Leading Like Jesus: Humility

Scripture: Mark 9:30-37

Mark 9:30–37 NRSV

They went on from there and passed through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it; for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “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.” But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him. Then they came to Capernaum; and when he was in the house he asked them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another who was the greatest. He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

Phase 1, 2, and 3

What amazes you the most about children?

In 2010 I had the privilege of spending some time with one of the grandchildren of congregation members in Northern KY. Grandma was watching her older grandson, giving his mom time to focus on his newborn baby brother. He was somewhere near preschool age at the time and full of energy. That afternoon, he decided to introduce me to one of his favorite things in the world. The Chipmunks Movie.

It was really hard for me to follow the movie because Cooper was so full of excitement that he was quoting every word from every scene in the movie. And he was quoting it about 2 seconds before the characters in the movie, so the actual movie became a distant echo of the performance Cooper was putting on for me. Then they started singing. Perhaps you've been somewhere in a group where everyone is singing, but not in time with each other. Cooper was a brilliant child and was able to reenact a 90 minute story, including all the characters and lines, by himself.

Children can be fiercely brilliant, wonderfully alive people. They see potential in everything and live lives full of adventure long before the disappointments of adulthood creep in and sideline us all. You all probably have a hundred other stories like this. Some of you may have even done that in the past with other movies like "The Wizard of Oz", "Annie", or "Elf".

Working with children can make us humble, especially on those days when we do not feel fiercely brilliant or wonderfully alive. In fact, there are times when it is not just that the student becomes the teacher, it is that the teacher feels like they do not have anything to offer the student.

Our passage today gives us another glimpse into the changing ministry of Jesus and His disciples. Phase 1 of the ministry, if you will, was to go and do. Phase 2 was to recruit others to follow along and help Jesus do more, reach more people. Serving and gathering people together is what most churches find the easiest and most fun to do. In fact, for many people, that is where their definition of church ends. However, our passage last week and today introduce a kind of Phase 3 of the ministry, and this phase would challenge everyone, especially the disciples. Phase 1 was full of wonder. Phase 2 was full of joy. But Phase 3 was one that would make the disciples humble as they began taking on more responsibility in the work of God.

God's work makes us humble as well.

Skipping Steps to Greatness

When those challenges come our way, what do we do? We keep our eyes up, focused on the prize, not the problems before us. Think positive and don't dwell on the negatives. But the message of Jesus seemed to be changing in this 3rd phase of ministry with Jesus. No longer were they talking about the coming kingdom, now Jesus was telling them about a King who had come to die. No one wants to be on the losing team. We want to be on the teams named lions, and tigers, and bears, not dandelions, tiger lillies, and bluebells. But when the King of Kings and Lord of Lords tells you that you are on the Dandylion team, and He already shot down Peter, the most outspoken of the group, there's not a lot you can say or do. So you make do with what you have and look forward to the future.

Some days we even think about the steps that it will take to get there. Well, we are going to have to clean up and dust off some of the things we haven't used in awhile. We may have to make some repairs here and there. In fact, some of this has already been happening. In the midst of planning out and working on some of those steps to greatness again, sometimes we even get into arguments about who is going to be in charge of what and who will have their names attached to that greatness.

But here is the thing that is weird about the situation. We are skipping an important step. Jesus is no longer out among the crowds. He is heading back to Capernaum, which is their new home base since Jesus got kicked out of Nazareth. It is Peter's hometown. Jesus is sharing about his upcoming death with his disciples, and it is shocking news, as Matt shared with us last week. His disciples don't know what to do with it. Peter tried to deny it, and that failed miserably. So now, they try to ignore it and focus on looking ahead. I wonder if Jesus felt like He had just told his kids He was dying of a terminal illness and they started fighting over the inheritance while He was still living, pretending He could not hear them. In the time that they all need to be together as family, preparing for this major shift, they are focused on getting over this grief before it starts.

There is grief in change, and you can't skip it. It is there for a reason and it is meant to change us for the better. Like the disciples, it makes us afraid to even think about it, so we choose not to, and we refuse to ask Jesus about it. But we cannot skip this step to get to the next part of the journey.

Taking the Long Way

Our television algorithms switched this week and we have had one of those running machines we use to stay in shape advertised every 30 minutes or so. Our culture would have seemed so strange to the disciples. If you went back in time and told them you could get in a flying machine and be anywhere in the world within hours, they would have locked you up as a lunatic or tried you for witchcraft. You would get the same treatment for telling them you had a little flat box in your pocket that let you talk to anyone in the world, like a magic mirror. However, if you told them that you paid money for a machine that helped you run in place until you were exhausted, I think they would find that even more unbelievable.

