Sunday, 22 March 2020

Matthew 20.17-28 James and John get it badly wrong


Matthew 20.17-28
 

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.”

So, we’re quite late on in Matthew’s gospel and we find Jesus on his slow journey to Jerusalem and the fate he clearly knows awaits him there. We’ve had numerous accounts of conflict with the religious authorities and we’ve had a series of parables and more direct teaching about the nature of salvation: just before today’s passage Jesus dealt with the rich young man leading the disciples to wonder, Who then can be saved?

Matthew generally portrays a much more on-the-ball group of disciples than Mark’s group of slow learners and by this time they’d accepted Jesus’ Messiahship and seemed to be getting a better grip on the nature of his mission and its inevitable outcome.

I say “seemed to be” because then we meet the mother of James and John channelling the full-on pushy Jewish mother stereotype. Declare that these two sons of mine will sit, one at your right hand and one on your left, in your Kingdom. Does her demand for special treatment for her sons come from her own initiative? After all, who here was never embarrassed by a mother’s inappropriate intervention? (Oh, just me then.) But we don’t see the brothers cringing in mortification: quite the opposite. They seem to be fully on board with their mother’s demand for special status. Maybe they even put her up to it. Are you able to drink the cup that I’m about to drink? Jesus asks them – and I’ve read this a number of ways and can’t decide which tone of voice to use here. Is it anger? Amazement at their sense of entitlemet, or deep disappointment, because their response was Yes we are able – and again I’m struggling to interpret the tone of voice. Is this a defiant “Yes we can” or an “Oops, but we’ve gone too far to back down now” response, or just ignorant bravado? Either way, despite all that Jesus has been teaching the disciples and preparing them for what follows, these two at least haven’t grasped the full implications of either what’s about to happen or the nature of discipleship.

Then we hear that the other disciples were angry with James and John. Angry, and perhaps embarrassed, at their lack of understanding or outraged at the idea that they might just lose out to these two in importance in God’s Kingdom?

Matthew doesn’t tell us about Jesus’ mood as he takes them all on one side and explains about the nature of servanthood as opposed to status. Is it a patient, if slightly weary, explanation or a sharp putting in their place? I’m opting for the latter: It will NOT be so among you!

Servanthood’s not a very popular characteristic is it? Who wants to be at everyone’s beck and call? If we examine the way Jesus is portrayed throughout the gospels though, that’s exactly the persona we see him adopt, the servant of all. Greatness with Jesus has little to do with success, reputation or wealth. Were the disciples, or at least James and John, still influence by the popular model of the Messiah that led to political power and authority with top jobs handed out to faithful supporters?

Jesus was facing imminent torture and death. Given that, what was on offer for James and John was the ‘cup’ of persecution. They didn’t see it - yet.

There’s a sense of doom and destiny in Jesus’ words. The anticipation of personal catastrophe’s chilling. When Jesus foretells the Passion, he mentions not just the handover, but the flogging and mocking. It’s hard to imagine the terror he must have experienced in those last weeks.

This walk to Jerusalem is heavy with foreboding. Jesus tries to tell the Twelve of the fears that fill his soul: he’ll be betrayed by friends, delivered to his enemies; he’ll hear the death sentence read over him; he’ll suffer injustice, mockery, humiliation and insults; he‘ll undergo torture and scourging and finally face a horrific death. Jesus describes vividly the degrading ways in which he’ll be treated in his Passion. He does this to prepare his disciples but at this stage they  still seem to be in total denial about the prospect of his suffering and dying.

Where does that leave us today? We’ve heard about the idea of servanthood over time, probably more than the disciples ever did, and with various forms of explanation, so we should avoid their mistake. Status. One-upmanship. Backbiting and jealousy. These are all things which we know are anathema to Jesus and not characteristics of the Kingdom. In many ways these are things that St. Paul often railed against in his letters and he deliberately targeted those fledgling Christian communities when he got news that such behaviour had become an issue.

That’s not the case here: in my observation this congregation isn’t riven by petty jealousies and outrageous ambition or a total ignorance of the servant-like nature of discipleship, even though I’m sure we all have our moments.

Today’s passage I see more as an appropriate reminder, an object-lesson in getting it wrong, something we need to hear from time to time, just to keep us focused.

After all, unlike the disciples at this stage in Jesus’ ministry, we DO know the nature of Jesus’ Messiahship, so have no excuses for self-promotion or expectations of advancement as a consequence of our discipleship.

Here in the west, we may not face the cup of persecution as some of our brothers and sisters do elsewhere, but we still have the responsibility, the expectation of humble service towards each other and beyond this congregation. But servant-hood isn’t a one-size-fits-all characteristic. Here we are with a variety of personality types and skill-sets which the Holy Spirit will use to express the servant-like nature of discipleship in a myriad of different ways. Let’s allow the Spirit to do her thing in our lives as we ask for help to lay aside our petty jealousies and ambitions for the sake of the Kingdom.

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