Today’s Scripture Readings

Gospel Reading

NRSV

While Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside by themselves, and said to them on the way, ‘See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified; and on the third day he will be raised.’ Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came to him with her sons, and kneeling before him, she asked a favour of him. And he said to her, ‘What do you want?’ She said to him, ‘Declare that these two sons of mine will sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your kingdom.’ But Jesus answered, ‘You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?’ They said to him, ‘We are able.’ He said to them, ‘You will indeed drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left, this is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.’ When the ten heard it, they were angry with the two brothers. But Jesus called them to him and said, ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave; just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.’

The leaders don’t want to listen to the prophet Jeremiah because he’s speaking a word they don’t want to hear. For them, he may be a prophet, but they only want to hear from the prophet and from God a word that suits them. They’re interested in the power plays of this world, and any word from the prophet has to fit those parameters.

But that’s not the way either the prophet or God work. Nor does Jesus. The disciples are interested in power, position and prestige. Jesus turns this logic on its head and speaks of service and sacrifice. It takes the disciples a long time to understand the truth of Jesus, and we are no different.

Lent is the time to recognise our taste for the power-plays of this world and to turn more resolutely to the way of service and sacrifice, which is the way of true life.