Jesus explicitly foretells His suffering, death, and resurrection three times on the way to Jerusalem in the Synoptic Gospels (Mk. 8:31; 9:30-31; 10:32-34). As I read through Mark’s gospel, I notice that after Jesus’ own predictions of His divine future the second and third times, disciples miss Jesus’ saying and argue the opposite of that saying : Who is the greatest? What Jesus describes is to be handed over to power authorities; the disciples promote power among themselves. The issue of power and leadership seems to be very important among the disciples. Otherwise, the issue won’t occur repeatedly. Jesus is their master and leader. Among the disciples, who is the leader?
In Capernaum, Jesus asks them, “What were you discussing on the way?” (Mk. 9:33) The disciples are silent (9:34). Are they silent because they are ashamed of getting involved with the issue? Or no one wants to be the first to answer Jesus’ question? Everyone wants to be the first to get the credit in leading, but no one wants to be the first to get blamed or be questioned.
In the light of Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection, the disciples argue about leadership. What they need is discipleship, not leadership. What they need is to follow, not to lead. In order to be a leader, we must first follow Jesus. The disciples totally miss the concept of following. They are fascinated with position, authority, and dominion. They are good at following the way of the world. The Jesus’ way is far from their system. What Jesus presents to the disciples is a powerless victim. What the disciples are concerned about is to become a powerful victor. Jesus says, “My power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). The disciples say, “I can hide my weakness in power.”
The first will be last of all and servant of all (9:35). Jesus then puts a child in their midst and says, “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me, receives not me but him who sent me” (9:36, ESV). A child is powerless. When Jesus puts this child in his arms, he embraces powerlessness. Being powerless is Jesus’ way—the opposite way of human nature. The Jesus we follow is powerless in the sense that his power—resurrection— is manifested through powerlessness: suffering and death.
In Christian living, when we learn to disarm power and embrace powerless, we are in tune with the visible Christ. More than that, we are in tune with the invisible Father in heaven. The Father who sends the Son is an act of forsaking the Son for us—the powerless. The Father is the forsaken God in sending the Son into the world. As Jurgen Moltmann notes:
The Father forsakes the Son ‘for us’—that is to say, in order to become the God and Father of the forsaken. The Father ‘delivers up’ the Son in order through him to become the Father of those who have been delivered up (Rom. 1:18ff.). The Son is given over to his death in order that he may become the brother and savior of the condemned and the cursed.
The Son suffers death in this forsakenness. The Father suffers the death of the Son. So the pain of the Father corresponds to the death of the Son. And when in this descent into hell the Son loses the Father, then in this judgment the Father also loses the Son.[1]
Both the suffering of the Son (being sent) and the suffering of losing the Son (the sending) involve with being powerless. On the way to Jerusalem, it is the path of disarming power. It is a great reversal of the theology of sending and being sent when the disciples fight for power on the way.
[1] Jurgen Moltmann, The Trinity and the Kingdom: The Doctrine of God (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), p. 81.
No comments:
Post a Comment