Hubris Meets Humanity | Mark 10:35-45

Mark chapter 10.

Mark 10 · chapter mention

Once you get there, would you stand with me as we prepare to read God's word together?

Mark chapter 10.

Mark 10 · chapter mention

We'll begin in verse 35 and read through verse 45.

God's word says, And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to him and said to him, Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask.

And he said to them, Well, what do you want me to do for you?

And they said to him, Grant us to sit one at your right hand and one at your left in your glory.

Jesus said to them, You do not know what you are asking.

Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?

And they said to him, We are able.

And Jesus said to them, The cup that I drink you will drink, and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized.

But to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.

And when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant at James and John, and Jesus called them to him and said to them, You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them.

But it shall not be so among you.

But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.

For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.

Let's pray the Lord together.

Heavenly Father, this morning you're hearing the prayers and the praises of a thankful church family.

That God, you have protected one of our own one more time.

So for that, Lord, we don't take it for granted.

We don't believe that it was coincidental.

We believe it was your kindness, and we praise your name for it.

Lord, we know that because of your kindness, you have something to say to us today.

And Lord, we pray that you would say it, and that you would say it not just to our ears, but to our minds and to our hearts that would transform our lives.

We ask these things now in Jesus' name.

Amen.

You may be seated.

Hubris and humanity go hand in hand.

And if you aren't familiar with the word hubris, hubris is to believe that you can live above the rules because you deserve it.

It's to believe that you can live in bold defiance of wisdom because you're immune to the consequences.

It's the intersection of pride and entitlement.

It's arrogance lived out, it's pride boldly applied.

There's an ancient Greek mythology that teaches us something about hubris.

There was a great inventor in ancient Greece, the myth goes, that his name was The Dallas.

And the Dallas was contracted by the king to build and design the labyrinth.

But the king was a paranoid man.

And as he saw the brilliance of the Dallas, he began to doubt his motives and wonder if he might overthrow him in some way.

And so he takes both the Dallas and his son Icarus and he puts them and imprisons them in the top of a tower.

Well, the Dallas recognizes that there's no way out except down.

And so he believes that he can fashion and invent a set of wings that he can give to his younger son Icarus that will be able to fly out and be able to come back and rescue his dad from the tower.

And so he does.

He takes, he takes thread, beeswax, and feathers, and he fashions together a set of wings, and Icarus puts them on and they fit and work perfectly.

But before his son takes flight, he gives him a warning.

And he says that the wings will work great so long as you don't fly too close to the sun.

That if you fly too close to the sun, that the heat of the sun is going to melt the wax of the wings and they're going to disintegrate and you're going to surely crash.

Well, Icarus flies and he takes flight, and it works better than he could have ever imagined.

He feels as free as a bird, as Leonard Skinner would put it, right?

And he begins to flap around and fly, and he's emboldened by what he experiences.

And so he goes a little bit higher and a little bit higher.

And the higher he goes, the more invincible he feels, and the stronger that he feels, and the more untouchable he feels like he is.

And he remembers the warning of his dad, but he just feels so strong and he feels so capable.

And he flies higher and higher until eventually he does get too close to the sun.

And just as his dad had warned him, the wax of the wings begins to melt, and the wings begin to disintegrate, and Icarus crashes into the sea to his death, unable to deliver his dad, unable to deliver himself.

And that's hubris.

That's hubris.

Hubris is the infection of all mankind since Genesis chapter 3.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

Then what we see in Genesis chapter 3 is what is the issue?

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

The issue is man believes that we ought to have equal footing with God.

It's hubris, and that is what brings about the curse.

That's what brings about the division.

You think about Genesis chapter 11 and what we see.

Genesis 11 · chapter mention

There at the Tower of Babel, man believes that we can attain the heights of God because of our own ingenuity.

And it's it's hubris.

This is what causes God to scatter man over the face of the earth.

And it's hubris for you and me.

When we believe that we can thrive and flourish in our lives apart from moment by moment, day by day, abiding in Christ.

What we see in our text this morning is both the infection of hubris and its antidote.

And along the way, what I want us to see is how Jesus begins to reform and reshape our worldview as he teaches us about hubris and its antidote.

