Attitudes for Disciples Mark 9:30-50 Justin Deeter June 4, 2017 After Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ, Jesus begins to predict his death and resurrection, teaching the disciples about his ultimate mission. He did this for the first time at the end of Mark 8, and then began to teach the disciples about the cost of discipleship. Similarly, Jesus predicts his death and resurrection a second time here in Mark 9, and then teaches them further about discipleship. Even though Jesus couldn t be any more explicit about what will happen to him, Mark tells us that the disciples still did not understand, and they were too afraid to let Jesus know that they didn t understand. Like a freighted student in front of their teacher, they acted like they understood and kept their mouths shut about their lack of understanding. As the cross comes into view, Jesus wants his disciples to understand what it means to follow him. In his teaching on discipleship, Jesus instructs the attitudes of discipleship, attitudes that all who follow Jesus must cultivate within their own lives, with the Spirit s help. As we look at this teaching of Jesus, I pray that we would develop the proper attitudes of discipleship. Disciples (first) serve others, (second) cooperate together, and (third) pursue holiness. 1. Disciples Serve Others (v. 33-36) Jesus and the disciples traveled to Capernaum, and along the way the disciples argued with one another. Upon their arrival, Jesus asked them the subject matter of their discussion. Ashamed, they hung their heads low, awkwardly looked at one another, and keeping their mouths shut. They had been arguing 1
about which one of them was the greatest. Imagine listening in on that discussion. It was like listening to children arguing over which of their fidget spinners was the best or could spin the fastest. It s utter foolishness! I m sure Peter, James, and John certainly thought they were the greatest of the disciples, after all Jesus had chosen them to go up on the mount of Transfiguration! Peter made his case that he was the greatest, after all he was the leader and spokesman for the group. He was the one who first publicly confessed Christ as the Messiah. He must be the greatest! Imagine Jesus frustration about this conversation! He has patiently instructed them in the way of the kingdom, the way of service and sacrifice. They ve watched Jesus patiently serve, heal, and instruct. They ve seen him pour out his life into others, modeling for them what true greatness looks like. Yet, the vanity of these disciples inflates with prideful entitlement. After all, they thought the kingdom of God was still a physical kingdom. They dreamed of the day in which Jesus would be made king and overthrow the Romans. They imagined which of them would be the greatest who would get to rule the largest province of Jesus empire! They don t understand the kingdom, nor do they understand what greatness is from God s perspective. We can tease the disciples all we want, but we all do the exact same thing. We want to be great, and by that we mean wealthy, successful, and influential. We want authority over other people. We want titles and positions that authenticate our own greatness. We want awards and trophies, recognition and praise. We want everyone to see and know our greatness, and we work tirelessly to make sure others get the memo. Whether you work in a hospital, a school, a business, or a church we have all seen the corrupting desire for greatness in the eyes of the world. But, the kingdom of God is no rat race. There is no jockeying for position in Christ s kingdom. The church is not a cut-your-throat-to-get-ahead institution. That s not the way the kingdom works. What undergirds our desire for greatness ultimately has its source in pride. We attempt to build our tower of Babels in order to prove that we have no need for God nor anyone else. As Jesus heart breaks over the disciples quarrel for greatness, he sits down and calls the twelve to them. It s time for the Rabbi to teach, and the disciples to listen. Then he teaches them the paradoxical principle of greatness in his kingdom, If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all. 2
He who wishes to be first, must be last. He who wishes to be great, must serve all others. In other words, true greatness puts others ahead of yourself. It means that those in authority, particularly in the church, don t wield their authority to domineer but to serve. Servant leadership means that we think about how we can best care for the people in our lives whether it s our employees and coworkers, our spouse and our children, or our fellow church members and neighbors. Jesus flips the world's understanding of greatness up side down. Greatness is not determined by power but service. If you seek to be great in God s Kingdom then begin to serve. If you have ambition to make an impact for King Jesus then you must sacrifice for the sake of others. Greatness is not determined by position but by serving the least of these. Jesus instructs his leadership team, the disciples, that as they will lead the church they must not lead as dominate, elite rulers. Rather, the disciples are to identify with the low as they serve all people. Jesus is training them to be servant leaders. In order to illustrate