We live for convenience and take shortcuts in a way that the world has never seen. We don't travel on foot. Walking is a hobby, not a means of transportation. When was the last time you took the long way to do anything?

Jesus led His disciples in a journey of transformation. When your focus is not just getting somewhere, but instead is on becoming someone, you can't take shortcuts. There is no magic formula to take someone from a child, to an upstanding citizen, to a faithful spouse, to a responsible, loving parent, to a supportive benefactor of family, church, and community. There is no special program that takes a child in church to become an active youth member, to confessing Christian, to choir member, Sunday school teacher, council chair, and eventually pastor. We are not recipes being made. We are people on a journey together, and every step we take is a choice we choose along the way. There are many milestones that we all need to pass along the way, but the goal of being a disciple-maker does not look the same for everyone, because we don't always see the world and each other the way Jesus sees us.

Transformation means taking the long way.

Humble Eyes

When we take the long way, we take the low way.

Jesus did not leap tall buildings in a single bound, swing from webs across town, fly through the air, or teleport. He walked. He walked through places without roads and roads full of puddles, and some of those puddles were not filled with water. He walked through all of it. The Son of God's feet must have gotten so gross. Then, instead of getting his own feet clean, as he would prepare for his last night on earth, with the disciples again (still stuck in this 3rd Phase) trying to argue who was the greatest, He got down on His hands and knees and washed their feet.

That would have been at least the second time the disciples heard this lesson. The first time, Jesus just told them: those who want to be the greatest have to make themselves the least, and those who want to have that authority in God's kingdom work in the nursery. They change diapers for Jesus.

Oh and they do more than that. They see children everywhere. They know their names, their faces, their stories. These are the people who are sometimes not even parents themselves, or who have children that are grown and gone. But the children remember their names long after they leave the nursery. As teenagers, they may not know many names of adults in church, but they remember those names. Youth and Children's Pastors often continue to be a pastor to their students, their disciples, long after they have graduated and left home. Now, I'm getting ready to say that it's not just about age, but I want to be clear: there is a biblical mandate in the Old Testament and New, to make sure we are investing in our youth and children.

Age is just part of the challenge of seeing potential and bringing it out in others. When I was first starting ministry I was interviewed by a conference reporter who was excited to see a young person in ministry reaching out to youth. I told him I had hoped to work with high school kids who would have been closest to my own age and easiest to relate to. Instead, God sent me elementary-aged kids and just a few middle schoolers. It taught me to see how Jesus sees.

Compared to Jesus, the Son of God, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, we are all just babies trying to fight over who is less goobery than the other. But Jesus doesn't see us as an outsider looking into the nursery wondering how many diapers were going to need changed. He looks at us like a mother, who sees nothing but potential in their child. He looks at us as one who is getting ready to hand His kingdom over to us. Perhaps not today, and perhaps not in the way we expect. We are not inheriting plots of land or banks of money. No, what Jesus is giving to us is His people - a treasure so dear to His heart, He was willing to die for them.

Jesus loves us more than our own parents ever could, and He loves our children more than we ever could. We won't experience that love in full if we take shortcuts. It will mean change, and grief, and it will be a humbling experience. Sometimes it will mean just watching Jesus do what we cannot fix or do ourselves. That is hard and that is humbling. But our plans for greatness tomorrow will not line up with God's will if we refuse to watch and follow Jesus today.

As we go through this time together.... as your faith is tested and you long for a shortcut out... As you cannot bear to watch others around you going through the low road...

Don't turn away. Don't fall asleep. Even as it makes you feel small and insignificant and powerless to do anything, don't disengage. Know that Jesus is leading the way, carrying His cross for each of us. He comes to meet us in our smallness, our insecurity, and powerlessness. He comes to show us that when all our tricks are gone, all our strategies have failed, when we are lost and clueless, with nothing left to give, it is there that Jesus comes to join us and show us how much God loves us. And when we see Jesus crawl up next to us, more broken than we are, yet He is the one stooping down to care for us, how can we not humble ourselves to see Him in the least of these around us?

Brothers and Sisters, will you allow Jesus to lead us in this Third Phase of ministry, to humble ourselves and allow Jesus to work through us, so that we might draw out all that potential in each other?