to King Jesus and his glory? Do you grasp that your mission in life is not to obtain more things for yourself, more fame for yourself, but, instead, to introduce people to Jesus as their Lord?

As you may recall, Jesus himself came to be baptized by John. We read about it in Mark 1, and then, from that time on, our attention is focused in the gospel accounts on Jesus, the carpenter-turned-rabbi, as he travels through Galilee—casting out demons and preaching the same gospel of repentance which is being proclaimed by John.

But Mark leaves us hanging, wondering as to what happened to John, now that Jesus has taken over center stage. The question is answered in this chapter by way of a flashback, for by this time in the gospel narrative, John has already been put to death.

As we heard last Sunday, people everywhere throughout Herod’s kingdom in Galilee are talking about Jesus. They are speculating about who Jesus truly is as Jesus’ disciples are popping up everywhere preaching, calling people to repentance, healing, raising the dead, and delivering people from the demons that beset them, and all in the power and name of Jesus.

News of all these things gets back to King Herod (Mark 6:14; Luke 9:7). We read in Mark 6:14–16, “[People] were saying, ‘John the Baptist has risen from the dead, and that is why these miraculous powers are at work in him.’ But others were saying, ‘He is Elijah.’ And others were saying, ‘He is a prophet, like one of the prophets of old.’” As we shall see, this deeply challenges Herod. It disturbs him in the core of his being.

Now, the leading figure in today’s passage is arguably not John the Baptist but King Herod, also known as Herod Antipas and Herod the tetrarch. He is a wicked man who, at that time, ruled over about a quarter of modern-day Israel and Palestine.

A close reading of the New Testament will reveal that it mentions four different Herods, and there were actually more, so it is very, very easy to get them confused. The first mentioned is Herod the Great, who was the evil, vicious, murderous vassal king under Rome. He ruled the entire region of Israel and Palestine at the time when Jesus was born. He is the one who ordered the deaths of all the infant and toddler boys in Bethlehem in his zealous effort to destroy Jesus as a young child. It was also this Herod the Great who rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem, but he did so more to boost his own ego than to the glory of God.

Now, there are a number of parallels between Herod the Great and Henry VIII. Herod had at least ten wives and children by each of them. Herod the Great’s first wife was Doris, whom he married before he was given the throne by the Romans. She bore Herod one son—Herod Antipater—who is not mentioned in the Bible and who was executed by his father five days before his father died.

Herod divorces Doris and sends her away in order to marry Mariamne I. Herod the Great and Mariamne I have two sons—Alexandros and Aristobulus—neither of whom are mentioned in the Bible. Aristobulus, however, does play an indirect biblical role, as we shall shortly see.

Even though Herod supposedly loves Mariamne I, he will eventually grow suspicious and paranoid about her. In the end, Herod executes her for alleged infidelity and kills her along with her two adult sons, Alexandros and Aristobulus.

Before he is killed, Aristobulus has two children who are mentioned in the Bible: first, Herodias and then her brother Herod Agrippa I, who, in turn, is the father of Herod Agrippa II, Drusilla, and Bernice, all of whom we encounter in Acts 24, 25, and 26. This Herodias is the Herodias found in today’s text.

King Herod the Great dies in 4 BC. The emperor Augustus then divides up Herod’s kingdom among three of Herod’s surviving sons and a man named Lysanias, whom we encounter in Luke 3. One son, Herod Archelaus, is given Judea proper. But he does such a poor job of governing Judea that the Romans remove him and replaces him with a Roman prefect (governor). The incumbent governor at the time of today’s story is Pontius Pilate.

Caesar Augustus gives Herod Philip II the tetrarchy of the lands of Trachonitus and Iturea northeast of Galilee, in the area centered on what today is known as the Golan Heights. Caesar Augustus then gives Herod Antipas, the man in our text, the territory of Galilee, located to the north and west of the Sea of Galilee, as well as a strip of land called Perea going all the way down the eastern side of the Jordan.

