Mark chapter 9 is our text, and we'll be looking
at verses 30 through verse 41...Mark 9:30 through 41. I told you last time that we are now embarking
over the next couple of chapters, chapters 9 and 10, on a series of lessons that the
Lord taught His disciples. His public ministry in Galilee has ended,
essentially, and now He has a private ministry a little while longer in Galilee with the
disciples. And then He progresses to travel down to Jerusalem. Through these months the final months prior
to His death, the focus of Mark is on His instruction to the Twelve. He repeats to them continually about His death
and resurrection. But in addition to telling them that and trying
to prepare them for that coming event, there are things they need to know. And so He is their teacher and the lessons
are private, not public. We have the privilege of joining those lessons. One of them is on humility and that is the
one before us in the text here. Now at first reading, from verses 30 to 41,
you might think that these are somewhat disconnected, but the whole passage actually fits around
the theme of humility. So let me read it to you and then we'll look
more closely at it. "From there, they went out and began to go
through Galilee and He didn't want anyone to know about it, for He was teaching His
disciples and telling them, 'The Son of Man is to be delivered into the hands of men and
they will kill Him, and when He has been killed, He will rise three days later.' But they did not understand this statement
and they were afraid to ask Him. They came to Capernaum and when He was in
the house, He began to question them. 'What were you discussing on the way?' But they kept silent, for on the way they
had discussed with one another which of them was the greatest. Sitting down, He called the Twelve and said
to them, 'If anyone wants to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all.' Taking a child, He set him before them and
taking him in His arms He said to them, 'Whoever receives one child like this in My name, receives
Me. And whoever receives Me does not receive Me
but Him who sent Me.' John said to Him, 'Teacher, we saw someone
casting out demons in Your name and we tried to prevent him because he was not following
us.' But Jesus said, 'Do not hinder him, for there
is no one who will perform a miracle in My name and be able to soon afterward to speak
evil of Me, for he who is not against us is for us. For whoever gives you a cup of water to drink
because of your name as followers of Christ, truly I say to you, he will not lose his reward.'" All of that relates to our theme of humility. And you will see that as we work through it. If I were to title this section and the lesson,
I might call it, "The Virtue of Being Last....The Virtue of Being Last." That title would seem offensive to the culture
in which you and I live because everybody wants to be first, number one. And that's the whole idea. Humility is not viewed as a virtue in our
culture, and it wasn't viewed as a virtue in ancient pagan culture either. And it's not just a cultural issue. Humility is foreign to fallen DNA. Humility is alien to the human heart. The human heart, every human heart, every
fallen human heart is a relentless worshiper of itself. It is the nature of man to be dominated by
pride in a bizarre, convoluted emphasis. In our society, to diagnose people's ills
because they lack self-esteem, our culture has poured gas on a fire. Nobody lacks self-esteem. That's a lie. People are dominated by self-esteem, dominated
by pride. It just comes in many forms. And in those forms people manipulate the things
around them and the people around them the way they want to manipulate them and using
the means they use. Nobody lacks self-esteem, everybody is consumed
with himself, or herself, in one way or another. To then diagnose all human ills because people
lack self-esteem is to really cry out for people to be more proud when they're already
dominated by deadly pride. It is alien then to human life to talk about
being humble, to be content to be last. And so I say, if we put a big banner out in
front of the church and said we're going to have a conference on how to be last, nobody
would show. We wouldn't attract a crowd at all. But learning to be humble is essentially finding
the foundation of sanctification because this is the very bottom line in what it means to
be a Christian. In the wonderful sixty-sixth chapter of Isaiah,
God exalts Himself, the Lord says, "Heaven is My throne, the Earth is My footstool. Where then is a house where you could build
for Me and where's a place that I may rest, for My hand made all these things. All these things came into being," declares
the Lord. God exalts Himself and He has a right to exalt
