A Pastor’s Thoughts

By Rev. Dr. Joseph Sellepack, Executive Director, Broome County Council of Churches —

I have long been fascinated by the character of Herod and his place in the Christmas story. In Matthew 2 the wise men come to Herod looking for a child who was born King of the Jews. They had seen his star rising in the East and had traveled many a weary mile to worship the child King.  

The story says that this news causes great consternation. Herod is frightened by their search and “all of Jerusalem with him.” Herod’s anxiety over a new king being born is enough to get everyone worked up. He launches a full-scale search to find the baby born King of the Jews.  

The scribes and theologians are consulted, and they come up with the city of Bethlehem as the place to send them. Then Herod charges the wise men, when they find him, to send word back to him so that he too might worship the child.

But Herod is not really interested in worship. Rather, he wants to solidify his power and his claim as King of the Jews. So when the wise men are warned in a dream to return home without going to Herod, Herod launches his own search. This involves brutally killing all children in or around Bethlehem who are two years old or under. Wailing and lamentation follow this act of “worship.”

As a modern reader of this story, I find myself thinking about the violence that Herod unleashes when he feels threatened. Because he is king, he creates a culture of violence and fear that not only justifies his immoral behavior but also uses the general welfare of people as the rationale that undergirds his suspension of morality.  

At this point, I feel we need a moment of silence. Just take a pause to remember the way in which self-absorbed ambition and desire by people in power will lead to travesties. It was a crime of startling magnitude, and it will not be the only time in history that a powerful person will feel threatened and act in unjustifiable ways to assuage fear.

But then I want us to think about how our own ambition and desire can lead us to sacrifice children as we try to control fear. We will use jobs and careers as rationale for neglecting our relationships. Then anxiety over careers, retirement savings, lack of material resources, waning popularity, etc., drives us to always be on our phones, scrolling social media, or pursuing side hustles. These habits may help us relieve the pressure and fill our boredom, but they sacrifice our relationships as we are absorbed into a 3X5 inch little world of a phone screen. 

Then finally, I want us to think about how Herod might epitomize selfish ambition, but we also are nonetheless culpable and implicit when we neglect the needs of children and excuse this neglect as being fiscally and socially responsible. So we deny health care to poor kids, keep food out of hungry mouths, and de-house children and families because it does not align with our political beliefs. Rachel is again weeping for her children.

In the end, Herod might be an unfortunate character in the Nativity. He will not be present in any manger scenes, but we should learn from him what lessons we can and learn to behave differently. Children’s lives depend on it.