Herod Antipas is not technically a king, but rather a “tetrarch,” which means “a ruler of the fourth part.” It was a political appointment somewhat akin to a governor.

While on a trip to Rome with his first wife, Herod Antipas meets Herodias, his seductive niece, the daughter of his half-brother Aristobulus and the wife of his half-brother Herod Philip, who is not the Philip II who rules the Golan Heights area. Herod Philip and Herodias have already had a daughter whom they named Salome. She is the girl who will dance for Herod Antipas in our text. Thus, Herod Antipas is Salome’s uncle and, as we shall see, soon to be her step-father.

It is during this visit to Rome that Herod Antipas falls in lust with his niece and sister-in-law Herodias. They have an affair, and both then divorce their spouses and marry each other. This was a violation of Old Testament Mosaic law which says that you must not commit adultery (Exod. 20:14), nor should you marry your brother’s wife while your brother is still alive (Lev. 20:21). This is what forms the basis for John the Baptist to publicly condemn and rebuke Herod and Herodias and call upon them to stop sinning.

II. John’s Message

True servants of God are courageous, bold men, and such is John the Baptist. No matter who is in the audience, he speaks plainly. He does not pull his punches in order to try and be nice to Herod or anyone else. He speaks exactly what God wants him to say.

When the Pharisees and Sadducees come out to where John is preaching in the wilderness, John calls them, “You brood of vipers.” This is not a good strategy if you are trying to win friends and influence people in high places. He tells them that they are in danger of being condemned to hell (Matt. 3:7) and that God’s ax is already sharpened and ready to cut them down because their deeds, their actions are evil.

Now many preachers, like Balaam of the Old Testament, will try to serve both God and their own desire for money and acclaim. They may not outright lie to the people in the pews. They may not overtly deny Christ and the gospel of his grace. But they will try to make the gospel palatable to unregenerate people by stating things as carefully as possible so as to not offend their hearers.

Some people call such an approach good marketing. But it is, in reality, compromise and treason to God. It is peddling the gospel for profit.

However, that man who serves Christ, that man who is led by and filled with the Holy Spirit, will purposefully preach in order to expose people’s sin and demand that they acknowledge the truth of God’s word and surrender to Jesus as Lord.

As the forerunner of Jesus, John preaches a message of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. So it is vital to ask, ‘What is repentance?” To “repent” means “to change one’s mind for the better by agreeing with God’s word; to vigorously amend your sinful ways, abhorring your sinful past.” It refers to “a change of mind that leads to a change of action.” It is turning from sin to God and proving your repentance by your deeds (Acts 26:20).

Repentance first requires an acknowledgement that you have sinned by breaking God’s moral law. The Ten Commandments may have gone out of fashion in many evangelical churches today, but not with God. They stand to show us our sin and drive us to God in repentance and faith. When genuine repentance takes place, the change in a person’s life is radical and powerful. He does not remain in his sin but lives a new life of obedience to the Lord.

Repentance arises out of a heart that is truly sorry for the sins you are guilty of committing (2 Cor. 7:10). Such godly sorrow always produces in the repenting sinner an earnest desire to please God by changing the way he has been living and conforming then to God’s rule. This means that if there is no change in your life, and if you have not started living a life of holiness, then you are not regenerate, you are not born again, you are not converted to Christ. This is genuine biblical repentance, and it is something that we do not see a lot of these days.

It is in this context that John the Baptist confronts Herod Antipas with his sin of stealing and marrying his half-brother’s wife. He calls on both Herod and Herodias to repent and turn to God and to produce fruit in keeping with their repentance by breaking off their sinful relationship and then doing what is right in God’s sight. Notice the verb in verse 18, “had been saying,” is in the imperfect tense. It means that every time Herod was around, John preached against incest and adultery and called for repentance. In other words, John has been persistently saying, and keeps on saying loud and long, that Herod’s relationship with Herodias is biblically illegal and that they should repent. In this way, John the Baptist sounds a whole lot like our senior pastor.

