Who is the Greatest? or Am I Better Than You?

One of the most interesting and challenging statements of Jesus occurs just after the mother of James and John has asked that they be allowed to have the highest positions in Jesus’ coming kingdom.  Jesus responded that it was not his place to grant positions in heaven, but His Father’s.   But the mere asking really irritated the other disciples.  It annoyed them to think that someone was trying to get the top spots in the kingdom.  Not because they had anything against James and John, but because it would mean that they wouldn’t be in the top slot.

And so Jesus responds to the whole lot of them with one of the toughest teachings in the Bible.  It’s found in Matt. 20:25-28. 

V.25 Jesus called them together and said,  “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. 26 Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 27 and whoever wants to be first must be your slave — 28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Notice that Jesus isn’t just suggesting here.  Notice that he isn’t merely hinting.  He is very straightforward in turning their pre-conceived ideas upside down with a new command that makes sense, but it doesn’t make sense all at the same time.  He is telling them that if they want to be great in God’s kingdom, they must be counter-cultural, go against the systems and structures set up by man, and become a servant.  They must strive for what we would call today, downward mobility.

I don’t think they cared much for the idea.  As a matter of fact, not long after this, they were traveling to Capernaum they began arguing quietly among themselves as they trudged the road behind Jesus.

Mark 9:33 ¶ They came to Capernaum. When he was in the house, he asked them,  “What were you arguing about on the road?”

Mark 9:34 But they kept quiet because on the way they had argued about who was the greatest.

It is ever upwards in their minds.  How do I get to the top?  How do I become numero Uno?  Is it possible to edge someone else out?  And we can’t finger point.  We do the same thing, don’t we? Oh, we know our place at work or school, but it isn’t without the thoughts, “Well, if I were running this show, I would…”  And it’s very easy to try and discount anyone who may be in authority over us.  We want to move up the ladder, to go higher and get better.  We want people to recognize that we are just a bit superior.  That we sure aren’t as ignorant or as back woodsy or as unsophisticated as those rednecks, or geeks or hillbillies.  No matter where you find yourself on the food chain, what do you do?  You look around to see who has it better and who has it worse.  And we can all say, “Well at least I’m not as bad as….” Or “If only I could…then I’d…”

Who’s the greatest?   That’s the question we are really asking.  Am I better than?  And Jesus’ response to His disciples might rattle our cage as well.

Mark 9:35 ¶ Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said,  “If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all.”
They didn’t much like that…and neither do we.  We don’t much like the thought of downward mobility.  We sure don’t like the idea of going to the end of the line.  And if someone cuts in on us…it makes our blood boil.  Jesus ups the ante.

36 ¶ He took a little child and had him stand among them. Taking him in his arms, he said to them, 37  “Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me.”

Great pastor Don, I have no problem welcoming little children.  It’s the teenagers that drive me nuts!  And what does this have to do with the church anyway?  I’m glad you asked.

One of the reasons the church has such a hard time allowing young people to participate is because we don’t want to lose control.  We reason that we had to pay our dues in order to gain leadership positions in the church, so they should have to pay theirs.  And as long as they haven’t paid theirs, they are subject to whatever we like, because, after all, we are on top.  How do you think Jesus would respond to that idea?  If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all.  Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me.”

Not only are we welcoming Jesus when we determine to serve young people, but we are also welcoming God the Father and the Holy Spirit as well.  If we are to become a people who disciple young people, we must become servant leaders.  But what does that mean?

First of all, it means choosing a path of downward mobility.  Choosing to relinquish any rights I may think I have in the church, for the sake of winning others and discipling them.  It means making a conscientious choice to build into the life of another person.  It means being less concerned with me, and what I like, and more concerned with you and what will win you to Jesus.  Who is the greatest?

It still isn't me or you.  It isn't even the kids we serve.  It always has been and always will be Jesus. And He has called us to follow His example and go lower.  How will we respond?

It's Everybody's Choice

It was a hot, humid Sabbath, back in the day before air-conditioning.  The windows were all open, flies buzzed in and out, fans stationed at strategic locations around the church churned the otherwise breezeless air.  I sat there with sweat running down my back, my forehead, my chest—pretty much any pore that could sweat was sweating.  I have no idea what the pastor said, for in my misery, his voice had long ago become little more than a drone in the background of my suffering.

