The Great Servant King

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0:16In God's sovereign providence, and perhaps with a little irony, we come in our ongoing series through Matthew, this Father's Day, to a text that centers on the request of a mother. But I think that this text has a lot for us, whether we're fathers, mothers, children, singles. And so would you pray with me as we go to the Lord in this text together?

0:40Lord God, we pray that you would come now and help us to have the right eyes to see and ears to hear and hearts to understand what you have for us this morning. We're thankful for the truths in this text that we have a gracious and merciful Lord and Savior, one who doesn't rule over us in a domineering way but comes instead and sacrifices himself in our stead. I pray that you would work in us a great faith to see and savor the work of Christ, and then I pray that you would come now by your Spirit to help us live in his footsteps. I pray that you would do that in his name. Amen.

1:24So starting with the parents in the room, can any of the parents resonate with the request that James and John's mother makes in this passage? When parents are holding their newborn babies or when we're teaching them how to drive, I'm not there yet, how to work hard, how to succeed in life, when we do all of these things, we have dreams for them. We have dreams that their life will grow into something great and amazing. The parents, especially moms, want our kids' dreams to come true. As a pastor, I get to officiate a lot of weddings, and there's this moment after the ceremony where we come to the reception, and there's a sweet connection between mothers and sons often.

2:05And I think probably over 50% of the weddings I've done have had the song "My Wish" by Rascal Flatts as the mother-son dance. I'm not saying you can't do that, I'm just saying it's common. But if you know that song, it goes, "My wish for you / Is that this life becomes all that you want it to / Your dreams stay big, your worries stay small / You never need to carry more than you can hold." Some of you wanted to sing that. Parents, perhaps especially moms, dream big dreams for our children. When we read Luke 2:52, we might echo the prayer, those words as a prayer for our kids. It's a good prayer.

2:46Lord God, would you help my kids like Jesus to increase in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and with men? And why do we pray that prayer? We pray it because we want great things for our children. I think even more so, that desire reflects something inside each and every one of us. We all want to be great. We want positions of authority. We want to win friends and influence people. We want, in a word, glory. All of us want to be great, we want to be recognized for that greatness, and we want to make a mark of significance in this world, and that is the idea that sits underneath this text this morning.

3:31And James and John, through their mother, ask Jesus for positions of power and authority and glory in Christ's coming kingdom. They want to be great, and their mom wants it for them, too. But Jesus is going to recast their, and our, view of greatness this morning. He's going to show them that the best way to get there is not what they were expecting. And here's what Jesus will show us. In his kingdom, the last shall be first. So the path to greatness moves through humiliation into glory. Or to put it more succinctly, Jesus is asking, "Do you want to be great? Pursue greatness by serving and sacrificing like Christ."

4:24Jesus' answer to the quest for greatness and glory inside each and every one of us this morning is that we would turn our eyes from ourselves and to him, and that we would pursue greatness by serving and sacrificing like our servant king. And so here's the outline of how Jesus is going to get there. He repeats his death and resurrection predictions in verses 17 through 19. Then James and John bring the request through their mother in verses 20 through 23, and Jesus finally will recalibrate greatness in his kingdom in verses 24 through 28. So repetition, verses 17 through 19, request, 20 through 23, and recalibration in 24 through 28. So to begin, let's look at Jesus' third and final prediction of his death and resurrection in verses 17 through 19.

5:17Matthew writes, "And as Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the 12 disciples aside. And on the way he said to them, 'See, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified, and he will be raised on the third day.'" So for the third time now, Jesus is telling his disciples. He pulls them aside. We're drawn into this private conversation. He tells them for the third time that he's going to die and then rise again. He repeats this once again, but notice the progression and details from the first two predictions of Jesus's death and resurrection.

6:05Back in chapter 16:20-21, listen to this From that time, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. Or consider the second prediction in chapter 17, verses 22 and 23. He says, "The Son of Man is about to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him, and he will be raised on the third day." So, let's look at two factors that are different between those two predictions and this one in our chapter. First, Jesus is showing them that what they've been leading up to, that time is right now.

6:51In chapter 16, Matthew writes, "He must go to Jerusalem." In chapter 17, "He's about to be delivered," Jesus says. And now in chapter 20, Jesus says, "We are going up to Jerusalem." It's like, hey, it's happening. It's happening. Get ready. A second difference is this. Consider the depth of detail in this last prediction. In chapter 16, Matthew describes that he will suffer many things and be killed, and then be raised. Or Jesus tells them in chapter 17 that he will be delivered and killed and then raised. But listen to our text this morning. The Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and scribes.