Himself and He's the only one in the universe who has a right to exalt Himself. But what He's looking for in verse 2, "To
this one I will look is the one who is humble and contrite of spirit and trembles at My
Word." God is looking for humble people. Micah 6:8 says, "What does the Lord require
of you but to walk humbly with your God." Luke 14:11; 18:14, our Lord says, "Whoever
exalts himself will be humbled and he who humbles himself will be exalted." That is a spiritual principle. Ephesians 4:1 and 2 where we are enjoined
to walk worthy of the calling to which we are called is followed by, "Walk with all
humility." Colossians 3:12, "Put on a heart of humility." James 4:6, "God is opposed to the proud but
gives grace to the humble." Verse 10, "Humble yourselves in the presence
of the Lord and He will exalt you." Now humility is hard to learn. It is mandated but it is hard to learn. Just when you got it, you lost it. As soon as you've said to yourself, "I have
finally attained humility," guess what? You can go back to square one, do not pass
Go, do no collect $200.00. We need to be taught humility and there are
a number of ways in which the Lord has deemed to teach us humility. One is by precept, principle, and we're going
to see that in the passage as our Lord instructs His disciples and us. A second is by example, to show us what humility
does so we can understand it. That's why He washed the disciples feet and
then said, "Do this..." But even more so, in this passage, verse 31,
He described His death which is the greatest illustration of humility ever. So He gives to us both precepts that teach
us humility, and He gives us a pattern, or an example of His own self-emptying, His own
humiliation. The third way that we learn humility is by
experience. And when I talk about experience, I mean painful
experience. I mean humble experiences, devastating suffering. That's the kind of thing that teaches us humility. Now these disciples needed to learn humility
just like we do, even though we are believers, we still have resident pride powerfully exalting
ourselves and we fight against that all the time. They needed this lesson, and we need it. They needed it because they were battling
normal human pride. They needed it because they had a kind of
messianic, triumphalism, and they were expecting the Messiah to enter into His glory any time,
any moment, and, of course, they were going to enter into His glory with Him. They were excited about the glory. They were excited about the exaltation. So their triumphalism needed to be knocked
down a few notches and their normal human pride needed to be assaulted as well. Additionally they had some terrible examples
of what spirituality looks like. What they had grown up with was Judaism and
the dominant features of Judaism were essentially spiritual pride, in every imaginable form,
symbolically and practically. The spiritual leaders of their nation were
men who called attention to their spirituality by artificial and exterior means and exalted
themselves as above the people. They wore enlarged phylacteries on their hands,
they wore enlarged tassels on their robes, symbols of their spirituality...like some
people even wear today in religious garb as if that was some kind of testimony and symbol
of real spirituality. They also went to give money in the temple
and in wanting to make sure everybody do that, they had a trumpeter blow a trumpet to call
people's attention to their giving. When they wanted to appear humbling themselves
and fasting and praying, they threw ashes on their heads and sat in a public place. When they wanted people to know how diligent
they were in prayer, they prayed in public out loud long prayers with endless repetition. These are the spiritual models. Now remember, there's no church. There's no alternative. This is religion as far as they know at its
very best. The Pharisees, the scribes, the rabbis, they
had all exalted themselves and they paraded their exaltation. So with that as the background experience,
the only religious leaders they knew were men who exalted themselves, caught up in the
triumphalism of being the followers of Messiah, knowing that He is the Messiah, and that they
have been chosen elevated their pride and made it difficult for them to be humble. In fact, they were so caught up with pride
that, as you just read, they were all the time arguing about which of them was...what?...the
greatest. They needed this lesson badly. And every time the Lord talked about suffering
and death and cross bearing and self-denial, they pushed it away. It was just alien to them. It was a foreign language that they didn't
interpret. So here comes the lesson on humility. And it begins where it has to begin, I think,
with a reminder of the coming cross because this is the greatest of all humiliations...