But neither Herod nor Herodias repent. Instead, we are told that Herodias harbors a deep-seated grudge against John the Baptist for continually calling them out in public. Herod throws John in prison, but this is not enough for Herodias. She wants to kill John (v. 19). Herod knows this, but in a strange way he fears John and protects him from his wife, knowing John to be a righteous and holy man (v. 20).

The most amazing part of verse 20 is that it tells us that Herod “heard him gladly.” He apparently liked listening to John. The idea that Herod enjoyed John’s preaching is weird, in a sense. Herod likes it, but he does not. Certainly, he does not intend to change his whole life and surrender all to the lordship of Jesus. In this way, Herod is like people who are addicted to horror movies. He is terrified, yet fascinated. It upsets him, yet he comes back to hear more.

There are many people just like Herod in our world today, even in the churches. They get caught up in the preaching, but they miss the point of the message. They like to hear their favorite preacher preach, but they have no intentions of doing anything the Bible demands. That is a dangerous way to live.

When God speaks to your heart, he is extending grace to you that you do not deserve. He could just leave you alone. So do not be like Herod and play around with the things of God. Herod kept John and treated him like he was his pet parrot. He treated the word of God like he could do as he pleased with it. But nothing sears the conscience any more quickly than saying “No” to the word of God. If the Lord has been speaking to you about any area of your life, you need to heed his voice and obey his word without delay. To do otherwise is deadly!

Verse 20 tells us that when Herod heard John preach, he was “perplexed,” “puzzled.” He was mentally tied up in knots. What Herod heard caused him to have a great moral conflict in his own soul as to the life he was living. Herod could see a beauty in holiness, yet he loved his own sins. He wished to be holy, yet there was Herodias, and he could not give her up.

This word could also be translated, “he did many things.” It may be that Herod may even have tried to improve his life in certain ways, in small ways, hoping that would be sufficient. But reformation is not repentance and faith. Hearing alone is not doing. Hearing a man of God speak about repentance and faith is not the same as actually repenting and believing and turning to Jesus as Lord.

Herod’s moral confusion is clear to see. He hates the fact that John keeps telling him the truth about his sins, yet he still wants to keep John around. And this same love/hate relationship is something that exists in the church today between the preacher and some of those he preaches to. They hate it when he exposes their sins. Yet they do not hesitate to call him when they have a need in their life.

III. Serving Christ Can Be Dangerous

So Herod keeps John in prison and shields him from Herodias (v. 20). But while Herod may be wily like a fox, he is out-foxed by his wife. She cunningly plots the murder of John. The event is worthy of Hollywood legend. Herodias has been biding her time, waiting for an opportunity to kill John. She sees her chance at Herod’s birthday bash.

This event was nothing more than a drunken stag party for Herod and his friends. And when they were “good and drunk” with wine, Herodias springs her trap. She knows that her husband is a lecherous man, so she has her teenage daughter salaciously dance for her uncle and the crowd. This act reveals the wickedness that was in the heart of Herodias. Imagine putting your own daughter on display in that fashion. What horrible wickedness!

Salome’s salacious dance has its desired effect. Herod is besotted by this beautiful young woman. Predictably, Herod rashly promises Salome up to half his kingdom. It is a foolish boast designed to make Herod look good in front of his guests (vv. 22b–25). At her mother’s direction, the girl requests John’s head on a platter.

Here we see the power of peer pressure. Herod realizes immediately that he has made a mistake. He should have said, “I promised you a gift, not a murder!” But rather than embarrass himself and lose face before all these important people gathered there, Herod does something that will haunt him to his last breath., and even something that will haunt his tormented soul for all eternity. He sends one of his bodyguard to immediately behead John. The grisly trophy is then presented to the girl who presents it to her mother.

As we watch Herod in these verses, we are witnessing the death of his conscience. He refused to accept the word of God and change his ways, as preached by John. He often listened to the preaching, but always said “No” to the word. Now he crosses the line and does the unthinkable: He kills this man whom he both fears and admires, all because of the deep-seated bitterness of his wife. What a tragedy!

