He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all."
- I'd like to share a song with you as part of this sermon. It may sound like it has nothing to do with the Gospel today, but I think it does. Still here goes:
Oh, Lord, it's hard to be humble
When you're perfect in every way.
I can't wait to look in the mirror,
'Cause I get better lookin' each day.
To know me is to love me;
I must be a hell of a man.
O Lord, it's hard to be humble,
But I'm doin' the best that I can.
- That's not a song I would recommend singing in this church or any church. It's a bit giddy and strange and I really do hope that it made you a little uncomfortable. In such a humorous song, there is a kernel of truth, as there often is in humor. The scrap of truth is the fact that so few humans are truthful about their own lives. We either see ourselves as a person as close to perfect as can be or as a person as far from perfect as possible. Should we consider ourselves as something other than those two extremes, we usually say “At least I'm not as bad as so-and-so.” At least, that's what I say.
- Still Jesus says Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all. This sounds like a prescription for a life of endless toil and put-downs. It reminds us of cold food and lack of selection at the buffet. To be “the servant of all” sounds like “be everyone's doormat.” Is that how we are to be? That is a very good question. We need to ask ourselves if we believe that Jesus wants us to consider ourselves worthless.
- In speaking to his disciples and putting a child in their midst as an example of the persons they should be receiving in his name, Jesus is teaching his followers about true humility. It isn't focusing on how good or how bad we are. It isn't about focusing on ourselves at all! Our focus is on the other, on those around us. Jesus tells his disciples to accept the least and smallest, and in doing that accepting Jesus and the One who sent him.
- In short, humility in the Christian sense, one of the greatest and most prickly of virtues, is centred on God, not on ourselves, and leads to the accepting of others as they are. In its best sense, humility is not being first or last but simply being what we are. It is accepting ourselves for what we are before the face of God.
- The word, “humility”, is related to the word “humus”, which means the stuff the ground beneath our feet is made up of; in other words, the earth.
- The stuff of creation, the material that makes up the earth is always just what it is, without pretence or mask. And yet as so many of you here today know so well, look what comes from the good earth, the ground that is planted and cared for, and that yields such fruit/
- In all honesty, I'm talking about dirt, earth, ground. I don't want to say we are all dirt as in 'dirty', but as we are told on Ash Wednesday, “Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return.”
- Jesus set a child in the middle of his gathered disciples not so much to show them (and us) child-like faith; Jesus says accept the child as you would me, so the direction is to accept the lowest as we would the highest in all humility for God's own reasons.
- Why a child? In many societies, even the one that Jesus lived in children were the least of the least. They were without voice or rights or place in society. They could not inherit riches or power or title until a certain age. This is so to a greater or lesser extent even our own age. So there were - and are - coming of age rites.
- The child is the perfect example of one without power or ability to reward and so is the perfect example of the sort of people Jesus recommends his disciples accept and embrace in his name. To say that welcoming a child in Jesus' name was to welcome Jesus and the one who sent him would be an eye-opener. To welcome and celebrate the presence of the King's messenger and even a prophet of God would be admirable and right. To give that same welcome to a child who is without power, influence, ambition, or ability to reward would be unthinkable. Street urchins were an annoyance at best. Yet their's is the Kingdom of God!
- The use of the small child says less about the child and any example we might take from him or her than it says about the disciples and the way they are to view the world – in fact, the way WE are to view the world.
- Jesus' teaching continues his telling his disciples, in effect, “If you want to be first, be last.” Now really, will there be a struggle for the last place? We normally push for the first, the highest, the finest, so will we push and shove our way to the bottom? Some people call this sort of message “counter-intuitive.” This means it goes against the common wisdom of our time or any time. Yet this is the Gospel, the Good News of Jesus Christ!
- To lead, one must be servant of all. The teaching is clear ...and hard. Jesus showed this in his own life, His washing of feet in John's Gospel shows this in a very particular way. His crucifixion and his acceptance of death for the salvation of the world in all the Gospels shows this.
- Jesus starts his message to his disciples with these words, words they could not agree with: "The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again." From there, he tells his disciples how to BE his disciples: "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all."
- I recall the words of a very wise man of an earlier time in Church history: "What we are before God is all that we are and nothing more."
- This Gospel message is as powerful and troubling today as it was then. Things may change all around us, but this teaching is one that still challenges and inspires us. May it always continue to do so.
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