the greatest of all. Our Lord promises His suffering and His death,
that's where we begin and then He begins to teach them the lessons concerning principles
and precepts. Let's start then with Christ, the supreme
example of humility. Verse 30. "From there," that is from the region of Caesarea
Philippi, the foot of the mountain, likely Mount Herman where the transfiguration had
taken place. They had come down to the foot of the mountain,
the Lord had been instructing them on the power of faith and the power of prayer in
the prior passage and they left that region up in the north, the northernmost part of
Galilee, Caesarea Philippi, it's called. They then began to go down through Galilee. So they're moving in the direction of Capernaum. They will arrive there, in verse 33, and a
little more private time in Galilee and they'll be on their way south into Judea and finally
to Jerusalem where the Lord will be killed and rise again and from where He will ascend. So we're now progressing in the direction
of the cross. That's what's on our Lord's mind. This is time with the Twelve. This is not public ministry anymore, so even
though He's going through Galilee, which He had done many times for well over a year,
He didn't want anyone to know about it. This is the private ministry. This is the time for Him to spend with His
disciples. There will be a little more public ministry
in Judea when He gets into the south and Matthew and Luke tell us about that, Mark really doesn't
tell us about that. Mark jumps right through the teaching lessons
here, right to the arrival in Jerusalem. But for Galilee, public ministry is really
over. They have made their decision concerning Him
and it is confirmed by His absence. He was teaching, verse 31 says, His disciples. You'll find that again in chapter 10, it flows
through the tenth chapter, one lesson after another, after another, after another, given
to His disciples. He is preparing them for their future. Not only does He remind them all the time
about His death and prepare them for that, as much as good be done, but He instructs
them on matters related to the Kingdom and life in the Kingdom so they'll be able to
know and instruct others. But He begins where He seems always to want
to begin, with His own coming death and resurrection. This is the main thing they need to understand. So He says, "The Son of Man," that great messianic
title drawn from Daniel 7, "is to be delivered into the hands of men and they will kill Him. And when He has been killed, He will rise
three days later." Now remember, they have said, "You are the
Christ, the Son of the living God." They know He is the Messiah, the Christ. They also know He is the Son of God, God the
Son, deity. In spite of the fact that they know that that
is the case, He tells them He's going to die. They can't process that. They can't handle that. They can't comprehend that. You remember in 1 Corinthians 1:23 and following,
Paul says that the cross is to the Jews a stumbling block, right? To the Jews, it is a stumbling block. It is a stumbling block to the Jews to whom
Paul writes and identifies but it was also a stumbling block to these Jews, a crucified
Messiah didn't make sense. They now know He is the Messiah. They know He is the Son of God. They can't...they don't even know the cross
is the way He will die. But death, the death of the Messiah is unacceptable
to them. So he that is convinced against his will is
unconvinced still. They just don't process it. In Luke 9:44, Luke has a parallel account
as does Matthew. And in Luke 9:44, Luke records our Lord as
saying to them, "Let these words sink into your ears." This is an evidence of the difficulty that
they had in accepting it. It just never got very down into their minds,
down into their consciousness because it was so objectionable, so impossible. But nonetheless, the Son of Man is to be delivered. Now I want to stop at the word "delivered,"
paradidomi , it's a really important word because it's repeated many times with regard
to Christ. It is a word that is the technical word used
for a criminal being handed over to judgment and punishment, and perhaps execution. It is a legal term and the use of it here
even hints at the fact that the execution of Jesus will be in some measure a legal act. It is bigger than that, broader than that,
but it is the word that does refer to that kind of legal act of turning over a guilty
criminal for judgment. Matthew uses that same term and so does Luke. Now the question is, who delivers Him over? Who does that? Who is responsible for that? Who is guilty of that? Well, we already know the answer to the question. We already know from chapter 8 verse 31 that
He will be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed. Is it the scribes and chief priests that constitute
the Sanhedrin, the ruling body of Judaism? Are they the ones that deliver Him over? Yes. Certainly they do. According to Acts 3:13, the God of Abraham,
Isaac, Jacob, the God of our fathers has glorified His servant Jesus, the one whom you... speaking to the Jews... you delivered up...
