You're not listening

 

How 'bout the way he acts?  Oh no, that's not the way--you're not listening to all I say.  If you want to know if he loves you so...   --"It's in his kiss" by Betty Everett, 1964

Communication is hard work.  Teachers know this.  Parents know this.  Wives who send their husbands to the grocery store with a very specific list know this.  Not only do you have to use clear and understandable language, you also must repeat yourself many times before the lesson is learned. 

Jesus knew this.  He tried multiple times to warn His disciples that He would be arrested, mistreated, even crucified--but they should not worry, because after three days He would rise again.  The message did not sink in.

In the Gospel of Mark, there are three instances where Jesus tried to forewarn His disciples about His impending death.  We have already looked at the first, back in Mark 8:31 and following. Jesus told them plainly 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."  Peter's response was to offer his protection to Jesus.  Instead of recognizing that this was God's plan to save the world, Peter offered to man up and save Jesus from the hands of those who would put Him to death.

Jesus turned that conversation into a lesson on self denial.  Jesus was willing to offer Himself up as a sacrifice, to deny His divinity, and to become a scapegoat.  He knew that God would raise Him up, and that even though He would lay down His life in this world He would be exalted.

In our text today, Jesus would try again to get through to His disciples the prophetic warning that He would be persecuted and suffer death, but that they should not worry.  Once again, even though the message was repeated plainly, the disciples were not ready to receive it.

They went from there and passed through Galilee.  And He did not want anyone to know, for He was teaching His disciples, saying to them, "The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill Him.  And when He is killed, after three days He will rise."  But they did not understand the saying, and were afraid to ask Him.  And they came to Capernaum.  And when He was in the house He asked them, "What were you discussing on the way?"  But they kept silent, for on the way they had argued with one another about who was the greatest.  And He sat down and called the twelve.  And He said to them, "If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all."  And He took a child and put him in the midst of them, and taking him in His arms, He said to them, "Whoever receives one such child in My Name receives Me, and whoever receives Me, receives not Me but Him who sent Me."  --Mark 9:30-37

 Don't be afraid to ask

In the 2001 movie Rush Hour 2, Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker have a memorable scene together.  As an international law enforcement agent, Chan's character has an epiphany, but is having trouble communicating it to the LA detective played by Tucker.  Frustrated by the lack of communication, Chan says, "Do you understand the words that are coming out of my mouth?"  Tucker responds, "Don't nobody understand the words that are comin' out of your mouth."

This describes perfectly the communication problems between Jesus and the disciples.  Jesus was not speaking in unknown tongues that the disciples could not understand.  He did not have a heavenly accent that was difficult for them to decipher.  He did, however, want to teach them spiritual truths that were beyond their ken.

Instead of asking Jesus what His words meant, the disciples may have misinterpreted the non-verbal cues and decided to keep quiet.  Why did Jesus take them away from the crowds?  Perhaps it was to keep the scribes and Pharisees from asking so many questions.  Why was He speaking so cavalierly about His own death at the hands of those same scribes and Pharisees?  Maybe it was just a figure of speech, like, "Man, those Pharisees are killing me!  I've got to get away for awhile."

We know now that Jesus didn't mean any of those things, but the disciples did not get clarification.  Maybe they saw something in His countenance that made them afraid.  Luke 9:51 says, "When the days drew near for Him to be taken up, He set His face to go to Jerusalem."  This is a fulfillment of the prophecy in Isaiah 50:7, saying "Therefore I have set my face like a flint and I know that I shall not be put to shame."  Perhaps they saw the set if His jaw and the glint in His eye, and were afraid to bother Him.  For His part, Jesus was facing not only the specter of His death, but of taking on the sin of the whole world.  It was a grim reality He was facing, and it likely showed in His countenance.  So the disciples let it go, and started talking about something else.

Don't be childish

During an apparent period of introspection on the part of Jesus, the disciples got into a spitting match.  The saying goes that men are just boys who are able to afford bigger toys, and it appears to apply here.  The fracas appeared to be an ego measuring match, so childish that when Jesus asked them what they had been discussing they didn't want to answer.

One of the rules in courtroom procedure is that a lawyer never asks a question of a witness that he or she doesn't already know the answer to.  This helps to avoid surprises in court, and helps the lawyer control the narrative.  Jesus was not a lawyer, but He is the Law giver.   Don't you think He knew the answer to His question before He asked the disciples what they had been talking about?  In a prior passage Jesus was quoted as saying, "How long will I need to be with you?"  The thought may have crossed His mind again here, but he showed remarkable patience and restraint.

A lot of religious people today get into arguments about who is greater.  God must love me more, they say, because He has blessed me financially.  I'm a more committed Christian, one might think, because I belong to a certain church, or I avoid certain sins, or I, I, I.  Jesus doesn't care.  He knows it's not about you.  It's about Him.  The mark of maturity in a Christian's walk is to do all that you do for His glory.

Don't think you're better

Jesus said the way to be considered great is to be a servant to all.  Hadn't He been showing them that, modeling that for them for all the time that He had been with them?  Walking humbly before God was an Old Testament theme that Jesus followed to the letter.  In other words, it didn't matter who was better, or bigger, or richer, or more committed.  Jesus called us to serve them all.

He then called a child to Him.  Holding the child close, He said we should accept all people who sincerely come to Jesus.  If we accept them, then Jesus accepts us, and God the Father accepts us.  The implied threat is that if we do not accept the child of God, then Jesus will not accept us, and we will be rejected by the Father.

What a wake-up call to those men who had been acting so childish themselves.  Trying to one-up each other did not make any one of them better.  It only served to put the others down.  It's the same with us today.  If you or I make a habit of bad-mouthing others, of putting them down because of some perceived doctrinal deficiency or denominational deviancy, it does not elevate our own standing before God.  What it does is attempt to elevate ourselves into God's position of final Judge, which places us in danger of being judged by God without Jesus' righteousness to cover our sin.

So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, and participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.  Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.  Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.  Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ 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.  Therefore God has highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the Name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.  --Philippians 2:1-11

 With 20/20 hindsight we now know exactly what Jesus was talking about, therefore we have no excuse.  Jesus did, in fact, humble Himself to the point of death on the cross.  We who humbly accept Him as Savior and Lord are obliged to accept all who come to Him.  John 6:37 says, "All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out."