Mark 10:32-45: Servant King, Servant Leadership

(1) Sermon Script

Big Idea

Jesus is a king who serves by being a slave. His service is shown in his determination to die for many. His people are called to the same self-sacrificial service, not to fall into the self-seeking and self-serving leadership of the pagans.

Introduction: It’s Hard to Find Good Staff These Days

A friend of mine some time ago mentioned to me that his company had a restructure. They decided they didn’t need a customer service section anymore. They changed it to a customer sales section. Note the change—from ‘service’ to ‘sales’. It was just a change in one word, but it was a conscious change of ethos. Customers are for ‘sales’—to sell stuff to—not people to be served.

We live in the era of massive payouts to high flying corporate executives. We hear endless reports of leaders in the business world cutting costs and receiving millions of dollars in bonuses and shares and termination payments. The exorbitant payments for executives are in sharp contrast with their seemingly ruthless attitude to cutting staff as a way to cutting costs and thus increasing their bonuses.

Jesus is in his last long walk up to Jerusalem. He is going there to die by crucifixion. And his focus on heading up to Jerusalem to death troubles and even frightens those closest to him.

A Frightening Fatal Focus (vv. 32-34)

Verse 32:

They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were astonished, while those who followed were afraid. (NIV)

Jesus is leading his band up to Jerusalem yet again. But this time, it is different. The disciples are just that: followers. For Jesus is the leader, and he leads like a heat-seeking missile, resolutely striding up the mountain.

I remember this enduring picture of leadership at our beach mission many years ago. We were all tired after two weeks of frenetic mission activity, and pulling down a small circus in the blazing sun was the last thing any of us wanted to do. But there was one guy who was leading the way. He would start pulling down a tent by himself, without anyone there to help him, and we’d all run to catch the tent as it fell. And when he saw that there were enough people on the tent he had just dropped, cleaning up the mess, he’d run to the next one, and pull that one down. Why this energy, this focus, this vision, this ever so slightly scary mania? Why? Because he was finally going to see the girl he hadn’t seen for weeks.

And why does Jesus show this energy, this focus, this vision, this unsettling and scary resolve? Verses 32 to 34:

Again he took the Twelve aside and told them what was going to happen to him. ³³“We are going up to Jerusalem,” he said, “and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, ³⁴who will mock him and spit on him, flog him and kill him. Three days later he will rise.” (NIV)

What do you do with people who tell their best friends they must be killed, and who purchase the one way ticket. How do you respond to them?

Well we now know. We have had public education campaigns. The government sends out brochures to deal with such people. We have specially trained military response groups. We call such people fanatics and fundamentalists and extremists and people who have been radicalized.

They are too risky, have no limits, unreasonable. Who knows what they will demand? They sacrifice their own lives and the lives of their followers to do the same. Well, Jesus is not going to sacrifice his followers’ lives, but he is deadly serious about sacrificing his own.

So Jesus looks at his future. With certainty he sees that Jerusalem holds for him only humiliation. He will be degraded and treated as less than human, stripped naked and flayed, beaten and tortured, and then what is left is strung up on a cross to die. And seeing all this laying ahead of him, he strides resolutely towards it, with those committed to following him struggling to keep up.

Does this picture make you unsettled, or perhaps even scared? And this begs the question, why? It is a similar question that we ask concerning suicide bombers, or historically speaking, kamikaze pilots. Jesus is very different to these people, as we shall see. But it does prompt the question, what makes them do it?

The Ultimate Faux Pas (vv. 35-37)

Well, we do in fact come to understand Jesus’ thinking and we will see what makes him tick. We find it through his response to his disciples. Jesus’ rationale is revealed through a rebuke issued to those who should have known better. For we see in these verses the ultimate faux pas. You know that feeling, when someone says or does something so completely inappropriate makes you cringe, embarrassed, and wish you were somewhere else. Someone, either you or someone in your presence, says something so stupid, so unfeeling, so inappropriate, that you can hear the crickets.

There was a Twinnings tea ad played on TV some time ago. It is a dumb man ad. A man at a pretty posh party looks at a lady’s tummy, and says, “Not long now”. And then he sees that the pregnant lady is actually a different one. No getting out of that. But the moral is that no man should never ask a woman if she is pregnant.