you delivered up and disowned in the presence of Pilate. And according to Matthew 27:2, it was the
Jewish leaders who delivered Him to Pilate. They are there and they're part of that delivering
up. But it isn't just them, how about Judas? Yes, according to Matthew 26:24, "The Son
of Man is to go just as it has been written of Him, but woe to that man by whom the Son
of Man is delivered," or betrayed is another way to translate that word, and that's referring
to Judas. Judas played a role in delivering Him up. And the Jewish leaders played a role in delivering
Him up. How about Pilate? Pilate played a role. Matthew 27:26, Pilate delivered Him to be
crucified. It starts with Judas who delivers Him up,
to the Jews. The Jews deliver Him up to Pilate. Pilate delivers Him up to the executioners. But the real story is not understood until
you read Acts 2:23 where Peter on the Day of Pentecost says, "This man," meaning Christ,
"delivered by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God." God delivered Him up. Judas delivered Him up. The Jews delivered Him up. The Romans delivered Him up. And after all of that, He is crucified. He was delivered into the hands of men. Judas put Him in the hands of the Jewish leaders. The Jewish leaders put Him in the hands of
Pilate. Pilate put Him in the hands of the Roman executioners. And at the end, they killed Him. However, He says when He has been killed,
He will rise three days later. They struggled with that. They struggled with the dying part and I think
they struggled with the rising part. You say, "Well that's a little strange, because
hadn't they seen Him raise dead people?" Yes, yes they had. They had seen Him raise the dead. But that still begs the question because He's
alive. He has the power to raise the dead, but if
He's dead, who raises Him? That's the issue. Even though He had said to them that He would
build His church and the gates of Hades, which is a euphemism for death, could not overcome
Him building His church. They could understand that as long as He was
alive that He had power over death, but if He's dead, who's going to raise Him? First of all, they can't understand the theology
of a dead Messiah, and they can't understand where the power is going to come from. They're really overcome by fear. Verse 32, "They didn't understand the statement
and they were afraid to ask Him." They certainly didn't like what they had heard
up until that point and they really didn't want any more information. They didn't want any details. Matthew adds they were deeply grieved... deeply
grieved. They were in pain. They were in sorrow. They were in sadness even to think about this. And so they just rejected it, which is a defense
mechanism that we do, don't we, when perhaps someone that we know about and we care for
and love has some terrible disease or some terrible accident and we get the initial word
about death and we say, "I can't really believe it." Well this was kind of a permanent situation
for them. He accepted the cross as from God, to accomplish
the plan of redemption from before the foundation of the world, designed, promised by the Old
Testament prophets, foretold from His own mouth. His words were sensible. They were reasonable. They were intelligible. But the reality of it was just beyond their
belief. Messiah? Killed by the religious leaders? The Messiah delivered over in some legal fashion
to be executed? This is impossible. The whole idea is so foreign to their messianic
expectations, so alien to their personal affections, so disturbing to their faith in Christ, so
opposite all the hopes of Israel, so sad, so grievous, so painful, they just could not
accept it, but it was true. The sovereign Lord would become a sacrifice. The pain of this is really very, very deep
and there's a wonderful statement made by our Lord that Luke records at the same incident,
Luke 9:45, let me give you what he said. Luke 9:45, "They didn't understand the statement,"
Luke says that, then he says this, "And it was concealed from them so that they might
not perceive it." Wow, it was concealed. It's a compound word, parakalupto , passive,
something acted on them to conceal this issue in its fullness from them. What's going on here? The Lord protected them. The Lord Himself is the concealer so that
they weren't literally devastated to the bone by this reality. This is a beautiful mercy, by the way. This is too sad. This is too devastating. You can only understand that if you had lived
with Jesus for a couple of years. This is way more than they could ever handle. Some day it will all come back. They would remember all the things that He
said and they would then know His Word was infallible. But they just couldn't deal with the theology
of this, with the implications of this nationally, with the implications of this personally. And the Lord spares them, it says, by concealing
it from them so they might not perceive it. The little bit of shock that these words gave
was all they could bear. They didn't want more information and the
Lord didn't give them any more. You know, one of the Lord's sweet mercies,
I think, is that we can't see the full future. People say, "I wish I knew the future." No you don't. You don't want to know the future. You don't want to know the future. You say, "Wouldn't it be great to know the
future?" No thanks. It would be the worst curse that could ever
be pronounced on anybody. It would eliminate anticipation of anything. It would eliminate surprise. It would eliminate the blessing of planning
and preparing and hoping. It would eliminate all joy. It would engulf us in constant agonizing pain
as everything backed up to be a present disaster. You don't want to know that. We've been given enough to know the sketch
