You're now the word of our God. A dispute also arose among them as to which of them was to be regarded as the greatest. And he said to them, the kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and those in authority over them are called benefactors, but not so with you. Rather, let the greatest among you become as the youngest, and the leader as one who serves. For who is the greater? One who reclines at table or one who serves? Is it not the one who reclines at table? But I am among you as the one who serves. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Our heavenly father, we come before your word this morning and we seek you. We seek your face. We seek to know your will. To understand your truth. to be moved, not only to grow in our knowledge of your word, but to be moved and to be stirred in our affections with a greater love for Christ, for his kingdom. God, we seek to be transformed, not to be conformed to this world, but to be transformed by the renewing of our minds, by your truth. God, so long ago you prayed for your people that they would be sanctified in the truth. And you tell us that your word is truth. So sanctify us this morning, we pray. We pray that you would wash us with the water of your word. And God, that you would direct the focus of our hearts to Christ. We might look to him and seek to be like him as his people. Give us understanding. Give us a heart to keep your word, and we pray all of this in Christ's name. Amen. It is a feature of our humanity that we consider certain people to be great, and we hold such people in high esteem. And we're impressed by their abilities and their accomplishments, by their position or their personality. And although what we are impressed by does change from time to time and from place to place. You think about the things that different generations even or in different parts of the world, everyone has their heroes, their great ones they look to and idolize. And it might be athletes or virtuoso musicians or pop stars or in some cultures it might be the warriors in society. God forbid it would be the politicians. We idolize people that we know personally for different reasons. And it may be because of a charismatic personality or because what they have done for us, we admire them. We have our reasons, but we, universally I think, we look to certain people and we consider them to be great and we hold such people in high esteem. We all have our heroes. And probably this is pretty intuitive for you. You don't make a conscious choice to regard certain people as great. You just do. You don't have a definition of greatness. You don't think about, there's not a rubric that you run people through and consider the different parts of their life and character and accomplishments or anything like that and make a decision that you will now consider this person. You just intuitively look to certain people with a sense of awe or you just can't help but be impressed by the sorts of people that other people are impressed by. Some of this is just cultural. But the problem with this, with this being an intuitive thing, we look to certain people, we consider them to be great, but this is something that we don't think about carefully or consciously. And we are just intuitively impressed by and admire certain people. There's a problem with this, and the problem is twofold. One, if you don't give this careful thought, you'll likely admire the wrong people for the wrong reasons. And it's easy to see this. Even if it's not easy for us to see this in our own hearts, although it's a danger for all of us, most of us can think of other people whose admiration or fanaticism or whatever it might be, devotion to people is extreme. And it is, you know, hard for us to understand. And oftentimes the way this works is, sorry young people, I guess I are one in one sense, but you look at maybe a teenager or a young person, if you're older, and you think, I don't understand the fascination that they have with certain, maybe it's, one thing that I was talking with one of our members about is how a lot of young people today are impressed by online personalities, influencers on social media and YouTube, and it's kind of a real, in a youth culture, there's a desire to go viral, to have some kind of content, whether it's on YouTube or TikTok, these social media apps, to post some kind of content that's gonna go viral and to get this recognition. Maybe you've noticed there are people who have decals on the back of their cars that have their social media information that you can look them up, but they desire to be famous as other people are famous online. And when I see the people who are respected in this way, the people who are personalities and have become famous and really have enriched themselves as a result because of the way that especially they are admired in youth culture, I can't fathom why anybody would admire or idolize such people. And maybe we can all think that way. I don't understand how People can look to these certain kinds of people as great, but it's still a danger for us. Of course, the people we intuitively admire, it's perfectly reasonable that I would admire that person. But if we don't give this careful thought about what constitutes greatness, what's worthy of admiration, then we are likely We will likely admire the wrong people for the wrong reasons. That's one of the problems. It's a two-fold problem, though. And secondly, the second part of this problem is that we, this is just, this is natural for humans, is that we imitate the kinds of people that we admire. This is inescapable. We'll all do this at some level. We imitate the kinds of people that we admire, whether we realize it or not. It can be an unconscious imitation. It may not be a full-blown imitation, But I can think of many examples of people who will begin to dress