The Road to True Greatness

Tony Merida says, “The gospel frees us from our addiction to ourselves!” (“Twitter Post”). Before Christ redeems us and sets us free, we are like crack addicts addicted to ourselves. We are like alcoholics intoxicated with ourselves. We are not as interested in serving as in being served, in giving as192 in receiving, in pursuing God’s way as in getting our way, in being the least as in being the greatest.

And we are certain the way to greatness is not by an obedience that leads to death (vv. 30-32), being last and servant of all (vv. 33-37), having others do what we can’t (vv. 38-41), and pursuing a life of serious suffering (vv. 42-50). Yet this is exactly what Jesus says as He lays before us the road to true greatness—greatness as defined by God!

We are in the middle of Jesus’ great discipleship discourse (Mark 8-10). Our Lord is turning upside down the value systems of this world. His teaching is radical and mind-blowing. No wonder “they did not understand.” Ours is a world where everything is about me! Jesus died to free us from such slavery. He died to free us to serve and to walk a road of true greatness, the road He Himself walked as He “did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life—a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45; cf. Isa 53:10-12).

The road to true greatness is paved with four important truths, all of which begin in our mind and lead to concrete action.

Obedience to the Will of God

Mark 9:30-32

Jesus and the Twelve passed through northeast Galilee headed south to Jerusalem where our Lord will be brutally murdered on the cross. His heart and mind are set to obey the Father’s will. He “must suffer many things” (8:31), and nothing will stop Him from fulfilling His divinely ordained destiny. Yet, as He focuses on the cross, He also takes time to continue instructing His disciples. They, like us, still have much to learn.

It Is Important to Listen (Mark 9:30-31)

Jesus wants to keep His movements a secret, “For He was teaching His disciples.” It also explains what He was teaching them: The Son of Man (Dan 7:13-14), who is Jesus, is going to be handed over to men who will kill Him, and after three days He will rise. This is the second of three passion predictions (cf. 8:31-32; 10:32-34). His goal is to prepare them for what lies ahead.

Jesus says He “is being betrayed into the hands of men.” This word “betrayed,” paradidotai, is used of our Lord’s betrayal by Judas (Mark 3:19; 14:41; Luke 24:7) but also of the Father’s delivering up of His Son (Isa 53:6, 12; Acts 2:23; Rom 8:32). Here I believe the implied agent is God. We must not forget: God purposefully killed His Son in order that He might193 not kill us! The way to the crown is by way of the cross. Salvation is ours by His suffering.

It Is Important to Understand (Mark 9:32)

As has been the case throughout our Lord’s ministry, the disciples do not understand. We need to be fair to them—we know now what they did not know then. Only after the resurrection does it all make sense.

“A dying Messiah? I have no room for that in my worldview. A crucified Christ? I have no room for that in my theology. The glorious Son of Man of Daniel 7 is also the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53? That just does not fit into my preconceived thinking of how God does things.” Ouch!

They did not understand, and they were afraid to ask Him. In contrast we should understand with the help of the Holy Spirit, but if we don’t, we should have no fear of asking Him anything. This Savior can be trusted. This Lord is approachable.

When He speaks, we need to listen. And when we know God’s will for our lives, like Jesus we should obey because God’s will is always perfect (Rom 12:2). Obedience to the will of God marks the road to true greatness.

Service to Others

Mark 9:33-37

Jesus and the disciples arrive in Capernaum on the Sea of Galilee. This will be His last visit here, and as He had done previously, He gives private teaching to the Twelve.

In spite of what He has taught them about self-denial, dying to self (8:34) and losing their lives for Christ and the gospel (8:35), they still aspire to be sovereigns and not servants. They remain deaf to what He has said about the road to true greatness. Serving others out of an overflow of “gospel gratitude” has still not sunk in. They had yet to embrace the truth that gripped the heart of missionary David Brainerd: “It is sweet to be nothing and less than nothing that Christ may be all in all” (source unknown).

We Must Overcome the Desires of Pride (Mark 9:33-34)

Jesus confronts them about what they had been talking about. They admit they had debated “with one another about who was the greatest” (v. 34).

Matters of rank and recognition were important to the Jews of Jesus’ day. The nature of man and the times have not changed all that much. Pride and the cult of personality arise even among the people who follow after the lowly Jesus.