First, the way he reshapes our worldview is he shows us that greatness doesn't come through self-promotion.

Greatness doesn't come through self-promotion.

We live in an era of shameless self-promotion, don't we?

Every person has to have their own brand, right?

This is especially true in sports.

Nobody can have a tackle or a sack, no matter even what the scoreboard says, without getting up and doing some kind of dance that brings attention to themselves, right?

I think about Deion Sanders.

Now look, I was a huge Dion fan.

I wore number 21 for the White Plains Wildcats back in the day because I was a defensive back in honor of Deion Sanders.

I wasn't quite as quick as Dion, believe it or not.

But if you watch a Colorado Buffalo's press conference, it is quite likely that Dion won't even be wearing anything that says Colorado or Buffaloes on it, isn't it?

He says he wears things that says Coach Prime.

Now it might be in Colorado colors, but it says Coach Prime.

That actually his own brand is bigger than the brand of the school for whom he coaches.

You Google right now self-promotion, and what you'll find, I did this, what you'll find is that there are hundreds of articles, hundreds of videos, dozens of pages that'll immediately pop up, and almost exclusively they view self-promotion in the positive as a means by which you can expand your influence and expand your platform.

And by expanding your influence and expanding your platform, you're able to attain and achieve all of the ambitions that you have in your life.

That we live in a time of self-promotion as though self-promotion is its most is our most valuable opportunity.

Well, here's Mark, and Mark's gonna push back on that.

He includes the story about Jesus to be able to push back on this idea of self-promotion that we might have a new idea of greatness and a new pursuit in our lives.

In fact, I think he equates self-promotion with hubris.

Now, what Mark says is that hubris deceives us.

Now we're introduced here to James and John.

James and John.

And they're called here the sons of Zebedee.

They're often referred to as the sons of thunder, the sons of thunder.

That's a great nickname, right?

And here they actually really begin to live up to this nickname as the sons of thunder.

They come to Jesus and they have for Jesus a really audacious request.

They ask that Jesus give them whatever they ask of him.

Now that's that's pretty bold to go before the Son of God and say, here, before I tell you what I want it to be, I want you, like the genie in the lamp, to just promise me that you're gonna give me whatever it is that I want.

And Jesus asks them what they want, and they say, here's what we want.

We want you to give us the seats of highest honor in your court.

We want to be the ones that are seated at your right hand and at your left.

In Jesus' day, to sit at the right and left hand of the king and his in his court would be the equivalent of being the secretary of war and the secretary of state.

These were positions of honor, these were positions of influence, these were positions of esteem.

Now, this probably happens on the coattails of the transfiguration.

You remember the transfiguration?

That there on the Mount of Transfiguration, Jesus is transfigured before three of his disciples in all of his power and his glory, that they begin to glimpse him not as his humble self, but as his actual self.

And this seems to have emboldened James and John.

In fact, in fact, because it was just three of them that saw it, it was just James, John, and Peter that saw Jesus in his transfiguration, in his glory, they probably think, baby, this thing has been reduced down to a three-horse race.

Why don't we just get a leg up, right?

Like, what what what if we kind of get a leg up on Peter if we just hasn't Jesus said, you just you have not because you asked not?

Let's let's jump in on this opportunity, right?

And so they go to Jesus thinking, I'll get a leg up on Peter, and we will be the ones with these two seats of highest honor.

And brothers and sisters, that's hubris.

That's hubris.

It's hubris to ask for what you don't deserve because in some way you believe that you deserve it.

It's hubris to feel entitled to a reward that you haven't earned.

This is exactly what we see in the lives of James and John.

That they believe that they are here and that they are entitled to what Jesus has to offer to them.

So what we know about this is it teaches us that they're deceived, that they're deceived.

In fact, Jesus says explicitly, you do not know what you're asking for.

You don't know.

You don't get it.

This isn't all adding up in your mind.

You're you're you're checking out on me here.

See, they they thought they still had a traditional understanding of who the Messiah was.

They believed that the Messiah was gonna be a great political and military leader, that he was gonna come and he was gonna raise up an army.

