A Servant’s Heart

29^th Sunday in Ordinary Time (B); 10-21-18

Is 53:10-11;   Ps 33;     Heb 3:14-16;   Mk 10:35-45

Deacon Jim McFadden; St. John the Baptist CC.

 

            If you look at exercise video ads, the sell typically looks like this: work hard, sweat a lot (i.e., suffer), and the prize you get is a killer body. Well, I tried that and look what happened! It might be tempting to apply this mentality to discipleship: work hard for the kingdom of God, suffer, and get the prize of heaven for it. C.S. Lewis points out in The Problem of Pain that this transactional way of approaching discipleship ultimately does not work. He puts it this way: “Heaven offers nothing that a mercenary soul can desire. It is safe to tell the pure of heart that they shall see God, for only the pure of heart want to.”

            Lewis’ insight may be the key of understanding today’s Gospel. Jesus has just given his disciples the third and final prediction of his passion. Recall that after the first prediction Peter rebuked Jesus (Mk 8:31-32).   After the second, the disciples argue about who among them is the greatest (9:31-34). Today’s reading begins just after the third prediction, with James and John asking to be given places of prestige when Jesus enters his glory.

Besides being clueless what it means to be a disciple, James and John, and probably the rest, are in the grips of negative ambition, which is based on the ego. Notice that there’s no mention of the good that they could accomplish from that place of honor. No, what they want is glory. Let us sit at your right and your left in your glory so that we may bask in some of it.

In response to this bold request, Jesus doesn’t exactly rebuke them, though I can imagine him rolling his eyes. Instead, he reminds them of what they are asking for: “Can you drink the cup that I drink or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” (v. 38).

What’s he speaking of? His passion, which will be his cup and baptism. This is the point upon which the whole Gospel hinges—that’s the moment of his glory. “When the Son of Man is lifted up,” says the evangelist John; Jesus is lifted on the Cross, wherein he will draw all people to himself. That’s the moment the Son of Man is glorified.

What’s going on here? Divine glory is not the same as human glory, especially under the condition of sin. Divine glory always has to do with love which is the beauty of self-sacrifice. That’s the splendor of God who is self-sacrificing love, which we see in the Washing of the Feet on Holy Thursday and the total self-giving on the Cross on Good Friday. Both of which is exactly what the prophet was speaking in our first reading. What Isaiah says in kind of weird prophesy is that the Messiah would be a suffering servant. Yes, the Messiah would be a new David, a conquering hero. Yes, indeed, but he’d do so unexpected ways. The Messiah would conquer our enemies of sin and death in suffering and self-forgetting love—that’s the divine glory!

            Prior to the Resurrection and Pentecost, the disciples just didn’t get it. But do we? What’s our excuse? We live in a society that puts a premium of success, accomplishment, and status: who’s in and who’s out? Whose got the juice? Who wields the most influence based on their status. It’s all ego-driven and the danger is to bring this attitude into the spiritual and religious life.

You see, brothers and sisters, Jesus has a servant’s heart in which he continually pours his love, mercy, and tender care into our soul. And, if we are going to be his disciples, we will do the same: we will embrace a servant’s heart. It does not seek prestige but opportunities to attend to the needs of others. It does so not to seek a reward for work done—such as a heavenly prize—but because it is worthwhile in itself to lovingly serve others.

Why? Love, as St. Paul taught in 1 Corinthians 13 is the greatest of the spiritual gifts. Love is what animates the Church because God is Love! It really doesn’t matter what we do, but it does matter how we do it. That was the core of St. Therese of Lisieux’s “little way”: Listen: “not doing great things, but doing little things with great love. That’s the servant’s heart; that something you could be ambitious for. It’s purged of all egotism, all the negativity, all of the spiritual self-reference.

Once we embrace that principle, once we embrace the servant’s heart, our whole life will change. Now, to be a disciple of Jesus is to embrace the way of self-forgetting love. To embrace true discipleship is to take on the mind of Christ, who took the form of a slave (Phil 2:5-7), which means we have a deeply personal, I and Thou relationship with our Lord. It means that we put on ourselves his divine nature (Col. 3:10) which is what we do every time we make the sign of the Cross. It means becoming conformed to the image of Christ himself (Rom 8:9), who is the suffering servant.

And, Jesus continues to suffer in His wounded Body, the Church. Our Lord has been betrayed by some members of the clergy, who should be icons of a servant’s heart, but have betrayed their trust by abusing the young, vulnerable, and innocent. Please read Bishop Soto’s pastoral letter to the People of God in the Diocese of Sacramento, in which he expresses his sorrow and shame over the sickening, repulsive actions revealed in the PA Grand Jury report and the actions of Archbishop McCarrick.

Our Bishop has hired an outside, respected consulting firm to undertake an independent, transparent investigation into our own wounded past in which perpetrators will be named and where their vile deeds happened. This investigation will open old wounds, hearts will be broken again, and anger will arise; but, we must go through this process so that accountability and healing may occur within our community. We owe it to our children, grandchildren, and future generations.

Brothers and sisters, we have been undergoing the most injurious crisis the Church in North America has ever experienced in our history. At the same time, we remember the reassuring words of our Lord and Savior, Jesus, that the Gates of Hell will never prevail against the Church. We may be assaulted from within and without, but evil will not have the final word because we experience and believe in the Resurrected Christ.

With that, I’d like to end our reflection by noting the irony of James and John asking to sit at Jesus’ right and left hand in his glory. They were thinking of thrones, places of prominence in the public arena. But, there were two people at the right and left of Jesus when he, indeed, came into his glory. Do you know who those two were? They weren’t James and John, but the two crucified thieves who were on Jesus’ left and right at the Crucifixion. Were James and John willing to assume those positions of crucified self-forgetting love when their master came into his glory?

That’s a good question for all us to mull over as we seek the honor and glory of God, as we strive to embrace a servant’s heart. Amen.