Clearly, John’s execution stands for the idea that faithful service on behalf of Christ is going to pick a fight with this world. (GJB) This should not surprise us. Jesus, in the book of John, says as much in John 15. He says that the world will hate you without good cause. But it is actually not hating you as much as it is hating Jesus, because you represent him (John 15:18–25).

In telling us about John’s martyrdom, Mark is also encouraging his own readers to stand strong by showing them that John foreshadows the Christians of their day under Nero, and Christians of our day who, in God’s providence, will become victims of corrupt and oppressive rulers and governments.

The comfort which Mark implicitly offers is explicitly written about by the apostle Paul in Romans 8:31–39. There we read,

If God be for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:

“For your sake we face death all day long;
We are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

However, you must consider that this comfort is only for those who have personally owned Jesus Christ as their Lord, and that happens only through regeneration by the Holy Spirit, a regeneration that manifests itself in repentance from sin and turning in faith to Jesus Christ as Lord of your life.

IV. Herod’s Guilty Conscience

The fact is, everyone has a conscience. Fallen and depraved man each has one. There is within him a voice called conscience, a voice that either accuses or excuses us, a voice that cannot be silenced, a voice that can make even great and powerful tremble. Herod feared John the Baptist. Felix trembled as he listened to Paul preach the gospel. Agrippa was “almost persuaded,” as the imprisoned preacher reasoned with him about the things of God. The conscience, you see, bears the stamp of the law of God written upon the heart of every man by his Creator.

If you recall from last week, the situation which brings Herod into our story this morning is Jesus sending his disciples throughout Judea in groups of two. They are doing what Jesus alone has been doing—healing the sick, delivering the demon-possessed, and preaching repentance to all. Now, instead of just Jesus alone, there are twelve men in the mold of Jesus. It is as though Jesus is suddenly everywhere.

Herod has already killed John the Baptist. And as soon as he hears about the message and ministry of Jesus and his delegates, Herod superstitiously assumes that John has been resurrected from the dead and come back to plague him. There is a proverb that says, “The wicked flee when no one is pursuing” (Prov. 28:1). Such is the case with Herod. He fears that John has come back to haunt him.

What, then, is the conscience? It is a God-given, cognitive inner knowledge and voice inherent in each person that acts as an ethical guide to the rightness or wrongness of something. The conscience does not speak in its own name. Ultimately, the authority it exercises is not its own, but God-given. Thus, even pagans know it is wrong to break up another’s marriage by stealing the other person’s spouse. Even pagans know that it is wrong to commit adultery. Even pagans know it is wrong to murder. Even pagans object to their property being stolen. Even in pagans, the conscience functions as a judge and avenger.

So we see that conscience demands to be listened to and obeyed, but it is not infallible. Our consciences are damaged by Adam’s fall and are further damaged by our own ongoing sin. Hence, we can talk about “sinning against conscience.” Our consciences can also be seared and stifled. Thus, we can even become more and more depraved and sinful. This highlights the need to have our consciences constantly re-enlightened and realigned to God’s commands as found in the Bible.

The conscience also acts as our judge. It condemns us when we do what our conscience tells us is wrong. So even after John the Baptist had been dead for some time, the memory of this street preacher and the sound of his voice resonate in Herod’s head. A sense of guilt and remorse are triggered by Herod’s guilty conscience. Herod knows that he had wrongly divorced his first wife and stolen his brother Philip’s wife Herodias. Herod knows that in doing so, he had committed and is still committing ongoing adultery and incest with her according to the Old Testament’s rules for marriage. Herod knows that he compounded his sins by imprisoning John. Herod knows that he sinned when, in a drunken stupor, he made a rash vow and promise to his step-daughter to do whatever she asked. Herod knows that he sinned greatly by ordering the death of a righteous man.

So we see that it is possible to deaden the conscience such that it no longer stands as a barrier between your and any sin that you so desperately want to commit (1 Tim. 4:2). It is possible to ignore the warnings of your conscience until it stops speaking. This is why some people can do the things they do without remorse or guilt. But this does not mean that their consciences will never pop up to plague them later on. You see, your sin is etched into your brain.