Here we see before our eyes James and John saying something completely wrong and unacceptable, that it should have been social suicide. They should have been called out and shamed. They show that they simply don’t understand Jesus or what he is on about. Verses 35:

Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to him. “Teacher,” they said, “we want you to do for us whatever we ask” (NIV)

James and John do something that every smart kid do, getting the ‘yes’ from the parent before they know what they are saying yes to. James and John want Jesus to sign a blank cheque, and perhaps that is showing that deep down they know that there is something wrong with the request. But Jesus is wise to what they are doing, and asks his own circumspect question. Verse 36:

“What do you want me to do for you?” he asked. (NIV)

Jesus is saying, “Tell me first what you want, and then I will tell you whether I will do it”. Now here comes James and John’s request, verse 37:

They replied, “Let one of us sit at your right and the other at your left in your glory.” (NIV)

The sons of Zebedee are saying, “Jesus, we know that you’re the President, but can I be Vice President, and my brother be Secretary of State. We will take the second and third places in your cabinet.

We of course see the self-aggrandizement in this request, but James and John’s desire is, at one level, understandable. They were on the way to the Christ’s city, Jerusalem, and they know that Jesus is the Christ. That’s something, isn’t it? So there is a measure of faith in the request self-centered request of the sons of thunder.

But have James and John listened to Jesus? Have they understood? Soon, Jesus will no longer be on the social ‘A-List’, courted by the elites and the crowds. Soon Jesus will no longer be the person to be seen with, for association with Jesus will soon be a health hazard?

James and John cannot hear Jesus because they misunderstand the nature of his kingship. They saw the glory and acclaim. He sees gory shame. James and John foresaw honour and glory at Jesus’ left and right hand. But Jesus knew that two crucified criminals would flank him at his coronation outside Jerusalem (Mark 15:27). Given what Jesus knowingly faced and was striding towards, their petty jockying for position may have cut Jesus to the quick.

Take a Look At Your Future (vv. 38-40)

So Jesus shows up their misunderstanding, and gives James and John a glimpse into their own future. Verses 38-40:

³⁸“You don’t know what you are asking,” Jesus said. “Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?” ³⁹ ”We can,” they answered. Jesus said to them, “You will drink the cup I drink and be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with, 40but to sit at my right or left is not for me to grant. These places belong to those for whom they have been prepared.” (NIV)

The “cup I drink” and Jesus’ “baptism” here are ways of speaking about the suffering, pain, and judgment Jesus is about to endure. The picture is of drinking castor oil or of being drowned. Jesus is saying, “Can you endure the overwhelming suffering and judgment I am going to suffer?”

And they say—whether they understand what Jesus is asking or not—“we sure can!” And Jesus said, “You sure will!”

Now, the question is, how will James and John drink the cup that Jesus drinks, and be baptized with Jesus’ baptism?

Is it that James and John will die with Jesus when Jesus gets crucified? No, James and John won’t do that. For on that night in the garden of Gethsemane, the sons of thunder will run away just like the rest (Mark 14:15). The shepherd will be struck, and the sheep—including James and John—will be scattered. James and John won’t drink the cup and be baptized with the baptism in that way. On that night, Jesus will suffer for them, and the next day, he will die for them—it won’t be the other way around.

Most people understand Jesus’ words about James and John sharing in his cup and baptism to refer to the sufferings of the sons of thunder as apostles. And it is true that both James and John suffered—indeed, James was the first of the apostles to be martyred—though he wouldn’t be last, for it would seem that ten of the apostles died in that way—as martyrs. And Paul does talk about his own apostolic sufferings as “filling up in my flesh the things lacking of the suffering of Christ for his body, which is the church” (Col 1:24). So one could conceive of it being a reference to James and John’s personal sufferings for the Christian faith.

But pointing in a different direction are a couple of facts. First, while John lived a martyr’s life—for a martyr at one level is simply a ‘witness’, and John certainly was that, as the Gospel and letters that bear his name show—he did not die a martyr’s death, but died in his old age, having outlived all of his apostolic colleagues. Second, if the cup represents judgment, in what sense can James and John be said to bear judgment, if Christ is going to the cross to bear judgement for them (Mark 10:45).

But there is a different understanding that I think has much merit. Perhaps Jesus’ words allude to the fact that James and John with drink Christ’s cup and be baptized with Christ’s baptism by their participation in the event of Jesus’ death, not their own martyrdom. Perhaps this is Jesus’ way of saying what Paul says, that the sons of thunder will indeed be baptized into Jesus’ death, that they will be buried with Jesus into his death and so be united with him in the sight of God by those events by faith (they were water baptized long before having been John the Baptist’s disciples: Rom 6:3, 4, 8). Then Jesus is saying that His death was not for him alone. Jesus’ death was also for James and John, and in that death they are judged because Jesus bears the judgment of God—and thus they have drunk the cup of Christ and have been baptized in his baptism. I like it as an understanding.

But no matter which understanding is right, the brothers are wasting their time with their early, get-in-quick request. For the final cabinet positions in Jesus’ glorious kingdom have already been decided, and that by Jesus’ Father. There will be no preferment, no ‘first-in-best-dressed’, no point in trying to skip the queue. God has already decided who will have the positions of honour.