194Let’s take a “painful pride” test.

1. Am I upset if I am not praised for my work?
2. Do I like and even long to sit at the head table in the seat of honor?
3. Do I seek credit for what others have done?
4. Do honorary titles pump me up?
5. Is popularity crucial to my sense of self-worth?
6. Am I a name dropper of those I know (or pretend to know?!)
7. Do I think I have something valuable to say about almost everything?

Proverbs 11:2 says, “When pride comes, disgrace follows, but with humility comes wisdom.” James 4:6 adds, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

We Must Overcome the Desires for Position (Mark 9:35)

With a heart of pride comes a desire for position. Jesus, in grace and tenderness, gives the Twelve a simple proverbial maxim: “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.”

Jesus does not repudiate greatness. He redefines it. Be great in things that matter to God not man. Plato said in Gorgias (491e), “How can man be happy when he has to serve someone?” (Edwards, Mark, 287). Jesus says you will only find real and lasting happiness (joy) when you do serve someone, not because you have to but because you get to and want to.

Jesus does say there is a position you should aspire to obtain: a diakonos, a waiter of tables, one who washes others’ feet (John 13:1-20) or changes their soiled undergarments. The work is not glorious in man’s eyes, but it is great in God’s! Here is a posture and position worthy of heaven!

We Must Overcome the Desires for Prominence (Mark 9:36-37)

Jesus illustrates what it means to be a servant of all: He “took a child, [and] had him stand among them.” However, He does not stop there but picks him and takes him in His arms. This would have been unusual. The ancients, with high infant mortality rates, did not exalt the merits of children as do many modern cultures. A little child was an excellent example of the last or least.

Jesus then startles the disciples by saying that if you receive one like this on My behalf, you receive Me. It gets even better: receive Me and you receive the One “who sent Me” (v. 37). Effectively, “Treat well those who have no standing in this world (children, lepers, AIDS victims, the mentally195 impaired, the physically disabled, the aged), and you will receive an audience with My Father!”

Jesus points the way to true greatness: Die to self, serve others, care for those no one else cares for. Receive them in Jesus’ name, and you receive Jesus—and His Father too! The way up is down. The way to get is to give. The way to be first is to be last. This is the way of Jesus. This is the way to true greatness.

Allegiance to Christ

Mark 9:38-41

A. T. Pierson said, “The ideal missionary must have four passions: A passion for the truth; a passion for Christ; a passion for the souls of men; and a passion for self-sacrificing” (Pierson, “Speech,” 122).

At this point the disciples just aren’t there. Oh, they are zealous, but it is a misplaced zeal, myopic and self-centered. In fact it is downright sinful.

The disciples are about to learn that God’s kingdom is bigger than their experience of it. It is so large that anyone who is for Christ is with us. Sinclair Ferguson says, “In the last analysis, it is more important that the servants of God are devoted to Christ than that they are to one of us” (Ferguson, Mark, 152).

The One Who Is Not Against Christ Is for Christ (9:38-40)

John came across someone casting out demons (something they failed at in 9:18!) in Jesus’ name. They did not know him—he obviously was not part of the “in group” of their religious denomination—so they “tried to stop him, because he was not following us” (v. 38). Us?

If John expected a word of affirmation and approval, he was sadly mistaken. Jesus responds with a strong command, “Don’t stop him.” On the contrary, stop what you are doing! Why?

First, anyone doing these things in My name does so by the power of God. It is an evidence of My call on his life (cf. 1 Cor 12:3). No, do not try to hinder him. Help him. Don’t try to restrain him. Rejoice in and with him.

Second, “For whoever is not against us is for us” (v. 40). Paul obviously understood this principle when he wrote,

196Against us/for us leaves no room for neutrality. And here is a nobody exalting Somebody while the somebodies are worried about who is following a bunch of nobodies! Who in these verses is on the road to true greatness?

The One Who Serves Christ Will Be Rewarded by Christ (Mark 9:41)

Verse 41 illustrates the point, undergirded by the authoritative amen, “I assure you.”