7:35They will condemn him to death, delivered again over to the Gentiles, mocked, flogged, crucified, and only then raised on the third day. The detail in chapter 20 is astonishing. So yes, this is a repetition of his previous two foretellings, but the differences are obvious. He wants them to see two things. The time is now, and it's going to be awful.

8:04Wake up. It's happening, and I'm going to the depths of suffering. And why does he want them to know these things? Three reasons he wants them to know. First, he wants them to know that he loves his people. Second, he wants them to not be afraid. And third, he wants them to follow him into suffering. So the first of those, he wants them to know that he loves his people. What a kind and courageous savior we have. He wants his disciples and us to know that he wasn't taken off guard when they came to him and arrested him. He wasn't surprised when they showed up in the Garden of Gethsemane. No. He knew far beforehand, and then he went willingly. He went eagerly.

8:58He went purposefully. Above all, he went joyfully because he loves his people. The second reason to tell them in advance, he wants them to not be afraid. Yes, it's going to get bad. It's not just going to vaguely get bad, like delivering and death. No. Bad as it gets. Handed over to the enemies, mocked and flogged and spit on and crucified. But resurrection is coming, so don't be afraid. And the third reason Jesus tells them for a third time is that he wants them to follow him into suffering. Jesus has spent the last few chapters, if you've been walking through Matthew with us, calling his disciples to pick up the cross of discipleship, to follow him in the way of Jesus.

9:55So as hard as things will get, he wants the disciples to willingly and eagerly and purposefully and joyfully follow him into suffering, knowing that glory is on the other side. Which is why the response in the next verses is so interesting. Look at what happens next in verse 20. "Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came up to him with her sons, and kneeling before him, she asked him for something. And he said to her, 'What do you want?' She said to him, 'Say that these two sons of mine are to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left in your kingdom.'" So the question is: how do we move from a private conversation with the disciples, they were pulled aside, now to the mother of the two sons coming with this request to Jesus?

10:49I think what's going on here is that we see she comes up to him with her sons. So most likely, James and John heard Jesus' repetition of his death and resurrection prediction. They went to mom, unpacked what was happening, and then came up with this idea. In Mark 10, we see that the sons are credited with asking Jesus. So this is most likely a request from the sons through the mother, and so I think it's like a little group of kids that are figuring out, hey, which parent should we ask? Who should be the representative? How are we going to get this pushed through? That's a little what's going on here, and the request is this: "Jesus, when you enter your kingdom, after you are raised on the third day, can these two sons of mine sit in the positions of power and authority and glory in your kingdom?

11:39Can you grant them to sit on your right hand and your left hand?" And I know we can be quick to pile on here. I mean, who does she think she is? Who do these boys think they are? How selfish and greedy and prideful. But before we do that, I think we should notice something about this request in comparison to the reactions in the first two predictions about Jesus's death and resurrection. Back in 16, you might remember that after Peter hears Jesus predicting his suffering and death for the first time, he responds, "Far be it from you, Lord. To which Jesus rebukes him. Peter can't possibly imagine a Messiah that would come to die.

12:27And then later in chapter 17, Jesus predicts his death and resurrection a second time, and the text says this of his disciples, "They were greatly distressed." The disciples can't see to the other side of suffering, to the glory awaiting Jesus. And so before we judge James and John and their mother, I think we should think about the nature of their request. Even though this is the third prediction, and even though it's the absolute clearest on how much Jesus will suffer, for the first time, I think somebody's seen to the other side. He will be raised on the third day. So albeit mixed in motives, James and John's mom has a real faith, kneeling before Jesus, waiting until he asks her what she wants, and then knowing that he has the power to deliver on this request.

13:23So there's a problem, and Jesus is going to deal with that in a moment. But if the first two reactions show a lack of faith in Jesus' resurrection victory, this one, its problem is that it can't see what comes before that. They can't see the suffering necessary before true glory. This request is a little bit like a health and wealth prosperity gospel that wants to get the glory and the blessing and the benefit before or without any of the trial. But in Jesus' kingdom, the path to greatness moves through death into life. In Jesus' kingdom, the path to greatness moves through humility into victory. So Jesus responds in verse 22.

14:12"Jesus answers, 'You don't know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?' They said to him, 'We are able.'" The you in verse 22, if you're a Southerner, you'll like this. It's a plural you, like y'all or you guys if you're from the West Coast, which we can't see because we're seeing this in our English Bibles, but we can see that they respond to what Jesus is saying. He's talking to not only their mother, who made the request, but to the two sons as well. "Are you able to drink my cup?" He turns to the brothers and their mother, and he tells them that they don't even know what they're asking.

