Greatness: Matthew 14-20Sample

When I was a teacher, I would sometimes catch students having hushed conversations, talking about other teachers, how to get away with not doing their homework, or gossiping about other students. If I walked over to them or came near, they would suddenly fall silent, sharing guilty looks.

Something like this happens in today’s reading. Jesus asked His disciples what they were talking about as they walked. Their response was silence. I can imagine them looking down, embarrassed. They knew what they were talking about was wrong. Here they were, walking with the Messiah, the Son of God, and they were debating who was the greatest in the kingdom of God.

Jesus does not get angry. Instead, He says to them, “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all” (Mark 9:35b, ESV). He is not interested in greatness but in servanthood. He doesn’t want us to come to Him puffed up with our own sense of greatness, but as little children—humble, trusting, and dependent.

Jesus also taught His disciples to receive children, and that in doing so, they are receiving Him and the Father. While literal in His meaning, to welcome children is also to welcome the vulnerable, the weak, the least-great.

Jesus’ call here is to come to God in humility, recognising that before Him we are like children, and that He loves us as our Father. And then this love we have first been shown by Jesus is what we are asked to extend in the same way to others.

Today, ponder this: In what ways can you be more childlike in your faith? Do you welcome children like Jesus has asked you to?