Click Here - Matthew 20:17-28.
Greatness. The world measures it one way – power. The ability to control not only our own life, but the lives of others is something that we all desire and crave. It’s part of our sinful nature. Look back at times when relationships have been damaged or destroyed in your life. Most likely a large part of the problem stemmed from one person (or both of them) exerting too much power over the other. Look at problems in our country, with both political parties existing (or so it seems) simply to have power over the other. And in the world, we see tyrants trying to maintain control of their power by killing their own people.
Jesus measures greatness in a very different way – humility. The exact opposite of power. For Jesus, the true sign of greatness with the ability to set aside one’s desire for power and self, and to focus on helping others. And to be honest, we don’t even have the power to do that. So often even our service of others ends up being for selfish reasons: to make us feel better, to make us look better in the eyes of others, or for some other self serving reason. We cannot be like Jesus, desiring to serve instead of being served.
But that’s the reason He came, to serve us in the ultimate way, by giving His live as a ransom for our power-hungry, internally-focused, self-serving lives. And He gives us His Holy Spirit, to guide us, for humble us, to lead us to give up our desires for His-desires.