like, or, and I see this in ministry actually, I can sometimes tell who a preacher listens to because they begin to adopt a certain affectation that sounds an awful lot like a well-known preacher who you might hear on the radio or who you might know as a sort of a public figure. And I think I'll bet you anything they were greatly influenced by this preacher because they have that affectation and we just unconsciously imitate the people that we admire. And if we don't give it careful thought we'll admire the wrong people for the wrong reasons and we will ourselves adopt the character deficiencies and everything that's wrong about them we'll begin to imitate and become like them ourselves. The consistent witness of the Bible is that those who devote themselves to idols become like the idols they worship. And we can idolize our fellow man and therefore will become like them. And the Bible actually uses even stronger language that those who give themselves fully to this devotion to worthless idols become worthless. So there are real spiritual and eternal consequences to how you define what it means to be great and who you look to as embodying true greatness. Well, for starters, I think everyone can agree in terms as we think about what is, how should we define greatness? I think for starters, we can agree that greatness is measured in relation to others. Greatness, even if you look at our passage here in verse 24, The word that's used is actually not just great, but the greatest. It's a superlative, but in other words, it's a type of comparative statement that can only make sense in putting me in relation to others. I am greater than you or someone else, or this person is greater than, he's a greater athlete, a greater musician, someone more greatly to be admired than others. And so, no matter how you think about greatness, it's always in relation to other people, but the question is, what is the nature of that relation? The world defines greatness as a relation of superiority to others. That's really Jesus' point here. If we go with our gut and just, we go along with the way the world defines what it means to be great, which we will do if we don't conform our minds, not to the world, but allow ourselves to be, through the study of scripture, transformed in our thinking by the word, then we'll go along with the world's definitions and we ourselves will define greatness as a relation of superiority to others. But Jesus defines greatness as a relation of service to others. Let's consider these verses in Luke 22 verses 24 through 27 and build out our definition of true greatness from the teaching of Jesus. First thing that we see here, I believe, in verses 24 and 25 is we have the perversion of greatness. The perversion of greatness. I think that we shouldn't just write greatness off altogether as something that is a pursuit that is inherently motivated by pride, that is a part of fallen human nature, that no one should pursue greatness. I mean there are places like for example in Romans 2 comes to mind, doesn't use the word exactly, but here in Romans 2 7, Paul says that those who by patience and well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. However you interpret that, and it's important to carefully interpret a verse like that, but there's a sort of pursuit of glory and immortality and a certain pursuit of greatness that God would commend to us and even reward us for. And so a pursuit of greatness rightly understood is a good ambition for us to have. It can be a good thing, but because of sin, greatness is greatly perverted, and we see this in verse 24. And I want you to notice how the question of greatness arises in this verse. Let's read this verse again. We see here that a dispute arose among them. as to which of them was to be regarded as the greatest. So you imagine that this is in the context of the Lord's Supper, the Last Supper, or the First Supper if you want to call it that because it's the first observance of the Lord's Supper that is made by Christians. But at this Last Supper of Christ before his crucifixion, the disciples take their seats around the table. And you think about whenever I go out to eat with, this doesn't happen when Laura and I go out to take the kids out to eat, I don't know why that is, what that says about us, but when we go out to eat with my parents or my grandparents, there's always a jockeying for position in relation to them. and they usually could care less about whether or not they're sitting next to me, but it's, I want to sit next to Pop, or I want to sit next to Mimi, or both, in between them, and so it's a real, you know, it's an opportunity for dispute among the siblings, and they frequently do argue. Well, you can imagine at this Last Supper how the disciples take their seats. Who's going to sit literally at Christ's right hand or on his left? Who's going to sit across from him? Who's going to be at the end of the table and have to read people's lips and be a little bit at a distance from the conversation that's being had? And because of the pride that's in their heart, and after all this is actually a conversation if you pay attention to the Gospels, it's not the first time Jesus has had to teach this. There's at least once, if not twice, and probably a half-dozen times where Jesus has had to address the issue of greatness, a position in the kingdom, and so forth, and he calls out and brings conviction to this pride that's in the disciples' hearts. It flares up here, and they have a dispute about this, and here we find the disciples arguing about, in effect, they're arguing about their relative superiority in the kingdom of God. You remember the world defines greatness as a relation of superiority and here the disciples are following along with the spirit of this world and arguing about who is relatively superior in relation to