Let's take our Bibles now and
turn to Mark chapter 10. Mark chapter 10, we'll be looking
at verses 35 through 45. And it's a lesson that we all must
learn. Every child of God is gonna learn
this lesson. Unfortunately, we have to learn
it over and over. It's a lesson in humility. It's an exposure of pride. And it's also a revelation of
the ignorance that plagues us all. Mark chapter 10, verse 35. And James and John, the sons
of Zebedee, come unto him, saying, Master, we would that thou shouldest
do for us whatsoever we shall desire. What a question. We want you to do anything we
want you to do. And he said unto them, what would
ye that I should do for you? They said unto him, grant unto
us that we may sit one on the right hand and the other on thy
left hand in thy glory. But Jesus said unto them, you
know not what you ask. Can you drink of the cup that
I drink of and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized
with? And they said unto him, we can. And Jesus said unto them, you
shall indeed drink of the cup that I drink up. And with the
baptism that I am baptized, with all shall ye be baptized. But
to sit on my right hand and on my left hand is not mine to give. But it shall be given to them
for whom it was prepared. When the ten heard it, they began
to be much displeased with James and John. But Jesus called them
to him and saith unto them, you know that they which are accounted
to rule over the Gentiles exercise lordship over them. And their
great ones exercise authority upon them. But so shall it not
be among you. But whosoever will be great among
you shall be your minister. And whosoever of you will be
the cheapest shall be servant of all. For even the Son of Man
came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his
life a ransom for many. Now let me give you five things
this morning that I see in our text that sum up this lesson
in humility. The first thing I want you to
see is a shocking reality. James and John, they were called
in the scripture the sons of thunder. two true disciples of Christ,
faithful believers, men under the tutorship of Christ himself. Yet here, demonstrating that
the nature of sin that plagues us all is manifested, and this ignorance and pride
is brought into light. And not only theirs, but according
to Matthew, they brought their mother, or I probably should
say their mother brought them. It was their mother who was doing
the talking, not them. But Christ could see past all
that, and when he spoke, he spoke to them. He didn't speak to the
mother. She might have even instigated
it. What mother would not want her
two sons to sit on the right hand and on the left hand of
the Lord Jesus Christ? But what pride and arrogance
to even think such a thing, yet in their ignorance, they didn't
know anything was wrong with it. They thought what they were
asking was a good thing to ask. To me, it's a shocking reality
that even believers and men of great renown can be ignorant
of things which seem to be almost elementary to others. You think about this. He was
grooming them to be apostles, the very foundation of our faith
in the New Testament. And these great men were ignorant
of the very nature of the kingdom of God and ignorant of the necessity
of his substitutionary death. Yet Mary Magdalene understood
it clearly and she held no office at all. Think about that. And this is manifested all the
time. I'll never forget going out to Illinois years ago, Austin,
I think that was the name of the little town in Illinois. And we were out there preaching,
and after the service, the pastor said, I enjoyed your message
this morning, but he said, I've got a bone to pick with you over
the message. And I said, well, let's have
it. And he said, well, we did an
extensive study. There was only three of them
meeting. He had appointed himself the teacher. And he said, we
did an extensive study, and he said, nowhere in the New Testament
does our Lord ever refer to a believer again as a sinner. And I was
so shocked by his statement, and Henry's son-in-law was with
me, and we were both so shocked by it, we couldn't even think.
