The Greatest?

Mark 9:30-37

September 22, 2024

 

            The following are a toddler’s property rights.

1.  If I like it, it’s mine.

            2.  If it’s in my hand, it’s mine.

            3.  If I can take it from you, it’s mine.

            4.  If I had it a little while ago, it’s mine.

            5.  If it’s mine, it must never appear to be yours in any way.

            6.  If I’m building something, all the pieces are mine.

            7.  If it looks like mine, it’s mine.

            8.  If I saw it first, it’s mine.

9.  If you are playing with something and put it down, it automatically becomes mine.

10.  If it’s broken, it’s yours. (Unless you find a good way to play with it, then, once again, it’s mine.)

My mother passed these onto me when my own children were toddlers, and I’ve never forgotten them – mainly because they’re true. I love children. I enjoy listening to them and learning from them and playing with them. This is not meant to disparage our children. However, if you have ever raised your own toddlers, taught toddlers, hung around toddlers, or even watched toddlers from a distance then you know the truth of these property rights too.

I share these property rights with you, because I want us going into this sermon and indeed into our passage from Mark’s gospel, with a realistic view of children in our minds. As theologian and essayist, Debie Thomas, wrote, it is easy to over-sentimentalize Jesus’ actions in this passage. So, if you are tempted to do that, remember these toddler property rights.

Jesus and his disciples are traveling alone through Galilee. Jesus did not want others with them, because he was once again teaching the disciples what it meant for him to be the Messiah. He will be betrayed into human hands. He will be killed and three days after he is killed, he will rise again. In the time elapsed since last week’s reading, three of the disciples have followed Jesus up a mountain and seen him transfigured. They entered that liminal space between this world and the next and got a glimpse of their rabbi in his full glory talking with Moses and Elijah. After they came back down the mountain, Jesus healed a boy with an unclean spirit, to the awe of the crowd gathered around them.

Now Jesus and the disciples are alone again. They are traveling, and as I said, Jesus is once again telling them plainly what will happen to him. The disciples don’t understand what he is telling them, but they are too afraid to admit it to him. I would guess that they were embarrassed because they know that Jesus has told them all this already, but they still don’t get it. They don’t or won’t understand what Jesus is talking about. I get their embarrassment. How many classes have I sat in, hoping and praying the teacher would not call on me, because I was too embarrassed and ashamed to admit that I didn’t understand the subject.

Maybe it was the disciples lack of understanding that precipitated the argument along the way. Perhaps they were trying to distract themselves, but as they are walking, they begin to argue about who among them was the greatest. Who among them would be the right hand man to their Teacher? Clearly, there has got to be a pecking order, that’s just how it works, so who would be on top of the heap and who would not?

When they arrived in Capernaum, and reached the house where they would be staying, Jesus asked them what they were discussing on the way. Before, they were too afraid and embarrassed to ask Jesus for help in understanding. Now, they are too afraid and embarrassed to be truthful about their argument. But Jesus already knew the content of their argument. He tells them,

“Whoever wants to be the first must be the last of all and servant of all.”

And this is when Jesus commits an unexpected and radical move. He picks up a little child who is there in the house with them. He pulls the child into his arms, and the verb in the Greek could imply that he hugs this little one, which would have been unexpected for a rabbi of his stature. Then he goes even further and says something completely unexpected. Jesus says something that I imagine the disciples nor anyone else anticipated hearing.  

“Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

Now this is where I urge us not to sentimentalize Jesus’ actions. Again, I adore children. I adore toddlers, but remember those property rights? Jesus did not do this because the little one was sweet and cuddly, and he wanted the disciples to feel warm and fuzzy inside. Jesus did this because children were powerless. Children had no rights and no real status in that society. They were considered property of their fathers. It isn’t that children were not loved or cared for by their parents or their families. They were. But if you think that being the Messiah is about power, then your world is about to be turned upside down. Jesus said, if you welcome this little one, this one without power, this one without status, this one who is at the mercy of others, then you are welcoming me. And if you welcome me as this child, then you welcome the one who sent me.

To be the greatest in the kingdom of God, you must be last, you must be a servant, you must be like this child, powerless. And remember, this kingdom of God is not someplace up in the sky, and it is not waiting in another time, far into the future. The kingdom of God is here now, in your midst, in our midst. And in the kingdom of God, the world’s understanding of power and the greatest doesn’t work. It does not compute. The power of God is found in the powerless, in the least, in the last, in the lowly.

In the first seminar I took for my doctorate, my professor, Dr. Cowser, said that power is not a good or bad thing. Power itself is neutral. It’s how we use it or abuse it. We can use power to do good and amazing things. We can use our power to make life better and richer and sweeter for many people. Or we can fall into the trap of absolute power. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. That’s not just an aphorism. It proves itself true in every generation. What is Jesus saying about his power in these verses from Mark? What is Jesus telling the disciples and any of us who want to be followers in our actions, as well as in our words, about what it means to be the greatest?

The power of God does not conform to the hierarchy of humans. The power of God is not found among those who are on top, but among those who are at the bottom. The power of God is in those the rest of us view as powerless. Jesus pulled a little child into his arms and said if you want to welcome me, then you must welcome this child, this lowly, this least, this powerless child.

            The disciples exposed their ambitions in this argument about who was the greatest. Jesus did not rebuke them for it, but with his words and his actions, he revealed their ambitions for what they were: selfish.

Selfish ambition. Aren’t those the same words James uses in his epistle? In fact he uses this particular phrase twice. In verse 14,

“But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not be boastful and false to the truth.”

And again in verse 16,

“For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind.”

Is it wrong to have some ambition? I mean it is our ambition that drives us. Our ambitions push us to work harder, to strive for goals. We all have some degree of ambition, whether it is for our careers, our family, our children, or even our church. But it seems to me that the disciples embodied these words of James. They exhibited selfish ambition. They wanted to be the greatest, but they didn’t understand what that meant. They wanted to have power, but Jesus showed them what true power was.

The power of God does not conform to the hierarchy of humans. The power of God is not about selfish ambition. It is not about ambition to reach the top of the heap or the social structure or anything else. The power of God is about turning the world upside down. The power of God is found in serving others, not being served. Jesus lived out the power of God by letting go of life itself. He was and is truly the greatest, not because of the power he wielded but because of the power that came from his letting go.

Are we, his followers, willing to do the same?

Let all of God’s children say, “Alleluia.”

Amen.