14:59This is a simple and powerful rebuke because the cup is a picture of God's wrath being poured out on the wicked. Psalm 75:7-8 says this, "It is God who executes judgment. From the hand of the Lord there is a cup with foaming wine, well mixed, and he pours out from it, and all the wicked of the earth shall drain it down to the dregs." So Jesus' rebuke is quite simple. You can't bear the wrath of God.

15:33You need someone else to stand in your place and drink it for you. You don't know what you're asking. And also, you misunderstand glory and greatness. In my kingdom, Christ is saying, the path to greatness moves through humiliation, through suffering into glory. So when Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane, praying for the cup to pass him, the Father's answer is no, because of the glory awaiting on the other side. And then Christ joyfully takes that cup for his people. Jesus is saying, "You don't know. You don't know. You don't understand my kingdom." The sons and their mother want earthly glory, positions of power and honor and authority, when in Christ's kingdom, greatness is measured by likeness to Jesus.

16:30And the pathway to glory is paved with humility. And they should want to be great, which means being like Jesus. So they should want to be great by imitating Jesus in both the suffering and the vindication by God. So when they respond, "We are able," we should see the irony. We should see that they don't understand, and they still do not understand what they are saying. This is like a couple of spectators at the finish line of the Boston Marathon. This would be me. You're at the Boston Marathon, you see the runners come across, and you think, "I could do that." You have no idea how much they ran to get ready.

17:08You have no idea how hard it was on miles 16 and 20, when the legs are giving out. Or maybe even more extreme, it's like people looking out the window at climbers on Mount Everest. This would also be me. And they see the little people reaching the summit, and they say, "We could make it. It looks like a great view up there." So James and John only see the finish line. They see the summit. They see raised on the third day, and they think, "We can drink the cup." But Jesus is saying they have no idea what they are asking for. And yet he responds graciously. Oh, how gracious our Savior is with us when we ask for the wrong things.

17:55Rather than correcting them directly, rebuking them for their arrogance, putting them in their place, he's going to shift the dialogue with kindness. Look at this, verse 23. "He said to them, 'You will drink my cup. But to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.'" So eventually, the disciples will join in the suffering of Christ for his kingdom. After he bears the wrath of God on the cross, after he's risen from the dead, James will be martyred in Jerusalem for the cause of Christ. John will be exiled to the island of Patmos to die in isolation. They will suffer for the sake of Christ's name, but he's trying to get their eyes off of future positions of glory, because you don't get those positions by asking for them.

18:47No, you get them by his grace, and by obeying the will of the Father in heaven. So focus on that instead. Remember, Jesus is saying, "In my kingdom, the path to greatness moves through suffering into glory. Your request should be, 'Lord Jesus, make us like you.'" And so some of you might be wondering how this passage even works. In other words, how does the Son not have the authority to grant positions of glory in his Father's kingdom? Well, Jesus is one person with two natures, fully God, fully man. The divine Son of God comes down from his heavenly position. The second person of the Trinity takes on human flesh.

19:33And so acting according to his divine nature, the Son of God knows all things, has authority for all things, has power to do all things, and acts as one with the Father and the Spirit. We see this in places like John 2, where Jesus knew what was in man. The Father grants positions of authority through the Son, by the Spirit. In these verses, though, the Son of God, acting according to his human nature, is on a mission. He's sent by the Father in heaven to go to Jerusalem, to make a way for these positions of authority, to win these positions of authority for his people. So he's working to make these positions of glory possible.

20:19And so I think of this verse a little bit like a general before a battle. So the general is gathering his subordinates. He's saying, "We are going to win." And they respond, "Hey, after this, who's getting promoted?" And the general responds, "Promotions have been prepared by the council of generals, but that is not our focus. That's not what we're worried about. Do your job with me now. I'm going to lead you into this fight. Let's go to battle, and glory is on the other side." So he's not denying his own authority in this verse, but instead, he's refocusing on the mission at hand. James and John want to know about promotions, and Jesus is saying, "Let's go to war."

21:08And so his sacrificial death is where he moves next, as he begins to recalibrate their hearts in verses 24 through 28, to true greatness. And so first, the disciples begin arguing in verse 24. "And when the ten heard it, they were indignant at the two brothers." And this verse shows that all of the disciples, not just the brothers, are guilty of this same glory-seeking fault. I think of kids having an argument, and correct one of the children, and the other one, in pride, stands over the sibling and says, "Yeah." I'm like, "You're guilty, too. What are we doing here?" That's what's happening in verse 24.