Jesus or relation to the church or the kingdom and implicit in this is an understanding of greatness which is I think we can say is corrupted by sin. And so Jesus intervenes to challenge their worldly idea of greatness which is which is really more in common with, as he says here in verse 25, with the kingdoms of the Gentiles than with the kingdom of God. And so we look at verse 25. He says there, the kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and those in authority over them are called benefactors. Jesus describes the way in which worldly rulers and authority figures insist upon their relative superiority. It's not just that they occupy positions of authority. What we know from if we're reading the Bible comprehensively and we're not discounting certain places and prioritizing our interpretation of one text out of context, you see, we can do that. But if we're reading the Bible comprehensively, we have to admit that there are people in positions of authority and in God-given authority. God himself even calls them to those places of authority, not just within the church, but within the home and even within society, within the state. Paul talks about this in Romans 13, that earthly or worldly rulers are God's ministers for your good. And yet, perhaps, These are some of those who are the worst offenders when it comes to abusing their authority and really giving a poor example to their citizens of what it means to be truly great, which is why Jesus uses them as an example. Such men oftentimes love the power and the prestige of their rank and flatter themselves as really gifts to those whom they take advantage of. Notice that they're called benefactors. If we just take this at face value and give them the benefit of the doubt, we have benefactors today. These are people who perhaps are enormously wealthy and they use a portion of their wealth to, you know, build a wing of a hospital they name after themselves. Or they make massive donations to humanitarian causes. And this is a good thing. This isn't to be discounted or discredited. This is a good thing to give in this way. But what Jesus is referring to is the tendency for people to enjoy the title. You see, they're called benefactors. In the ancient world, it was actually sometimes very common for tyrants to give themselves the title of benefactor. authoritarian figures to style themselves in such a way. And so you can see that they really flatter themselves and they consider themselves to be something like God's gift to mankind. Because of their abilities and their greatness, the resources that they possess, what they're able to get done, the power that's at their disposal, they see themselves as maybe savior figures. They have a kind of a savior complex. Well, church, we ought to mark such self-importance as the opposite of truly great. and as a perversion of true greatness. Notice Jesus' words which begin the next verse, "...but not so with you." To insist upon whatever power or authority or position or prestige that God has given us, which we might use to exalt ourselves and gain for ourselves a recognition among others as being superior to others, We just eschew that. We have no concern about that. It's not our ambition. It's not something that we emphasize or care anything about. And so we ought to not define greatness or to pursue greatness as the world does according to Jesus. But how many of those whom the world admires are exactly this way? Their greatness consists in what they have, not what they've given to others, but in what they've taken. And those who admire them look for ways to take his will, to enrich themselves, to stroke their ego, and so on. You know, and something else that strikes me about the way in which greatness can be perverted, we see in verse 24, the dispute that arose among the disciples, it's not about who is the greatest. It's about who was to be regarded as the greatest. And for many people, the problem is that they don't want to be great so much as they want to seem great. And this is the paradox of greatness, is that those who are the greatest oftentimes receive the least amount of recognition for that greatness. I mean, if you think about what Jesus says about who is the greatest, The greatest man born to a woman. He says John the Baptist. Well, what kind of recognition did John get? Now, multitudes did come out to see him, but look how that went for him. Would he enrich himself? Was he given power or prestige? Was he applauded by the world? He was beheaded. And yet Jesus calls him greatest. And so if we are truly great, Oftentimes what that means is we may not seem great to the world, but the sinful human heart craves that recognition of greatness, and it will trade the substance of true greatness for just an appearance of it if only other people will recognize me as superior in some way. We want that recognition. And so the disciples were concerned about which of them was to be regarded as the greatest. Well, don't be unwittingly attracted by such foolish and worldly behavior. As Christians, we must refuse to admire what others admire and not be a fan of what is pathetically not great. Rather, we must learn to recognize true greatness, which brings us to our next point, the principle of greatness. We find this in verse 26. But not so with you. Rather, let the greatest among you become as the youngest. and the leader as one who serves. So if the world defines greatness as a relation of superiority to others, Christ is here defining greatness as a relation of service to others. And now Jesus presents us with the alternative to the world's faulty notion that rather than superiority, Jesus is commending service. We must be content with receiving according to Christ less honor with humbling ourselves to a lower and lesser status than what our sinful hearts crave or imagine we deserve. And