And so Herod Antipas is being eaten up by his own guilty conscience. We can imagine that he tries to assuage his conscience by reasoning that he is not responsible for what he did when he was drunk. While it was unwise to promise his step-daughter whatever she wanted, how could he have foreseen what she would ask for? And, no matter if his word had been unwisely given, would it not have been far worse to break it? As a ruler, he would be perceived as fickle and unreliable by his people. Had he not been in some sense tricked into this murder? And were not Herodias and Salome far more guilty than he is?

But no amount of rationalizing will excuse the fact that Herod killed an innocent, decent, and good man. His conscience will not stand down. It nags him constantly. And that is the power of guilt. You cannot escape your conscience accusing you. You cannot run from it. You cannot hide from it. It shows up when you are alone. Guilt comes calling in the dead of night. It shows up when you are in the hospital. It comes to you at home. It gnaws in your soul. It eats away at your mind and it gives you no peace.

Now, while the conscience may be temporarily quieted, the only thing that can purge a guilty conscience is the shed blood of Jesus. The only solution for guilt over past sins is to bring those sins to Jesus. When they are honestly brought to him, Jesus forgives the sin and removes your guilt. Only Jesus can set you free from the monster of a guilty conscience. Listen again to his promise to Christians in 1 John 1:9: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Know, however, that one of the most dangerous things you can do is to continue sinning against what you know to be truth. Paul calls this sinning against a “good conscience,” and says that it leads to spiritual “shipwreck” (1 Tim. 1:19). That is what we find in our text today. This clearly is not the proper response to biblical preaching. When a preacher takes the Bible and preaches the truth from it, there are guaranteed to be times when it offends you, when it gets a little too close to you and your sin. His word may even smite your conscience. And when that happens, you have some choices:

1. You can attack the preacher. That is dangerous because God will more harshly judge you for that response. If the preacher is preaching the truth, he is really just delivering the mail. In attacking him, you are attacking God whose servant the preacher is.
2. Or you can give up and surrender to Jesus as Lord. You can call on him to give you a heart of repentance and faith. You can confess your sins, beg his forgiveness, and ask him to rule over you (1 John 1:9).

But not all confessions are equal. Let us look for a moment at Herod’s confession.

V. Herod’s Confession (vv. 15–16)

In verse 16, we see that Herod is so convinced that Jesus is none other than John the Baptist that he makes a startling confession. He says, “John, the man I beheaded.” That “I” is an “emphatic, personal pronoun.” Herod is saying, “whom I and I alone beheaded.” This is what lawyers call “an admission against interest.”

Herod is confessing his own guilt, but he is not seeking forgiveness from the hand of God. This is confession only of a sort, but it is not repentance! Thus, there is no salvation. There is only a further hardening of his conscience, and Herod stifles the last effort of his wounded soul to call him to God.

You see, it is one thing to know you are guilty of sin. It is another thing to acknowledge that you have sinned. And it is still a whole other level to own your own sins and repent of them before the Lord. Only when there is an earnest desire to repent, and turn away from sin, can there be true salvation. This was the faith of the people who had flocked to John in the desert. They came to repent and be baptized. But Herod refused to submit to John and John’s preaching.

So I ask you: Are you willing to repent of your sins and beg forgiveness of Jesus and submit to his rule over you? Know, however, that when the Spirit of God calls and you ignore that call, you are choosing to remain in your sins, and there is nothing left for you but judgment.

When God calls you to repent and you ignore that, your conscience begins to harden. Do this long enough and often enough, and God will completely harden your heart and conscience as he did Pharaoh’s. We read in Romans 1:24–32 that, at some point, God gives people over to the lusts of their hearts. So I implore you: Do not harden your heart, do not harden your conscience by ignoring the call of God. However hardened it may be now, it will awaken to accuse you on the last day when you stand before God at the bar of his judgment.

