But Jesus called them to Himself and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave� just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.� (Matthew 20:25-28, NKJV)

One of the things I love about Jesus is His complete fearlessness. He was so surrendered to God’s will and had no interest in His own personal gain that there was no need for Him to fear anything. He wasn’t bothered by what people might think of Him as long as He knew what He was doing was pleasing to His Father. How we need more Christians like that today who are not man-pleasers but God pleasers; people who are totally committed to speaking the truth in love no matter what the cost.

This passage in Matthew is yet another example of Jesus’ revolutionary teaching. Nearly everything He says - here and elsewhere - seems to be the very opposite of what the Jews were expecting from “the Son of Man”. Words like “meek” and “servant” were the last thing on peoples mind as they looked forward to the coming of the Messiah. They were looking from a king who would come and overthrow Caesar and the Roman Empire; the establishment of a physical empire. It is in light of this that we can only imagine the kind of astonishment that the disciples must have been filled with as they heard Jesus saying that He hadn’t come to be served (like a king would be), but rather to serve.

Perhaps it is worth thinking for a moment about just what a servant is. Sometimes we can brush over words too quickly an lose the importance of what is being said. This is particularly so here in the West where, by and large, people no longer have servants. The Encarta Dictionary though defines a servant as: “someone who serves another, especially somebody employed to do household jobs such as cooking, cleaning, and serving meals.” Surely Jesus can’t be speaking about Himself in such terms? And yet, we only need to look at His life and we see that He didn’t live for Himself at all. Everything He did was for others…for us. He took serving to a whole new level; He took it to the point of dying for the people He came to serve.

And it is this Jesus in whose footsteps we follow. Do we really want to be like Jesus? Really? Are we prepared to see ourselves as servants just as He did? Or are we quite content holding onto our own lives, living for our own gain, pursuing a comfortable Western life? Jesus is looking for followers after His own heart who will put His kingdom before anything else. And with these people He will change the world.

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