the point, Jesus brings a child into their midst. Children were the lowest of the low. They had no rights, no influence, and no authority. In many ways, our modern culture has rightly elevated care and concern for children, however for much of the history of humanity, children did not experience the sort of love in society that they receive today. Children were the lowest social status on the totem-pole. They were ignored and neglected, unnoticed by the hustle and bustle of adults striving for greatness. Jesus brings the child and tells them, Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me, receives not me but him who sent me. In other words, Jesus tells us that his disciples must serve the lowest of society, the outcasts and the marginalized. We must serve them if we hope to be great in Christ s kingdom. We must cast of our pride, and become a servant to all. When we serve the lowly, we serve Christ, and we receive the Father who sent his Son. This runs across the grain of our contemporary culture, and even that attitudes of many Christians within the church. The question to ask is not, how can I be served? but how can I serve? The disciple doesn t ask, What s in it for me? But What can I do for others? This should be the attitude of every church member, every follower of Christ. We do not come into the church as entitled consumers demanding our way, but humble servants ready to give up our lives for the good of our covenant community. It means that we do not ignore the marginalized in society the homeless or poor, the Muslim or homosexual, the 3
pregnant teenager or the alcoholic in the ditch. In fact, these are the very people Jesus calls us to care for, and to serve. We speak the Gospel into their lives, and live out the Gospel through our servanthood. This is what James warns about in his epistle. He admonishes us, My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, You sit here in a good place, while you say to the poor man, You stand over there, or, Sit down at my feet, (James 2:1 3, ESV) We must not show partiality in our service, serving only those we wish to serve. Rather, the Gospel demolishes the social hierarchy of our culture. The dividing lines that our culture draws, do not exist for the Christian. Rather, we are called to be servants to all people at all times. The disciples must follow the attitude and example of Jesus. Jesus is by default the greatest in the Kingdom of God. He is God. Yet although Jesus is the greatest, he leads his people through service. Jesus speaks these words in the shadow of the cross, his second prediction of his ultimate mission. He will establish and lead his church by giving up his life on the cross, so that by his death we might receive forgiveness from our sins and be cleansed from all unrighteousness. This Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death even death on a cross. 1 The greatest man became the greatest servant. If God himself would stoop to such low a level to serve you and me, we too should live lives of service for one another. If you want to know what it means to be great, look to Jesus. We must follow in his pattern of life. The right attitude for Jesus disciples is one of service. Do you want to be great? Then be a servant to all! 1 Philippians 2:6-8 4
This is the first attitude from our passage today, that we must cultivate with the Spirit s help. But there is also a second attitude. 2. Disciples Cooperate Together (v. 38-41) The second attitude is cooperation. John comes up to Jesus a bit perturb. There is someone going around casting out demons in Jesus name, and they tried to stop him because he was not a part of their group. Here we see the corrosiveness of pride in a disciple s attitude! John could not imagine that someone other than the twelve could do ministry and be used by God to advance the kingdom. After all, they were the chosen and elite. They were the twelve disciples, who had the prominent position of being Jesus right hand men. To John, this Jesus-following, demon exorcising, vigilante need to be shut down! He didn t come from the right group, therefore God could not use him. Jesus corrects John, Do not stop him, for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. For the one who is not against us is for us. For truly, I say to you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you belong to Christ will by no means lose his reward. The church today struggles with factionalism between denominations. Though there are significant and important differences between denominations, different groups of churches tend to thumb their nose to other denominations. We Southern Baptist tend to struggle with this attitude. We take great pride in our great convention of churches, and we can begin to believe that God will only reach the world through Southern Baptists! Though God has and continues to use our convention of churches for the cause of Christ globally, we can t be so arrogant to think that we are the only ones that God uses to advance his kingdom. Though we should never wash over theological differences, we should not let minor differences cause us to demonize faithful Christians in other churches. The one who is not against us is for us. Sure, our partnership will be limited. You won t see a Baptist church and a Presbyterian church ever start a new church plant together, after all we differ fundamentally on who the nature of the church and what is biblical Baptism! However, we can praise God for his great work in other denominations as he saves souls and as the Gospel spreads. 5