And raising up an army, he was gonna overthrow Rome and re-establish the king of the reign of David, and that Israel was gonna rule over all of the world through his reign.

And so they've seen Jesus now in his power and glory.

They're like, man, you you can't act like you're some humble guy anymore.

We've seen you, dude.

Like we've seen what you're capable of.

Now we're ready for you to come, bring up the army, and let's overthrow these cats.

Let's make this thing happen now.

And when it happens, we want to be in charge with you.

We want to have these positions of great honor.

And so what we can see is that they are misunderstanding and deceived about the nature of Jesus' reign, about the nature of Jesus' future, that they are so starstruck for greatness and so starstruck for glory that they are blind to the reality that there is a cross between here and there.

And this is what I find to be the reason that many would-be followers of Jesus fall away from him.

That this is the reason that why many would-be followers of Jesus aren't interested in following Jesus.

We tend to think that if we begin to identify Jesus with this traditional understanding of a Messiah, we tend to under to think that now our lives will become simpler.

Now our lives will become less stressful, now our lives will be more tranquil.

We may not have the entire framework theologically that the early Jews did, but this is often how we think of Jesus.

And in fact, we are thinking the same way that James and John are thinking.

And so the reality is that when hubris deceives us about the nature of life, about the nature of Christ, about the nature of his kingdom, well, what happens next is hubris disappoints us.

Hubris disappoints us.

That Jesus recognizes that his disciples are naive.

He recognizes that there's a gap in their understanding.

There's a gap between what their expected path of discipleship is and their actual path of discipleship will be.

And so Jesus steps in to begin informing his disciples to speak into their naivety that they might be able to know the truth, that they could understand what they're actually asking.

You do not know what you're asking, he said, Are you able to drink the cup that I drink?

Now, what does he mean by that?

This is actually an allusion to a passage in Jeremiah, Jeremiah chapter 25.

Jeremiah 25 · chapter mention

It's the same passage that Jesus references when he prays in the Garden of Gethsemane, Lord, if there is any way that this cup might pass from me.

What is the cup in the context of Jeremiah 25?

The cup is that which contains the wrath of God that has been stored up for all of his people and all of the sins that they have committed against him.

That in that cup are the sins of all the times they have thrown themselves after the idols of this world.

In that cup is the anger and the wrath that is owed for every lie that they've told, every lustful thought that they've had, every time they've been jealous, every time they've taken advantage of someone else for their own benefit.

In that cup are every second, every minute in which they did not love the Lord their God with all of their heart and all of their mind and all of their soul.

In that cup is every sin of commission.

In that cup is every sin of omission.

And on the cross, do you know what happens?

On the cross, that cup, the unfiltered, unmitigated wrath of God will be flipped upside down and it will be poured out over the Lord Jesus.

And so here is Jesus looking at his boldened, emboldened disciples, and he's asking them, Can you drink my cup?

Can you go to the cross?

Can you face the wrath of God in this way?

Then he asks them a follow-up.

Can you be baptized with the baptism of which I am baptized?

Now, what's he talking about there?

Here, Jesus is using baptism the same way that Peter does in the letter of 1 Peter.

He's talking about, he's making a reference to the judgment that came in the flood, right?

That the wickedness of man had spread over the face of the earth.

God had regretted that he had made mankind, and so he sends the great flood there in Genesis chapter 6, and he baptizes the earth, he purifies the earth, he washes the earth free as his judgment spreads over the face of the earth.

Genesis 6 · chapter mention

Now we know there was a rainbow, right?

That there was a covenant from God that he would hang his bow upside down in the sky, that judgment would never fall on the earth in the same way again.

And it doesn't, it fell upon his son instead.

That was the baptism that was to fall upon him, the judgment that was owed for all the sins of the earth, the judgment that was meant to purify the earth has now fallen upon the Son of God Himself.

And he looks to them and he's saying, Can you, can you face this baptism?

Now notice the hubris.

If there was any doubt in your mind of the hubris that these men had, do you notice what they say?

We are able.

We are able.

We can do that.

Is that all there is?

They're still deceived, and because they are still deceived, they are set up for an even greater disappointment to be able to experience.

