Mary Cosby used to begin her New Testament class by bending her soft-cover Bible and saying she preferred a Bible that was flexible. Then she would say, “The Bible is not a manual for morality, but a mirror for identity.”
I always found Mary’s statement reassuring and interesting because, to get real, no matter how much I may want to be a good person, I’m not usually drawn to detailed instructions on how to become one. But to hear stories about other people and their histories and the choices they make and how those choices play out is always intriguing.
The gospel this week, Mark 6:14-29, is rich with possibilities for getting a glimpse of our own inner Johns and Herods. Herod Antipas seemed to have a genius for getting himself into horrible, self-destructive situations and John the Baptist seemed to have a genius for being true to God’s call no matter what the outcome was.
It isn’t an easy thing to see what is in our deeps. Psalm 19:12 says, “How can I learn all the sins lurking in my heart? Cleanse me from these hidden faults.” Most of us are familiar with the psalmist’s dread of inner failings, but it is also true that there are gifts and treasures deep in our psyches that we don’t know about. We can begin to explore, as the psalmist did, by asking God’s help in seeing ourselves more clearly.
In Our Many Selves, Elizabeth O’Connor offers a next step: “What you criticize in another, try to find in yourself. We want to discover our dark selves. Not in order that they may be condemned and banished out of sight, but in order that we may have conversations with them and they may lead us to the light.” And she quotes Carl Jung: “…with luck, it may dawn on me that, what I am disliking in others is actually something with which I struggle within myself.”
When my young daughter discovered this way of possibly seeing into her own faults, she said to me, “Mom, I’m just going to love everyone exactly the way they are so I don’t have to see these yucky things in myself!” And I understood completely. But as an adult, I know the more consciousness I recover, the more freedom I gain from unwanted actions and words.
So I observe myself in relationship with people who annoy me, or who infuriate me, or whom I envy, etc. And when I begin to see an inner Herod, I try not to shame or reject him, but begin a conversation–maybe I can discover the root of a negative attitude or behavior, and welcome that dark self into the light.
In a way, it seems easier to observe the inner Herod than John, partly because we are familiar with cruel, self-indulgent leaders in the world. They seem to follow a pattern of refusing to practice any self-examination, to freely project blame onto chosen scapegoats, and to surround themselves with flatterers. John on the other hand, is a figure so outside our experience it is difficult to find him within. His intense solitude in the early years, his outsider status, even his diet and clothing are foreign and strange. Also, John’s call was to prepare the way for Jesus, a unique role in all of history.
His courage in confronting Herod’s life choices might be a place for us to connect with John. We are currently facing situations that require immense devotion to prayer and discernment on how to keep faith with The Way of Jesus. Am I called to confront publicly political events and actions that are directly against anything Jesus ever taught or embodied? How am I to live and be true to the faith in a time like this? Perhaps John could be for us an inner guide to the Light of integrity and courage.
I find wisdom and guidance in this quote from John Calvin: “Our wisdom insofar as it ought to be deemed true consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But as these are connected together by many ties, it is not easy to determine which of the two precedes, and gives birth to the other.” Something to ponder.
-Carol Martin, Bread of Life Church
