Mark 9:30-37

Sometimes adults and children make an uneasy blend.  Adults can often feel that their work is more important, and their conversation more meaningful.  They see children’s matters like children themselves: small and irrelevant.  The hopes and heartbreaks of children don’t seem particularly important or relevant to many in an adult world. 

Grandiose adult visions can inflate until they crowd out any view of the small and the young.  Such was the case with Jesus’ disciples in the Gospel of Mark and in this pericope.  The disciples just don’t seem to understand who Jesus is and what he has come to bring about on earth.  Instead, they are caught up in their limited dreams and visions of what discipleship means.

For eight chapters in the Gospel of Mark, the writer has been trying to show us who Jesus is.  In typically rapid-fire Markan fashion, the narrative has taken us through the proclamation of John the Baptist, the Baptism of Jesus, the Temptation in the Wilderness, countless exorcisms and healings, and several miracles.  The Twelve are called.  The sick are cured.  The possessed are set free.  The hungry are fed.  When Jesus comes to town, stuff happens.  This Jesus is something new altogether. 

In the midst of this tumultuous pace, the narrative slows long enough for a pivotal declaration in Chapter 8.  Jesus is on the road with his disciples.  “Who do people say that I am?” he asks.  The disciples give various responses.  Then the focus narrows.  In response to Jesus’ poignant and piercing question, “Who do you say that I am?” Peter responds, “You are the Messiah.” 

Peter’s faith confession forms the hinge for the entire Gospel of Mark.  From this point forward, Jesus reveals more and more of his nature as the Messiah.  He begins to teach the disciples what it means to be a follower of the Messiah.  “If any want to become my followers,” Jesus says in Mark 8: 34,  “let them deny themselves and take up the cross and follow me.”

Jesus’ disciples repeatedly fail to understand the nature of the Messiah and the cost of discipleship.  In verses 30 through 32 of the lectionary text, Jesus is trying to teach his obtuse followers as they travel through Galilee.  He tells them that the “Son of Man” will be betrayed and killed, but that he will rise again.  Characteristically, the disciples do not understand their teacher, but they are afraid to ask him what he means.  They do not seem to know that Jesus is referring to himself as the “Son of Man.”  

When the group arrives in Capernaum, they are questioned by Jesus about their argument along the road.  They had been arguing about who was the greatest, a point of controversy among social groups in antiquity.  No one will answer Jesus’ query, but he seems to know already the texture of their dispute.  Jesus sits down to teach and says succinctly that those who wish to be first must place themselves last of all, as a servant to all.

Jesus further demonstrates what he means when he talks about being last.  He takes a little child (paideon in the Greek) and places the youngster in the midst of all of the assembled adult men.  This little child is an example of powerlessness.  He gathers the child into his arms and says that to welcome a child in his name is to welcome him. By saying “a child in my name,” Jesus is referring to the disciples.  Followers of Jesus are as dependent on hospitality and welcome as a little child.  Followers of Jesus are without power and status in the world.  They form kinship with the little and least for they have become as the little and the least.  Any act of hospitality performed towards a child—a disciple—is the same as offering that hospitality to the Messiah, Son of God and Son of Man.  Moreover, any act of hospitality offered to Jesus is the same as offering that act towards the one who sent him, whom we Easter people know to be God.  The kenotic power of the Triune God stands behind all that Jesus says and does.  This same kenotic power fills all that Jesus’ disciples do in the world.     

By The Reverend Molly L. Shivers, Director, Burlington District Congregational Health Services Team