You see, the reality is, the reality is, is wherever there is a gap between your expected path of discipleship and the actual path of discipleship, there's a space for a lot of disappointment to live, isn't there?

You think about in your marriage, you think about in your life, you think about in your friendships, most of the disappointments that we encounter are disappointments with unmet expectations, right?

When we get sideways and we expected one reality and one reality was still the other.

I think this is often the case with Jesus.

In 20 years of ministry, I literally cannot even count the number of times in which people have sat down with me and said, Cody, I thought when I followed Jesus, life would get better.

I thought when I followed Jesus, life would get easier.

But it feels like to me my life has only gotten more stressful.

It feels like to me my life has only gotten more challenging.

It feels like to me that all of hell has declared war against me.

And brothers and sisters, that's exactly what's happened.

That's exactly what's happened.

That first comes the crucifixion and then comes the resurrection.

First comes the suffering and the cross, then comes the glory that is there in the in the glorification.

This is why Jesus repeatedly, as he's calling new disciples to himself, he says, Count the costs.

Count the costs.

I remember a few years ago, my oldest daughter Gracie, she was wanting to be baptized.

She was wanting to, she was, the Lord was at work in her life, profess faith, to be baptized.

And look, as a dad, there is nothing on this earth that you want more than to baptize your little girl.

Like, I can't even think of something that would be more beautiful or powerful than that.

You it's the moment you pray for from the time that you hold them in your hands for the very, for the very first time.

But I remember thinking, like, she's got to count the cost.

Like, I want to make sure that she's not just going through the motions and just doing the cultural Christian thing.

And so I remember I sat down with her and I said this, I said, sweetheart, like, I think this is the greatest decision that you can make.

But I want to make sure that you understand the decision that you're actually making.

That if you're gonna be baptized, then what you're saying is you're saying before God and the church is you're telling them that you're gonna be exactly who God wants you to be, you're gonna go exactly where God wants you to go, and you're gonna do exactly what God would have you to be do.

That you're gonna say, Jesus, you get all of my life for the rest of my life.

And here's what here's what that means in real life.

That means that sometimes because you've committed that you're gonna do what Jesus wants you to do, you're not gonna be able to do what you want to do.

That sometimes, because you have committed that you're gonna go only where Jesus says that you can go, that there's gonna be some places, some parties, some experiences that you're gonna be left out on.

But because you're gonna only be who Jesus has called you to be, there's gonna be a whole world of people that says that's not right, that's not enough, and that's not okay.

And so they're gonna come against you and they're gonna make fun of you and they're gonna laugh at you.

Like, I need you to know that there are costs involved in what's happening.

It's all worth it, it's all worth it.

But before we get to the resurrection, there is the cross.

And she deliberated for a bit before she came to faith.

But brothers and sisters, we ought not be deceived so that we will not be disappointed.

That here is Jesus, and he's wanting us to understand the reality of the nature of his kingdom that hubris deceives, and hubris disappoints because hubris hubris does what it does, it divides.

This is what it's always done.

You think about that picture in Genesis chapter three, right?

Genesis 1 and 2, man and woman are walking together, they're enjoying each other's company, they aren't fighting, they aren't arguing over the air conditioner, what to watch on TV, right?

Like everybody knows exactly the restaurant they want to go and eat at.

It's awesome.

Not only that, they're they're walking together in the garden in perfect fellowship with God Himself until they decide that they want equal footing with God.

And what happens?

Immediately they recognize their nakedness, and they went from walking shoulder hand in hand with the Lord through the garden to hiding behind the bushes, trying to cover themselves with whatever they could use, because they recognize that fellowship with God has been broken.

What happens with the relationship with each other?

They start blaming one another immediately, don't they?

And in fact, the curse says that there's going to be great enmity between man and God, great enmity between man and woman, between one another, that there is division, and this division is the result of hubris.

Well, the same as the true is true in the fellowship of the people of God.

Here you have two disciples that go rogue, right?

Well, guess what it reveals?

That there are ten other disciples that have the same warped ambition that those two had.

Look at what it says.

It says, and when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant at James and John.

