Mark 10: 32 – 45
Hey, Can You Do Me A Favor?
32 Now they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was going before them; and they were amazed. And as they followed they were afraid. Then He took the twelve aside again and began to tell them the things that would happen to Him: 33 “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and to the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death and deliver Him to the Gentiles; 34 and they will mock Him, and scourge Him, and spit on Him, and kill Him. And the third day He will rise again.” 35 Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to Him, saying, “Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask.” 36 And He said to them, “What do you want Me to do for you?” 37 They said to Him, “Grant us that we may sit, one on Your right hand and the other on Your left, in Your glory.” 38 But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” 39 They said to Him, “We are able.” So Jesus said to them, “You will indeed drink the cup that I drink, and with the baptism I am baptized with you will be baptized; 40 but to sit on My right hand and on My left is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared.” 41 And when the ten heard it, they began to be greatly displeased with James and John. 42 But Jesus called them to Himself and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. 43 Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. 44 And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all. 45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
The Gospels of Matthew and Luke also comment on this teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, so let’s take a look at what they wrote.
Matthew 20: 17 - 28, “17 Now Jesus, going up to Jerusalem, took the twelve disciples aside on the road and said to them, 18 “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and to the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death, 19 and deliver Him to the Gentiles to mock and to scourge and to crucify. And the third day He will rise again. 20 Then the mother of Zebedee’s sons came to Him with her sons, kneeling down and asking something from Him. 21 And He said to her, “What do you wish?” She said to Him, “Grant that these two sons of mine may sit, one on Your right hand and the other on the left, in Your kingdom.” 22 But Jesus answered and said, “You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” They said to Him, “We are able.” 23 So He said to them, “You will indeed drink My cup, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with; but to sit on My right hand and on My left is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared by My Father.” 24 And when the ten heard it, they were greatly displeased with the two brothers. 25 But Jesus called them to Himself and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. 26 Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. 27 And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave— 28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
Luke 18:31-34, “31 Then He took the twelve aside and said to them, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished. 32 For He will be delivered to the Gentiles and will be mocked and insulted and spit upon. 33 They will scourge Him and kill Him. And the third day He will rise again.” 34 But they understood none of these things; this saying was hidden from them, and they did not know the things which were spoken.
We need to remember that Peter who gave his witness of the time he spent with the Lord to Mark along with Matthew were eyewitnesses. Luke later on came back and through his investigation only reported on our Lord’s remarks about His arrest.
32 Now they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was going before them; and they were amazed. And as they followed they were afraid. Then He took the twelve aside again and began to tell them the things that would happen to Him:
As they walked along the dusty road towards Jerusalem, something about our Lord Jesus’ new demeanor and His determination to press on urgently to Jerusalem amazed the disciples. Luke puts it in his Gospel chapter 9 verse 51, ‘when the days were well nigh come that He should be received up He steadfastly set His face to go towards Jerusalem’. They sensed that something was about to happen.
Have you ever been around something or at some place and your get afraid or an eerie feeling? ‘Those who followed were afraid.’ This may refer to a different group of followers than the twelve, including among others the women who went around with them. They must have gathered something of the expected dangers for they were afraid. But they too continued to follow.
33 “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and to the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death and deliver Him to the Gentiles; 34 and they will mock Him, and scourge Him, and spit on Him, and kill Him. And the third day He will rise again.”
Here our Lord Jesus for at least the third time explained what was in store for Him. It was probably no coincidence that the first occurred in Gentile territory, the second in Galilee and the third in Judea, each building in intensity from the other as He neared Jerusalem. He was slowly and dedicatedly marching toward the centre of Judaism and had declared what was to happen to Him in each area, indicating that those in each area could participate in what He would achieve.
Jehovah Yahweh would hand Him over to those who were supposed to be His representatives. These represented the two main religious authorities of Judaism, the chief priests who controlled the Temple and its worship, and the scribes who were looked to for teaching and guidance by the people.