• “Whoever” is all-inclusive.
• “Gives you a cup of water to drink because of My name”—he serves Me and shows his allegiance to Me by serving My servants.
• “He will never lose his reward”—I see and reward the smallest and humblest acts of service done to others in My name. You reflect the love and concern I have for the nations (11:17), for those I came to serve and give My life as a ransom (10:45).

Service to others frees us. It gets our eyes off of us and onto others who need the same Christ we need. An anonymous author said, “World Missions is God’s major therapy for our sin of selfishness that eats the heart out of the local church” (source unknown). Allegiance to Christ will lead us to applaud and celebrate those on God’s team, even if they are different from us!

Fear of Hell

Mark 9:42-50

These nine verses are a source of great interest. (1) They put front and center the cost and serious nature of radical discipleship. (2) They are grouped together and united by various catchwords: “downfall,” various body parts, “hell,” and “salt.” (3) Several of these sayings are found in different contexts in the other Gospels (Matt 5:13, 29-30; 18:8-9; Luke 14:34-35). Jesus taught these truths on more than one occasion, as any good teacher would.

Our Lord had the strongest possible view of judgment and hell: it is real and it lasts forever. In this context it serves as a warning and a motivation to follow Jesus in devotion and discipleship.

Learn the Lesson of the Great Millstone (Mark 9:42)

This is a hinge verse that brings to an end the themes found in verses 35-41 and then introduces what follows. It picks up on the theme of a child in verses 36-37 and those who belong to Christ in verse 41.

197“Little ones” here does not refer to children but to those who follow Jesus, to disciples. If verse 41 speaks of doing good to them, verse 42 addresses just the opposite. If you cause just one disciple to “stumble” (Gk skandalizein), it would be better to be given a pair of cement shoes and hurled into the ocean.

I believe Jesus is still speaking to John, and the issue is still pride. God’s wrath is great against it because it does so much harm. If we do not rid ourselves of the sin that took both Satan and Adam down, we will be a stumbling block to others, and God will hold us accountable.

Learn the Lesson of Self-Mutilation (Mark 9:43-48)

A saving faith is a fighting faith. It will engage the battle against sin with deadly seriousness. Out of gratitude for the new “life” (vv. 43, 45) we have in Christ and the “kingdom of God” (v. 47) we now belong to, we pursue a holy agenda with passion and discipline.

Jesus launches three powerful hyperboles to warn us of sin’s danger to others as well as to ourselves. We know they are hyperboles—not to be taken literally—because the Bible forbids bodily mutilation (Deut 14:1; 23:1; 1 Kgs 18:28; Zech 13:6). However, in no way does this diminish or negate the importance of what Jesus is saying. “Things we value supremely, like eyes, hands, and feet—should not stand in the way of eternal life” (Edwards, Mark, 294). Eyes, hands, and feet are all inclusive of what we see, what we do, and where we go. As important as they are, better to lose them than to let them prevent you from entering eternal life and God’s kingdom.

Evil actions come from a heart that rejoices in sin rather than in Christ (Mark 7:20-23). But Sam Storms is correct, “Very little, if any, sin comes out of your heart that didn’t first enter through your eyes.” He then adds, “Our external members are but the instruments we employ to gratify the lust that emerges from within. What our Lord was advocating, therefore, [to quote John Stott], was not a literal physical self-maiming, but a ruthless moral selfdenial. Not mutilation but mortification is the path of holiness he taught” (Storms, “Be Killing Sin”).

Jesus said more about hell than anyone else in the Bible. “Hell” is the New Testament word used for the place of eschatological punishment (Matt 5:29-30; 10:28; Mark 9:43, 45, 47; Luke 12:5). The Greek word gehenna comes from the Hebrew ge-hinnom, “Valley of Hinnom,” a valley south of Jerusalem where Kings Ahaz (2 Chr 28:3) and Manasseh (2 Chr 33:6) offered child sacrifices to the pagan god Molech. Declared unclean by Josiah (2 Kgs 23:10), it became the place to burn refuse and to dispose of corpses (Isa 66:24; Jer 31:40). The prophets proclaimed oracles of doom on it, and198 gehinnom became a symbol of final judgment (Isa 31:9; Jer 7:31-32; 19:6). It is a place of unquenchable fire (Matt 3:12; Mark 9:43), a lake of fire and brimstone (Rev 20:10, 14-15), an eternal fire (Matt 18:8-9; 25:41), a furnace of fire (Matt 13:42), an outer darkness (Matt 8:12; 22:13; 25:30), and an eternal punishment (Matt 25:46). Only God has power to cast both body and soul into hell (see also Luke 12:5).