I looked around and saw many other church members stirring up the air themselves with whatever they could get hold of, be it funeral home fans, camp-meeting fans, or just hymnals out of the rack, and trying to pay attention.  Others had succumbed to the heat and were dozing, some quietly, some not so quietly. Other kids, like me, were trying to simply endure to the end.  Some were watching the flying insects.  Some were counting ceiling tiles.  One had abandoned his seat altogether, and had crawled under the pew and was now laying on the cool tile floor right in front of one of the square box fans sitting on the floor.  He was fast asleep.  I privately envied him, knowing that death would be my fate if I tried something similar on my side of the church.

The pastor, in his dark suit, with the coat on and buttoned, literally had rivulets of water pouring down his forehead, which he swiped repeatedly with an already soaked handkerchief as he continued to preach.  I don’t know how he did it.

And somewhere in the middle of my agony, the question came clearly to my mind.  I had no answer for it that day, and I’m not sure that I  have a much better answer for it on this day.  The question?  Why do we do this?  Why do we come to church week after week when nothing ever seems to change?

On that day for me, as on this day for some of you, the answer was that I was there because I had to be there. My parents had insisted I be there, so I was there because I had to be.  But others had actually chosen to be there.  What was that about?

In that day and time, a person was measured in the church community, as well as the society at large, by their behavior.  It seemed to be externally focused.  Look good…you are good.  Look bad…you are bad.  It didn’t seem to matter what a person was really like on the inside.  If you didn’t look or act just right on the outside, you were judged harshly.  So maybe many of them came to avoid judgment.  Or perhaps they came because they wanted to move up in the church community.

Or maybe from my perspective, I was the one being a bit harsh, because there probably were some there because they truly loved Jesus.  I mean, there had to be some there because of that.  It’s just that it seemed like nothing ever changed in that church.  Week after week, summer, spring, winter and fall, we would all be there, and outside of a few amusing incidents, I can’t really remember anyone changing.

Miss C, an old maid spinster, was still mean outside of church.  Mr. R. still yelled at little kids who didn’t go right into church, asking them if they wanted to go to hell, because that’s where they were headed if they didn’t get right into church…which is where some of us thought we were on those hot summer days IN church.  The story was that Mr. B would beat his kids if they didn’t sit still during church as well as their one-hour family worships, and the two older ones often came to school with bruises on their legs and arms.  Mrs. M. gossiped about everyone to everyone.  And it was widely known, probably through Mrs. M, that Mr. H was making political moves towards being nominated head elder so that he could run the church the way he thought it ought to be, and that included maybe even getting rid of the pastor, if need be.

Then there was the pantry patrol, a group of ladies who would go to the homes of others in the church to make sure that they didn’t have any “forbidden’s” in their pantry or refrigerators.  No sugar. No pop.  No mustard.  No vinegar. Nothing that would be against the health message they touted.  Moderation was not part of their vocabulary.  Nor was kindness.  As strict vegetarians, they also sought to make all others vegetarian, and woe be unto you if they found some meat in your fridge.  Eggs, somehow were ok…but not chicken.

The gospel preached back in that day emphasized more the hardship of following Jesus, and how much you had to do, or not do, and how much you were supposed to give up. It was about conquering all known sin, at least any that people could see. It was about passing out tracts and literature, distributing articles of clothing and Bible studies given.  It was about getting your Ingathering goal…not giving it, and it was about making sure that others knew that you had done your part for the church, whatever that may be.  It seemed to be all about externals—but though people did some pretty whacky things, like the pantry patrol, it never really seemed to make a difference in their day-to-day lives.  It just seemed like people were working like mad to get to heaven.

Gradually, the pendulum began to swing back the other direction.  People actually acknowledged that one could be saved by grace, through faith, and not from the works they were doing.  But as pendulum swings go, it kept going through its swing until we get down to now, where we are on the other side of the pendulum swing.

We’ve opted now for such a grace orientation, that we almost never talk about Christ's life and death and resurrection giving us the victory over sin anymore.  We’ve just accepted living with it and repeating a pattern of sin, feel guilty, ask forgiveness, sin, feel guilty, ask forgiveness, etc.   We’ve actually settled for sin management, instead of sin conquering.  Which is not new either.

