Mark
9:34-35: "But they held their peace: for by the way they had disputed
among themselves, who should be the greatest. And he sat down, and called the
twelve, and saith unto them, If any man desire to be first, the same shall be
last of all, and servant of all."
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What our Lord requires of believers is not natural to them. A servant's heart
can be pretended, and false humility can be worn like a Halloween costume, but
the reality is beyond the reach of the flesh.
The flesh requires to be served, it will not willingly humble itself to serve.
It wants the church to dance to its tune; it dances to no one's tune.
I have seen it often over almost fifty years of ministry: people want the
church to "meet their needs," but not many have their eyes open to
meet the needs of others. The same is true of families: families are broken up
by divorce because somebody thinks his/her "needs" are not met. It is
a consumer mentality and people want to get their "money's worth" out
of every relationship.
Those who preach should preach to edify, not to entertain and win the praise of
men, and certainly not to win fame and fortune. Those who teach must teach so
as to be understood and to enable the weak to stand and the feeble to walk.
Those who sing, should sing for edification, and not to please men and win
praise from them.
In this we are like the people our Lord referred to in Lu 7:32: "They are
like unto children sitting in the marketplace, and calling one to another, and
saying, We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned to you,
and ye have not wept." The rulers rejected Christ because He did not dance
to their tunes nor wept to their dirges.
Solomon put it this way: "He that is first in his own cause seemeth just;
but his neighbour cometh and searcheth him." Pr 18:17 The man who wants to
rule others may make a good case why it must be so, but others see through him
and realize the true motives driving his actions.
It is a good thing that our Lord did not have this attitude. "Being found
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even
the death of the cross."
