"True Greatness"
The Holy Gospel comes to us this morning from Mark the 9th chapter, beginning at the 30th verse.
9:30 They went on from there and passed through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it; 31 for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.” 32 But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him. 33 Then they came to Capernaum; and when he was in the house he asked them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” 34 But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another who was the greatest. 35 He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” 36 Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, 37 “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”
Dear Heavenly Father, we give you thanks for coming among us in the person of your Son, Jesus the Christ, who gave his life to restore us to a right relationship with you, our Creator. Through the power of your Holy Spirit, strengthen us in faith, that we might turn from our selfish ambitions and serve you by serving others, especially those in need. Let our lives be a mirror to others of your redeeming grace. This we ask in Christ’s holy name. Amen.
I’d like for you to imagine the following scene, and tell me what you think about it. You’ve just been told by a doctor that you have an incurable disease. This disease is fatal. You know you have a short time until you die. The doctor describes in detail how the disease will progress and rob you of your life, and how painful of a process that it will be. So you go home, and you tell your family and closest friends what is going to happen to you. You tell them exactly what this disease is going to do to you, and when you will die, and the pain and suffering you will go through.
And what’s their reaction? They start to argue amongst themselves. One of your children says “Mom always wanted me to have her heirloom jewelry, so it’s mine!” Another says “No, I was always their favorite, so I’m going to get the house and you’ll be lucky to get a few bucks!” Yet another says “No no no, you’re all wrong. Since I took care of them in their old age, I’m going to get everything because you two never came and helped out during their illness!” I think we all agree that this would not be an appropriate course of action, listening to the children argue over which one is the greatest or will receive the biggest reward, right after you have told them you are going to die and the details of how you are going to die. We’d condemn such action as absolutely out of line! Rude, insensitive. Just some of the words that come to mind over such behavior.
Yet, in our Gospel reading for this morning, we see this very thing happen. Jesus predicts His upcoming passion, His suffering and death. He tells His disciples how He is going to go about His Messianic office by suffering and dying for the sins of the world. He says “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him. And when he is killed after three days he will rise.” Here, Jesus is pouring out his heart. He is telling them what He is destined to do as the long-promised Messiah. One would expect the disciples to be saddened, or shocked by this announcement by Jesus. Our Teacher is going to be harmed, and suffer? You would think they’d be in agony over this.
Yet, what are the disciples discussing along the way to Capernaum after Jesus tells them this? The text tells us “they were arguing with one another about who was the greatest.” I can think of a few reactions most people have to this. Outrageous! Unbelievable! How rude! What in the world is wrong with these guys? What makes this text remarkable is that this is not the first time that this has happened.
Earlier in this chapter of Mark’s gospel, we have the account of the Transfiguration. Six days before that happened, back toward the end of Chapter 8, Jesus made another prediction of His upcoming suffering and death. And do you remember what happened at that time? Peter pulls Jesus aside and rebukes Jesus. Matthew’s account tells us that Peter says “Far be it from You, Lord. This shall never happen to you!” And do you remember what Jesus’ response was? “Get behind me, Satan. For you are not setting your mind of the things of God, but on the things of man.” In that case, according to Peter’s mindset, a suffering Savior isn’t glorious. It’s depressing. So he tells Jesus “this suffering servant stuff ain’t gonna happen because that’s not what I was looking for.” And Jesus corrects Peter’s attitude.
If we flip ahead another chapter in Mark’s Gospel, we come across Jesus foretelling His suffering and death yet a third time, and what happens there? James and John come up to Jesus, and ask Him to do whatever they want, and they ask for seats at His left and right in His glory. Again, another case of the disciples looking for glory in worldly terms.
If anything, these passion predictions point out to us the great contrast of glory in worldly terms vs. heavenly terms. In our world, we think of greatness as being in positions of power, authority, and might. That’s greatness in our society. Just think about the folks that we put up on a pedestal as “great”. They’re usually people who have excelled at something and have earned a lot of money, power, and worldly prestige because of it.