So our Lord Jesus as the prophets had been before Him, was to be delivered into the hands of those who knew not God and could only expect the same treatment. As happens in all religions, and as would happen in part with Christianity, apart from a remnant it had gradually built up traditions and dogmas which had stifled the truth at its heart as represented by its Scriptures and could not bear opposition from anyone who would not bow down to their traditions and dogmas. Being handed over to them was like being thrown in a lion’s den.
In the same way as they had done it to Jeremiah before Him they will condemn Him to death as we read in chapter 26 verse 11, “11 And the priests and the prophets spoke to the princes and all the people, saying, “This man deserves to die! For he has prophesied against this city, as you have heard with your ears.”
Mark wrote about our Lord Jesus as the prophesied Suffering Servant. We read in the book of Isaiah chapter 53 verse 7, “7 He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth.”
Also I need to point out that to be handed over to the Gentiles meant that He was seen as unclean and having no part in Judaism. It was the ultimate rejection. The Gentiles will mock him, and will spit on him and will scourge him, and will kill him. Even the Gentiles will have no time for Him.
It is clear from these words that our Lord Jesus was steeped in the Old Testament Scriptures and had seen in Jeremiah, in the Suffering Servant of Isaiah and in the suffering Psalmist a picture of His own coming suffering. Indeed He quoted from the latter’s opening words when He was on the cross. The disciples meanwhile had concentrated on more pleasant and popular promises and could not or would not understand Him. It is always difficult to break down prejudice. His ideas were totally alien to them because they did not know the Scriptures.
Death would not be the end for after three days He will rise again. He would be vindicated by resurrection’ This He repeated each time He spoke of His death.
35 Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to Him, saying, “Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask.”
I love people who come up to me and say something similar like, ‘Can you do me a favor?’ My answer is, ‘first tell me what it is and I will see if I can or not.’
36 And He said to them, “What do you want Me to do for you?”
Our Holy Adoni Yeshua accepted their approach and recognized that they were leading up to asking something big of Him.
37 They said to Him, “Grant us that we may sit, one on Your right hand and the other on Your left, in Your glory.”
The idea of suffering that The Lord Jesus told them three times now had passed them by, but the idea of glory appealed. If the twelve were to rule, and Peter had shown that he came short, they felt that they deserved the favored places. We can see from this the way the disciples were thinking. In spite of the warnings they could not rid their minds of earthly glory. You see they wanted pre-eminence in sharing the rule and the glory when our Great Holy King Rules.
It is interesting how quickly they could seize on ideas of glory and how slowly on ideas of suffering. But we often hear what we want to hear and neglect what is unpleasant, and invariably interpret in the light of our own fixed ideas.
38 But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?”
Our Lord Jesus warned them to appreciate that they might be asking more than they realized. To take their position by His side meant being involved in what He was going to be involved in. Were they prepared for that? Did they even know what it was? (Did they, for example, want to be on each side of Him when He was on the cross, as Mark will later point out that the insurrectionists were. They little realized how they must have been grieving Jesus at their lack of understanding.
With His eyes ahead on the sorrows that awaited Him He had already begun to drink the cup, and He knew that He would have to drink it to the full. The cup was the cup of suffering and the cup of God’s wrath, regularly mentioned in the Old Testament, to be drunk by the One Who was made sin for us.
39 They said to Him, “We are able.” So Jesus said to them, “You will indeed drink the cup that I drink, and with the baptism I am baptized with you will be baptized;
In their reply they had no idea what He was talking about. Perhaps they did naively think in terms of the King’s cup and social graces, or perhaps they acknowledged that although there may be dangers ahead when The Lord Jesus as Messiah finally sought to establish His rule, they would be well able to face the opposition bravely, and if necessary die nobly for the cause. But what they had no idea of was the humiliation, the suffering, the degradation, even the slow martyrdom by exquisite torture, of which He was speaking.
40 but to sit on My right hand and on My left is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared.”
