The Conscience on the Fence, Pt. 2

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We all know people who seem incapable of making decisions. They’ll research a purchase for weeks but never check out, circle a choice for months and somehow never land––even when they know which way they should go. Pastor Nick Gatzke shares the story of a man who sat on the fence, and his delay had tragic consequences.

Holiness can have a repelling effect on people. The reason for this is that deep down inside, we all want to live our own lives our own way. That we want to be the king of our domain. And in ourselves, we certainly don’t want to submit to another king, a king named Jesus. And this self-determination and rebellion wells up within us. It comes out as anger at the even idea of righteousness or holiness. And we don’t want to recognize that there’s another way we should be doing something. I wonder if that’s ever happened to you. When you engage with somebody and they find out that you’re a Christian and they are automatically repelled, not because of anything you’ve said or even did, but because of what you represent. R.C. Sproul illustrates this aspect of holiness, reminding us of a little book by a German theologian called Rudolf Otto. And the book was translated under the English title, The Idea of the Holy.

What Otto did and that is so interesting, is that he went around and examined people from different cultures around the world, Aborigines and Europeans and different types of people, and he tried to find out what they regarded as holy or sacred in their culture. And then he did studies phenomenologically to see the normal human reactions to the holy. And after making this study, he tried to distill the essence of the human experience of the holy and come up with some conclusions. And he would come up with these conclusions and invent phrases to describe them.

And so if you would ask him, Dr. Otto, what is the holy? His answer, because he had a Latin term for everything, was the mysterium tremendum. What does he mean by that? He means that the experience of the holy is an experience of something very strange, impossible to penetrate or fathom. It’s mysterious, but it is also powerful. The awesome, mysterious power provokes a sense of fear within us. Listen to how Otto describes what he calls this awful mystery. He says, the feeling of it may at times come sweeping like a gentle tide, pervading the mind with a tranquil mood of deepest worship. It may pass over into a more set and lasting attitude of the soul as you interact with the holy, continuing as it were, thrilling, vibrant, and resonant until at last it dies away and the soul resumes its profane, non-religious mood of everyday experience. Then he goes on to describe, it may burst into a sudden eruption from the depths of the soul with spasms and convulsions or lead to the strangest excitements, to intoxicated frenzy, to transport, and to ecstasy.

It has the wild and demonic forms that can sink into almost grisly horror and shuddering as you interact with something holy. He describes the fact that not everybody responds in the same way to the awareness of the holy. Some people become whirling dervishes and all kinds of flamboyant activity, and other people are moved to absolute silence and contemplation. And he detected in his study of the holy that across the board, throughout, varying civilizations, the basic response of human beings to experiencing something holy is to have conflicting feelings. There is something about the holiness of God that attracts us, and there is something that repels us or frightens us. On the one hand, it fascinates, and on the other hand, it terrifies.

And Herod and Herodias are angered by the holiness that John represents and it repels them. And Herod, at the same time being perplexed, listens to him gladly because it attracts him. That is the nature of holiness and our response to it. And so in verse 20, you see Herod’s interaction with John results in him being perplexed, but He would hear him gladly. And so you can almost imagine what that might have been like because Herod never had to hear him if he didn’t want to. You can almost imagine him summoning the prisoner to his chamber to discuss the things of life. And he would ask questions to John about God and this message of repentance and the coming of this. Jesus that he had heard about. And John would speak confidently and boldly, just as the prophet Elijah had done.

And Herod was perplexed. And he’d think on it. And he wouldn’t change his actions because there was so much to lose. But his mind wouldn’t let it go. He would stay on the fence. Something was happening in his conscience. And so a few days later, he’d stroll down to the dungeon and lean up against the cell. And he’d ask a couple of follow-up questions to the things they’d been talking about before. And he’d think about that for a minute. And then he would go on his way. His conscience was gnawing at him about these things that John had said. And it was making him think about things that he had never thought about before, and he was happy for that. Something was going on inside of there. Perhaps he was tired of the politics and the social climbing and the backstabbing that occurs in a king’s court, and the words of John the baptizer were life-giving and stimulating.

But to repent would mean that he would have to give up so many things, so many things that he liked, So many things he thought brought him fulfillment. To repent would mean his status would change. His promiscuous lifestyle would be halted. The opulence in which he lived in would be threatened. And so he would listen and he’d think and it would gnaw at him, but he would not repent. There was too much to give up. He would rather protect John and continue to have the stimulation and access of the mind and even the soul, while living his own life his own way, he would stay on the fence. Time went by. Herod preserved John’s life. He had a tremendous opportunity to turn to God.

But despite the opportunity, he would firmly position that conscience of his right on the fence. Perhaps he thought he could live that way for the rest of his days. But then it was his birthday, and it was time for a party. And so verse 21 tells us that Herod threw a big kingly birthday party for himself. Nobles and military men and leading men of the community were all there. They’re present for the grand dinner. The food was excellent. The meat was superb. The wine was of the highest quality. And as was often the case in kingly type parties, the succulent treats were consumed and the music was playing and the party would go late into the night and the alcohol was flowing and Herodias, Herodias, wife saw her opportunity. Late in the hours of the evening, with the music playing, she sent her teenage daughter, Salome, out into the hall, scantily clad to give a sensual dance for the king and for all the guests to enjoy.

This appeal to the masculine desires was common, to have dancers of this type and these types of parties in the ancient world. But most of the dancers were typically hired professionals or prostitutes who were there to please the drunk men. But not tonight. Salome, a woman of stature, came into the hall with all of her beauty and charm, and all the eyes of the room were on her. And as she finished, The crowd erupted in applause and cheering and their senses were piqued. And verse 22 says, the king said to the girl, ask me for whatever you wish and I’ll give it to you. That’s how enjoyable the experience was. He had so much. Only a king could offer such a thing. And the crowd cheered the generosity and the king made an oath that he would give up to half of his kingdom. What would she choose? Fine jewelry, a new stallion, expensive clothing from a far off land.

