What Should I Ask For?

“I want you to give me at once on a platter the head of John the Baptist.” Mark 6:25

This is what Salome, the daughter of Herodias demanded of King Herod after asking her mother for advice, “What should I ask for?” The young girl had just danced for King Herod and his guests. He was so pleased with her performance that he promised to give her ANYTHING she asked for, "even to half of my kingdom!"

Salome was only 12 (according to a Jewish historian) but she must have been sultry and seductive in her movement. I can't imagine a jaded man like Herod being captivated by a cutesy, childish dance.

"What should I ask for?" the child asks her mother, echoing children throughout the ages, in need of guidance and wisdom. And instead of wise counsel, what did she get? Herodias instructs her to ask for John the Baptist's head!

Salome hurries back to Herod and demanded, "I want the head of John the Baptist, RIGHT NOW, ON A TRAY!" She did her mother better! This just shows that when we teach a wrong thing, it escalates. That's the nature of sin. Perhaps that's why it says in Exodus 20:5: "I, the Lord your God, visit the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation..."

If we want the best for our children, we should dig up any seeds or roots of sin and rebellion in our lives, so that it will not grow into a shrub or tree in the lives of our children!