Inverting Authority: The Downside Up Greatness of the Kingdom of Heaven | Mark 9:33-37, 10:32-35 | Ben Akatsa | March 22, 2026

What you're reading for today comes from two different places.

The first one comes from March Chapter Nine.

The first is 33.

You can't try to be more than a little bit.

And they came to Capernaum, and when he was in the house, he asked them, What were you discussing on the way?

But they kept silent.

For on the way they had argued with one another about who was the greatest.

And he sat down and called the twelve.

And he said to them, If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.

And he took a child and put him in the midst of them.

And taking him in his arms, he said to them, Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me receives not me, but him who sent me.

And when I turn to Mark 10, studying verse 32.

And they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them, and they were amazed, and those who followed were afraid.

And taking the twelve again, he began to tell them what was to happen to him, saying, See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles.

And they will mock him and spit on him and flog him and kill him.

And after three days he will rise.

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 of you.

And he said to them, 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.

He said to them, You do not know what you're asking.

Are you able to drink the cup that I drink?

In order 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 see it at the to see it at my right hand or at my left is not mine to give uh to grant, but it is for those who 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.

This is the word of God.

Please be seated.

Well, good morning, church.

It is so good to have the privilege this morning to speak the word of God and to share that with you.

I'm gonna ask you if you can to just go ahead and bow down and we're gonna say a prayer here together.

I know we've already prayed, but I'd like us to uh just do this again.

Um two prayers just with your head bowed.

First one, for me, pray this way.

Uh Lord, enable then to speak clearly and to rest in your grace.

Please pray that way.

I need that prayer this morning.

And then pray for yourself this way.

Uh Heavenly Father, open my ears to hear what you have to say.

Enable me to obey.

And then I'll pray for us.

Lord, we humble ourselves before you, we humble ourselves before your word.

Would you apply this word where each one of us needs it?

To the glory of Christ.

Show us Jesus this morning.

In Jesus' name we pray, and everybody said.

Amen.

I'd like you to say this word after me.

Great.

Again, great.

What does it take to be great?

To be important, to be notable, to be the person people look at and they're like, there's something about that person, I want to be like them.

There's a word we use in sports, the word goat, greatest of all time.

Who is the greatest basketball player of all time?

The greatest football player of all time?

Another word we use in our vocabulary, influencer, like a social media influencer.

The other day, my son was showing me this uh YouTube influencer called Fulton, who had like 10 million, has like 10 million followers.

I was looking at it last night, and as I'm looking at it, the numbers are climbing in the hundreds.

What does it take to be great, to be important?

Each one of us, I suspect, if you're like me, that you do desire a measure of greatness in your life.

I think it's a human need.

I think it's something God puts in our hearts.

So, how do we truly become great?

The passage we're gonna look at today has these verses.

Mark 9, uh 37, that's our sermon title.

Inverting authority, the downside up greatness of God's kingdom.

Hopefully that upside down helps you remember.

Um, there are these verses in the book of Mark, and I'm gonna have them up on the screen.

We can read them together.

Mark, actually, I'm gonna read them.

If anyone would be, meaning wants or desires to be first, that's Jesus speaking, and then verse chapter 10.

But whoever would be or wants to be great among you, Jesus has something he's gonna say, and he's saying this: Do you want to be great?

Good.

Here's how to be great.

And the first thing we're gonna see is that the first thing we'll see that Jesus will say is, ignore the cultural ideas of status and welcome the least important into your life.

We see this in Mark 9 because the disciples are talking and they are arguing.

This is not a small scuffle because Luke 9 tells us that this was a heated debate between the disciples.

No, I'm great, no, I'm great, no, I'm better than you.

They're having this discussion right after Jesus tells them he is going to suffer for them, and the setting is this place called Capernaum, and it's in a house.

Um, on the screen, you see a map that shows kind of an idea of where they were uh in Israel.

You see the Sea of Galilee, so they're here.

It's in a house.

It might be Peter's house because we know from scripture that Peter had a house.

And if you travel to that area today, you're gonna go to a place where there was a church that's been built over where we think Peter's house was, and there's a modern church built above the ancient church that's built above his house, and there's a little window there where you can look and look down to where.

Oh, that's probably where Peter lived.

