In Mark 9:33-37, Jesus catches the twelve disciples off-guard by asking about a lively conversation they were having. They were immediately silenced by embarrassment because “they had argued with one another about who was the greatest.” What’s most fascinating about the text is that Jesus doesn’t disregard their desire for greatness. He doesn’t flatten everyone to one level. Indeed, we’re all accepted equally, but we’re not all the same. He recognizes in his disciples’ desire for greatness as a good thing that has become distorted by sin. And instead of destroying the whole distorted thing, He proceeds to correct their presumptions of how greatness is acquired. God created us with a desire to be great for His glory. Now Jesus presents a way to transform the ugly pursuit of greatness into something beautiful.

As John Piper notes, our desire to be great and significant has been distorted in two ways:

1. it has been corrupted into a longing not to be great, but to be greater than someone else.
2. it has been corrupted into a longing not to be great, but to be known as great.

In verse 35, Jesus presents a remedy for both of these.

1. Stop trying to be just greater than someone else; work to be great according to the vast potential God has placed within you, and if that means being last, then so be it.
2. Stop working to be just known as great; work to be great by serving those around you, especially those in need

Where do we get the resources to do this? Only be seeing Christ through the Gospel:

Mark 10:42-45
“42 And Jesus called them to him and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. 43 But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. 45 For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

This past Sunday, we gazed deep into the glorious Scripture passage found in Mark 9:1-29. In the first section of this text, Jesus is transfigured before Peter, James, and John, showing them His glory. The text is amazing because we see that Jesus doesn’t just reflect the glory of God; He produces it. The glory of God emanates from Him. He’s the source of it. Thus, Jesus is the object of worship. He is God. Make Him the ultimate object of your soul’s worship. His glory is our soul’s deepest need. Thus Peter, though he’s scared stiff, knows that He doesn’t want to leave. He wants to stay and continue to gaze into the glory of God. This is heaven.

Then, after having this amazing “mountain top experience” with God, they return back to the hellish brokenness and chaos of life on earth. As soon as they come down, they’re plunged into confusion and evil. They return to a world full of suffering. This text, taken together with Mark 9:1-13, teaches us that worship is the way to make it through suffering. Seeking the glory of God balms our wounds. Suffering will either make you stronger or more cynical. It will either drive you toward God or away from Him. So what keeps us from growing bitter in suffering? Worshiping Jesus.

From the Scripture passage found in Mark 8:27-9:1, this past Sunday we learned that Jesus is not just the Christ, not just the Messiah, not just the anointed King… he’s the King that “must suffer.” He’s the King on a cross. Never before Jesus, has anyone brought the prophecies about the Messianic King together with those about the Suffering Servant. This wasn’t just unexpected… it was outrageous! Thus, in verse 32, Peter takes Jesus aside and “began to rebuke him.” Peter condemns Jesus in the strongest possible language, and the text uses a word that describes what Jesus usually does to demons — He rebukes them. Jesus says the only way to defeat evil and put everything right in the world is for Him to suffer.

Then starting in verse 34, Jesus says that every Christian, every believer, every follower of Christ must deny themselves and lose their life. Here Jesus doesn’t mean we must seek physical death. The word life in this text means “identity.” He is saying we must stop basing our identity (who we are) on what we do. How would you answer the question, “Who are you?” Can you answer it without falling back on what you’ve done or what you have? What lets you know you value? What lets you feel like you mean something?

On the last page of his classic book Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis comments on losing yourself to find yourself:

“The more we get what we now call ourselves out of the way and let him take us over, the more truly ourselves we become. Our real selves are all waiting for us in Him. The more I resist Him and try to live on my own, the more I become dominated by my own heredity and upbringing and surrounding and drives. Without Him, what I so proudly call myself becomes merely the meeting place for trains of events I never started and cannot stop. Most of what I call me, can be easily explained by my physical drive or by what others have said or done to me. It is only when I turn to Christ, when I give myself up to His personality that I finally begin to have a real personality all of my own. Nevertheless, you must not go to Christ for the sake of a new self. As long as it is your own self that you are concentrating on then you haven’t really begun to go to Him.”

Jesus says I went to the cross to lose my identity so you could have one. On the cross He lost His relationship with His Father, which was the source of His identity, so that we could become adopted children of God. Praise Jesus!

This past Sunday, we continued our spiritual journey through the Gospel of Mark, attempting to grasp Mark’s vision of the God-Man Jesus Christ.

We focused on Mark 8:22-31, which says “And they came to Bethsaida. And some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him. And he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village, and when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, “Do you see anything?” And he looked up and said, “I see men, but they look like trees, walking.” Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again; and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. And he sent him to his home, saying, “Do not even enter the village.” And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” And they told him, “John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others, one of the prophets.” And he asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Christ.” And he strictly charged them to tell no one about him. And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again.”

As we near the climax of the Gospel, where Peter testifies Jesus as the promised Christ, we see a startling miracle. This is the only miracle in the Gospels where it appears that Jesus’ power doesn’t work the first time. Why not? Well, I believe Jesus doesn’t heal the blind man completely with the first touch in order to teach us a lesson. This isn’t just a miracle; it’s also a parable. A parable to teach us about the pervasiveness of our spiritual blindness. Through this text, Jesus teaches us that nobody will ever be able to tell who Jesus really is without external, divine intervention…without a touch from Jesus. Moreover, we need more than one touch. The implication of this text is that we should never be satisfied with our level of spiritual sight, but like the blind man, we should confess that we don’t yet see clearly. We are all on a journey to spiritual clarity and to every humble confession of blindness, Jesus has promised to respond with yet another touch.