of the future, but we don't need to know anymore. All the excruciating details aren't necessary. The Apostles couldn't handle anymore than
what they had been told. They couldn't even handle that. This is the Lord protecting them. He always promises to be near us and to be
a sympathetic and merciful high priest and never give us more than we can bear, never
more than we can endure, never more than we could handle. That's part of His care over us. That's a wonderful thing to see. They have their limitations and He knows what
they are. The Lord will never take your faith to the
bottom and devastate you. So the Lord then, Himself will be the great
illustration of humility. They don't understand that now, they will
understand it in the future. They will understand it in the future. And now let's turn to the disciples. Verse 33 to 41, these needy students like
us, and we're going to look at the Lord's lesson on humility. It's going to have four negatives and a positive. I'm just kind of breaking it down this way
for you... 4 negative effects of humility, and then a
positive look at humility. Verse 33, "They came to Capernaum," familiar
place, the center of the Galilee ministry. "And when He was in the house...in a house,"
we don't know what house, maybe the house of Peter who lived there. "He began to question them, 'What were you
discussing?'" By the way, the parallel to this is in Matthew
18, it's a rich, full account of all that goes on here. We'll see parts of it in Mark. So they're in this house and they're confronted
by the Lord. Verse 33, "What were you discussing on the
way?" By the way, this is the most effective entry
into teaching. What's on the mind of the students? What do you want to know? What's going on? What are you talking about? Let's go from there to what we need to learn. Well they had been having a discussion. They'd been walking for a long time, we don't
know exactly how long, but it would be a significant journey from...for miles, 20, 30 who knows
miles, up Caesarea Philippi, coming all the way down to Capernaum. And on the way, they were having a discussion,
it was a prolonged discussion. It was a heated discussion. It was, frankly, a really ugly discussion. They were hassling with each other all the
way down the trail. It was an embarrassing discussion. And our Lord exposes that. They didn't want to admit what they were talking
about. But it related to this whole idea of death
and self-denial and taking up a cross and suffering and persecution because they're
still ambitious. They're still self-seeking. They're highly competitive. And they're following, sort of their lifelong
models of self-glorification. Very hard to overcome this. The Apostles were struggling with it, even
preachers in the modern world struggle with this. And what they were struggling with was which
of them, verse 34, was the greatest. Now is that an ugly discussion? You know, if you got together with a group
of your friends and had that discussion, you just wouldn't do that because you would say
that's not appropriate, that's... even though in your heart you go around thinking you're
better than other people, you're not going to have an open discussion about the fact
that I'm better than you are... if you're past eight-years-old, or ten-years-old, very
immature thing to do. But you have to remember what their models
were like . S piritual competition for prominence, wanting
chief seats, names in the marketplace, honors. But they still knew it was wrong. So we now move in to the lesson and the first
thing I want to say is this, "Pride destroys unity... Pride destroys unity." This is the first implication here. He says to them, "What were you discussing
on the way? But they kept silent." Why were they silent? They were ashamed. They were embarrassed. They knew those kinds of attitudes were wrong. They knew those were sinful expressions. Their consciences would tell them that. They were silent because they had been discussing
with one another which of them was the greatest. The Lord has just spoken about His own humiliation
and all they can think about is their own exaltation. They're all proud, self-seeking and pride
is not really able to be contained. Pride is not a private thing. It comes out like all other sin, it is conceived
in the heart but it shows up outside. It is critical. It is judgmental. It is comparative. It belittles. It demeans. It pushes others down for the sake of self-elevation. This is absolutely destructive of unity. When the Lord goes with these guys in the
upper room, and says, "Look, they're going to know you're My disciples by your love,"
having just washed their feet and told them to humble yourselves and do the dirty work
on behalf of each other, they were getting their last lesson before His cross on humble
love, humble service, for the sake of unity. You want to have a unified front, you have
to humble yourself. Only humble people love. And there is no unity apart from humility. Paul writes to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians
3 and he says, "The problem with all of you is that you're carnal. You're carnality shows up, I'm of Paul, I'm
of Apollos, I'm of Christ. You're at each other's throat trying to rate
yourselves and rank yourselves by whoever is your hero." Paul says in Philippians 1:27, "Strive, please
with one mind together for the gospel in one spirit." You can't have a great impact for the gospel
with discord and disunity. This attitude, this competitive attitude is
so strong in them that even after this lesson, and probably many other lessons along the
way, you come over to chapter 10, verse 35, Jesus again in 33 and 34 talks about His death. Again He brings up His death, which, of course,
again is the model of humility. And immediately after that, James and John,
