Well, we're going back over to Mark. I think I'll just leave these off. It's like, I see you like trees walking, like the scripture says. But we're going to be in Mark's gospel, chapter 9. And I told you I'd probably pick up verse 30 again, which I will. So we'll begin in verse 30. And I'm going to take us a little bit of a bite at a time as we go through. So to begin with, let's look at 30 to 32. And let me pray before I read the word. Our Father and our God, again, we come to you by the great name of Jesus. And Lord, this time at the preaching of your word, Lord, we acknowledge that we're handling here the very word of God. And Lord, your word is powerful and mighty. And Lord, we need your help, because we at times and so often are weak. So we pray that you would enable us to understand your word. Give us ears to hear and hearts to receive. We thank you, Lord, in Jesus' name. Amen. So my first little note here is about the disciples lacking understanding. Lacking understanding. And it says, then they departed from there and passed through Galilee. And he did not want anyone to know it. For he taught his disciples and said to them, the son of man is being betrayed into the hands of men, and they will kill him. And after he is killed, he will rise the third day. But they did not understand this saying, and were afraid to ask him." You can tell they're all guys here, right? Because they're afraid to ask any questions, ask for directions, that kind of a thing. So I concluded verse 30 last time, but I wanted to catch it again as we head off with Jesus and his disciples as they're passing through Galilee. Because it says in that verse that he did not want anyone to know it. So you can imagine whatever path they're taking, probably not that the main thoroughfare is where people would be, and people would be gathered around him and pressing in. He wants to have some downtime. It says clearly that before he taught his disciples. So he wants to have some private time to teach the disciples, specifically here in this context, about what is going to happen not too far in the future. We're two, two and a half years or so into this earthly ministry, so it's not much longer and he'll be going to the cross and he's preparing his disciples for what that's going to look like. What's going to happen when he's handed over to wicked men and they take him and abuse him and kill him and put him on the cross? But, he always says, I bet I'll rise three days later. And clearly they do not understand. Mark tells us very plainly, but they did not understand the saying and were afraid to ask him, to ask him what it meant. Part of what's going on with the disciples here, and I don't fault them, we certainly probably would have had the same messianic expectation that they did, being that he's been identified as, you know, thou art the Christ, you're the Messiah who is to come, and they knew full well that he was to go into Jerusalem and set up his glorious throne, and then he had to establish his glorious government, and they're going to argue about that in a little bit, who's doing what. And for them to hear him talk at all about him being killed, I believe they thought, well, this must be some kind of a parable of sorts. We can't quite figure out, what does he mean when he says killed? What is he talking about here? And they don't want to ask, because Jesus has already said a few times in rebuke, are you so slow to understand? Are you still without faith? And they don't want to press in to ask him. Now, back not that long ago, in chapter 8 of Mark, when Jesus, in verse 31, says, "...he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again." It was at that time, in chapter 8 of Mark, that Peter takes him aside and rebukes him, almost as if Peter knows better what the Messianic mission was than Jesus himself did, and he gets rebuked, and Peter gets rebuked in turn. Here in chapter 9 of Mark, they don't understand and they're afraid to ask him. And then you'll see, Lord willing, as we get to chapter 10 of Mark, it says in verse 33, Jesus speaking, says, We're going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and to the scribes, and they will condemn Him to death and deliver Him to the Gentiles, and they will mock Him and scourge Him and spit on Him and kill Him, and the third day He'll rise again." And that's pretty detailed, a prediction of what exactly is going to happen as he prepares them. And it's at that time that James and John come to him and request high positions in his new government. They don't understand what Jesus is talking about. They don't understand that he's talking about his literal death and his literal resurrection. In Luke 18, verse 34, we get this verse, and it kind of helps a little bit. It says, "...but they understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them, and they did not know the things which were spoken." And I don't think that means that God put a divine cloak over their eyes where they could not see because God blinded them to what Jesus was clearly teaching. It was their own notions of what they thought Jesus was going to do when he got to Jerusalem that blinded and clouded their ability to understand what Jesus was saying. I was reading this morning Calvin on this, and Calvin said, Once came it from a discourse so clear and distinct was not understood, but because their minds were covered in a thick veil of foolish imagination. They were so clouded, in other words, by what they thought was going to happen that they couldn't understand Jesus' clear teaching here. And when I look at that, and it's so easy to read any of these stories and go, look at those foolish disciples. But we also struggle with understanding. Now think about this. They've been honed and taught by Christ himself, but for only a couple years. And I look at passages of scripture I struggle with, and I'm thinking, Larry, you've been studying and preaching for over 20 years. And I still struggle with passages of Scripture, you know? The Westminster Confession of Faith says this, and it's helpful. It says, All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all. Yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed for salvation, are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them. In other words, what they were saying there is that the gospel is so clear that you could have a child, if they were old enough to read and comprehend a little bit, to understand, well, I don't know what all this means, but I'm coming away with at least the understanding that I'm a sinner that needs a Savior. And it seems like the Bible is telling you that God has provided that Savior in the person of Jesus Christ. and that I need to repent of my sin and embrace Christ by faith. Those simple things are so simple in scripture that anybody that would not get that has really been blinded. The Bible talks about how Satan has blinded people's eyes. J.D. Jones, in his commentary on the struggling to understand the teachings of Christ, puts ourselves kind of in the shoes of the disciples a little bit. He says, and this is so comforting, he says, Jesus will be patient with us, though we too are so slow to learn his lesson and catch his spirit. We have been to Christ, some of us, for years, But we're poor scholars. We've