And we had a new believer. He hadn't been going to church
probably three months, and he wanted to ride out with us, so
we let him. And he looked at him, and he said, well, what
about this one? This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all the acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the
world to save sinners, of whom I am chief. That's what the Apostle
Paul said. And he sat there for a minute,
and he said, we might have missed that one. This happens all the time. Men
of high renown, men of big education, men highly esteemed among men,
they're totally ignorant about great truths. And it seems like
the least in the kingdom of God know them well. Isn't that something? That ought to teach us something
about humility. And then here's another thing
under the same headache. We learn here that God's saints
in this world are still sinners. Are you aware of that? We're
sinners. We're sinners being saved by
grace. There are some that want to deny
this, but their denial of it is the very evidence that it's
in them. You wouldn't deny it if you knew it. The scripture
speaks of a spiritual warfare, an inward struggle that exists
until we die. Goes on our whole life. Paul talks about it in Romans
chapter seven. He said, the good that I would,
I do not. The thing that I would not, that's
what I do. He said, I find then a law when
I would do good, evil is present in me. In Galatians chapter 5 and verse
16, he said, This I say then, walk in the Spirit, and you shall
not fulfill the lust of the flesh. If the flesh was not still sinful,
there'd be nothing to worry about, would there? He said, For the flesh lusteth
against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, and these
are contrary the one to the other. so that you cannot do the things
that you would. Every believer would be just
like Christ. That's what he wants. He wants
to live like Christ lived. He wants to give like Christ
gave. He wants to be like Christ. He wants to love people like
Christ loved people. But the good that I would, he
said, I don't do. I don't do. I want to. John wrote this long after this
day. He said, if we say we have no
sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. And if
we say we have not sin, we make him a liar and his word is not
in us. We cannot deny that we're yet
sinners in this world. And then what about the other
disciples? Matthew said they were filled
with indignation. And it wasn't over what James
and John asked. It was because they asked before
they did. They beat them to it. They were
filled with indignation. And it's a shocking reality to
be awakened to your present sinful self. But for the grace of God, you'd
do anything anybody else ever did. Now, you wanna read about
the saints, read about David. He was a prophet. You reckon David was saved? Well,
sure he was. But see that saved man. I mean,
if you see him down there protecting the flock and killing the lion
with his bare hands, and you see all this stuff that David
did, slaying the giant and all these things, and you have no
doubt, this is God's man. This is God's prophet. You see
him being anointed down there in the house of Jesse and all
these things above his brethren. And you see his life being manifest. You can't doubt that this is
a child of God. But then see him on that rooftop.
lusting after another man's wife. And it wouldn't work out for
him, so he began to plot and plan, murdered her husband, who
was a faithful servant of his, murdered him, and then committed
adultery with his wife. There's nothing that a believer
won't do that an unbeliever would do, but for the grace of God. It's a shocking reality. We know
it appears. We know this. But it's a shocking
reality when it comes down here. And God manifests it in some
event in your life. He manifests that to you in decisions
that you've made and things that you've done. And it's a shocking
reality. All right, here's the second
thing. Something of which All men are
ignorant and that is the inner working of faith by the Spirit
of God in the believer. These two disciples in ignorance
and pride thought they could drink of the cup which was given
to Christ to drink. Now what is this cup? It's the
wrath of God. That's what we're talking about.
Can you drink of the cup that I... He drank the wrath of God
and drank it dry. He swallowed even the dregs at
the bottom of the cup. And these two disciples in ignorance,
they didn't understand what he was talking about. And in ignorance
and pride, they thought they could drink of the cup which
was given to Christ to drink and be fully immersed buried,
baptized with the baptism he was baptized with. And then here's
the shocker, verse 39 in Mark 10, as I studied this. Our Lord
said, you shall indeed, you shall indeed drink of the cup that
I drink of, and with the baptism that I'm baptized with, all shall
you be baptized. Now knowing what this cup is
and knowing what this baptism is, I want you to understand
that for them to do this is an absolute impossibility. If you could drink the wrath
of God dry, there'd be no reason for hell. You would suffer that
hell just as Christ did and it'd be over with. But you can't do
it. You can't do it. It's absolute impossibility.
And besides that, it's contrary to the scripture. By his own
blood, he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained
eternal redemption for us. And then it says in the scriptures
about this, I have trodden the winepress alone. And of the people,
there was none with me. I looked, and there was none
to help. And I wondered that there was
none to uphold. Therefore, my own arm brought
salvation. Jesus Christ offered himself
alone, alone to God. So when he says they shall indeed
drink that cup that he drinks of and be baptized with that
baptism, that what he's actually talking about here is something
that happens representatively. And we do it by faith. By faith. By faith, we see ourselves in
him drinking that wrath of God. We see ourselves in him being
fully immersed under that wrath of God. We see him as our substitute
and we receive him by faith. And so by faith we can sing with
David. He said, I will take the cup
of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord. That's the
only way that we can do what our Lord said that they would
do. And this is the very thing symbolized
in the ordinances given to the church. Baptism. We're buried with him in baptism,
representatively. We died with him. We were buried
with him. But we're risen with him. And
drinking of the cup and eating of the bread, spiritually eating
and drinking the body and blood of Christ, a body given to reconcile
us to God. Faith perceives this, and it
rejoices in this, and it finds assurance in Him. And then thirdly,
I want you to see a glorious precept. He establishes a New
Testament precept here. The Lord understood what he was
dealing with and who he was dealing with, and so he graciously teaches
them the truth. In verse 42, he tells them of
the world and how things are. He said, here's how it is in
the world. They exercise lordship over folks,
and their great ones exercise authority upon folks. what we used to call climbing
up the ladder of success. You get up this far and you get
this title and you go up a little further and you get this title
and you go up a little further and you get that title and then
you begin to exercise authority. And that's what these two were
asking, that they might sit on his right hand and on his left. But he said this is not how it
is in the kingdom of God. These men still had visions of
an earthly kingdom and probably thought his resurrection from
the dead would be its beginning. They saw him raise the dead,
so it wasn't terribly hard for them to realize that he could
raise himself from the dead. And when he told them he was
going to Jerusalem and they were going to judge him and put him
to death and on the third day he was going to rise from the
dead, they took this as the beginning of the kingdom. Now he's going
to After demonstrating his power over death, he's going to begin
his kingdom. And he's going to bring in this
new kingdom and establish it here in this world. But his kingdom is spiritual.