in this position, we're to serve the good of others, to give of ourselves rather than to take to ourselves. This is, I think, a real tangible mark of a great leader or a great person, is that they give more than they take. And this is what makes so many of the prosperity teachers, they're just egregious examples of the world's example of greatness. And there are men who are so pathetically not great, they're little men, small men, because they demand money for others. And then they enrich themselves and they fly on their private jets and they build for themselves lavish I mean just mansions even, they have vacation homes and I mean this ought to be, if this serves us at all, if there's any good from prosperity teachers, it's to make this contrast so stark, you know, to really teach us by way of a negative example of what to avoid in knowing certain terms. But we instead need to use what God has given us not to demand...perhaps we are superior. I mean, we don't have to maintain a lie or to just sort of think that everyone is equal in every way. I mean, certain people are certainly better than others at various things. And some people are better than other people in practically everything. There's nothing wrong with looking at that and admitting that and noticing that. So I'm not trying to be some kind of egalitarian, you know, follow some kind of egalitarian nonsense. But the point is that if I am superior in some way, if you are superior to me in some way, I've got more money or more time or I've got more talents. Some way that God has wired me or gifted me that I am above average in some sense, rather than to use that to establish myself as superior in relation to you, I use that to serve you. I use those things in order to bless you and for your benefit. That is the essence of true greatness, to spend and to be spent for the souls of our fellow believers. It's true greatness, and those who serve most humbly are most great. Now again, this isn't to argue against the idea of leadership in Christ's church or for some kind of egalitarian leveling of all distinctions. Some people will read a passage like this or they'll take a select number of biblical texts that speak in the way our text does or which say that, for example, in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female for you are all one in Christ. And there are some who will read this out of context and without pulling this together with all that the Bible teaches elsewhere, and they'll conclude that we ought not to place anyone in a position of authority over others, whether husbands as heads over their wives and households, or pastors over their congregations, ministers over their congregations. There's no sense of authority, of submission, or anything like this. However, we can't afford to interpret such texts that speak of a certain degree and kind of equality among believers in a way that is inconsistent with what the Bible teaches clearly elsewhere. The point isn't that the church doesn't need leaders or that men shouldn't rule their homes. The point is that the way we lead is different than the world and the way in which the world defines great leadership. We don't insist upon our right to command others or on our right to make unilateral decisions or to be honored as those who God has called to serve in positions of authority. We don't insist upon these things. That focus on position and power and prestige and the emphasis on and the love for these things, it is or it ought to be absent among those who are great in the kingdom of God and in the church of Jesus Christ. But rather, we're to use the resources of the church or of the home, which are at our disposal, anticipating the needs of our families and our church, and we're to meet those needs for the good of those who are under our care, those who are adjacent to us, that God has put within our realm of influence, our reach, to bless and to do good for these people, to do what we can for their good and for the glory of God. This is why we are called ministers, which means servants. That a minister is not somebody, this isn't a title of respect, not an honorific, like the honorable judge or, and I hesitate, one time I even put mister on the bulletin and someone made fun of me. Mister, you're a pastor. Well yeah, I am, but the impulse to put R-E-V, that I am reverend, the right reverend. Most honored, right? And there are people who will insist upon these titles, but these distinctions have no place in the kingdom. A pastor is an under-shepherd of Christ. He would be a good candidate for Mike Rowe's dirty jobs. He's doing a thankless work, perhaps, and that's fine because he's doing an essential work for the kingdom, for the Savior, to minister to God's people, to serve them. And as we adjust our perspective, so that we come to admire most greatly those who most humbly and quietly and diligently serve us and others, we will surely begin to follow their pattern in their way of life. So we need to think about greatness in this way so that then we will notice people who are truly great and that we'll come to hold them in high esteem, to actually admire the right kinds of people, not the wrong kinds of people, And if we do this and we'll, as Paul's intention was that others follow him, but only as insofar as he was following Christ. If we look to those who are truly great, who are humbly serving others, then we will inevitably be led to greater Christ's likeness. And this brings us to our third point. We see this in verse 27, the person of greatness. Jesus says, therefore, who is the greater one who reclines at table or one who serves? Is it not the one who reclines at table? Just think about this in terms of a restaurant. Who is the position, if you go to a really nice restaurant, the kind of restaurant where people scrape the breadcrumbs off the linen