July 25, 2018 – Mark 10:42-44

So Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you, it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must be the slave of everyone else. Mark 10:42-44.

To be first is to be the slave of everyone else.  How we despise the word slave.  Recently a young lady told me she and her father didn’t ever get along.  She didn’t like being told what to do.  

I thought about those words over and over. From the time we are children our world centers around what we want in this life.  Yet, Jesus came and taught us how to live with joy.  His lesson is to ‘love one another’.   In order to love one another, we see others through the eyes of Jesus. Jesus healed physical illnesses, but more importantly, He heals the heart from short-sightedness or spiritual myopia.  When we only see the immediate future and we want ‘our rights’, we are unable to see others hurting around us.

This spiritual myopia can be called self-gratification. This is not new.  Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden wanted to have the wisdom of God and ate of the tree of good and evil, God had forbidden.  This was the first sin, and we commit this same sin.  Jesus is the visual representation of Father God, and taught us. He continues to teach us through The Holy Bible.  Learning His Word gives us the wisdom to love one another. To see as Jesus sees. You are my refuge and my shield; your word is my source of hope. Psalm 119:114

For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Mark 10:45.