James and John,
The sons of Zebedee,
Approached Jesus.
Master,
They said to him,
We want you to do us a favor.
He said to them,
What is it you want me to do for you?
They said to him,
Allow us to sit one at your right hand and the other at your left,
In your glory.
You do not know what you are asking,
Jesus said to them.
Can you drink the cup that I must drink,
Or be baptized with the baptism which I must be baptized?
They replied,
We can.
Jesus said to them,
The cup that I must drink you shall drink,
And with the baptism with which I must be baptized,
You shall be baptized.
But as for seats at my right hand or my left,
These are not mine to grant.
They belong to those to whom they have been allotted.
When the other ten heard this,
They began to feel indignant with James and John.
So Jesus called them to him and said to them,
You know that among the pagans the so-called rulers lord it over them,
And the great men make their authority felt.
This is not to happen among you.
No,
Anyone who wants to become great among you must be your servant,
And anyone who wants to be first among you must be slave to all.
For the Son of Man himself did not come to be served,
But to serve,
And to give his life as a ransom for many.
The Gospel of the Lord.
Isn't it counterintuitive to our world today where we are taught to be the best,
Reach the top rung,
Strive to always be the leader,
That we now read Jesus saying quite the opposite.
Jesus saying that if you want to be first,
You need to be lost.
Now that creates a true conundrum in my mind because where would we be without leaders?
Where would we be without Christ sharing with us the message of life and of love that is without limits,
That is unconditional?
I don't think we would be very wise to forget this lesson that Christ taught us.
But maybe it is not as clear-cut as we make it out to be.
We see that in Christ's life,
To me,
My ultimate leader,
My ultimate template that I would love to pull,
The ultimate example of love that is unconditional,
That in being a servant Christ led.
Christ never took up arms and said,
Follow me.
Christ said,
Follow me and make other people others fishermen of men and become those fishermen and set an example of how to live.
And then we see in Christ's life that it ended up in heartache,
In pain,
In persecution,
And in death.
Now if our story just ended there,
I don't think two thousand years later we would be reading the Holy Gospels.
Because in the death,
And if Christ had remained dead,
It would have been an example of delusion.
It would have been an example of if you aim to serve,
You give your life into that,
It doesn't amount to anything.
And yet,
Yet this mystery that is unfathomable happened.
Three days later,
Christ rose from the dead and he ascended into heaven.
And that,
That is why we follow the example of Christ.
That is why we try to get into the Christ consciousness,
Because that is love,
That is unconditional.
And what else is there than love and not love?
I was driving the other day and that thought came up,
What is there that is greater than love?
And a couple of words ran through my mind,
One of the biggest words that came through was peace.
But how is peace above love?
Because within peace we do love and we find love.
And I believe that if we strip away everything,
All our egos,
All these thoughts about status and hierarchy and race and sexuality and,
Oh my,
Religion,
And we connect with each other,
We let the Holy Spirit that is within each of us,
The God that is within each of us,
Connect to the God that is within each other,
Then all that is left is love.
And it is my prayer that in time we can move towards recognising that.
Now let's get back to our reading where Christ said,
If you want to be first,
You need to be the slave to all.
Christ did not say that you need to be subservient to all.
But you need to serve all.
And that does not mean that your dignity is less than anybody else's.
What it means is that you need to recognise,
And we all need to recognise God in each other.
Because how can I recognise that the person in front of me is God,
Or has God within them,
And not want to serve them,
And not want to see how I can connect with them in love,
And how can I show and connect that love?
And that is through how we interact with each other and how we give to each other.
If I am able to connect with another human being,
And I can recognise a form of suffering in their life,
Is it not then my duty to try and ease that suffering?
I'm not saying that we are here to take over each other's suffering,
But in our own small way,
Should we not honour the God in the other,
And just maybe give a smile to somebody who's having a bad day.
Touch,
In as much as we are not able to and allowed to connect physically these days,
But maybe just a squeeze on the shoulder of somebody,
You never know when that might mean the world to that person.
And if that situation then turns around and bites you in the behind,
What do you say?
How do you react?
If that person then reacts out of fear,
Is it then up to us to say I'm never going to do that again?
Is it up to us to say that I'm going to harden my heart because I get hurt?
I don't get hurt,
It's my ego that gets hurt.
Because if we take a look at the example of Christ,
What did he do?
Maybe it's time for the revival of the What Would Jesus Do?
Bands,
Because Jesus chose always to respond out of love.
Sometimes we saw that that response of love was in anger.
That response was being assertive.
So when we reread the Gospel and the story of how we are to become slaves to be first,
Let us just remind ourselves that we can still set our boundaries.
Love one another as yourself.
Love one another as you love yourself.
So in being a slave to others and serving others,
It is also just as important to remember that God resides in ourselves and we need to honour that just as much.
Amen.