Maybe that's where they were.

But the scriptures say that when they got to the house, this is what Jesus does.

He sat down and he called them.

And he said, if anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.

And then verse 36 of chapter 9, look at what Jesus does.

He took a child and put him in the midst of them, taking him in his arms.

Jesus is telling the disciples that if you want to be first, if you want to be great, you must be last of all and servant of all.

And the object lesson he gives them is a child.

Why a child?

You see, every culture has some scale by which they judge who's the most important in the culture.

In India, might be a caste system amongst blacks.

The lighter you are, the better sometimes you're viewed in the culture if your skin is lighter.

Every society has an idea of who's better than who and who's greater.

In that setting, in their culture, and I'm gonna quote here children were not fully human beings with their own integrity, but incomplete beings who needed to be trained.

End of quote.

Jesus takes a child because, in their eyes, in that culture, that person that the child was at the bottom of the scale.

And he takes the child and puts their arm around the child.

Had Jesus not picked the child as reading the story, we never would have known there's a child in that house.

Jesus makes that child visible to us.

He puts the child in the midst of them.

They have no choice but to see that child.

And he says, Whoever receives one such child, whoever who receives, those who like this child have a low status in culture, receive as the idea of welcoming into your life.

Whoever receives one such child, Jesus says, In my name, receives me.

Jesus is saying, ignore the cultural ideas of status and welcome the least important.

Greatness in God's kingdom is not bombastic, it's not loud.

It's a simple work that shows attention to the least important in our midst.

Do you want to be great in God's kingdom?

Jesus says, great.

This is how.

Ignore the cultural ideas of status and welcome the least important.

At a church that my family and I used to attend before we came to Ethnos, this was at Grace Life.

We used to have times where we'd go to the pastor's house for lunch.

And it would be families, you come with your kids.

And one day something happened that really warmed my heart as a parent.

We were sitting at the table and I'm looking, and the teenage son of the pastor has carried Zachary, he's engaging Zachary, he's showing Zachary pictures on the wall.

This is a teenager.

It's a stage at which you're most driven to be selfish, took notice of my child and was giving them the time of day.

It's that kind of idea where you go outside yourself, you ignore whatever would be normal in your culture, in your setting, and you take notice of the least.

This could look like for kids, if you're in MC, maybe the ones who are younger in your MC taking time to play with them.

In our MC, we encourage our kids to do that with the younger ones.

In other MCs, we could do the same.

This might mean, sorry, y'all, my iPad here.

Okay.

I just lost my notes because my iPad locked up.

I don't know what this could look like in your setting at work.

It might be the person that people try to avoid.

That's who you are giving the time of day.

If you're gonna be great in God's kingdom, ignore cultural ideas of status, welcome the least important.

The next thing we see is don't jockey for titles or position.

That word jockey, if you see somebody who's riding a horse, I have a picture on the screen.

The person who rides a horse is a jockey.

And normally when they are racing, the jockey is trying to maneuver the horse to get the best position so that they can pass the person who's in front of them so that they can win the race.

Normally it has this negative connotation of doing whatever it takes to get your way.

And Jesus is gonna tell his disciples, don't jockey for titles or position if you are going to be great.

And we see this in chapter 10.

In chapter 10, verse 35.

So here we see James and John coming up to Jesus and saying, Teacher, we want you to do something for us.

This is significant because normally when you see James and John coming together in the book of Mark and in the Gospels, Peter is there with them.

But right here, they have left Peter.

Normally, John and James and Peter are in Jesus' inner circle, but here when James and John go to Jesus, they go by themselves.

There's no room for Peter.

In the book of Matthew, when this story is told, it's the mother of James and John who actually comes to Jesus to make this request.

You see, when James and John come to Jesus, that word that's used for coming to Jesus could mean they're kind of cornering Jesus.

They're doing whatever they can to get Jesus so that they can make this request for themselves.

Let's get him alone.

Let's use our mom.

And in verse 37, they say, Grant us one to sit at your right hand and one to sit at your left in glory.

To sit at the right or left in that culture was to have the best seats in the house.

It's like going to a wedding and you see a high table, you see the bride and the groom, and you know the people who are sitting next to them on the left and the right.

This must be important to the bride and the groom.