That started back in the garden.  Check out  Genesis 3:6,7  When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

We get pretty hard on Adam and Eve for plunging us all into sin, but the fact is, they had never heard a lie before, and they had no clue that all beings weren’t totally honest.  They did not know that deception existed.  They had only had truthful dealings with God.  Everything He told them was true, and they had no reason to doubt.  Isn’t it logical then to assume that in their innocence, they would have no reason to doubt what the serpent said? Satan knew this, and used it to his advantage.  But once they had bitten on the lie, innocence faded away.

Isn’t it interesting that when the abrupt realization comes that they were not innocent anymore, and that suddenly they find themselves vulnerable and naked, they instantly start trying to manage sin?

They sewed fig leaves together to cover their nakedness, caused by their transgression.  Now here’s the real interesting thought.  Adam and Eve had never heard of deception before.  They were innocent and had no knowledge of evil, or lies or anything…they were led to sin because they trusted a serpent to be honest with them, even though the serpent contradicted God.  Their doubt, their desire to be like God, and their acting on that desire caused them to fall, though they had never seen sin or lies or evil before.

We, on the other hand, have known about deceit almost from birth.  We know of evil and disease.  We have a written history of how it started.  We have the story of sin and of redemption.  We know that Jesus has made a way out for us when He died on the cross.  We know all of this, and yet we still sin.  And we still make excuses.  And in our teaching today, we have actually made it all ok.

See, whenever we teach that salvation is by mental assent, or intellectual belief, that doesn’t also include transformed behavior, we have given ourselves permission to keep on sinning.  And we make excuses.  We sew fig leaves.  “Well, that’s just the way I am!  I can’t help it.”  “I was born with a red-hot Irish temper—so I can’t help it.”  “My dad had a problem with chasing other women, so I guess it just comes naturally.”  That may be the way you are, but it is not the way Jesus wants to leave you.

How much longer will we go on pretending to be Christians, while doing everything the world does?  When will we realize that to do everything the world does, would actually make us non-Christian?  When will we realize that to do so is really fraudulent of the church at large?  That we are actually telling people we are what, in fact, we really aren’t?

Rom. 12:1,2  Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices,(a sacrifice is a total giving up of something—here Paul is saying to offer yourself as a sacrifice) holy and pleasing to God — this is your spiritual act of worship.  2 Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is — his good, pleasing and perfect will.

God is calling you this morning to a transformation.  It is true that Jesus loves you just where you are…but He loves you too much to leave you that way.  He wants you to become just like Jesus.  And if you are not becoming more and more like Jesus, you are not truly a disciple. 

If you are not being transformed into the image of Jesus, then you are not truly following as a disciple.  If your temper problem is not more under control today than it was when you first started following, you haven’t truly given it to Jesus.  If you still lie, or gossip or steal, then you need to bring those things to Jesus and let Him begin the transformation process.  If you don’t love others more now, than when you first started with Jesus, then you haven’t been doing the discipleship coursework.

Accepting His gift is one thing.  It’s the first step.  That’s what we call justification.  But walking in His steps is the second step and the third…and so on, until you become like Jesus.  That’s sanctification.  Your faith becomes obvious in your life by the changes that take place due to your obedience to Jesus.

We’ve got to rearrange our goals from being successful, or wealthy or even noble and instead, make our goal to be a committed follower of Jesus.  Until we do, we will lack passion, and perspective and priorities and perseverance to follow Jesus.  And we won’t see the fruit of the Spirit growing in our lives.  And we won’t tell others about the kingdom, even though we know that Jesus asked us to.  And we will be weak, spineless, Christ-less Christians, which are really not Christians at all.  And as a result, because the individual members lack those things, the whole church will be weak, spineless and Christ-less, which means that we really aren’t a Christian church, no matter how much we may identify ourselves that way.

It all goes back to a choice.  It’s everybody’s choice.  Each of you have to make it.  A choice, not only to take the first step with Jesus…which many of you did last Sabbath by accepting His grace and forgiveness in your lives, but also a choice to take the second step, by accepting His grace and leadership into your lives.  He not only wants to forgive you, He wants to transform you into His likeness.  He wants to change you from who you are to who He wants you to be.  He wants to help you overcome your sin and bad habits and He wants to rule in your heart.  He wants you to talk and act and think and become Just like Jesus.

God calls us to more than just a mental assent to the truth.  He calls us first of all to repentance.  And then He calls us to live the life of Jesus.  To believe what Jesus believed. Live as Jesus lived. To love like Jesus loves.  To minister like Jesus ministered.  To lead as Jesus led.