Consider too Herod’s condemnation. The final mention of Herod Antipas in the word of God is in Luke 23:6–11. Here Jesus has been arrested and had just appeared before Pontius Pilate, who sends him over to Herod because Jesus was from Herod’s jurisdiction.

When Jesus appears before him, Herod has one more chance to declare an innocent man innocent and set him free. Yet all Herod wants is to see Jesus perform a magic trick, a miracle. He does not care about the truth or justice. He is just looking for spiritual entertainment.

Herod’s conscience is now so scarred that he has no compassion for the man he knows is innocent. He and his men go so far as to mock Jesus. They adorn him in a king’s robe and send him back to Pilate.

Thus ends the story of Herod Antipas. He has ignored the truth and killed his own conscience. There will be no hope and no salvation for Herod forever.

Interestingly, Jesus refuses to even speak to Herod at that trial. There comes a time when God stops talking to a person. There will be no more opportunities for you to repent and be saved. You have sinned away the day of grace and you are doomed.

It is a dangerous thing to continue turning God away. Eventually, you reach the place where your conscience dies. When that happens, you will never again hear God’s saving voice. Please do not play around with spiritual matters. If God is speaking to your heart, do as he is telling you to do.

VI. Lessons to Be Learned

In conclusion, from a strictly human point of view, it seems as though the forces of darkness have won. John the Baptist is silenced, but he is still a good example to us. When we look at his life, we see boldness, faithfulness, and obedience to God to the very end. He was faithful till the end and is now glorious in heaven.

This is a calling up of ourselves to walk faithfully with God. But know, though, that not all will be roses. The gates of hell do not go down without a fight. From John’s life we learn that service in the cause of Christ will arouse hostility and may even lead to your death. However, we are each called to be faithful unto death.

A second lesson we can learn is the danger of postponing dealing with Jesus in your life. Perhaps Herod thought he could postpone repenting, that he would sometime get around to it, but he never did. Perhaps he thought Herodias would change and that he would not have to follow Jesus by himself. She never did, nor did he. In the end, Herod lost his lofty position. He was exiled by the emperor, he died, and went to hell, as did also Herodias and Salome.

These verses reveal the devastating power of hatred, bitterness, and unforgiveness. It is better to follow the command of God and forgive those who hurt you than to be consumed alive by bitterness and hatred. These verses reveal the danger of peer pressure. These verses reveal the danger of not controlling your tongue (Jas. 3:1–12). So make your stand against sin through God’s grace and Spirit. Repent, confess, and turn to God. Keep short accounts with God in the beginning, when the sin is still small, for otherwise you have no idea of how large it will grow.

Always remember that sin in some sense is always crouching at your door. Herod was able to stand for a time against the wiliness of his wife. She, however, waited until she found a convenient time, renewed her attempt, and succeeded. The birthday of Herod will arrive for you, and merriment and entertainment will make you careless. Nothing short of being born again and then practicing living in the presence of God and constantly be being filled with the Holy Spirit’s power, and maintaining a settled determination to avoid all sin, and keeping short accounts with God can equip you to have a conscience devoid of offense.

Know, however, that when you persist in refusing Jesus and the gospel, there remains no hope for you. There is nothing in your future but the terrible effects of sin and the horrors of hell. Luke 13:5 says, “But unless you repent, you too shall perish.”

Has the Lord been speaking to you? Has he been calling upon you to repent and believe in Jesus for your salvation? Has he been calling you to submit to his rule over your life? Has he been calling to you to turn away from your sin generally and some sins particularly in your life? In Isaiah 55:6–7, we read, “Seek the Lord while he may be found; call on him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the evil man his thoughts. Let him turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on him, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.”

The time to turn to Jesus is now. The time to trust and obey him is now, this morning. Fascination with Jesus will not save you. Nor does mere conviction of your sin bring you to salvation. You must bow your knees before King Jesus, plead for his mercy, and follow him.

So I urge you, do not harden your heart as did King Herod. Do not wait until it is too late for you to repent and believe in Jesus. Today is the day of salvation. Do not wait.