It's that same idea.

We want when you come in your glory, when you are crowned as king and everybody knows who you are.

We want to be right there for people to see us.

That's what they're asking Jesus for.

And Jesus tells them, you do not know what you're asking.

And then he brings in these two metaphors of drinking from a cup and of baptism.

Drinking from a cup in the scriptures sometimes has the this idea of experiencing God's judgment.

And even the picture of baptism sometimes is used of a ship that has been shipwrecked and is down in the sea.

Put together, Jesus is saying, I'm going to suffer.

I'm going to experience judgment.

My experience is not going to be great.

You don't know when you what you are asking.

Are you able to go through what I'm going to go through?

They say yes.

I don't think they knew what they were saying yes to, but Jesus does tell them, yes, you will experience pain and suffering.

But to sit at my right and my left, to have the best seats in the house, I cannot give that to you.

That is given by my Father for those for whom it has been prepared.

See, here's the thing: any position of greatness that you and I get is not going to be because we earned it, it's going to be because God granted it.

And even in the coming kingdom, whatever benefits we get, whether we call them rewards or whatever else, is all going to be God's grace, saints.

They say they want the best seats in the house.

And as we read, when Jesus calls the other ten, the other ten were angry with James and John.

Why?

They all wanted the same thing.

In Luke 22, 24 through 26, I have the verse up on the screen.

When Luke writes these words, this is what Luke says.

A dispute also arose among them as to which of them was to be regarded as the greatest.

And Jesus said to them, The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and those in authority over them are called benefactors, but not so with you.

It shall not be so among you.

That phrase are called benefactors.

The way it's written, it's supposed to communicate to us these people who are actually seeking for these sorts of positions.

Jesus is telling them, in my kingdom, you don't jockey for titles or position.

You don't try to maneuver to get these things.

That's not how you get greatness in my kingdom.

And these words here are emphatic.

It should not be this way with you.

I come from a culture in Kenya where when whatever position you have in the society, people want to call you with that.

If you're an engineer, they're gonna be calling you engineer John, just so that it's your status that's coming first.

If you're a lawyer, lawyer Michael, title coming first.

Whatever you are, it's the title that they want to keep repeating and that you want heard.

And that even creeps into the church where at some point it was okay to be called pastor, but that did not become enough.

Eventually you start hearing people being called bishop pastor.

You're like, what?

And then at some point, even the title apostle, apostle, bishop, pastor, you're like, it's this accumulation of titles.

Don't get me wrong.

Please hear me, saints.

Titles are necessary, they're important.

We cannot avoid calling Jonathan Pastor Jonathan.

We can't avoid it.

Titles are necessary.

The Bible is full of titles, no problem.

Some of you will be considered to be a deacon.

That's a title.

Some of you, men, will be considered to be an elder, a pastor.

That's a title.

No problem.

No problem calling someone a CEO.

That's not what Jesus is saying.

Jesus just says, don't jockey, don't try to maneuver to get these titles.

And then the third thing we see is use your privilege to humbly serve those around you.

Jesus says in Mark 10.

Verse 43, I'm going to read, 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.

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

Meaning, for the three years of Jesus' ministry, almost every two weeks you'd hear him calling to referring to himself a son.

Son of Man.

It was an important title.

Where does that title come from?

From Daniel 7.

And in Daniel 7, this is what we read.

This is in the Old Testament.

This is a prophecy about the future.

And this man called Daniel is writing about this person that he sees.

I saw in the cloud in the night visions and behold, is there one right before this one?

Is there another verse?

There's not.

Okay.

I saw in the night visions and behold, with the clouds of heaven, there came one like a son of man.

And he came to the ancient of days and was presented before him, Son of Man, coming to the ancient of days.

Ancient of days here means God the Father.

And to him, to who the Son of Man was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him.

His dominion, that kingdom, is what?

An everlasting dominion.

And to bring the point home, which shall not pass away.

To add even a finer point in his kingdom, one that shall not be destroyed.

So Daniel in the Old Testament is seeing a vision of God the Father giving the kingdom to this person called the Son of Man in the clouds.

And Jesus says, referring to himself, that for even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and give his life a ransom for many.

Jesus is telling his disciples, Before I am glorified, I am first going to have to suffer.

