Every couple of years a new gospel comes out. The Bible has four – Matthew, Mark, Luke and John – but a variety of others have made their way onto bookshelves. You can read the Gospel according to the Peanuts or Dr. Seuss, Starbucks or Star Wars. The best of these illuminate how theology – the ways we talk about and understand God –manifests in pop culture.
Reading today’s gospel in Mark I recalled a song by Kenny Rogers called “The Greatest”. Maybe you know it. It tells the story of boy playing backyard baseball. He throws every pitch and swings at every ball. Every time the boy gets ready pitch, he tells himself, “I am the greatest player of them all” and every time he misses. But at the end of the song, after the third strike, he says, “I am the greatest that is a fact/ But even I didn't know I could pitch like that.”
While most of us hear the story of a boy striking out, the way Kenny tells it, the boy pitched a perfect inning - 3 up, 3 down – or maybe even a no hitter. Who is the greatest depends a lot on who’s defining what it means to be the greatest.
In the gospel reading, Jesus and his disciples are on the road and, teaching them, Jesus tells them a second time that he will be betrayed and killed, and he will be resurrected.
Mark tells us the disciples didn’t understand – they couldn’t understand – what Jesus was saying. A suffering Messiah was such a contrast to the images of Messiah that they had learned. Instead of a Messiah who would be victorious over their enemies, Jesus told them that he would die in the hands of his enemies.
And Mark says they were afraid to ask Jesus what he meant. They weren’t afraid of their teacher, but his words frightened them. His truth-telling threatened their sense of security and safety, their ability to protect themselves against the world, and against death. It exposed their fears and vulnerabilities.
Afraid to reveal their own lack of understanding, afraid they were the only ones who didn’t get it, afraid of being left out, the disciples started bickering, arguing about who among them was the greatest.
Like the disciples, we are afraid of what we don’t know. We are afraid of uncertainty and afraid of silence and rush to fill it with words, even when those words are arguments.
And watching the disciples, I wonder how many of us would confess to Jesus what things we argue about? In worship we remember that Jesus came into the world to love each one of us and to forgive us that we might all be restored to relationship with God. But when we leave our worship spaces we bicker and argue about who’s right or wrong and which decisions are faithful or unfaithful.
The gospel reminds us that even though the disciples didn’t answer him when he asked what they had argued about, Jesus knew.
Jesus knows how easily we are distracted from the gospel and yet, he doesn’t scold us or punish us.
Instead, he continues teaching, saying,
“Whoever wants to be first must be last and servant of all.”
Jesus reminds us to pay attention to what matters. And like Kenny, he reminds us that being the greatest might look different from what we expect.
Being the greatest isn’t going to look like awards or prizes, accolades or promotions. Instead, it’s going to look like helping when no one notices. It’s going to look like making space for those who do not have any status. It’s going to look like loving the person who isn’t useful or beneficial to you.
Because the God we come to know in Jesus is not a transactional
God. This God is the One who sent Jesus to love every one of us and wants us to
love everybody we meet.
This is the Way of Jesus Christ that we follow. It doesn’t follow the rules of the world we live in. It is a way of suffering and rejection, and when we follow Jesus, we must know that we cannot insulate ourselves from it or hide within the safety of our church sanctuaries. Wherever we find ourselves, we are called to welcome the least and be servants to them.
Good and gracious God,
we give thanks that you know our hearts and minds and love us
still.
Thank you for your grace and mercy when we are afraid and lack
understanding.
Thank you for your Son Jesus coming into the world that all may
know your abundant love.
Show us how to be servants and to show love for every person in
our words and our actions.
We pray in Jesus’ name.
Amen.
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