Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“On an appointed day Herod put on his royal robes, took his seat on the platform, and delivered a public address to them. The people kept shouting, ‘The voice of a god, and not of a mortal!’”
NL Daily Devotion for Monday, April 26, 2021
by R. M. Fergus, Clergy Stuff
I can’t express enough just how dangerous this is. We may profess a belief in an invisible and incomprehensible God, we may even be earnest and whole-hearted in answering God’s invitation to dig deeper and know them more, but when someone three-dimensional and tangible and in the flesh tells us what we want to hear and promises us safety and security and prosperity, even at the expense of others, we are sorely tempted to trust that person more than God.
It happened in Nazi Germany. It is the path of White Supremacy all over the world even now. Herod is alive and well in addressing the people and having those people proclaim him a god, even if not in so many words. Of course, in this passage, God immediately strikes Herod down where he stands, for refusing to tell the people they are wrong in their assessment of him. And that’s not something that happened to Hitler, nor the most recent president of the U.S., nor any other overt or covert White Supremacist leader anywhere in the world.
God makes it clear that all are equal in God’s eyes, that anyone who speaks and acts to oppress others is not from God. It is on us to have our eyes wide open and refuse to put anyone—even leaders we like—in the place of God.
How do I approach with love those whom I perceive to be deceived by leaders like Herod?
![1 Kings 17:1-16 [17-24], God’s Care for the Widow](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56b39b61ab48de92d991a40a/bf37035e-33d5-439f-a0d6-a68b02d0f1bc/24-11-03.jpg)
