Day of the Church Year: 17th Sunday after Pentecost
Scripture Passage: Mark 9:30-37
I invite you to open your Bibles to Mark 8.
Once again today, Jesus teaches the disciples what it means for him to be the messiah: that he will be betrayed, die, and rise again. Even though he teaches this lesson three times in the gospel of Mark, the disciples never understand. If you flip to Mark 8:31-38, you’ll recognize last week’s gospel. What’s the first thing Peter does after hearing about Jesus’ upcoming death and resurrection? Rebukes him because he doesn’t want Jesus to die. In today’s gospel, if you flip to Mark 9:30-37, what’s the first thing the disciples do after hearing about Jesus’ death and resurrection? They argue about who is the greatest. If we look forward to Mark 10:32-40 where Jesus again teaches them about his upcoming death and resurrection, what are James and John’s first words? Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you. And what do they want him to do for them? They want to sit one at his right and one at his left in his glory.
The disciples, fundamentally, do not understand the nature of Jesus’ reign as messiah. They’re consumed with power and glory and avoiding pain, but Jesus walks right into betrayal and suffering and death and each time speaks about humility and service. Humility and service as the essence of Jesus’ reign, humility and service as the way Jesus exercises his power. Amusingly, in today’s gospel, the disciples argue about who is the greatest. Is that up for debate? Isn’t Jesus the greatest? I wonder what criteria they are using to discern who the greatest is, such that they fail to see Jesus’ greatness. And I wonder what criteria we use to determine who the greatest is in our culture. What are your thoughts? How do we determine who the greatest is? In both worship services, we discussed how the world defines greatness through wealth and material possessions, prestige and popularity.
Jesus ends the disciples’ argument about greatness by embracing a child and telling them: Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me. The call here, to be clear, is not that the disciples become like children but that they welcome children. Contrary to our own cultural norms, in the ancient world, children lived with the least status of any group of people. While the disciples are wondering who the greatest is, Jesus embraces a child who, in their eyes, is least and littlest and most vulnerable, and says: the greatest one among you will embrace this one. The greatest one among you will, in this honor / shame culture, accept the shame that will be brought onto you by embracing this child. The greatest one among you doesn’t care about your status at all. For whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.
Greatness is about power, and so, Jesus upends the nature of power. When he tells the disciples that he will be betrayed, die, and rise again, he’s teaching them about his power. When he allows the Syro-Phoenician woman to challenge his prejudice, he’s showing the disciples what power looks like—like admitting when you’re wrong. When he dares to put his hands in the ears of a deaf man to restore his hearing, Jesus is showing all who care to see what power looks like—like using your gifts for the sake of another’s healing. When he somehow multiplies the loaves and fish, he’s showing the crowd what power looks like—like tending the basic needs of God’s whole people.
Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all, Jesus says, like me. To the rest of the world then and now, power and service are opposites. But to Jesus, they are one in the same. He is everyone’s servant and calls the disciples and calls us to a similar way of life. It’s not simply that powerful people serve others; it’s also that those who serve all exercise great power, the power of the Holy Spirit.
For the skeptics among us who wonder: can’t humility and this service business get out of hand? I suppose. But to be humble does not mean denying our own gifts and skills and beauty. And I don’t think Jesus means we are to lack boundaries. Even Jesus escaped the crowd to pray and delegated responsibility to the disciples to do his ministry. We cannot and, in my view, should not do everything everyone asks of us. Sometimes, people ask us to do things that are not in the interest of the common good, not aligned with the mission of the church or our workplace, not consistent with our own sense of integrity. There are very real ethical trade-offs with nearly every decision we make. Still, the posture of humility is critical to understanding Jesus’ reign as messiah and our call to follow Jesus. If we have in our heads a ladder of power and greatness and see ourselves on a higher rung than others and if we thus ignore certain people and issues of justice in our world, like the disciples, we have not understood the nature of Jesus’ reign as messiah.
The good news of a messiah who comes as servant of all is that we get served. We get loved. We get forgiven and seen and accepted just as we are. Whether or not we exercise power through service, Jesus still serves and loves us—because that’s what true power looks like. Thanks be to God! Amen.