They're frustrated, they're angry, they're not happy with these guys, they don't like it, right?

Do you know what the greatest threat to the people of God is?

Do you know what the greatest threat to the orchard church is?

It's my ego.

And it's your ego.

You know what the greatest threat to your marriage is?

It's your ego.

And it's her ego.

You know what the greatest threat your relationship with your children is?

The greatest threat to your relationship with your parents, the greatest threat to the relationship that you have with your friends?

It's your egos.

That when you have egos that collide, people divide.

When you have egos that collide, you have people that divide.

So how is it that you know if you have an ego?

I think there's two questions that really get to the heart of it because there's usually two different paths that an ego takes.

The first question that you can ask yourself is Am I easily offended?

Am I easily offended?

Because if you find yourself often the victim, if you find yourself often offended, it's probably because in your mind you're not getting the credit that you deserve.

In your mind, you're not being treated the way that you believe that you deserve.

You're not being acclaimed the way that you believe that you deserve.

You're not being taken seriously as you believe that you deserve.

If you often find yourself offended, it's probably because you have a big ego, and that ego is not being stroked in the way that you believe that it ought to be stroked.

The second way this manifests itself, and the second question that you can ask yourself is do I always have to be right?

Do I always have to be right?

And if you always have to be right, here's the telltale if you always have to be right.

Do you find yourself often frustrated with people that disagree with you?

If you find yourself frustrated with people that disagree with you on finer theological points, on where the furniture ought to go, on how fast you ought to drive.

Like if you find yourself often frustrated by those kinds of things, it is emblematic that in your mind, in your framework, you know the truth.

You know how it's supposed to be.

And if all these other morons would just figure out that you know what's happening, life would be much better.

It's ego and it's hubris, and it divides.

It divides us, doesn't it?

It divides us.

See, Jesus is reshaping our worldview so that we can recognize, so that we can recognize that greatness isn't where we think it is.

In fact, greatness is found in the very last place that most of us would ever think to look.

That greatness doesn't come through self-promotion, greatness comes through self-denial.

Greatness comes through self-denial.

Earlier I picked on a Florida State Seminole in Dion, so now I want to use another Florida State Seminole to redeem myself to all of you fans to be able to show that I'm an equal opportunity offender.

Jordan Travis was a pretty highly touted quarterback coming out of high school, and he committed early to go to Florida State.

He goes on, and for three years, he does nothing but back up.

In fact, in his mind, to hear him tell it, he felt like he wasn't really even getting any better.

He would work, he would do all the things that were necessary, everything that the coaches asked of him, but but it seemed like maybe he had reached a ceiling and that he wasn't gonna be able to max out what he had hoped that he'd be able to do.

And so in his third year, after his third year, Jordan Travis calls a meeting with the coaches.

And he goes down and he sits down with the coaches and says, Look, I think I'm taking somebody else's spot.

I'm not gonna be able to do what I thought I was gonna be able to do.

I'm willing to stay on the team, but I want to stay on the team as a non-scholarship player, and I want to give up my scholarship so that we can give somebody else, get somebody else in here and give it to them who I think would help the team better than I would.

Now, the coaches were actually encouraged by his progress, and they pull it, and they're like look, man, that's not necessary.

We think you're gonna be just fine.

We see the work that you're putting in, and we believe that you're getting close.

We're not gonna take away your scholarship, we want you to stay.

Now, if you remember in 2023, what happens?

In 2023, Jordan Travis leads Florida State on an undefeated season where he is at the top of all the Heisman candidacies.

Until when?

The end of the season.

Jordan Travis breaks his leg.

You remember this?

And then Florida State was determined by the college football playoff committee without their best player to not be a good competitor for the playoff, and they're left out of the playoffs to the benefit of my crimson tit, actually.

They're left out of just praise the Lord.

Um it was Sabins last year.

The Lord needed to give him one, right?

Um and so he left him out, and so they they come and they interview him and they say, All right, Jordan, Jordan, how do you feel about the fact that your team was left out of the playoff because of your injury?

I think what he said, I think it'll stick with me forever.

He said this, he said, I wish honestly that I had broken my leg earlier so that everybody would be able to see what a great team this is.