the sons of Zebedee came to say, "Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask of
You." What do you want Me to do? He said. "Just grant that we may sit one on Your right
and one on Your left in Your glory." I mean this is... the brashness of this, this
is mind boggling. This was deep into the fabric of their fallenness
and of their religion. Pride just devastates unity. They actually brought their mother with them
to ask on their behalf. Pride destroys unity and unity is critical. Again, the wonderful testimony of the worthy
walk, according to Ephesians, is humility and humility preserves the unity of the spirit
in the bond of peace because there's one body, one spirit, one hope of your calling, one
Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through
all and in all. The unity of the people of God is a critical
reality for the testimony of the gospel. Disunity is a destructive thing. You've got to get rid of all that competition. Pride destroys unity and they were at each
other's necks, climbing on each other to elevate themselves. Secondly, pride forfeits honor. It not only destroys unity, it forfeits honor. Just the very thing that proud people seek
is not available that way. Proud people battle for position. They battle for self-promotion, self-elevation
in ministry even, just like these men, even now, today, and always. And they get not what they want but the opposite
of what they want. Verse 35, "Sitting down," now He's taking
up the rabbinical teaching position, "Sitting down, He called the twelve and said to them,
'Anyone wants to be first, he should be last of all and servant of all.'" So you want to be first, do you? You want honor? You want elevation? To borrow the words of James and John, you
want to be on the right hand, the left hand in glory? Is that what you want? And by the way, Luke 9:47 says, "Our Lord
knew what they were thinking in their heart," singular, in their heart, singular. They were one heart on this issue. All of them had the same thoughts. You're thinking about being first, being first,
being first and you think the path to being first is to elevate yourself. And I'm telling you, the way to be first is
to humble yourself because pride will forfeit the very thing you perceive you want. You can't get it that way. Spiritual pride appeared to them in their
culture to be a desirable thing and legitimate. But our Lord continually denounces this and
finally in Matthew 23 He just blasts the religious leaders of Israel who love the chief seats,
and love the honored greetings in the marketplace and love to be elevated. And He says, "You hypocrites," over and over,
"You hypocrites, you hypocrites, you hypocrites. All you do is produce sons of hell." "Now God, who gives the rewards, gives grace
to the humble," James 4:6. So pride will forfeit honor. Yesterday I was speaking at a conference up
in the Bay area and very kindly someone got up to give me an introduction. It was really a very grandiose introduction. It was really very unnecessary. And when I got up, I just simply said, "There
goes my eternal reward." I said that kiddingly, of course. But the point is, if what you want is the
accolades and the affirmation and the exaltation of men, you forfeit the real reward. You find true honor when you are willing to
be last, not when you have to be first. In the tenth chapter again, if we can borrow
a little bit from what's coming, verse 43 shouldn't be among you the way it is even
with the Gentile rulers who lord it over everybody, verse 42, but whoever wishes to become great
among you shall be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be slave
of all. And there's the model again. "Even the Son of Man didn't come to be served,
but to serve and give His life a ransom for many." It always goes back to Him as the model. And it's all about serving. It's about being last. Find the path to being last. And what does it mean to be last? To be the servant of everybody, the servant
of all. Pride will forfeit that. Pride is when you have to have everybody serve
you. Thirdly, pride rejects deity. And now it gets really serious. It destroys unity, it forfeits honor, but
it rejects deity. And the lesson on this is clear in verses
36 and 37. "Taking a child, He set him before them and
taking him in His arms He said to them," this is a small child, a child small enough to
be held in His arms and Luke says also, "The child was by His side." So small enough to carry and old enough to
stand up, a little child. This little child is going to be the best
illustration of humility, for the lesson. This child is an object lesson, a visualization,
if you will, a picture. A child has no power, no achievement, no accomplishment,
no greatness, a child is weak, dependent, ignored, vulnerable, nothing to offer. This is a perfect illustration for a believer. "Whoever receives one child like this in My
name." We're not talking about an actual child, talking
about a spiritual child of God, a child like this, "In My name, receives Me." What is He saying? When a believer comes to you, Christ comes
to you. How you treat another believer is how you
treat Christ. What a profound lesson this must have been
if those men got any inkling of what He was intending them to understand. Here you are stepping on each other's necks,
here you are trying to promote yourselves above each other, and instead of opening up
your arms to become the servant of each other, because I come to you in each other, you've
rejected Me. This is serious stuff. Look at Matthew 18 because Matthew 18 gives
you a little more insight into what He said. This is the same teaching, Matthew's account
of it. "At that time, the disciples came to Jesus