21:48They're not indignant at the brothers because the brothers should be seeking Christ's kingdom. They're indignant because they have the same sickness in their hearts. They're indignant that James and John would act better than them. They're indignant that James and John would consider their roles to be worthy of more glory and honor in Christ's coming kingdom than their own. They're angry because James and John are asking for recognition when they feel like it should be theirs. And doesn't that just show the state of our own hearts? We do this very same thing. Pride is insidious. Pride waits to be offended.

22:32And pride acknowledges that Jesus is Lord over my whole life, and then when Jesus doesn't organize it the way I want or gives credit to someone else, I'm upset. Which provides Jesus an opportunity to recalibrate everyone, including us, to true greatness in verse 25. "And Jesus calls them to him. And he said, 'You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.'" So Jesus is once again saying that the disciples don't understand his kingdom.

23:29You're arguing, you're indignant at one another, and you don't know what true greatness is. In Jesus' kingdom, the first shall be last. In Jesus' kingdom, greatness is measured by service. In Jesus' kingdom, positions of authority correspond to positions of servitude. How high you're up is really how low you're down. He unfolds this proposition with a negative comparison, and then a positive comparison. So negatively, Jesus wants his followers to not be like the rulers of the Gentiles. The rulers of the Gentiles, they rule from their position. The phrase, "lord it over them," it appears in other places with the idea of being domineering.

24:16The connotation here is of mastering someone by force, putting them in subjection. These people take seriously the maxim, "It's better to be feared than loved." They love positions and power, and not people Jesus is saying, "Don't be like them." For my followers, Jesus is saying, "In my kingdom, greatness is measured by likeness to me." So the positive comparison Jesus makes for greatness is quite naturally to himself. And I love how Jesus doesn't say this with any sense of sinful pride. Jesus is not an egomaniac when he says that we should follow his example, because his example is perfect. His example is that he came not to be served, but to serve.

25:08The Son of God, the very radiance of the glory of God, the exact imprint of his nature, the one who upholds the universe by the word of his power, the image of the invisible God, the one by whom, and through whom, and for whom all things in this entire universe exist. That Son of God, the one deserving of all worship, all service, that Son of God emptied himself of glory and position. He deserved to be served, yet he came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. He came to die instead of sinners. This verse is a beautiful summation of the gospel. This verse is a succinct way of understanding the good news of Christianity. My prayer is that this verse would be baked so deep into our souls, that we know who we are and whose we are, because of this verse.

26:16Jesus drank the cup of God's wrath, all of it, down to the dregs, in our place, in our stead. He substituted for us all the way down to the death that we deserve. So now, in him, by faith alone and not our own works, we can be made right with God for all of eternity. Jesus paid for the wrath deserved by us so that God could be both just and the justifier of those who call on the name of Jesus in faith. Jesus makes us children of God by the truth in this verse. Praise the Lord. God is a good father because Jesus has made a way for us to be right before him. That is true greatness. True greatness is sacrificial and substitutionary service done for the glory of God.

27:13True greatness serves and sacrifices like Jesus. True greatness looks not only to its own interests, but to the interests of others, and true greatness looks a lot like death. It often goes unnoticed and unthanked. It requires at least death to self. True greatness happily shares that favorite toy when you really don't feel like it, and true greatness changes another diaper, it makes another meal, it does another load of laundry, it drives to another event. True greatness works hard to provide, even when the job has lost meaning and fulfillment. It plays catch. It reads out loud. It wrestles even when you'd rather lay on the couch.

28:01True greatness shows up to care for and love on an aging parent, even when that aging parent can't remember your name. True greatness takes a week off of work, not for a vacation, but to go and serve at a camp for kids and adults with special needs. True greatness stays in the same kids' classroom for 20 years. It signs up to pray and hold babies in the nursery, or to pray for and hug middle schoolers on the other side of the church. True greatness labors to translate these sermons into Chinese week after week without any recognition. True greatness picks up trays and washes dishes. It shows up early, it stays late, it cleans up what 15 other people have walked past, and it smiles all the way through it knowing that glory waits on the other side when we hear the words, "Well done, my good and faithful servant."

29:00So Jesus is recalibrating the measure of greatness to align with the measure of his own greatness. You want to know how to be great? Look at me. That's what Jesus is saying. In his kingdom, greatness is measured by service, sacrificial and substitutionary service. And the path to greatness imitates him by moving through humility into glory. So that's what he wants his disciples and us to walk away with from this text. So three applications that flow from this passage. First, worship. Second, service. And third, endurance. Worship, service, and endurance. So first, worship. Before we act in other ways, before we jump straight to following Jesus' example, I think it's important for us to remember the words of 1 Corinthians 6:20.