That Gazumped Feeling (v. 41)

Of course, in indignation, the other ten then weigh in. Verse 41:

When the ten heard about this, they became indignant with James and John. (NIV)

Isn’t it fantastic to see how the ten clearly are concerned for their errant brothers, and how in love they want to correct their ambitious fellow disciples? But is this righteous indignation we see? Or is the indignation of the ten that of those who are likewise ambitious seeing someone more sneaky and opportunistic than themselves doing what they would have done if they had been clever enough to have thought of it at the time. My money is on the latter, because the ten are included in Jesus’ corrective. The sons of thunder’s pre-emptive quest for leadership would have gazumped everyone else, and they know it, and respond in grumpy indignation.

Kingdom Leadership is Servant Leadership (vv. 42-45)

Because of this, Jesus calls them all together in verses 42-43 for a bit of group therapy, because none of the twelve understood the true nature of servant leadership. Verse 42:

Jesus called them together and said, “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them.” (NIV)

Both the two and the ten had fully imbibed the worlds notions of leadership. Great ones are served, they dwell in glory, served by minions, whom they oppress, whether by design, negligence, or dint of necessity. The world affords more than enough examples of this. Big fish oppress little fish. That’s the law of the jungle, the law of the city, the law of human relations when humans are left to their own devices.

But notice how Mark doesn’t record Jesus as saying “those who rule the gentiles”, but Jesus says “those who are regarded as rulers”. It looks like they rule, they seem to rule, but they don’t really rule. The Lord God rules, and his Christ, the king, the Son of David, rules. And this means that a reversal of normal human and social relationships must take place in the kingdom of God. Verses 43 to 44:

⁴³Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, ⁴⁴and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. (NIV)

Here is truly great leadership. It lies not in being served, but in being a servant—stronger, being a slave. That is what a minister is: a servant or a slave. Indeed, because every Christian is called to ministry, every Christian is called to slavery. The high privilege of slavery is for every believer in Christ.

In my limited experience of the business world, I’ve noticed that my most effective managers have been the ones who have known and allowed for my needs before I knew or could articulate them. And Jesus too knows his disciples’ needs before they ask. He is doing what they need him to do, even though they don’t know it yet.

But for Jesus none of this is mere management theory, the smart way to climb the corporate ladder. Rather, it is the unfolding drama which will culminate in Jerusalem, and he now considers these things and brings them to bear on his disciples’ thinking as he walks the incline to the city where it will happen. Why does Jesus show such scary resolve in this one way journey to Jerusalem? How is Jesus different to a radicalized extremist, a crazed fanatic, a religious fundamentalist? Jesus is very different, because he marches up to Jerusalem not to take the city by force, nor to destroy his enemies and bringing about their death, but to save them by his own death. Verse 45 again:

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

The Son of Man is a title often used by Jesus of himself. At first glance, it seems a humble title. It shows him human. But against its Old Testament background, and for those with ears to hear, the Son of Man is a divine title which claims eternal universal kingship over every nation on earth. From Daniel 7:13-14:

In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshipped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed. (NIV)

You can see, then, that the Son of Man is a mighty figure. He receives authority, glory, and sovereign power. All nations worship him. And he reigns forever over an everlasting kingdom. That’s who Jesus is. He claims all this by calling himself, ‘the Son of Man’.

But this Son of Man “did not come to be served but to serve.” Certainly, he will be served and worshipped: that is appropriate for the ruler of the universe. But that is not his mission in his coming to earth 2000 years ago, and particularly in this last great journey to Jerusalem. For he is mission in coming to his own in the flesh is to be a servant. Here Jesus picks up the famous ‘Suffering Servant’ passage in Isaiah 53:11-12:

After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many and he will bear their iniquities. Therefore I will give him a portion among the great and he will divide the spoils with the strong, because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. (NIV)

Conclusion

Here is the real Jesus: the worshipped Son of Man; the Suffering Servant of all. So we see in Jesus here the power of a man prepared to die. Of course, it is true that a man prepared to die can harness that power for evil, to hold the world in terror. But with Jesus, we see the power of the best man (though he is more than a man) prepared to die for evil people to bring them good. For Jesus heads up to Jerusalem to give his life as a ransom for many, his life instead of ours, a righteous man on behalf of sinners, that we might live not for ourselves, but him who died for us and for the many who he served by his death.

Dear friend, the greatest one of all became a servant for you and me, so that you and I can become servants and be great. Let’s acknowledge that the Suffering Servant gave himself as a ransom for us, and go and do likewise to all people.

Amen.

(2) English Translation

[1] Reflexive middle.

[2] Reflexive future middle.

[3] Note, ‘on the third day’ is not as strongly attested.