and said, 'Who's the greatest in the Kingdom of heaven?' He called a child to Himself and set him before
them." Again, they're always talking about who's
the greatest. We're expecting the answer to the question
to be "You, you're first, you're second, you're third, you're a close fourth, you guys are
tied for fifth." "He called a child to Himself and set him
before them and said, 'Unless you're converted and become like children, you're not even
coming in to the Kingdom. You better get something straight. You all come in as children with no portfolio,
no accomplishment, no achievement. You're weak, totally dependent." Verse 4 makes it clear. "Whoever humbles Himself as this child, He's
the greatest in the Kingdom of heaven." And then He says, "Whoever receives one such
child in My name, receives Me." How you treat other believers is how you treat
Him because Christ comes to you in His children. Just an amazing truth. Christ comes to us in every other believer. What comes next is even more amazing. Look at verse 6. "If you cause one of these little ones who
believe in Me a believer to stumble, get in a fight with them about who's the greatest
and you're leading him into the sin of pride, for example, if you cause one of these little
ones who believe in Me, not children, but spiritual children, Kingdom citizens who are
always going to be children in a sense. "If you cause one to stumble into sin, it
would be better for him, the person who does that, to have a heavy millstone hung around
his neck and be drowned in the depths of the sea." That is a pretty serious crime. You'd be better off to die a horrible death
by drowning with a millstone around your neck, than to ever cause one of the little ones
who believe in Me to stumble. Why? Because I live in that little one. "He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit. And when he comes to you, I come to you." "Don't you know," verse 10, "that you are
not to despise one of these little ones? Don't look down on kataphroneo , belittle,
think little of one other believer because their angels in heaven continually see the
face of My Father who is in heaven." What does that mean? That God looks out for His own children and
the angel surround His throne and watch His face because Hebrews 1 says they're ministering
spirits sent to minister to the saints. The angels are watching the face of God to
pick up His concern over one of His children who is being harmed, and so that the Father
can send the angels to protect that one. All of heaven is watching how His children
are being treated. And they... the bottom line is you better
be careful how you treat other believers. Our Father, according to verse 14, doesn't
want any of His little ones to be devastated. You've got to change the way you think, Jesus
says, then in verse 37, instead of thinking you're better than everybody else, you've
got to become the servant of everybody else and realize that every other believer is a
child of Mine in whom I live and dwell. This would indicate to me, as a footnote,
that even before the cross and even before Pentecost, there was residency in the life
of a true believer. God dwelt in the true believer. Pride is devastating. It devastates others because it destroys unity. It devastates self because it forfeits honor. And it devastates God because it rejects Him
when He comes to us in other believers whom we belittle. Two more. Pride creates exclusivity, it creates exclusivity. This is very interesting. I can't tell you any more about it than what
you can read for yourself. I have the same Bible you do so the details
are what they are. John said to Him, "Teacher, we saw someone..."
let me stop right here. John is beginning to have his conscience bug
him, super-sensitive John, smitten in his conscience, remembers an incident. We don't know when it happened. We don't know anything about it. But John remembers it. And so he says, "Teacher, Master," He says
both those things, Master in Luke, "We saw someone casting out demons in Your name and
we tried to prevent him because he wasn't following us." Look, they were competitive with each other,
trying to be the greatest, and they certainly didn't want anybody else succeeding outside
their group. And here they were somewhere on an occasion
and they ran into someone who was actually casting out demons in Your name. Not trying to, not the sons of Sceva who couldn't
pull it off, and not the phony people in Matthew 7 who say we did this, we cast out demons
in Your name and we did these things. And He says, "Depart from Me, I never knew
you." Not those kind, this is someone who is a true
follower and a true believer. We don't know anything about him. In Luke 10 verse 1, our Lord ordained 70 to
go out two-by-two and He gave them power over demons. And verse 17 of that chapter, it says they
came back and said, "We had power to cast out demons." There were others that the Lord had given
this power to. Perhaps this is one who became a part of the
70. We don't know. But what he was doing was legitimate, God
was doing it because he was a true believer in Christ and he was doing it in the name
of Christ. But they were telling the guy to stop because
he wasn't a part of their group. This is not Simon Magus, folks. This is the real thing here. But they were exclusive. Jesus said, "Don't hinder him. There's no one who will perform a miracle
in My name," and here Jesus affirms that He actually did it in His name and it was a miracle. "And no one is going to be performing a miracle
in My name and be able soon after to speak evil of Me." What happens with pride is that you begin
to become exclusive. You've got your own little club and there's
nobody else in it. And then Jesus makes the principle clear. "For he who is not against us is... what...