That stands out, doesn't it?

In an era of outlandish, shameless self-promotion, that kind of self-denial, it stands out, doesn't it?

And this is what Jesus is trying to show us that greatness isn't found where we think it is.

Greatness is found in a life that has been laid down.

This is why Mark includes us, he's trying to show us that Jesus is teaching a new way.

That Jesus here is showing us that humility defines and redirects the leadership of his church, that he wants them to recognize that they're not going to lead like everybody else leads.

He says something that's meant to be shocking.

Essentially, this is what Jesus says to his disciples.

He says, This is what the godless politicians do, y'all.

This is what the godless politicians do.

This is where I get that.

He says in verse 42, and Jesus called them to him and said to them, You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles, rulers over the gentiles, lorded over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them.

Who were the Gentiles?

They were the godless.

He's looking to them and he's like, You're mad at Rome.

You're mad at Caesar, you're mad at all the governors, you're mad at Tiberius and the Pilate and all the people, right?

Don't you see?

This is this is how they live.

This is how they act, this is how they behave, this is how they pursue ambition, this is how they pursue glory, this is how they pursue greatness.

That in my kingdom, in my kingdom, it shall not be so.

You will not live like that.

That's not who we're gonna be in my kingdom.

That Jesus is here and he's redefining the nature of leadership in the hearts of his apostles that will go forward and establish his church, that they will be able to know the right way to lead.

That they won't lead like the examples they found in the world.

That's how we often lead in the church.

They won't lead by the examples they find in the world.

Instead, they will lead by the example that they have found in Christ Himself.

That they will redefine to recognize, to recognize that the Gentiles are the ones that step on other people so that they can get to the top.

The godless politicians are the ones that throw elbows to knock people out of their way so that they can attain all of the acclaim and the goals that they want to attain.

Not God's people, not in Jesus' kingdom.

In Jesus' kingdom, we're not gonna throw elbows and walk over people.

We're gonna bow beneath people, we're gonna elevate other people above ourselves.

It's completely foreign in that world and it's completely foreign in our world.

I like the way that Paul he uh explains something similar there in Romans chapter 12, I have it at the bottom of your screen.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

He says there's gonna be a new competition in the church.

That the only competitive fire that's gonna be found in the church is not gonna be who can I knock out of my way to get to the top.

It's gonna be who can I outdo to show honor?

That we're gonna show such love for each other that we're gonna enter into a competition with one another, that we can outdo one another in showing honor.

And that by constantly deflecting greatness and deflecting praise and deflecting glory from myself and holding up others, that in that way, in that way, I will I will symbolize and picture who it is that Jesus is and how it is that Jesus lives.

This is a different way of living, isn't it?

This is a different way of approaching leadership.

This is a different way of approaching your life where you're not aiming to get ahead, you're aiming to elevate.

I often tell this to couples in marriage most marriage problems are the result of having at least one, often two people that are trying to get their way.

Right?

Most marriage problems are the result of me focused on what I want, on what my dreams are, on what my ambitions are, on what my aspirations are, on what I think my needs are, on what all of my desires are.

And so I live my life trying to figure out how can I get out of this marriage what I need?

How can I get out of this marriage what I want?

How can I get out of this marriage what I'm looking for?

When you have one person like that, you inevitably drag the other person down.

If you have two people like this, the merit the marriage is gonna unravel sooner rather than later, unless there's intervention.

Think about the Jesus approach to marriage, the Jesus approach to discipleship.

It's the same thing.

That a healthy marriage is the result of not me focusing on what I want, what I need, what I what I uh prefer, what my dreams are, what my ambitions are.

A healthy marriage, and according to Jesus' definition of leadership, is when I focus on her needs and her wants and her ambitions and her desires.

Now, if it stays one-sided, that's not healthy, right?

But in a healthy marriage, what happens when she does the same thing for me and she reciprocates all of that?

Do you see how beautiful that is?

You see, when each person is focused on what they want, neither of them end up getting what they want.

The marriage ultimately dissolves very often, right?

But if you have both people and both people are concerned about the other person, Jesus has told us it's more blessed to give than to receive.