And that idea of giving a ransom for many is what Jesus is saying.

I'm going to have to suffer.

It comes from Isaiah 53, where another prophet looking into the future and seeing Jesus says these words about Jesus.

Oh, I want to show you all this verse where Jesus stands and he's being asked, Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?

And he says, I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of power and coming with clouds in the heavens.

Jesus refers to himself as the Son of Man.

But first he has to suffer.

I'm going to read these verses from Isaiah.

Surely he, who is the He, the servant of the Most High of God, has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed him stricken by God.

But he was pierced for our transgression and crushed for our iniquities.

Upon him, the chastisement that brought us peace.

Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace.

And with his wounds we are healed.

All we like sheep have gone astray.

We've turned to our own way.

And the Lord has laid on him this suffering servant, the iniquity of us all.

Jesus is saying, before I'm glorified, I'm going to have to suffer because something has to happen first.

The problem of sin has to be dealt with.

Humanity has a problem.

You and I have a problem.

And it's called sin.

And sin is anything you think, anything you say, anything you do that breaks God's law, nobody can avoid sin.

We cannot deal with sin on our own.

The Bible says that without the shedding of blood, sin cannot be dealt with.

And God came up with a plan to deal with our sin problem.

And his plan was this: that one day his son would come, he would bear our sin upon himself, and when he died to bear our sin, if we believe in him and what he has done, then God looks at us and says, Your sin has been paid for.

I declare you are righteous.

You and I we're good.

And when you die, I will welcome you to my heaven.

Jesus was telling his disciples, before I'm glorified, I'm going to have to die.

I'm going to use my position to ransom many.

And he's telling them, if you are to be great in my kingdom, whoever would be great must be your servant.

And whoever would be first must be a slave.

Just like I did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give my life as a ransom for many.

We use our privilege to serve others.

And if if you and I are to be great, we are to use Jesus as our model of greatness.

And you see that in the verse that says, For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

Jesus is that model of greatness.

Whoever would be great among you must be your servant.

For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve.

In John 13, Jesus says this, you call me teacher and Lord, and you're right, for I am.

If then your teacher and Lord have, if I then your teacher and Lord have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.

We use Jesus as our model for greatness, not the culture.

The word lamb is used of Jesus in the New Testament scriptures over 32 times.

Twenty-seven of those appear in the last book of the Bible called Revelation.

When John is writing the book of Revelation and he first encounters Jesus, the scriptures say his face, the face of Jesus, was shining in all its brilliance.

And one writer says this like nuclear light blazing forth from a human shell, we see the blindingly radiant sun whose presence dwarfs the earthly powers of persecuting empires.

End of quote.

After John sees the vision of Jesus in this blinding radiant light, John is transported to heaven.

When John is transported to heaven, he sees Jesus again.

After you've seen this nuclear blazing Jesus, and then you're going to heaven, where now Jesus is crowned.

What sort of image do you expect to hear of Jesus?

What sort of image do you expect to see of Jesus?

And this is what this writer says.

And I quote, as John is transported into heaven, we expect an even more glorified Son of God.

Yet here the lamb appears as a lamb slain.

What a strange jolting image.

Then Jesus is worshiped, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe, tongue, and nation.

And this writer adds this the Son's glory in heaven centers in his becoming the sinner's substitute.

Think about this for a moment.

What heaven seems to be celebrating in this book is the image of the eternal, transcendent, all-powerful Son of God as what?

A lamb.

End of quote.

You expect when you get to heaven to see this even grander image of Christ, and what do you see?

A lamb.

And when that happens, all of heaven worships.

Saints, that is greatness.

That's the model of greatness that we are called to follow.

And the model matters because you won't know a counterfeit of greatness when you see it, and you'll seek for the wrong model unless you see the model that Jesus has laid down for us.

The last thing we're gonna see.

Actually, before that, I wanted to mention this.

There's a pastor called John Piper.

And at some point, realizing he was going to make a lot of money in the ministry, decides to cap his salary at a certain amount.

And then one day his elders come to him, these are other pastors with him, and they tell him, Because you've capped your salary, we have other people below you, associate pastors, we have administrators who we want to start paying more, but we can't because you've kept your own salary.