is for us. Just be glad." Like Paul, he was in prison and people were
preaching and they were saying terrible things about Paul and they were saying that he was
in prison because he botched his ministry, because he had a secret life of sin. He was in prison because God put him on the
shelf and Paul says in Philippians 1, "They were hoping to add pain to my chains. They were hoping to make me suffer more. They were building their own career and their
own reputation by pushing me down and elevating themselves." And Paul's response is, "I rejoice and will
rejoice if Christ is being preached, whether in pretense or in truth." Wow! There's diversity in the Kingdom. There's diversity in the Kingdom. And just because somebody doesn't dot every
"i" and cross every "t" exactly the way you do and I do is no excuse for us to shut them
down. They're either for us or against us. And if they're for us, they're for us. And if Christ is being preached whether in
pretense or in truth, Christ is being preached, Paul says, I'll rejoice in that and continue
to rejoice. There aren't any competitors, is what that's
saying. There are no real competitors among believers. They're all preaching the same gospel, true
believers stop competing even with people who are outside your group. A final word and a positive note. Humility gains reward. Humility gains reward. "For whoever gives you a cup of water to drink
because of your name as belonging to Christ, literally, truly I say to you, he will not
lose his reward." They got reward on the brain. Greatness equals glory, equals reward. They want the payoff, misthos is the Greek
word, it means wages. They're looking for the payoff, the big payoff. Life's tough... life's tough in that part
of the world in that time in human history, very tough. Kingdom glory, nothing better than that. They want it, they want it now. They want the payoff, the big payoff... glory,
exaltation, elevation. Well pride wasn't going to get them that. But humility would and humility here is demonstrated. It looks like this. You give a cup of water to drink to someone
who belongs to Christ, that's humility. You don't have any psychoanalysis of what
humility feels like. Forget that. Cause as soon as you feel humble, guess what? You're proud. And as soon as you feel proud, you have hope
for humility. I'm not talking about feeling, we're talking
about what humility does because that's the only way you can define it. It looks like this, it's basically kind, it's
basically sacrificial toward those who bear the name of Christ. Whichever one of you goes to the other and
gives a cup of cold water for the sake of Christ, you... you will not lose your reward
cause the fear was, "Oh, if I humble myself, I'm going to lose the fight. This is a competition, we've got to win, we've
got to be first, we've got to be first." So the fear is, if I end up at the bottom,
I'm going to lose the reward, I'm going to lose the prize. No, you're not going to lose it. You're going to gain it. The simple act of sacrificial kindness to
one who belongs to Christ will result in what you will never achieve by elevating yourself. You won't lose your reward, you'll gain it. I think Paul really got the lesson. Turn to Philippians 2, let's close there,
just need to read it. Paul got the lesson and repeated it in his
own words, inspired words. Chapter 2 verse 1, Philippians, "Therefore
if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there's any consolation of love, if there's
any fellowship of the spirit, if any affection and compassion make my joy complete by being
of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose, do
nothing from selfishness or empty conceit but with humility of mind, regard one another
as more important than yourselves. Do not merely look out for your own personal
interest, but also for the interest of others." That's a call to humility, isn't it? And here's the model. Verse 5, "Have this attitude in yourselves
which was also in Christ Jesus, who although He existed in the form of God, did not regard
equality with God a thing to be grasped or held on to, but emptied Himself, taking the
form of a bondservant, or slave and being made in the likeness of men, being found in
appearance as a man, He humbled Himself." How far? "By becoming obedient to the point of death,
even the horrible ignominious death on a cross." That's your model. That's your model. Did He lose His reward by becoming less? No, what happened? "For this reason," verse 9, "God... what...
highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name. God gives grace to the humble. God humbles the proud and exalts the humble." Father, we thank You again this morning for
Your truth that enlightens our minds. The joy of learning it, the delight of it,
as the Psalmist said, I delight in Your Law, O Lord, O how I love Your Law. That delight and that love, that affection
for the truth overwhelms us and brings us joy as we learn these things. What brings us even greater joy is the application
of these things in obedience and that even brings joy to You. Humble us, Lord, humble us under Your mighty
hand and in due time exalt us as You see fit. Help us to know that we will never lose out
on an eternal reward by being last. Those who seek to be first, they lose out. They have their reward, as Jesus said to the
leaders repeatedly in the Sermon on the Mount, you have your reward, you have your reward. And what was it? It was accolades from men. But for those who seek to be last, You're
the one who will give that final reward. We know there will be a great day when we
can take our rewards, the rewards that You've given us by grace, and return them to You
as an act of worship. May we be faithful, Lord, to apply these things
to our hearts and give You the praise for what You will do as the Word finds life through
us. We pray in the name of Christ. Amen. Amen.
