Scripture Daily

Context No. 1524 of 4322 · Mark

Context · Reflection

Mark 9:33-37: in context

33He came to Capernaum, and when he was in the house he asked them, “What were you arguing among yourselves on the way?” 34But they were silent, for they had disputed with one another on the way about who was the greatest. 35He sat down and called the twelve; and he said to them, “If any man wants to be first, he shall be last of all, and servant of all.” 36He took a little child and set him in the middle of them. Taking him in his arms, he said to them, 37“Whoever receives one such little child in my name receives me; and whoever receives me, doesn’t receive me, but him who sent me.”

On the road the disciples had been arguing, and when they reach Capernaum Jesus asks what they were discussing. They fall silent, ashamed, for they had been disputing which of them was the greatest. Jesus sits down, calls the twelve, and overturns their whole idea of greatness: if anyone wants to be first, he must be last of all and servant of all. Then he takes a little child, sets him in their midst, puts his arms around him, and says: whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me.

Jesus answers the disciples' argument about greatness by redefining it entirely. They were competing for the top place, each wanting to be the greatest; Jesus tells them that in his kingdom the way up is down: if anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all. Greatness, as Jesus measures it, is not being served but serving, not rising above others but going beneath them to serve; the greatest is the one who makes himself the servant of all. This turns the world's whole scale upside down, in which greatness means status, power, being served, being above. And then Jesus takes a child, a person of no status or importance in that world, and says that to receive such a one in his name is to receive him. The child, the insignificant, the one who can offer nothing in return, is the very one in whom Christ is received; to welcome the lowly and unimportant is to welcome Christ himself. Both parts overturn the disciples' argument. Greatness is servanthood, not status; and Christ is met not among the important but in the lowly child, the person of no account, whom we are to receive as we would receive him. The disciples wanted to know who among them was greatest; Jesus points them to the last place and to the child, and says that is where greatness and where he himself are found.

Do I measure greatness as the world does, by status and being served, or as Jesus does, by becoming last of all and servant of all, and do I receive the lowly and unimportant, in whom Christ says he himself is received?

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