Ann Henderson came home from her doctor’s appointment looking much the same as usual. Maybe she was a little quieter, but not enough to cause comment. The whole family was home for dinner that night, for once. She was grateful. She would only have to say it once. She waited for a moment when nobody was speaking - not an easy thing in this large and noisy family - and said, “I have something to tell you.” “Yeah, Mom?” from a middle son, reaching across the table for the catsup. “It’s important,” Ann said. “Please listen.” “OK,” and they all looked at her expectantly. She took a deep breath and prayed that her voice would be steady.
“I saw the doctor today, I’ve been waiting for some test results, and the news isn’t good. He says I have only about a month to live - probably less.”
There. It was out. How were they going to respond? Could she summon the strength to help them deal with all the possible reactions: denial, anger, incredulity, tears? She waited. No one said anything. Finally,
“Have you decided who’s gonna get what?” said Jane. “I want the wide screen TV.” “Can I have the RV?” said John, “I can live in it at college.” “That’s not fair!” shouted the others, “they’re always grabbing the best stuff! There won’t be anything left for me at this rate.”
“Stop it!” Ann wanted to scream. “Is that all you care about?”
This is a pretty appalling scenario, isn’t it? Have you ever seen such a display of greed and insensitivity as this?
And yet this is almost exactly what was going on that day in Jerusalem 2000 years ago. Jesus had just told them yet again - that he was going to die. Luke records this touching little scene as taking place at the last supper Passover supper right after Jesus tells them one of them will betray him, but we know from Matthew and Mark that this wasn’t the only time Jesus had lectured them on this very topic.
Each time Jesus speaks to the disciples about his coming suffering, his words go in one ear and out the other. He has told them time and time again that he is going to Jerusalem to his death. He has told them that he would be betrayed, and that the scribes and priests would kill him. Do you remember the scene John describes at that same Passover meal, where Jesus gets up and washes the disciples’ feet? I’m pretty sure that this little argument happened before the foot-washing.
Their teacher, their master, their Anointed One, the Hope of Israel, is about to go off to die, and all they could think about was what they would get out of it. So Jesus has to get their attention somehow. Words alone aren’t going to do it.
To be perfectly fair to the disciples, of course, it isn’t that they didn’t care. It’s just that they didn’t believe Jesus was going to die. How could he? He was the Messiah, the Redeemer King of Israel, and that meant power. And power is good, right? Power is being able to tell other people what to do. Power is not having to do what you don’t want to do, like eating spinach or getting up in the morning. Power means you can get back at people you don’t like, and take care of your family and friends. Power is getting, and having, and keeping. Power means being on top.
You see, as important as all of this is, as much as they’ve given up to follow Jesus, and as much as they really do love him, they’re not taking it seriously yet. They’re on that wonderful high that comes with the first glimmering that this may, indeed, be a championship season. This small town, bush league, class C team is going to go all the way to the finals! They’re already planning the victory party.
The disciples still think of victory, of royalty, of glory, in exactly the same terms they always have. They envision an earthly kingdom founded and run according to human standards. They assume that when Jesus takes his rightful place as Messiah, his friends will get special privileges. The new age they look forward to looks just like the old one, starring pork barrel politics and influence peddling. They fancy themselves as the elite of the elite, ruling over others as others now rule over them. If they heard anything of Jesus’ words of suffering at all, they see it as temporary, just a rough spot on the road to glory. They really expect a kingdom for themselves, where they can impose their will on others. They hope to replace the self-glorifying, oppressive structures of the Romans with their own self-serving control structures. And nothing would change except the names of the rulers and the faces of the slaves. Oppression gets recycled and new tyrants rise to the top. It’s the same old same old, deja vu all over again.
Luke doesn’t tell us which disciples start this unseemly squabble. Mark reports that James and John want to be the greatest, with the privilege of sitting next to Jesus in the places of greatest honor. Matthew says it’s their mother that puts in a word on their behalf. Here it looks like they’re all worried about their respective status. It isn’t enough for them just to be one of the privileged twelve who have followed Jesus from the very beginning. It isn’t enough that they’re miles ahead of the rest of the masses who have been hanging around the fringes of the movement. They even have to be ahead of their fellow disciples!
What they don’t realize, of course, is that when Jesus is lifted up to begin his reign it will be on a cross. What they don’t realize is that on that day the ones on his right hand and his left will be two thieves - the one who scoffed, and the one who believed.
They don’t know that the road to glory leads down, not up.
And Jesus knows they don’t know. He tries words, first, pretty much the same ones he’s used before. “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors. But not so with you; rather the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves. For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.” [v. 25-27] And so he gets up and shows them what he means. But, of course, they still don’t get it, do they?
The twelve think of faithful discipleship as a means to an end. If they stick with him, they’ll share the victory cup maybe even have their names engraved on the trophy. They don’t understand that the favors and advantages that they will receive from following Jesus include the privilege of sharing in his sufferings and bearing their own crosses. They will, indeed, drink from his cup and share in his baptism. But it is completely beyond them at this point to understand that it means suffering, and that suffering for Christ is a privilege. And even now, with the example of Jesus Christ and the testimony of centuries, Christians resist that awareness. It goes against everything our culture teaches.