So I get the joy of being able to offer to my wife all the things that she needs, all the things that she wants to express my affection to her.

And then I get the joy of her doing the same thing for me.

And guess what happens?

It weaves us together.

You can't break apart a marriage like that.

You can't break apart a church like that, you can't break apart a friendship like that.

That hubris divides, but humility unites, doesn't it?

Hubris divides, but humility unites.

And so here is Jesus teaching his key, his disciples, who are on the threat and on the brink of outright division, how they can be brought back together.

And the way they can be brought back together is by getting over themselves and and outdoing one another and showing honor.

And then he redefines greatness for them.

He redefines greatness for them.

If you think about it, self-promotion is really the currency of our day, right?

And self-promotion has great currency because self-promotion gets us money if we do it well, right?

That's why there's so many articles on it.

It gets us the money, the influence, the opportunities that we're pursuing.

And if we get the money, the opportunities, the influence that we're pursuing, then we get the greatness and the glory in the way that the world perceives greatness and glory, especially here in the United States of America, right?

But what Jesus is saying is Jesus is saying that there is a different currency in the kingdom.

In fact, the kingdom is built on a different and new economy altogether.

That all of those things in the old economy, which used to equate greatness, all those things in the earthly economy which equate success, they are the complete opposite of the way that the kingdom defines success, the way that the kingdom defines prosperity.

You'll notice what he says.

He says that whoever would be great among you must be your servant.

Whoever would want to be first among you must be slave of all.

You know what those are?

Those are historically low-ranking positions, aren't they?

Those are historic positions of dishonor, if we could put it that way, right?

A servant in Jesus' term, by the by the word that he's using there, is a a person that waits tables.

It's a person that basically says, sir, can I get you some more coffee, sir?

Do you need another uh round of cheesecake?

Like, what can I do to make your life better?

What can I do to serve you better?

The idea of a slave, there it's a little different than slavery was in the southern United States.

It's it's slavery that would have been indentured, it would have been paying back a debt, but it's still slavery in which you're living every day based on the will of your master.

Now, here's what Jesus does.

This is how he flips the economy.

He says, Everybody here that's seeking to be first in my economy, they're gonna be last.

All the people that are last, they're gonna be first.

All the people in this economy that are the masters, they're gonna be the slaves.

And all the people who are slaves, they're gonna be the masters.

All of those who are who are who are lording over, they are gonna be servants.

But those who are servants, they're gonna be lording over in my economy.

In other words, Jesus takes these positions of historic dishonor and he gives them the highest honor.

And he says, This is what it looks like to live in the kingdom.

What it looks like to live in the kingdom is to live your life based on the will of your heavenly father.

What it looks like in the kingdom is to serve one another and to bow before one another and lift one another up by serving one another and bowing to one another, that you bring everybody together and you strengthen the whole thing.

That here, here, the economy is completely different.

And here's the opportunity for us, and here's the challenge for us.

The opportunity for faith and the challenge to live out that faithfully is one and the same.

It's that we live in a world that still operates on the old economy.

But if we have faith in Jesus and we've given all, remember what I told Gracie Kate?

All of my life for the rest of your life, my life.

I'll be who you want me to be, I'll go where you want me to go, I'll do what you want me to do.

If that's who we're gonna be, then the call on our lives is to begin living and implementing by faith now the new economy, even though we're living in a world that's based on the old economy.

That I'm gonna go ahead now and begin living like the first will be last and the last will be first.

I'm gonna go ahead now and be begin living as though servants are the positions of glory.

I'm gonna go ahead and begin living now as though being a slave to my father's will is actually more beneficial in the long run, even though it may cost me influence in the short term.

Right?

Christians, Christians pursue greatness with a towel tied around our waist.

Because that's how our Savior lived.

When I think about the people that have most impacted my faith, I think about people whose names you don't know.

I think about I think about Ralph Vaughn.

Ralph became a Christian when he was a granddad.

Do you know what kind of humility it requires to walk in front of a church and profess faith in Christ when you're in your 60s and 70s?

It takes a lot.

And yet, my favorite memories of Ralph is after his conversion, him sitting on a lawnmower, a riding lawnmower, with a big smile on his face, cutting 13 acres of grass.

