“Last Things First”
Original sermon given September 22, 2024, written and delivered by Pastor Jeffrey Leininger at First Saint Paul’s Lutheran Church.
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“Last Things First"
Mark 9. 30-37
Mark 9.30-37
In the name of the Living God and the risen Christ. Amen.
Those of you in education, or studying to be in education, will no doubt have heard the phrase: “a teachable moment.” It’s a nice phrase. I like it. It conjures up pleasant images of incredibly wise and patient teachers redirecting willing and open students. Teachers out there, is this how this usually goes? It’s better than when I was a rambunctious schoolboy. I usually had “yell-able moments.” Educational theory has come a long way.
There are two “teachable moments” in today’s gospel reading—only the teacher is far more than an educator, and the students have much more to learn than standard curriculum. The first occurs as the Lord and his followers leave the pagan lands and return back into the Jewish region of Galilee. As they’re walking, they have an intimate, quite moment, ever so briefly away from the crowds and healings and demons. Jesus takes this teachable moment, to remind them again of the Great Plan unfolding through him. Three times in Mark’s gospel we get this reminder from Jesus of what’s really going on, and all three times they don’t quite get it.
The Lord speaks clearly about true greatness. He will empty himself by being handed over to a sinful humanity, be tortured, crucified, and buried. And then in three days, he will rise again. He will take “last things first,” so to speak, by choosing the way of the cross before the way of glory, the crown of thorns before the crown of kingship.
You’ll note what he’s not teaching them here. He’s not putting together a plan to win an election. Nor is he outlining the KPIs for the growth of their new HOLY JESUS LLC. Nor is he giving them a moral program for improving their lives and families. Nor a strategy for rebellion and military victory. Rather, he’s teaching them again that the Great Divine Plan begins with sacrifice. His own. For the life of the world.
That’s why we’re here this morning. We remember, celebrate, and are taken into again the Great Divine Plan of Christ’s sacrificial death on the cross, and his victorious conquering of the last great enemy, death, for all people of all time. They didn’t understand what he was talking about—and neither do we sometimes—which is why we need to keep coming back here, to be brought into this teachable moment. We too—though undeserving, though not understanding, though often filled with the wrong, worldly expectations of who we want Jesus to be and what we want him to do for us—we too need to be reminded of the Great Divine Plan. God was, in Christ, reconciling the world to himself. The servant of servants came for all.
If they didn’t understand teachable moment 1, they were in direct opposition in teachable moment number 2. It’s a great scene because soon after he’s explained his servant-sacrifice, they are arguing about who was greatest among them. Maybe Peter thinks he’s great because he’s the boldest in word and deed. Or maybe Simon the Zealot because he understands military strategy. Or maybe Matthew because he can do the spreadsheet. Or Judas because he knows investment strategies. Or maybe John because he’s the youngest and can outrun them with those youthful legs! Who knows, right? But he calls them out, and they are silent because they know by his probing question that they’ve been following this world’s “first things first” attitude, rather than Christ’s last-things-first kingdom of sacrifice.
There’s a pause. He sits down. He gathers them near and teaches: “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” (Mark 9.35) Then in the greatest children’s sermon ever given—because the child is literally the sermon—he places the little one in their midst and enfolds this little one to himself, as if to say, “Here—with the smallest, the least, the most insignificant, the last, this one with the most to receive from me—is where the kingdom starts.”
This second, teachable moment—this greatest of children’s sermons—convicts us about how we measure “greatness”. Our world loves lists, rankings from first to last. But Jesus calls us to reevaluate what true greatness is. The kingdom of God was more at work in the arms of the savior around that little child, then in the arms of Caesar ruling the world’s greatest empire. The child had far more to receive than Cesar and so was greatest in the kingdom.
But its also a reminder about our own status before Jesus. No matter how we might rank ourselves, we are, must be, and need always to remain children in his arms. When we forget how much we need from him and how much he can give us—forgiveness, healing, eternal life, love beyond what anyone else offers—when we forget this is when we also confuse what greatness really means. True greatness is to receive from the greatest servant, Jesus.
Maybe you too can see yourself in the arms of Jesus this morning—you can be your own, personal, children’s message. No matter how much worldly greatness you’ve achieved or how distraught you are because you haven’t achieved it. No matter how you might compare yourself to others—what you have, what you can do, what you look like, what your hope for, what you’ve accomplished—we’re all the same in the arms of this servant king.
Two teachable moments. The first, a reminder that the great plan of divine salvation would start with the sacrifice of the cross. This would seem like defeat but would become a greater victory than they could have imagined. The second moment, a reminder of how we measure greatness. The last become first because they have the most to receive from Jesus.
Let’s just be children in his arms again today and receive from him far more than we know or deserve.
Come soon, Lord Jesus. Amen.