We must develop an attitude of cooperation amongst other Christians. That cooperation looks differently at times, but we should strive to work together for the kingdom of God. We must not ever see other churches as competition to demolish, but partners to encourage. This is one of the reason why we put other churches in our community on our weekly prayer list, because Forest Hills is not the only church whose trying to reach our city for Christ! There are many faithful churches in this communities, who are trying to take the Gospel to the lost in our city, and we praise God for that. We must praise God for Gospel growth whether it takes place in our church or the church down the street. We can t angrily become territorial, after all we are building Christ s kingdom not our own! Thus, we must cooperate with others, patiently ministering in the community together. The first attitude is one of service, the second is one of cooperation. The thirdly, a disciple seeks holiness. 3. Disciples Pursue Holiness (v. 42-49) Holiness is indispensable for the Christian life. Once we ve been saved by Christ and made righteous by faith, we begin the lifelong journey of conformity to Jesus. As Christians, we ve been filled with the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit begins the process, along with our cooperation, to make us like our savior. The disciple seeks after holiness. A Christian must never possess a complacent attitude. We never arrive to perfection in this life. The Christian life is a pilgrimage, a long and arduous journey of holiness. This is the narrow path that leads to life! Thus, we must constantly be cultivating godliness in our life through word, prayer, and the ministry of the local church. We must constantly be putting to death our sin, and seeking to do good in the world for the glory of God. As we look at Jesus teaching in v. 42-49, we will see three aspects of the disciples desire for holiness. If you find yourself in a place of spiritual complacency, I pray you listen carefully to Jesus words. A. Living as an Example (v. 42) First, a disciple lives by example. Jesus warns us that if anyone of us lives our lives in such a way that we lead little children into sin, it would be better that we have a great millstone hung around our neck and get thrown into the sea! For 6
the adults in the room, this is a grave and serious responsibility that we have to the children in our church and in our home. Our children are learning what it means to follow Jesus by our example. We have our elementary age children in our service each week so they can worship with us, but also so that we can model for them what it means to worship Jesus. We must be very careful what our lives are instructing the children amongst us. The eyes of children are always watching, and always seeking to imitate us. What are you teaching your children, not necessarily by word but by action? Are you modeling for them what it means to be a disciples of Jesus? Is it evident to them that Jesus is the treasure of your life? Do you speak with grace and holiness? Do you model patience and gentleness? Or, are they imitating your materialism, your jealousy, your gossip, and your entertainment addiction? Are they learning from you what it means to love God or what it means to love the world? Parenting is discipleship. Who are you discipling them to be? Parents, we must pause and ask these questions. However, these questions are not just for parents and grandparents in the room, but for every member of our church. We all have a responsibility to disciple one another, and that means the children in the room listening in even now. They are watching whether you sing with gladness or with grumpiness. They are watching to see if you are diligently listening to the sermon with Bible open and pen in hand. They watch you while you check email or catch up on Facebook during the service. They see you glancing repeatedly at the clock eager to get out of here as soon as possible so that you can get to the buffet. They watch you to see how you respond at the close of the service, whether you will reflect, sing, and pray that God would help you apply his word, or whether you pack up your bags, so you can jet out of here as soon as the closing prayer is over. Our children are watching all of us worship, what are we teaching them by our example? If our example leads them to sin, woe to us! It would be better for a great millstone to be hung around our necks and thrown into the sea! If you are teaching them by your example that God is boring and worship is a begrudging obligation be prepared to be thrown into the sea! B. Killing Sin (v. 43-48) Second, as we cultivate a desire for holiness, the disciple must violently kill indwelling sin. Jesus, in attention grabbing hyperbole, tells use, And if your hand 7
causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched. Jesus isn t calling us to start cutting off body parts. That misses the point. The reason we sin isn t because we have hands, feet, or eyes, but because we are sinners in our hearts who use our bodies to sin. With our hands, we do sinful actions. With our feet, we go towards sinful places. With our eyes, we look at sinful images. All of this (remember from Mark 7:14ff?) comes from within. There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him. So why does Jesus speak with such violent language with cutting off appendages. Simple, it s because he wants us to understand the seriousness that we must uproot sin from our hearts and live. Holiness is not optional for the Christian. Those who live in unrepentant, continual sin have not been born again. The Christian life is a struggle, a struggle against sin and the devil. It s a war between the old man and the new man, the flesh and the spirit. Jesus disciples can t have pet sins, sins that we tolerate and nurture. God forbid that any Christian thinks that he can tolerate only a little pornography in his life or only a little drunkenness, or only a little gossip, or only a little pride. With eternity in perspective, we viciously attack and kill any sin left in our life, knowing that sin is not our friend but our enemy. It will destroy us if we let it. As John Owen said, Be killing sin or it will be killing you. There is no sacrifice too great when it comes to killing sin in your life. After all, hell is a place where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched. Why bother keeping your beer if you will spend eternity in hell? Why bother keeping your porn-portal smart phone, if it causes you're eyes to sin and be thrown into hell? Such radical acts of abstinence from alcohol, technology, and the like might seem extreme, but the seriousness of sin sometimes demands radical tactics. If you are struggling in the fight against sin, I encourage you to call a brother or sister in Christ from your community group to sit down and talk about your struggles in order to gain help and accountability. Unfortunately, we do not have time this morning to go into the specifics of how to kill sin in your life. That is a sermon for another day, but for now I will direct you to John Owen s classic 8
work, The Mortification of Sin. Today we must learn that a disciple can not have a friendly relationship with his or her sin. Sin is our enemy, and we must treat it as such. As we desire holiness, we kill sin! C. Salting the World (v. 49-50) As we cultivate an attitude of holiness, Jesus gives us a third way of doing that, by being salt in the world. The life of the disciple and the pursuit of holiness isn t simply an inward journey, but an external one. As disciples who follow Jesus and seek after holiness, we must not become overly introspective. Holiness must make itself known through good deeds and good works. Disciples must be salty, not in language, but in good deeds! Jesus tells us, For everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt yourselves, and be at peace with one another. What does Jesus mean by everyone will be salted with fire? It s a peculiar phrase, found only in Mark s Gospel, but most likely Jesus is referring to the purging work of suffering in the Christian life. The difficulties of life help refine us into the holy salt we must be for the world. In Jesus day, salt was used to help keep food from growing rancid. Before the age of refrigeration, it was the only way to preserve your food. In the same way, Jesus disciples are to be salt in the world, keeping the rancidness of evil at bay through their good deeds done for God s glory. The Christian life must manifest itself with good works. Inward holiness must pour out into a life of good deeds. Disciples make an impact on the world, as they spread the rule and reign of Christ over every facet of society. Thus, disciples must be salty in their holiness. Conclusion In these passages from Mark s Gospel, we ve learned a lot about the attitudes of disciples. In light of the coming sufferings of Christ, Jesus tells the disciples they must have an attitude of service, cooperation, and a pursuit for holiness in their lives. They must seek greatness by becoming servant to all. They must cooperate with others to help advance the Kingdom of God across the world. They must seek holiness by setting an example to others, particularly children, killing sin in their life, and living as salt in the world. 9
If you are a follower of Jesus, this is God s call on your life. May we examine ourselves and repent of our shortcomings, resting again this morning upon the provided grace of God. May we strive for greater faithfulness in our calling as disciples, following the life of Jesus and his teaching given to us here. If you are not a follower of Jesus, we must end where we began. This teaching on discipleship began with Jesus prediction of his death and resurrection. If you wish to become a disciple of Jesus, you can only become one through faith in Jesus. He has died for the forgiveness of your sin, and raised for your resurrected hope. You become a disciple by repenting of your sins and trusting in Jesus as savior and Lord. If you wish to begin your journey of discipleship, you must first give Jesus the rights to your life. If you ve yet to make Jesus your savior and Lord, I pray that you would do so today, and that you would begin this glorious pilgrimage of discipleship along with us. 10