And this is what he says.

Their worry was we don't want anybody to be paid more than you.

And John Piper says this what makes you think they should be paid less than me?

What's governing that, meaning that way of thinking, that I have to be paid more than everybody when I don't need it?

That's pure American, that is not biblical.

That's a pastor who has a model from Jesus Christ.

See, the CEO of a company doesn't have to be paid the most, somebody else can be paid the most.

That's not a political statement.

I'm just saying that's a model that Jesus laid for us.

The model of greatness that you and I have matters.

And the last thing we'll say is this pray for a change in your perspective of greatness.

Pray for a change in your perspective of greatness.

When you listen to a sermon like this, it's easy to say, okay, I need to look for the least and then you know, ignore cultural norms and go show them attention and bring them into my circle.

It's easy to think to yourself, okay, Jesus needs to be my model, and all these things are true.

But I think if we don't do this, then everything else is gonna be really, really hard.

Why do I say this?

Right after this passage in John 10, 35 through 45, Mark brings in a story of a blind man.

And Mark does something that ties the story of the blind man to the story of uh James and John coming to Jesus, asking to have the best seats in the house.

Let me read it.

I'm gonna read from verse 46.

And when they came to Jericho, and then and they came to Jericho, and as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a great crowd, Bartimias, a blind beggar, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the roadside.

And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me.

And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent, but he cried out all the more, Son of David, have mercy on me.

And then Jesus stopped and said, Call him.

And they called a blind man, saying to him, Take heart, get up.

He is calling you.

And this is a verse I wanted you to see.

It's going to be up on the screen.

And Jesus said to him, What do you want me to do for you?

That is the very same question that Jesus asked James and John right before when they said, Do whatever you want.

Jesus asked, What do you want me to do for you?

And now here's a blind man being asked the same question.

And what does he say?

Rabbi, let me recover my sight.

More than once in the book of Mark, this writer has used a blind man being given sight to illustrate to the reader that there's a point Jesus' followers are not getting, they cannot see things clearly yet.

For you and I, and for the disciples to have this right view about greatness, something needs to happen.

Jesus has to change our perspective of greatness.

And that's why I say, pray for a change in your perspective of greatness.

This is a true story of a family that had traveled to Maine.

And there's a county there that's famous for these semi-precious gemstones that are called Tomellini gems.

So this family had gone to that state and they were going to search for this gem.

So they're here in a river where they can see rocks, and the wife spots something that's gleaming in the water, and they pull it out, and the more they work on the rock, it's like the biggest Tomellini stone that anybody has found yet to that point.

It's worth thousands of dollars.

And so they're really excited.

They take the stone and they give it to their young boy, and they tell him, Take the stone, take it to the car.

So the boy is excited.

He takes a stone, and then as he's jumping over the rocks to go to the car, guess what he sees?

He sees a frog.

And he's like, Okay, I'm gonna get you.

He takes that really precious rock, throws it at the frog, he misses.

The stone goes in the water, and sure enough, that precious stone that is worth thousands of dollars is lost, and they could not find it.

The boy knew no better because he had no concept for the value of that gem.

Here's what I'm trying to say to us and to me.

Jesus is giving us a perspective of greatness that is precious in God's sight.

And when you and I live here and go through life, every so often we're gonna be tempted for the world's perspective of greatness.

And it's a question of seeing greatness God's way or seeing greatness the world's way.

A gem or a frog?

Pray that God would change your perspective of mine and mine of greatness.

Who does Jesus allow on his right and on his left?

The next time those words are used in the book of Mark is on the cross.

When there is a thief on his left and on his right, and the one on his right is given access to the kingdom.

That is God's perspective of greatness.

Let's bow our heads.

Apply these words to our hearts.

Lord, when we have privilege wherever it is, whether it's here in a church or out in the world, may we use it to serve others because that's greatness.

Would you help us, Lord, to ignore how the culture sees greatness?

And Lord, to welcome the least into our lives.

Lord, help us not to jockey for titles or positions, not to maneuver selfishly to get our way.

Jesus, have mercy on us.

Like that blind man we say, Have mercy on us, O Lord.

And help us to see greatness the way you see it.

In Jesus' name we pray.

And everybody said Amen.