Mathew 20:20-28
Purpose #4: You Were Shaped For Serving God
Introduction
A. Who here will have the highest ranking in heaven?
B. Maybe it will be me. The pastor. A Pastor is close to God right?
C. Maybe it will be one of the Elders; after all they are the head of the church?
D. Maybe it will be our deaconess, they are very godly servants right?
E. Well 2000 years ago the disciples were arguing the very same question
F. And of course they all wanted to be the one with the highest rank
G. If we are honest with ourselves, we struggle with the very same thing today
H. Speaking of today, we are going to look at how to earn the a high ranking in heaven
I. In looking at the text we notice
a. The two wanting Honor
b. And then the Ten wanting honor
c. And each of their request and how Jesus responded to their request
I. The Two Wanting Honor (20-23)
A. Their Request
1. Explanation
a) The first thing that you notice that may seem a little funny here is that this whole request is made from James and John’s Mom
b) The first time I read this my immediate thought was how childish of them
c) I went on to study it more closely and I found two good explanations for why they
(1) You notice that this same story recorded in Mark 10:35-45 that the mother is not mentioned, this could be because Mathew goes to great lengths to try and not make the disciples look foolish. He tries to make them look good
(2) It also is possible (and probably more so) that Zebedee is an Aunt of Jesus. She is family. What better person to make a request like this then family
d) Notice she does something, she kneels down. There is a reason for that. That is to show respect for Christ. She is admitting that he is King
e) She then ask God to place her sons and the right and left of him. Now understand that this means to make then number one and number 2 in command behind Jesus
f) Then Jesus ask them a personal question “Are you willing to drink the cup that I am going to drink”
(1) Now when we are talking about the cup here: In the OT is regularly used as a metaphor of punishment and judgment (cf. Isa 51:17; Jer 25:15-29; Rev 14:10; 16:19)
(2) Jesus is telling them that their will be times of suffering
g) Now they were both ready to go through this suffering
(1) And indeed they both will face this suffering later on in their life
(a) Acts 12:2 James becomes the first apostolic Martyr
(b) Rev 1:9 John will suffer exile
2. Application
a) Becoming a follower of Christ will not be an easy path
b) Becoming a follower of Christ will often entail that you will drink of the cup
c) The cup being on of punishment and suffering
d) If you were in James and John’s shoes would you have been willing to answer that way?
e) Would you have been willing to say I will suffer with you o Lord?
3. Illustration
a) The people who produce the commercials for our Armed Forces are quite smart if you stop and think about it.
b) They tell you what you will gain from the military. They do not tell you at what price. They do not tell you about the trials you will go through. I don’t blame them; they are trying to get people to join.
c) The question that Jesus asks probably would not bring many new recruits however, the question is completely true?
d) Are you willing to suffer as the Lord did?
B. The Lord’s Reply
1. Explanation
a) After James and John respond that they are willing to suffer with the Lord. The Lord responds
b) You can tell that he is impressed with their willingness to suffer
c) However they forgot a something important.
d) The Bible leaves room to understand that their could be (not saying that there is) higher positions for some then others
e) But that should not be the focus
f) The place you sit in heaven should is up to the Father
g) That is His decision, and His alone
2. Illustration
a) Let me give you and example. If you are hired to do a job, you concern should be to do the job the best you can. Chances are you will receive a promotion eventually but that should not be your goal. Your goal should be to do the best you can.
b) When you finally do receive the promotion, your goal should be do to your next job the best you can, not another promotion.
3. Application
a) James and John were focused on positions, titles
b) Jesus reminds them it is not positions, it is doing your job
c) We should not aspire to hold a certain position in Heaven, to have a certain place
d) What we need to work on is doing the best that we can with what we have
e) Not to compare our selves with the person across the Isle and say I do more then he does
f) But rather wake up every morning and say “How can I give God my best today”
g) What about you? Are you to that point?
h) Are you serving to serve God, or do you want a “special Place” in the Kingdom of God?
i) What is your motivation?
II. The Ten Wanting Honor (24-28)
A. Their Request
1. Explanation
a) The rest of the disciples Got wind of what James and John did.
b) I can imagine this story getting around
c) One person who overheard the conversation, probably a relative of one of the other disciples told his relative
d) That disciple got the other 10 together
e) Soon you have all 10 disciples sitting around talking about how wrong that it
f) Talking about how unfair it is, talking about how they used their mom to do the dirty work
g) Talking about how much better they were then James and John
h) I’m sure they got their rule book out and tried to figure out if they could kick them out of the group
i) They were upset. So eventually They went to Jesus
j) They told Jesus how wrong it was that those two asked him that
2. Application
a) But see that is only half of the side of the story
b) Truthfully what was bothering them is they thought that Jesus was actually going to choose James and John to be at the right hand
c) It did not matter the question that they asked him
d) They were Jealous
e) They thought They should be the ones at the center of attention
f) And so we do the same thing
g) We will find ways to make things sound so good, but truthfully we just mask up our own jealousy
h) It was not over the question that the problem was, it was over the jealousy
i) We all say we want the best for the other person, but only if it means they are not better then us
j) A true servant of God must not be motivated by jealousy
k) A true servant of God must only be motivated by serving
3. Illustration
B. The Lord’s Reply
1. Explanation
a) The Lord then calls them all together
b) I am sure Jesus is sitting there in His head saying “Don’t these people have a clue?”
c) Jesus address the very heart of the issue
d) In today’s society we do a pretty good job at treating all people equal
e) We have come a long ways in this area
f) Back then however, it was not the case
g) If you were a slave, you were treated like a slave
h) High officials would go out of their way to flex their power.
i) They would make sure that everyone knew who was in control
j) They would be constantly showing their domination over their servants and show them absolutely no respect
2. Application
a) What Jesus says it amazing?
b) It goes against everything their culture taught them
c) To be great you must be a servant
d) To be a slave
e) To put themselves in the lowest place possible
f) To be a servant
g) To cap it off, Jesus, points to His own life, and says do what I did.
h) Powerful stuff
3. Illustration
a) God calls us to be servants
b) God does not call us to be kings
c) God calls us to be willing to do whatever needs to be done
d) Look at the life Christ lived hear on Earth
e) Think about what He had before He came here and what He went through well he was there.
f) He served. He was not served
g) He calls us to do the same
Conclusion
A. WE get to the point in our lives when we start to think we are more then we actually are, and we forget we are suppose to be servants
B. We start to think moving picnic tables is below us, we are too good for that
C. We start to think we should not be concern with this or that task cause we are too important
D. When I was in Chicago the other week staying at Wheaton College, they have the Billy Graham museum; did you know Billy Graham went to Wheaton?
E. As I was walking through it two pictures really stood out in my mind
F. One was a picture of Billy Graham preaching in front of over 500,000 people. WOW! That was incredible, so I thought.
a. Of course then I started dreaming about doing the same. About be able to preach to that many people
b. Then I came to another picture. There were four people in the picture. Billy Graham was wearing Jeans and talking to three kids
c. Billy Graham one of the most famous evangelist of all time
d. Billy Graham able to preach to Millions
e. Billy Graham taking the time to witness to everyone he met
G. I want to leave you with three questions:
a. Am I seeking things for myself, or am I seeking humility?
b. Am I praying “my Will be done”, or am I praying “Your will be done, Father?”
c. Do I want to be the highest here, or am I waiting for my reward in Heaven?
H. Thing about these questions.
I. If you need to come to the forgiveness rail do so.
J. Apologize to people do so.
K. Public apology, do so.