tablecloth, the little tool, and they, you know, you have these servants that just attend to your every need, a really fine dining experience. Who is in the position of of greater honor, the one who sits at the table, who pays for the meal, who enjoys this feast, or the person who serves? Well, we imagine that it's the person who sits at the table, who enjoys the meal, this is the person who's being honored by those who serve him. And yet Jesus is saying, that's natural to think this way, but he says, notice what I've done. I've served, I'm the one among you who serves. Jesus understands our need for an example to follow and he gives us a perfect example of greatness in his own person. I want you to turn with me to John chapter 13. This is a detail that Luke leaves out of his gospel, for whatever reason, but we have in John's gospel an account of Jesus' example. We've seen his teaching. Now we observe his example. We read here in John 13, starting in verse 1. Now before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. During supper, when the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him. Jesus, knowing that the father had given all things into his hands and that he had come from God and was going back to God, rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments and, taking a towel, tied it around his waist. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him. You see, this is an act of profound service. It is unimaginable humility. For the Lord of glory, the second person in the eternal Godhead who has come from heaven, where he was worshipped throughout this age by innumerable angels in glory, to come down and to take this position of servitude fulfillment of prophecies that we have in, for example, in Isaiah, the suffering servant. Jesus comes to serve. And what we find is in Philippians chapter 2, Paul mentions this and likewise commends the example of Christ for us. He says in Philippians chapter 2, we'll read verses 1 through 11 here, Paul says, so if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit. That sounds a lot like the way in which the kings of the Gentiles lorded over those who... This is the worldly definition of greatness in which we relate to others in a way of superiority. But instead, Paul's saying, don't do that. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others as more significant than yourselves. This is what Christ teaches. And then Paul says, let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus. He's saying look to Christ as your example, not just as the one who teaches you to do this, but the one who models it for you. You can follow in his footsteps. Verse six, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore, God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. There is no one who in the history of redemption exalted to a place of more greatness than Christ, and he gets there on this path to greatness, as it were, he gets there through the greatest kind of service. I want to say though in conclusion, as we encourage you, as Jesus encourages us to look at his own example, in John 13, for example, the example that we have throughout the Gospels, and model our own ambition for greatness, our own pursuit of greatness after Christ, to serve others rather than to consider ourselves superior to others. But I want to say this, and that is that greatness is impossible unless Christ has first served you. You can't serve Christ or other people, not in a way that honors God, not in a way that really does lasting, you know, eternal good to other people or brings eternal glory to the Father unless Christ has first served you. He didn't come to be served by you. but to serve and to give his life for you. We see this in John 13, verse 6. It came to Simon Peter to wash his feet. Simon Peter said to him, Lord, do you wash my feet? Jesus answered him, what I'm doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand. And Peter said to him, you shall never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, if I do not wash you, you have no share with me. Simon, typically overzealous, said to him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head. Jesus said to him, the one who has bathed does not need to wash except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean, but not every one of you. For he knew he was to betray him. That was why he said, not all of you are clean. I wonder, have you been cleaned, cleaned, cleansed by the blood of Christ? Have you looked to Christ not as the one to serve that you might find salvation, but the one who serves you that you might find salvation? To look to him as the suffering servant, the one who lived and died. He gave himself for you, for your sin that you might be saved. If you trust in him, you can have this assurance today that you have salvation. that you have been pardoned from sin, that you've been forgiven of your sin and cleansed from all unrighteousness if you'll confess your sins to him and look to him. This is the path to true greatness, is to begin by allowing Christ to serve you in salvation as we pray together. Father God, we thank you for everything that you've done for us in Christ. We thank you that All of our pursuits of greatness from the early days of the fall to the lofty and proud ambition of men in the plains of Shinar as they built a tower to reach to heaven. God, to exalt themselves to a position of superiority. This pride has been a part of our human condition, but you've not written us off. God, but you've humbled yourself to come and to redeem us from this sin. We thank you, but we confess this morning that you are truly great. There's none great as you. We pray, God, that you would be exalted by your people this morning, and God, that you would work greatness in our hearts, Christ's likeness. We pray all of this in Christ's name. Amen.