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In Christ, Mark
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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
A dispute also arose among them as to which of them was considered to be greatest.
Jesus said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who exercise authority over them call themselves Benefactors. But you are not to be like that. Instead, the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves.”
“For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.”
Luke 22:24-27
This ends today’s reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
Rank matters.
At least this is what the world would lead a person go believe.
I think the first time I realized this was when I was in high school. There was always an interest in how well our sports teams were doing and how they ranked against our rival schools. And then there was in internal academic rankings that took place to establish who would receive the honor of being the Valedictorian and Salutatorian of our graduating class.
I have to admit I am a bit of a sports junkie and so it seems rank and sports go hand in hand together, no matter what sport you favor, just as I first saw in high school. College teams are ranked as to where teams stack up against one another nationally. Within professional sports leagues, there are standings everyone pays attention to because they dictate who does and doesn’t make the playoffs. Golf and tennis are a bit more individualized as players, not teams, are ranked. And I could go on and on and on.
After high school, I joined the military where I learned that rank mattered even more. If a service member, a Sailor in my case, worked hard and succeeded, then they could gain promotion to a higher rank which would bring more responsibility, and maybe more importantly, more pay. And who isn’t interested in a little more income?
I even saw different levels of rank and hierarchy in the church. My first earnest participation in a congregation was in a local Presbyterian church and one day I was asked to be an Elder in the church. My work within the life of the church had gained notice and I was asked to consider an elevation to a special place of leadership. This would later repeat itself when I shifted to a Baptist church where I would get to advance to the position of Deacon.
Yes, we find the matter of rank everywhere but there is a big difference in what I saw within the church and what I saw outside of it. And this difference is touched on by Jesus as we look at our passage from the 22nd chapter of Luke’s gospel.
Now we know Jesus had hand-selected twelve ordinary men to be His first disciples and they had faithfully followed Him through His ministry travels, even if one was less than loyal and honest that the others as we have seen over the past few devotions in the person of Judas Iscariot. But as we see in our verses, some of the disciples weren’t satisfied with just being counted as a selected member of Jesus’ fraternity. No, they wanted to be counted greater than the others.
To put it another way, there was concern about a ranking order within the twelve as if some of the disciples were better than their peers. Or maybe they thought they held greater favor with Jesus, their Master, than the others. Whatever the reason, this was the issue at hand and we find Jesus wasting little time to address it head on. Look at His words again here:
“The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who exercise authority over them call themselves Benefactors. But you are not to be like that. Instead, the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves.”
“For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.”
The disciples had been in the company of the greatest Servant who ever lived and yet some of them had not paid attention to the actions of their Master. Jesus didn’t lord over people although He was the Lord of all lords. Rather, He cared for the needs of others and did so selflessly, and He expected anyone who followed Him to do the same.
You see, when a person has a selfless, sacrificial heart, then the focus is not on themselves but the needs of others. There is no concern for ranking because the spotlight isn’t shining on the server but the person being served, the servant wanting to see the needs of another in full light so they can tend to them. This is the way Jesus carried Himself. He was a Servant first before all else and He showed it all the way to the cross and beyond.
This is what separates what happens in the Christian church from the world. I say this because Elders and Deacons receive their elections because of their shown ability to serve, to serve their God, His Son and Master Servant Jesus, and those that both bring to the church servants to care for. There is no ranking among elders and deacons. They are all proven servants of the Lord Most High and that’s good enough.
Friends, Jesus is sending us a very important message today. He wants us to stop trying to do things which have the purpose of glorifying ourselves in the eyes of others. Rather, He wants us to follow His lead and show the world that greatness is defined by how well we move beyond ourselves and meet the needs of others. For when we do, we show that we are more like our Savior Jesus than the world, and as Christians, that’s always the place He wants us to be.
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
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