Fortunately for them our Holy Master Lord Jesus knew their hearts. He knew that in spite of their dull apprehension and their desire for pre-eminence they would soon show their mettle. So He gently let them down. Now He would speak of a lesser cup and a lesser baptism of suffering which they too would be called on to share. ‘The cup that I drink, you will drink.’ Not the cup of the wine of the wrath of God, for that was for Jesus, The Lamb of God only, but the cup of suffering. Both would drink it to the full.
They would not necessarily suffer the agonies of crucifixion, and certainly they would not die with the weight of sin on their shoulders, but in one way or another they would find themselves ‘partakers of Christ’s sufferings’. We read in the book of Acts chapter 12 verse 2, that James would be dead fairly early on, having triumphed in the name of Christ, when he was executed by the sword under Herod Agrippa. John was persecuted, and imprisoned and sent to work in the mines on Patmos. He died in Ephesus an old man, having undergone the travails which inevitably faced all the Apostles.
Have you ever wished that you were an Apostle that was able to spend personal time with our Lord Jesus while He was here on earth? I know I feel this way. However, we all need to realize that our Lord did not dispense favors. He did not have favorites and still does not today, although as you look around at how some people seem to be blessed so much. He dealt with all according to God’s purposes. Whatever He did was in line with what His father willed. Indeed, He pointed out, the ‘prime positions’ in heaven were already allotted in the foreknowledge of God and were settled on a basis that as yet they had not begun to conceive. It was not therefore possible for them to be changed. They would go to those chosen from the beginning, for whomever they had been ‘prepared’.
41 And when the ten heard it, they began to be greatly displeased with James and John. 42 But Jesus called them to Himself and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. 43 Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. 44 And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all.
It takes a long time to develop true humility and with all our Wonderful Majestic Lord Jesus’ teaching it had not yet become obvious among the Twelve. Thus when the others heard what James and John had done they were upset.
How hard a lesson it is to learn, that the Christian leader should desire only one thing, and that not to be admired or exalted, but to be allowed to humbly serve. He must not want position or fame or to be treated as someone important. He must want to act as a bondservant to everyone, and really mean it. The Apostles had not learned it yet and they had been with Him for years. Show me someone who basks in praise, and I will show you someone who is a beginner in Christ.
Our Lord Jesus illustrated His point from Gentile rulers. The Jews had experienced a number of them. And one thing was common to all, they lorded it over their people. They were proud of their authority and very conscious of it, and they exerted it to the full. They were the masters and they wanted everyone to know it. Furthermore the dreams of the Jews for the future rested on similar hopes for their own exaltation. It was these very attributes that would cause them to reject and crucify The Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ.
You see for us Christians our Lord teaches that those who seek any position so as to be masters and lords in that way were not true disciples, nor were they following their Master. If they thought like that they were totally in the wrong. For disciples the opposite was to be true.
The true disciple’s prime concern, said our Creator, is to serve, yes even to be a bondservant. That is the test of greatness among Christians. Such a man does not look for praise, he does not seek honor, he does not desire position. He gladly takes the lowest task if it will help someone. He just wants to be useful in God’s service, and as long as God is satisfied he is satisfied. That is true greatness. And that will apply in heaven as well as on earth.
45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
The perfect example was before them. The Son of Man, He Who would one day enter into God’s presence to receive the dominion and the power and the glory, and would return to earth in power and great glory, had come to earth to serve. He Who should have been served by all, had made Himself the servant of all. He had deliberately humbled Himself. He was truly God’s Servant. He was here to do the Father’s will and would do anything for those whom the Father had given Him. His aim and purpose will always be the good of all. He does not want the dominion for Himself but so that He can use it for the good of all. There will never be any thought for Himself. It was for this that He became man.
One of the most remarkable things about our Great Holy Lord Jesus was that He could speak like this in true humility. He said it because it was true. Never once do we get the idea of self-conceit. Always He wanted only to please His Father and do and be what was right. What always comes over is the totally balanced man Who wants only to give of Himself to make the world right, and make it right with God.
Are you willing to be a ‘true’ disciple now that you have heard these requirements?