In our reading for today, Jesus has a great object lesson for the disciples on the issue of greatness in the kingdom of God. Jesus tells the disciples “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.” Then to show this, he takes a child and puts the child in the midst of the disciples, takes the child into His arms, and says “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me, receives not me, but him who sent me.”
Let’s think about this object lesson here. Children are not glorious in the eyes of the world. In fact, they take up a lot of their parents’ time, talents, and treasures to take care of. A child needs to be given to, needs to be served, in order to survive and grow up. To receive a child, means that you have to physically get down to their level to pick up that child, give of yourself, in order that the child is taken care of. That’s not glorious in the eyes of the world. When you think about it, through the centuries, childcare has not been considered a glorious occupation. Motherhood or Fatherhood is often considered to be a burden by society instead of a great occupation. And why? Because servant hood is involved. It means giving of yourself to serve the needs of someone else who can’t meet their own needs.
This business of serving someone else is completely foreign to our definition of greatness. Before we get too far into bashing the disciples, we have to confess this morning that this is a concept that we have a hard time with, too, as Christians living in the 21st century. I already mentioned our society’s definition of greatness. To give you a perfect example, when Mother Teresa passed away in 1997, a lot was made of her service to the poor, sick, orphaned, and dying in the slums of Calcutta. She worked and served the “untouchables” of Indian society, devoting her life to these people. When people were remembering her life, the sentiment behind it was “we sure need a lot more people like her in this world, as long as it isn’t me.”
But this backwards way of greatness also plays out in our churches today. Churches that have a lot of money coming into the offering plate each week, and are packed to the rafters for several services are considered to be great, regardless of their stance on God’s Word. And yet, the small, rural church that preaches the good news of Christ Crucified for the sins of the world that struggles to meet its needs and has to share its Pastor with a neighboring congregation isn’t considered to be all that great. Within the local congregation, we look at our service within the church as something to puff us up with pride. We shout out to God “God, look at what I’ve done for you! I’ve been a member of this church for years. I’ve always been faithful in my attendance here. I’ve served on the council, I’ve been in the choir, I’ve taught Sunday School. I started this group or that group. I certainly put in a larger portion of my income into the offering plate for the work of my church than the person in the pew ahead of me. I pray daily. I read my Bible more than anyone; I have more knowledge than most people here. I’m doing pretty Good, Lord, so you must favor me over the next person.” While this line of thinking sounds good and pious, what word there comes up frequently? “I”. Instead of having Christ serve you or being a suffering servant, you have just made your piety into something to boast over. It’s nothing but sinful pride. Our world’s idea of greatness, whatever it may be, shows us that we don’t understand what being great in the Kingdom of God is all about.
But thanks be to God that Jesus did! You remember that prediction He made that the disciples seemingly blew off? He went ahead and fulfilled it anyway. Because there was no way that sinful man could possibly pay the enormous debt of his sin before God, Jesus left the splendor of heaven and took on the limitations of our sinful, human flesh. Where we broke God’s laws, He perfectly kept them. He then allowed Himself to be arrested, beaten, falsely accused of things He had not done, and allowed Himself to be crucified. Yes, Jesus, the 2nd Person of the Trinity, the Son of God, who was present when the world was created, allowed creation to take His own life. But the grave didn’t hold Him, as He rose again 3 days later.
And the amazing part about that was, he didn’t do it for Himself. He did it for you and me. For the times where we have put ourselves first, Christ suffered and died for that sin so that we might be saved from that sin. For the times where we have allowed our personal piety become our god, He died for that sin so that we may come before the foot of the cross, confess our sins of thought, word, and deed, and hear the good news that we are forgiven.
This is where that object lesson with the child becomes even more significant. In order for God to serve us, He had to stoop down to our level, and take on our flesh, in order to care for our needs. Jesus humbles Himself and becomes last of all in taking our sin to the cross and dying for it there. And through becoming the least of all, He becomes servant of all, and greatest of all.
Amen.
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The Bible texts of the Old Testament, Epistle and Gospel lessons are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Church of Christ in the USA, and used by permission. Sermon written by Rev. Christopher Martin.
In our reading for today, Jesus has a great object lesson for the disciples on the issue of greatness in the kingdom of God.
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