Jesus and his students came to Kfar Nahum, and once they were in the house he grilled them:“What were you debating on the road?” They kept quiet: On the road, they were debating with one another about whichof them was greatest.
Jesus sat downto teach , called the Twelve, and told them,“If anyone wants to be in first place, they’ll instead be last of all, and minister to all.”
This story is typically used to show Christians how to become the greatest in the Kingdom: You gotta become the lowest. You gotta strive for last place. You gotta serve everybody. So if you’re ambitious, and you want to get a nice high position in the Kingdom, start serving others. Start low on the totem pole.
But that’s not what Jesus was trying to teach. That’s what we wish he taught: We want to be great in the Kingdom, and want the secret to that greatness. And if we apply ourselves, and work really hard, and minister to others to the best of our ability, we’ll earn that greatness. We’ll achieve that greatness.
But the Kingdom of God doesn’t run on merit. It runs on grace. We get in because of grace. We grow in Christian maturity because of grace. We get recognized because of grace. We get promoted because of grace. It’s not because we start at the bottom and work our way up. It’s because God puts us where he wants us.
The Kingdom is not like a business.
The Kingdom of God is a kingdom. An everlasting kingdom, to boot: Once Jesus returns, he’s gonna rule forever, and will never step down. His officers are gonna live forever, which means they’re never gonna retire, which means none of us are ever gonna move up in the organization. Seriously. Where you are in the Kingdom, you’ll be there forever. But you know what? That’s okay. Because where you’ll be is where God put you—and you’ll be perfect for that spot, and miserable anywhere else.
In the Kingdom, you don’t get your job by merit. You don’t get any post in the Kingdom by merit. I’ve been to churches where people finally got the jobs they “earned,” and they were miserable—and made everyone miserable around them—because they were better suited to their old positions. This happens in the business world all the time, and makes life hell for plenty of otherwise happy workers. I’ve worked for many a boss who “earned” their job, and were fine co-workers, but rotten bosses. It wasn’t that power corrupts; it’s that they excelled at their old job, but weren’t suited to their new one.
We see this happen in the church quite a lot. We shouldn’t, but we do: People who lack character, but because they’ve been around for a while, or because God gave them a bit of supernatural power, they figure they deserve positions of authority. Like Jesus’s students, we figure because we performed a few miracles and hung around with Jesus a while, we’re ready for the big time.
But you might notice this other trend in the church: Nepotism. It happens a lot. Look at all the pastors and ministry leaders who were children of pastors, who never worked their way up, despite how people tend to interpret Mark 9.35. Very often, Pastor Sr. will retire and hand over the reins to Pastor Jr.—who’s either been carefully groomed for the job, or who’s been off doing some other ministry, but once Pastor Sr. retires, Pastor Jr. “comes home” and take over. And yeah, plenty of people in the church organization will bellyache about how unfair nepotism is, ’cause they felt they “deserved” those jobs. Yet quite a lot of the time, Pastor Jr. does just fine in the job.
In the scriptures, not only does God have no problem with nepotism, he practices it himself: Israel was blessed entirely because God had a relationship with their ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. (Dt 9.5) The kings of southern Israel were likewise blessed because God had a relationship with their ancestor David: Solomon did just fine as king, for the most part, even though he inherited the job. So did Jehoshaphat, Josiah, Hezekiah, and every God-fearing king.
You’ll also notice this trend in the church: People get their lowly task, and never give it up. Some of us start at the bottom and stay there, ’cause we and others realize that’s where we’re best placed. God calls us to all sorts of jobs. We go where he puts us, and learn, over time, he really does know best.
This isn’t a how-to tip. It’s a warning.
Americans tend to chafe at this idea. It sounds like a caste system: Once a servant, always a servant; once a leader, always a leader. American society is based on the belief that we can, when we make the effort, move up the ladder. Maybe not to the top caste, but at least to a comfortable caste. Some of us aren’t so sure this is true, and think the system is rigged. But enough of us believe it—and want it to be true in the Kingdom of God as well. But it’s not.
The greatest in the Kingdom (after Jesus, of course) is the person whom God has chosen to be greatest in the Kingdom. That person didn’t earn it. Likely won’t even deserve it. But God made the decision. And God will make that person suitable for the job, just as he did Moses, Gideon, David, Simon Peter, and on till today. It won’t be the person who strived the hardest, because that person will figure they earned the position, and won’t be appropriately humble before God. It won’t be the person who suffered the most, because that person will likewise figure the job is their compensation for the suffering, and likewise won’t be humble. It’ll be someone who is appropriately humble—but if you figure the secret to becoming the first in the Kingdom is to be the most humble person in it, you kinda have a problem. Trying to be the greatest at humility is a paradox. For Jesus humility comes naturally. For us, we gotta work at it—and it’s not gonna happen when we want it for the ulterior motive of prestige.
This is why Jesus told his students if they want to be the greatest in the Kingdom, they’re gonna blow their own chances by their own ambition.
Now yes, there are other passages where Jesus spells out how leaders in the Kingdom are meant to act like servants. Namely
Follow better examples.
First let’s look at Jesus’s students James and John. They once asked him for the greatest seats of honor in his Kingdom: The seats at Jesus’s right and left. (Mk 10.35-37) They might’ve figured they had a good shot at it, since they were Jesus’s relatives as well as followers. And they were willing to do whatever it took to merit those spots. (Mk 10.38-39) But Jesus’s response was,
Now look at Paul. He considered himself the last-place apostle because before he became a Christian, he used to persecute Christians. (1Co 15.9) “By God’s grace,” Paul pointed out, “I am what I am.” (1Co 15.10 KWL) Yeah, Paul worked hard to overcome the evil he’d done before, but he never gave himself the credit for overcoming it: “Not me, but God’s grace which is with me.” (1Co 15.10 KWL) It was by God’s grace Paul became a Christian. It was by God’s grace the other Christians accepted him as one of us. It was by God’s grace Paul was tapped to spread the gospel and start churches. It was by God’s grace Paul wrote a whole bunch of bible. It was by God’s grace we Christians today recognize him as someone to look up to, rather than the angry persecutor he originally was. Paul’s hard work to earn and achieve this status? Filthy rags. It was all grace.
Grace, folks. Grace grace grace. The lowest person in the Kingdom is greater than John the Baptist (Lk 7.28) —and there’s a guy who really merits a really high position of honor. Is it fair that the crummiest Christian goes ahead of John? Not in the slightest. But grace isn’t about fairness. It’s about God being spectacularly unfair—and we benefit by it, ’cause none of us deserve the Kingdom, and get it anyway. So I’m not gonna argue with God’s grace. I’m gonna rejoice in it—and do my job in the Kingdom, wherever God puts me, and rejoice in that too.