Faithfulness, that's greatness in the kingdom, man.

That's greatness.

I think about Edwin Lester.

Edwin Lester was a humble home builder, lived in a humble home with the same woman in the same house for more than 50 years.

When I first got to my last church, I walked through the doors on my first Sunday, and there was Edwin, already hunched over from a hard life of living a hard life of hard work.

And he says, Brother, I want you to know that I prayed for you before I even knew what your name was.

I can't wait to see what God's gonna do in your life.

It's greatness in the kingdom of God.

It's greatness.

I think about Joyce Vaughn.

I went to Africa with an 80-year-old woman named Joyce Vaughn, and I could not keep up with her.

She was at 80 years old lumbering through the African bush so that she could go to refugee camps and places that none of us would ever, literally the ends of the earth, to make sure that every kid in every village that she could personally reach would know that there was somebody that loved her, there was a God that had come for her and for them, and that they were valued in her eyes.

It's greatness in the kingdom of God.

Think about Bobby Wilkins.

Bobby Wilkins was my junior high Sunday school teacher.

And Bobby Wilkins was in a time in my life in which I needed, I needed somebody like him.

And so he would wake up early and come pick me up and take me to a deer stand.

And he would talk to me about Jesus all the way to the deer stand and talk to me about Jesus all the way out of the deer stand, and he would teach me everything that I could learn about the woods.

He would take me, uh, he would, we would wear cut-off blue jeans.

This is true rabbit town form, man, and we would take uh fishing rods and wade the creek, and the whole time wading the creek, man, he's talking to me about life, and he is sowing the gospel in my life, and y'all, it changed me.

It changed me.

Look, all of them, all of them have gone to be with the Lord now.

All of them have gone to be with the Lord, and none of you even know their names.

And that's the point that's what glory and greatness actually look like in the kingdom.

That's how Jesus is at work in places that you don't know, through people that you don't know, to spread the good news of the gospel that he has come and they can be okay.

It's happening all over the world.

And the question that faces all of us is are we willing to be those people in this place?

Are we willing to stop trying to get ahead, stop trying to attain greatness in this world and instead be satisfied with greatness in his kingdom?

Because you see, this is why Jesus came.

Jesus came to recover true glory.

All of us have been living for fake glory and fool's gold for far too long.

But Jesus came because those of us who were image bearers were meant to spread over the face of the earth, and as we spread over the face of the earth to multiply the glory of God, being reflected in us.

But because of sin, because of our own pursuits, of our own hubris, all of that has been defaced, all of that has been uh hard become hard to see.

And so Jesus has come that he might redeem us, recover for us the glory of God, that then we might spread over the faces of the earth and increase the glory of God as we go.

In fact, there's two different words that he uses here in verse 45 to talk about the purpose of Advent, the purpose of why he came.

The first one is the word came.

We've talked about it several times.

I want you to think about that word.

It didn't say that he became, he came.

Right?

What does that mean?

That means he already was.

He just relocated, right?

He already existed.

That by Jesus saying that the Son of Man came, he's reminding us that the Son of Man is the eternal God.

He is the eternal God.

That he has stepped here to be born in a barn that we can be born again.

That he would go and sleep in the dirt so that all of us could go and live in the kingdom.

He came.

He came.

Second word I want you to notice is the word give.

He came to give.

What does give tell us?

He didn't come because there was a gun to his head.

He didn't come because he felt some kind of external pressure to do what he didn't want to do.

He came to give.

Voluntarily, unreluctantly, willingly.

This is the nature of who our Savior is.

And brothers and sisters, that's the significance of Christian Christmas.

And that's the significance of the Christian life.

And all of the hubris is drained out of your life when you think of a single sentence.

Jesus has served me.

Jesus has washed my feet.

Jesus has suffered my death.

Jesus has covered my sin.

And at the same time, the propulsion that you need to live the Christian life day in and day out in faithfulness is the same sentence.

Jesus has served me.

Let me serve him.

See, brothers and sisters, at the foot of the cross, there is no hubris.

There's only humility.

Let's pray the Lord together.