29:57"You were bought with a price, so glorify God in your body." The ransom comes before the imitation. So fix your eyes on Christ. To serve and sacrifice like our servant king, we must first fix our eyes right on him. Jesus is the great servant king. He empties himself of his glorious position. He takes on human flesh. He dies for sinners. Ultimate humiliation. He descends as low as he can, and therefore, because of that, Philippians 2 tells us, because of that, God has highly exalted him. Therefore, God has bestowed on him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow, every tongue should confess that Jesus is Lord. We crown him the Lord of love.

30:49Behold his hands and side. Ultimate and eternal glory. He's worthy of it all. That's our Savior, the one who took a crown of thorns and now has a crown of glory. The one who knelt to wash our feet, so now we bow at his. That's our Savior. Do you see him for who he is this morning? The one who pays the ransom you never could have paid, so that you might be right with God. The Lord of all, the Lord of glory. So the first thing we should do from this passage is walk away with our eyes fixed on the glory of our Lord and Savior, Jesus. And as we behold that glory, 2 Corinthians promises we will become like him.

31:34By his Spirit at work in us, we pray toward the end of being like our Savior. So second, service. Pursue greatness by serving and sacrificing like Jesus. The flaw in this text for the disciples is not that they want greatness, it's that they have no idea what greatness is, and they don't know how to get there. Greatness in Christ's kingdom, as we've seen, is being like Jesus, and the pathway to get there is to be like Christ in his service and sacrifice. So on your way to the top, race to the bottom. And this takes shape in a lot of ways. We can pursue everything in that list of greatness that I just rattled off earlier by asking the question: Whose good can I serve right now, and what would it cost me?

32:30Whose good can I serve right now, today, and what would it cost me? We can also consider the various roles of authority in our own lives. As husbands, we don't use the authority of headship in our homes to stand over our wives in power, and to dictate everything that goes on in the house, to remind our wives that we're in charge, to make unilateral decisions and shame question-asking. No, we use our authority to sacrificially build up and serve our families for the good of their faith and the flourishing of our life together. He who loves his wife loves his own body. It means to lovingly draw out their hearts, to lead by giving up our lives for their sake. And that doesn't mean that we forsake the call to lead in the home. It means we lead like Jesus.

33:25As parents, we don't abuse our authority of command in our children's lives to get our own way, to secure comfort, and lack of annoyance, to ultimately provoke our children to anger. We use our authority with a heart of serving our kids so that they might come to love the authority of God as Father in their lives. And then we prepare ourselves to drink the cup of our children's suffering when they, in turn, engage in hard and sacrificial service to glorify Christ. Parents in the room, are we ready for our children to do great things? Or would we rather keep them at home? We don't shelter our kids from hard things, but we model good and gracious suffering for the glory of Christ and the building up of his church.

34:12In all these ways, and in the ways I can't elaborate on, we don't forsake the authority and influence that we get by being faithful followers of Christ in the world and excelling in the callings that God has given us, but we use that authority in a servant-like manner for the joy of others. Pursue greatness by serving and sacrificing like our servant king. So first, worship. Second, service. Third, final application, endurance.

34:43As followers of Christ, we embrace suffering and trial with triumphant joy. Exhortations like, "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you face trials of many kinds," can come across a little tone-deaf in the moment of suffering. But we remember passages like this. We remember passages like Philippians 3, verse 10. "We count everything as loss in order that we may know him and the power of his resurrection. And not only that, that we may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death." In our sufferings, brothers and sisters, we know Christ more intimately.

35:24Or 2 Corinthians 4:10, "In our sufferings, we carry in our bodies the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies." We pursue greatness by serving and sacrificing like our servant king. We don't seek out suffering, but we know and willingly embrace the suffering that comes by putting ourselves low. We consider suffering a privilege in how it conforms us to the image of Christ, that we might know him, that we might know the power of his resurrection life because we've known the depth of his crucifixion. We consider it a privilege even as we ask him for the grace to endure and the mercy to no longer be under that suffering.

36:10And then those sufferings, brothers and sisters, produce in us a weight of glory beyond all comparison. What hope we have as Christians, that for all of eternity to come, we will glory in those sufferings because in them, we saw more of Christ. We manifested Christ's love and life to a watching world, and we've had the honor of becoming like him. And in that, we count it all joy. Let's pray together.

36:46Lord Jesus, we worship you. We give you glory. We give glory to the Father who sent you as the ransom for sinners. We thank you for the grace and mercy with which you went to the cross while we were still your enemies. We thank you for the Spirit ministering that new life to us each and every day, and we ask that you would recalibrate our hearts now to see your glory for what it is, that we might love you and be like you. For your glory and our joy, in your name we pray. Amen.

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