These are the types of things that you would expect a teenage girl to ask for. What should she choose? She retreats to her mother for advice. And the response was chilling and calculated. The head of John the Baptist. And she came, verse 25, immediately with haste to the king and asked, saying, I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist. And she added, just for the sake of a party, on a platter. What? What did you say? Herod must have said. Herodias has finally done it, he thought. The music stopped. The chill entered the air. And Herod knew that his conscience would no longer be on the fence.

And verse 26 says that this grieved him. He was exceedingly sorry, but because of his oaths and his guests, he did not want to break his word to her. He still had a chance right there in that moment to do the right thing, but in his mind, it would cost him too much. His conscience was now tipped over. The fence to the other side. He immediately had John, the greatest man on earth, according to Jesus, other than Jesus himself. He immediately had the greatest man on earth, other than Christ, beheaded. You see, you can’t stay on the fence forever. Sooner or later, you got to make a choice. Some of us have been trying to do that with God. We’ve been trying to stay on the fence. We’ve been trying to continue to engage the things that we want. We want what we want. We want what we want, even if those things are opposed to God. And we want the benefits of relationship with God as well.

And so we want to have it both. And if we don’t repent and go completely toward God, What often happens is that we do our evil things, our sinful things. We are convicted of sin in some way, shape, or form. We try to ride the fence of conviction and do not respond to our conscience. We push those things away and we pretend that our sinful deeds never happened. We rewrite history in our minds. We lie to ourselves or we minimize the significance of what… actually going on as we try to keep our conscience held together on the fence. Have you ever done that before? I have done that plenty of times. Maybe some of you are even living that way right now. You want what you want, and you want to ride the fence because you want the God stuff too.

But here’s the truth. Your conscience can’t stay on the fence forever. It can’t. You must choose to follow Christ, or you will choose at some point to just follow yourself. Another way to say that is that if you don’t yield to Christ, you will yield to your sin. Another way to say that is that if you don’t turn away from your sin, your sin will ultimately turn you. Herod did not want to kill John. He never thought he was going to actually get to that place. But if you don’t turn from your sin, your sin will ultimately turn you. Michelangelo’s final work was called the Rodanini Pieta, the sculpture on which he worked for 10 years. And Giorgio Vasari, a contemporary of Michelangelo’s, wrote that Michelangelo ended up breaking the block of the sculpture. Probably because it was full of impurities and was so hard that sparks flew under his chisel.

Imagine 10 years and then the block is broken. The sculpture was rescued by a servant and it survives to this day. It bears the marks of Michelangelo’s chisel, but none of the beauty of his earlier work. What happened? Well, another sculptor named Lorenzo Dominguez once summarized a dilemma that’s unpredictable, the unpredictability of working with stone. He said it this way, very simply, stone wants to be stone and the artist wants it to be art. The same dilemma exists for those of us who are the work of God’s hands. As God works to bring people into his kingdom, to free the image of Christ that’s within us, he begins chipping away at our self-determination. He does this through our conscience and through the conviction of sin by the Holy Spirit in our lives. And if we submit, the features of the Savior begin to emerge from our life. If we submit long enough, the ultimate work of glory is revealed.

If, however, the life resists and continues to resist, there’s a day when God will let the stone be stone. C.S. Lewis said as much when he stated that there are only two kinds of people in the end, those who say thy will be done and those whom God says, okay, go ahead and have it your way. You know, This wasn’t the last time that we would see Herod in the New Testament. A year or two later, he pops up again. He’s a different man by then. And this time… has an opportunity to either support or reject the crucifixion of Jesus. And it says this in Luke chapter 23, “when Herod saw Jesus, he was very glad for he had long desired to see him because he had heard about him and he was hoping to see some sign done by him.

And so he questioned him at some length, but he made no answer. The chief priests and the scribes stood by vehemently accusing him and Herod with his soldiers treated him with contempt and they mocked him. And then arraying him in splendid clothing, he sent him back to Pilate and Herod and Pilate became friends with each other that very day for before they had been at enmity with each other.” Sad to see, just a few short years, Herod’s conscience had gone from being open to God to be completely dead to God. He wanted to see Jesus, but not to have conversations with him like he had with John the Baptist. He wanted to see Jesus, but not to inquire if he was the one that his father, Herod the Great, had been trying to kill and therefore killed all the innocents. He wanted to see Jesus, but not to see God. He was curious to see Jesus, but only because he wanted to be amused and entertained by his miracles.

And that’s it. His conscience was seared. And Jesus wouldn’t even speak to him. You see, you can’t stay on the fence forever with God. If you don’t turn from your sin, your sin will turn you. And so what about you, on the fence, or are you firmly within his domain? Are there areas of your life that you don’t have surrendered to Christ just yet? Do you have prevailing sins that you haven’t repented of hoping that you can keep them and still keep the benefits of God? Is God convicting you or compelling you to act, to change, to yield? And are you still resisting? You can’t stay on the fence forever. If you don’t yield to Christ, you will yield to your sin. If you don’t turn from your sin, your sin will turn you.

But here’s the good news. God is gracious. He’s kind. He’s quick to forgive. And he invites you to come to him. Let’s pray. Father, may your spirit who is the one that convicts us of sin, who compels us toward holiness, who softens our hearts to you, be doing that very work right now. And may we push him aside no longer. Amen.

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This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy, but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.