Learn the Lesson of Good Salt (Mark 9:49-50)

Picking up on the word “fire” in v. 48, Jesus affirms that “everyone will be salted with fire.” “Salt” is a preservative. Thus all will be “salted with fire” in a manner consistent with their relationship to Christ. For unbelievers it will be the perpetual fires of final judgment in hell. For the disciple it will be the preserving and refining fires of trials and suffering that mark the road to true greatness. This saying is found only in Mark’s Gospel. It must have held special significance for him and Peter.

Salt is good as long as it can serve its purposes. But if it loses its purifying and preserving value then it is worthless. Sinclair Ferguson helps clarify the intent of our Lord’s words: “unless we maintain the purity of our own lives (plucking out the eye, etc.) and are purified by the flames of testing, and remain faithful to Christ, our lives will have no preserving influence on this corrupt world” (Mark, 155).

Perhaps in light of the disciple’s argument about the greatest (v. 34) and John’s opposition to another brother doing the work of the Lord (vv. 38-41), Jesus draws one simple application from having salt in yourselves: “Be at peace with one another.” Be humble, and avoid stumbling or causing others to stumble. Don’t fuss and fight over positions and status. Be a reflection of the God-given peace you have received from Jesus (Rom 5:1). Pull for your brothers and sisters in Christ, not against them. After all, though we may play different positions, all who follow Jesus as Lord are on the same team. Here is a path to true greatness where it really matters: in the eyes of our Savior.

Conclusion

One of the greatest servants of King Jesus, I believe, that has ever walked the earth was a short woman, thin haired in her last years, named Emma Lou. With only a high school education, she faithfully served her Lord until the end of her life, when the Alzheimer’s disease destroyed the precious mind that cared so deeply for her Savior. When rational thought escaped her and moments of panic gripped her, she would repeatedly voice a simple prayer, “Help me, Jesus.”

199At her funeral her son-in-law would remark that he never heard Emma Lou say, “I want.” Even if it was her birthday and you asked her where she would like to go out for dinner, her response was always the same: “Whatever you all want will be fine with me.” Her daughter-in-law looked to her as if she were her own biological mother.

Her son had the honor of preaching her funeral and did so from Proverbs 31 because Emma Lou was a Proverbs 31 lady. And I have heard him on more than a few occasions recount how she worked a double shift for two weeks from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and from 10:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m. so her son could go on a mission trip, a trip on which God called him to the gospel ministry.

I know so much about Emma Lou because she was my mother. Was she a great lady in the eyes of the world? No, not really. Was she a great lady in the eyes of our Lord? Without a doubt! When I get to heaven, I will see my mom. I suspect, however, that I will need some heavenly binoculars because she will be so close to the Lord’s throne and I will be so far away. She understood and walked the road to true greatness as a simple and faithful follower of Jesus.

Reflect and Discuss

1. What evidence is manifest in our current culture that, before redemption, we are addicted to ourselves? How does that temptation persist even after we are saved?
2. Some skeptics contend that the disciples made up the resurrection story. How does 9:31-32 argue against this notion?
3. How is pride viewed in our current culture? Is this the same kind of pride that is condemned in the Bible, or is it different?
4. How does Jesus redefine aspiring to greatness and seeking a reward? How does this fit together with Him condemning pride and encouraging sacrificial service?
5. How does 9:39-40 support cooperation among Christian churches of various denominations? Do you tend to resist such ideas? Why?
6. What are some examples of giving a cup of water? How does doing it in Jesus’ name and belonging to the Messiah further define this good deed?
7. Can hell still serve as a motivation for repentance, or should Christians avoid speaking about hell?
8. Why did Jesus use hyperbole to warn us about temptation and hell? Does this mean His words are not really, literally true?
9. What should Christian individuals do to be “salt” in their families and neighborhoods? What should the church as a body do to be salt in the world?
10. Do you know someone who is little known and unnoticed but who is probably a spiritual superstar in God’s eyes? What aspects of that person’s life are worthy of imitation?