I spent some time in Germany this summer, in the town where I grew up. I walked down the hill from our house where my mom still lives to the tram stop at the center of town, the same way I used to walk just about every schoolday for twelve years to get to school. And I noticed that the streets looked so much narrower than they had been in my memory.
I passed the Elementary School - a lovely building with lots of carved sandstone details around the windows and the tall, arched entrance. I remembered how stepping through those doors felt like entering a sacred space, a temple of sorts; I couldn’t help but look up, and I straightened my back, and I swear I felt less like “just a little boy” and more like a scholar, an explorer, a person. Passing my Elementary School this summer I noticed that it was much smaller than in my memory, a rather humble two-story building, but it still communicated the importance of the people who gather inside and the significance of their endeavors. I found myself wondering if perhaps it had been built to scale for 6-10-year-olds, a thought I found quite moving.
Do you remember how big everything was when you were little? How you had to reach up to touch the door knob? How getting on a chair was like climbing a piece of playground equipment? And do you remember that room full of adults who were all standing tall as trees and chatting way up there while you were trying to find your way across through a forest of legs?
We all have memories like that, memories of a world just beyond our reach, a world we can’t wait to belong to. Getting to sit at the grown-up table at family gatherings is easy, it’s just a matter of time, all you have to do is grow a little every year. Getting to hang out with the people you really want to hang out with at school is a lot tougher. That may be when many of us begin to wonder if just being who we are is enough; and we begin to project being the kind of person we believe others want us to be.
The disciples had met Jesus. They had met the one who would set all things right, and they had begun to follow him. He had talked about going to Jerusalem, and they were ready to go with him. But then he kept talking about being betrayed into human hands and being killed. They did not understand what he was saying, and they were afraid to ask him.
Why were they afraid to ask? Well, we kinda know how it is. You want to fit in with those who get it, those who nod knowingly whenever he speaks. Even when you’re frightened, confused and clueless, you still want to project confidence and make everybody else believe that you have it all together. And so in Mark’s story, the disciples, instead of asking how the way of the Messiah could possibly have anything to do with getting killed, they share their aspirations for high office in the kingdom.
Two of them discuss sitting at Jesus’ right and left in his glory. One of them never misses an opportunity to mention that he has been with Jesus the longest. And while one touts his revolutionary zeal, another braggs about his connections in the business community from his days as a tax collector. They are afraid to ask what Jesus meant when he talked about betrayal, suffering, and death in the city, but they clearly have no trouble imagining their seats at the big table and their names and titles on kingdom letterhead.
Jesus, of course, is never afraid to ask. “What were you arguing about on the way?” And suddenly they were silent, the whole chatty, ambitious bunch; no one said a word. Why the sudden silence? Well, we kinda know how it is. Had he asked them in private, individually, several of them probably would have told him about Theophilus who “thinks he’s the greatest” or about Bartholomew who is “dreaming about a seat on the supreme court.” But with everybody gathered around, perhaps they were afraid or too embarrassed to be open about their dreams of greatness.
Three times in the gospel of Mark, Jesus talks about being rejected and betrayed, about being handed over and condemned to death and being killed and rising again after three days. Three times, and not merely because this is disturbing news that messes with our assumptions and won’t sink in easily, but because being a disciple of Jesus means being on the way with Jesus and letting his way of loving surrender of self for the sake of the kingdom shape us. Our ways of thinking, speaking, doing, living are inextricably tied to his way. We don’t understand and we’re afraid to ask not just because we want to keep up the appearance of our deep knowledge. We’re quiet because he messes with our assumptions and has this habit of flipping things upside down in our world. And he does it again. He says, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.”
In our world, those at the top of the ladder lord it over those at the bottom. But in the world Jesus lives, proclaims and opens up, in the world of God’s reign, earth and heaven do not touch at the top, in the clouds of power, but at the bottom where Jesus kneels to wash the feet of all. He defines greatness in terms of service, and nothing else. His way remains at ground level and it leads to all of us, every last one of us.
We all start out little. We all start out needing to be welcomed. We all need somebody to see us and speak our name, somebody to pick us up and hold us, because we all start out small, needy and helpless. How much of our drive for greatness, do you think, has to do with that deep need to be seen, to be noticed and recognized, and finally welcomed?
Jesus took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” We argue about who is the greatest and Jesus puts a little child among us. Who even knew there was a child? Who noticed? We were engaged in important matters, making sure our voice would be heard, our opinion registered, and our contribution recognized in its true significance. And Jesus puts a little child among us.
Politicians pick up little children all the time, it looks good on any screen and it makes them more likeable. But Jesus doesn’t pick up a child to draw attention to himself. He does it to draw our attention to the child.
“In any culture, children are vulnerable,” writes Elisabeth Johnson.
They are dependent on others for their survival and well-being. In the ancient world, their vulnerability was magnified by the fact that they had no legal protection. A child had no status, no rights. A child certainly had nothing to offer anyone in terms of honor or status.[1]
Pheme Perkins observes how “our social conventions have exalted childhood as a privileged time of innocence,” but in stark contrast, “the child in antiquity was a non-person.” And Jesus identifies himself with the child, who was socially invisible.[2]
“Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” You want to be great and you make yourself as big as you possible can, just to be seen and recognized. But in the world of God’s reign you’re not being welcomed because you’re great. You are being welcomed because you belong. So don’t be afraid to shift your attention. Notice the ones that habitually go unnoticed, who are not great by any common measure, and welcome them.
“Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” The welcome, welcome, welcome of Jesus’ radical hospitality on earth resounds like the holy, holy, holy sung in heaven.
Much of our religious tradition has taught us to wonder, “What must I do, who do I have to be, who do I have to become in order to be worthy of welcome by the holy God? How can I work my way up?” But Jesus works at ground level. He looks us in the eye and says, “I see you. I know you. I love you.” He turns our attention away from ourselves and our anxious obsession with our status, and frees us to turn our attention toward each other. He stops the lonely ascend to the top that is our quest for recognition and control, and he guides our feet into the path that leads us to see and serve each other. Jesus opens our eyes to see that the neighbors who are constantly rendered invisible by our arrangements of power, are indeed the embodiment of the invisible God.
Perhaps some of you have been wondering in recent weeks, what became of the men and women who used to live in tents under the Jefferson Bridge. And what became of the people who used to camp at Brookmeade Park? Where do they live now?
How long do we want to pretend that rendering them invisible is the best we can do? When will we finally see them?
[1] https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-25-2/commentary-on-mark-930-37-5
[2] Pheme Perkins, Mark (NIB), 637.