In our story from Matthew for today, Matthew 2:13-23 for those following along at home or on the road, babies are killed, not by accident, but because of the evil decision and deeds of King Herod. He was the ruler of the area when Jesus was born. He had heard from the Wise Men about the child being born and the star. He heard about the Messiah being born.
This wicked, evil man put out an order. Kill all of the boys in the region, two years or younger. That’s right, he ordered soldiers to kill innocent babies and toddlers to protect his own reign. This is not a story we often tell in church, the Slaughter of the Innocents. THIS IS THE TRUTH: EVIL EXISTS IN OUR WORLD.
When people die in our world, especially when the death seems untimely, such as the death of a child, people try to make sense of it. We try to comfort ourselves by saying there must have been a reason. “It was their time.” “God needed another angel.” We say these things because we hope it will make us feel better. In my experience it rarely makes the grieving parent or grandparent, or sibling, or friend feel any better. Because it does not make sense. And we want to believe God is a loving God.
So how can God think it is the right time for a young child to die? Surely God did not want a bunch of infants and two years olds to be slaughtered by Herod’s soldiers. Would a loving God have chosen that? I want nothing of that God. Do you? No thank you!
These are hard questions. Does God choose for a young father to be killed by a drunk driver and that driver to walk away unscathed? Does God choose for an 80 year old woman to be shot by a by a gunman, a mistaken target, when some younger gang member was the intended target? And even then, did God intend for the younger target to be shot instead? I don’t think any of this is part of God’s plan. I think all of this is of human sin. There is evil in our world. And human choice. And there are natural forces. Hurricanes. Tornadoes. Stuff happens.
This book, this Bible we read, and live our lives by, is a book of real stories about real people. We turn to this book for hope. We find miracles in here, and healings. We find words of encouragement. But sometimes we find stories that are just painful.
We find stories where the bad guys win. We find stories that are of the things of the world, evil things, not the things of God. I don’t like to preach on those stories. I’m guessing you don’t like to hear them. But they are in here.
And when we make the decision to be followers of Jesus, we get this WHOLE BOOK.
We are stuck with the whole thing: the good and the bad.
So what do we do with a story like this? What do we do with a story of babies being killed because a terrible, insecure king named Herod, who did not like the idea that Jesus was born to be the new King of the Jews. And so Herod, in his evil and twisted mind, used his power, to kill all the babies in Bethlehem and the surrounding area under the age of 2. Now experts tell us it was only possibly around 20 babies. To be honest, when I had read this story in the past, I thought it was hundreds. But it really does not matter how many. If you are the mother of that baby, it does not matter if it is only one.
If it is your baby, the loss is unbearable. If ti is your baby, there is no good explanation. There are no words to take the pain away. There is just agony.
All I can think is this: Jesus came to bring salvation to the world, but he could not grow up fast enough to save those babies from the likes of Herod and his evil.
Not even Jesus could save them.
But I began to imagine as I pondered this text this week, what it must have been like to be a brother or sister of one of those baby boys. What would it have been like to live in a family with that legacy? “Your brother was killed because he was born around the time of that young man Jesus – they say he is the Messiah. God sent him to save us all.”
Do you think those families had some bit of hope, because of that promise? Do you suppose, that even in the midst of such grief, that they might have been able to dig deep into their souls, and find a tiny ember of hope, burning ever so bright? God is still with us. In fact, God loves us so much, that God sent God’s own child to earth to love us. Wow!
That could not entirely heal the pain of losing my baby. But it would give me some comfort in my grief. To be a sibling who survived Herod’s massacre, I think, might have made one feel a strong sense of purpose. My brother will not have died in vain. I will find this Jesus and I will follow him. Herod will not win. Love will win. God’s love, come to earth in Jesus will win.
Friends, I believe that’s what this painful and oh, so real story has to say to us today. It’s a painful story, a difficult one for us even today, thousands of years later. Even as God’s love was born into the world, and the power of evil was trying so hard to vanquish it, the power of love was strong.
You see, those weeping mothers and fathers had a choice. They could give in to their despair, and give up on God. I would have been tempted to be there. They could stay in their anger and turn away from God, because God allowed their babies to be taken from them.
Or they could turn to God, and embrace hope. An innocent child was taken from them, simply because he was born in the wrong place at the wrong time. So each family had a question: would they turn to God, and cling to the promise that God is still with them, and that God loves them. Would they trust that ultimately the power of God’s love always wins over the evil forces of this world? Or would they give up on God? We know of course, that God never gives up on us, but we CAN give up on God. Have you ever wanted to give up on God?
So what does this say to us today? For one, it tells us, that even the most painful stories in the Bible can speak to us, so we need not avoid the hard stories in the Bible. But that’s a minor point. I think the message is this. We will all experience some kind of tragedy. We will all confront evil in this world. This is a time when we have a choice. We can get angry at God and turn away from God because we think God let us down. We will all get angry, and to that. But that’s hopefully something short.
Or we can take the path that I believe those mothers and fathers in Bethlehem took long ago. We can acknowledge that the evil in the world is not from God. Evil comes from human sin. (And some bad things happen just by accident and forces of nature.) God does not make this happen. But out of any tragedy, God still loves us, and God can bring blessing to us. God wants to heal us and comfort us, and restore our lives to wholeness. God does not want to leave us in that place of weeping and mourning and brokenness. There is a time for that, and then there is a time to move on.
When we weep, God weeps with us. And then when it is time for the weeping to end, God reminds us that there is still a baby over in Egypt, ready to come back to us, to grow up and be our teacher and our Savior. Jesus is our hope. Jesus is always with us. That is the good news of today. God is always with us. God is ALWAYS with us. Let’s follow Jesus and embrace that hope.
Do you have a place where you can weep? Do you have a community that can weep with you? Do you hear voices that tell you God loves you and will take you through these times? Do you have hope? If not, find a community where you can get all of this. There are many out there. If you are near Central & Monroe in Toledo, and in just a few months Conant Street & the Trail in Maumee, come join us. We will weep with you, because we have, but we also will show you hope.
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