And so he gives this precept to him. He said, so shall it
not be among you, but whosoever will be great Now that's what
they aspired to be. They aspired to be great. And
here our Lord said, would you be great? Whosoever will be great
among you shall be your minister. And whosoever of you will be
cheapest shall be servant of all. How contrary that is to our way
of thinking. Huh? It just don't fit, does
it? Huh? How unnatural to our way
of thinking is this precept, and how utterly foreign it is
to our thoughts. And yet this is the very nature
of the kingdom of God. Our goal is to serve, not to
rule. If He gives us a place of authority,
that place of authority has to do with ministering, it has to
do with sacrifice, it has to do with giving. Our aim is to give, not to receive,
and our ambition is humility and not pride. Which brings me to the fourth
thing. He gives them the ultimate example. In verse 45, he said, for even
the son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister,
and to give his life a ransom for many. In Philippians chapter
two, verse five, it says, let this mind be in you, which was
also in Christ Jesus. who being in the form of God
thought it not robbery to be equal with God. This is his state
before his condescension into the earth. He's equal with God,
and he didn't think it was robbery. He was really equal with God. He was God. In the beginning
was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He thought it not robbery to
be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation. Try to measure that span. Try to calculate how far down
that was. He made himself of no reputation. He took upon him the form of
a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. Now watch this. And being found
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself. My soul, what a humbling
thing for God to take to himself human flesh
and the title of a servant. But then this servant, humbled
himself and became obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly
exalted him and hath given him a name which is above every name. Isn't that what he just told
those disciples? He that would be cheapest among
you must be minister to all. He's gotta be a servant to all.
That's exactly what he did. Here's our example, here's our
pattern, the least becoming the greatest. The world always talks
about heaven, and they always talk about going up, climbing
up, ascending up. Our Lord said here it's a coming
down. It's a coming down. And then let me close on a very
positive note. one to which our Lord gave to
his disciples often. Look here at the last part of
verse 45. And to give his life a ransom
for many. Here is the motive for all of
our service, our ministering, and our humility. He gave his
life for the sheep. He loved us, the scripture said,
and gave himself for us. Here in his love, John wrote,
not that we love God, but that he loved us and sent his son
to be a propitiation for our sins. And then he writes, beloved,
if God so loved us, we ought to love one another. That's our motive. It's the love
of Christ, Paul said, that constraineth us. Where did that great love take
him? Took him down to be minister
of all, didn't it? It took him deep into perfect
humility. It took him down so far as to
be numbered with the transgressors, to be judged as a sinner, to
bear our sins in his own body on the tree. And if that don't
motivate you to be a servant and a minister and bring humility
to you, how far short of this do we come? Somebody just say
a little something sideways. Man, I pout, throw my face down. They be smiling, I ain't gonna
smile. I'm mad. Oh, how far short of
this humility do we come? If I don't motivate you, I'll
tell you this. Somebody said one time I needed
to come over and point my finger at somebody. And I said, if I
can't motivate you with the death of Christ, what good is it gonna
do for me to stand in your yard and shake my finger at you? Ain't
gonna do any good. And I'm not gonna do it. I'm
not gonna do it. Lord, teach us how to serve in
your kingdom. How to give to one another, how
to care and minister for Christ's sake. How to humble ourselves. Peter, that's what Peter said,
humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt
you in due season. And I'll tell you, if this is
what you're shooting for, You need God to exalt you in due
season. It's not going to do any good
for you to exalt yourself or somebody in some denomination
to exalt you or a committee to get together and give you a diploma
and exalt you. That's not going to do you any
good. Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God that He
may exalt you in due season. And I tell you what you're going
to do when He does. He's going to put those crowns on your head
up in glory. And you're gonna all gather around,
and the lamb of God's gonna come into your midst, and the first
thing you're gonna do is take that crown off, throw it at his
feet. He's the only one worthy. He's
the only one worthy. May God teach us this lesson. Thank you.