Even today, among people who claim to be followers of Jesus, even today we see people pushing and shoving for positions of advantage. Too many Christians keep a sharp eye out to make sure that nobody gets ahead of them, that they always come out on top, no matter whom they have to step on. Not too long ago I heard from a friend who took a temporary position as a church secretary. It was the worst work situation she’d ever been in, she said, because the pastor she worked for always made sure she got blamed if something went wrong, so that he would never have to admit to a mistake. She is lucky, said my friend, that she had known other pastors, pastors who served their people with humility and grace; otherwise, she would have come away cynical and disillusioned, believing that the followers of Jesus Christ were no better than anyone else - in fact, worse, because of the hypocrisy.
So Jesus tries one more time to explain to the disciples that he is a different kind of king, that he is heading toward a different kind of glory, and that they must learn to value different kinds of behavior. Eugene Peterson paraphrases Luke’s lesson,
“Kings like to throw their weight around and people in authority like to give themselves fancy titles. It’s not going to be that way with you. Let the senior among you be the junior; let the leader act the part of the servant. Who would you rather be? The one who eats the dinner or the one who serves the dinner? You’d rather eat and be served, right? But I’ve taken my place among you as the one who serves.”
Jesus isn’t telling them that ambition is a bad thing, or that they shouldn’t aspire to be great. He’s telling them that true greatness looks different from what they’re used to; true greatness is not what they expect. And he tells them how, indeed, encourages them - and us - to become great. Great servants.
Being a servant is probably even less popular now than it was then. In those days almost everyone served someone. What gave you status was WHOM you served. The higher your master’s rank, the higher YOUR rank. Those of you who used to watch Upstairs, Downstairs remember that the hierarchy in the servants' hall was even stricter than in the drawing room. In the same way, a trusted slave in a Roman patrician’s household enjoyed much higher status than a freedman who owed allegiance to no one. But today to be a servant is almost unthinkable.
My career in the working world spanned more than 20 years and ranged from file clerk to management. Over that time secretaries stopped making coffee for their bosses - because they weren’t servants. I remember taking offense myself one time when the Vice President over our department stuck his head out of his office door one day and asked me to get coffee for himself and his guests. I didn’t say anything, I knew better, but I burned with resentment. I wasn’t a secretary. I was an Assistant Tax Analyst. Didn’t he know that getting coffee was beneath my dignity?
I’d like you to conduct a little experiment in imagination. I’d like you to imagine parking, getting out of your car, walking up to a door and entering without knocking. Once inside, you are greeted, and you take a seat at your usual place. Soon a wonderful meal is brought to you. You don’t pay for the meal; it was a gift, but you give $5 to the person who served you. You smile and say thank you as you leave.
Where have you been?
Have you gone to the Olive Garden, armed with a gift certificate for two dinners (alcoholic beverages excluded)?
Or have you just gone to a family Thanksgiving dinner and slipped a fiver to your favorite niece on the way out?
Those are two pretty different scenarios, aren’t there?
The first one is a commercial transaction, where you pay people unrelated to you to do something for you and to give something to you. You walk in unannounced because the facility is open to the public. The greeting is mass-produced, not custom-made with you in mind. The relationship is limited, clearly defined, and the customer is always right. One is served, the other serves. And the one who serves is the equal of the one who is served, because the economic nature of the transaction keeps them at arms-length from one another.
The second scene is completely different. You walk in unannounced because you belong. The greeter knows you by name. As a matter of fact, pretty much everybody knows you by name, and you know them back. The kids serve, because the grownups cooked, and the ones who can’t cook will clean up after dinner. All right, all right, some of them will bail out and watch the game while their spouses grumble... but shoot, they’ll take the trash out later and wash the car on the weekend. Everybody pitches in. Everyone serves. Everyone takes turns serving and being served. And the closer you are to the center of the family, the more work you do. It is only guests, people who haven’t fully been brought into the circle, who don’t have a part to play.
That’s what church is supposed to be like. Every time the church gathers for worship it is a family Thanksgiving, and on the first Sunday of every month it’s actually a thanksgiving feast. Did you know that the Lord’s Supper is also called the Eucharist, which is the Greek word for thanksgiving?
Jesus follows his lesson on serving with a promise: “I confer on you ... a kingdom, so that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and you will sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel." [v. 29-30] Do you think that when they arrive the disciples will still be elbowing one another out of the way as they vie for the places of honor? Do you think they will lean back in their chairs and wait for someone to bring them their drinks? Or do you think that maybe - just maybe - they'll look around for a towel and a basin and find someone’s feet to wash?
What’s your attitude when you come to worship? Is it as a consumer, consulting the menu of religious services, comparing price and selection with the competing restaurants or even opting for take-out or the microwave? Or is it as a member of a family, where you help pass the plates even though you really don’t like creamed onions or candied yams? Are you here as one who serves, or as one who is served?