scarcely mastered the ABCs of the Christian faith as yet. We have not learned the lesson of self-denial. We've not learned the lesson of forgiveness. We've not learned the lesson of love. Yet, our patient Lord bears with us. He repeats the old lessons again and again. Verily, as Peter says, the long suffering of the Lord is our salvation. And as the patience of Jesus with these disciples makes me able to believe he will be patient with us, so what he made of these dull and slow disciples makes me able to believe he can do something with the dullest and the slowest of us. And the Lord is so patient. And doesn't he bring us through the lessons over and over and over again to humble us and to get us to gain biblical wisdom? It takes time. It does take time. And hopefully 10 years from now, I look back at where I'm at right now and go, boy, that guy didn't know anything. Because we grow as God brings us through life experiences and we apply his word to those life experiences. Karen and I were traveling last Sunday, actually, back from the Catskill Mountains in New York down to Ocean City to look at a beach. Somebody mentioned that today. And I got there and said the same thing, there's a beach, let's go home. But we were traveling and so Karen was downloading and playing some sermons for us to listen to and she downloaded a question and answer with John MacArthur and I like it, he just allows this church every once in a while to come up and I don't know if it's an evening service or what and they just get to the microphone and ask him a question and just off the cuff he gives them a biblical answer. They ask some tough questions. And I liked The question, and I like the way MacArthur handled it, because somebody kind of complimented him and said, hey, Dr. MacArthur or John, I really appreciate your faithfulness to the word. You've been preaching and doing ministry now for over 50 years. And he says, what advice would you give a young man such as himself who's entering into ministry? What would you tell me with that 50 years of ministerial experience? And I'm not quoting him verbatim, but MacArthur's answer was basically, I can't give you anything. You have to minister for 50 years to get that experience. And then he went on to talk about how it's good to have some older men in the pulpits that have lived that life with Christ for some time and have learned. But of course, there's advice you can give somebody. But I thought that was a wise answer. You'll be 50 years wise when you've been doing ministry for 50 years. And so there's something to be said about those of us who've been walking with the Lord for some time. And I look at these disciples who've only been walking with Jesus for a short time, relatively speaking. Somebody wrote, I've learned that maturity has more to do with what types of experiences you've had and what you've learned from them, and less to do with how many birthdays you've celebrated. So I guess years alone aren't enough, right? The Lord's going to bring us through experiences, and we learn. For me, remember when I took the job I've got now, I've been managing for almost 10 years now at my company, and the person who was my manager who brought me into management, he sat me down, I went to his house, he trained me for an entire day. I said, Reagan, I don't know what I'm doing. He goes, just come to my house, I'll show you how I work through my day and I'll give you an idea. So I got to his house, and he goes, before I start to show you how I go through my day, he goes, the first thing I'm going to tell you is everything I know I learned by making mistakes. He says, it's OK to make a mistake. You've got to learn from them and then move on. And isn't that how? it is a lot in our Christian walk. We learn so much by falling on our face. We think God's done with us. Oh, I blew it. And God picks us up and we cry out to him and dusts us off and sends us on our way a little bit wise, just a little bit, a little bit wiser, a little bit more prepared to navigate life. So they lacked understanding. And secondly, they lacked humility. And we see that in verses 33 down to 37. Then he came to Capernaum, and when he was in the house, he asked them, what was it you disputed among yourselves on the road? But they kept silent, for on the road they had disputed among themselves who would be the greatest. And he sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, If anyone desires to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all. Then he took a little child and set him in the midst of them. And when he had taken him in his arms, he said to them, whoever receives one of these little children in my name receives me. And whoever receives me receives not me, but him who sent me. So Jesus is now in the house, could have been Peter's house if you look at earlier passages of scripture in Capernaum, and he's in the house and he's the one who asked the question. I don't know what was going on in the room, but Jesus is the one who asked the question. Again, Calvin says, the disciples did not come to Christ of their own accord, but that after secretly disputing on the road, they were brought out of their lurking places and dragged forth to the light. Isn't that how God operates in our life? They were up to no good on the road. Probably didn't think much about it. They were just having their little discussion. Didn't think Jesus was listening at all. And Jesus says, what were you guys talking about? Hey boys, what was all the talking back there? It sounded like you guys were having a little dispute going on. And what does it say? They were speechless. They knew. I think their consciences were kind of biting at him a little bit. But Jesus knows. Jesus knows exactly what was going on, probably behind him as he was leading the entourage to Capernaum, to the house. Psalm 139.4 says, the psalmist writes, For there is not a word on my tongue, but behold, O Lord, you know it all together. That should give us pause. It does for me, for this man, because Jesus had taught that every, and he used the language in my translation, every idle word that we speak, any flippant thing you happen to say, every idle word will be brought into the judgment, Jesus said. And he knows it all. I was reading McLaren, the old preacher. He says, the tongues that have been so loud on the road were dumb in the house. silenced by conscience. His servants still do and say many things on the road which they would not do if they saw him close beside them. And they sometimes fancy that these things escape him. But when they are in the house, With him, they will find that he knew all that was going on, and when he asked the account of it, they too will be speechless." And we've got to remember that. We'll stand before our Lord one day. Bengal, the old commentator, says, "...a thing which does not appear wrong by itself shows its true character when brought to the judgment of God and the knowledge of Jesus Christ." I don't think they're embarrassed about what they're talking about when they're in the middle of it. But now that Jesus is calling them out, they're doing that sheepish, looking at the feet kind of a thing, and nobody's talking about it. One more passage I'll give you, and this one's always given me... This is more in a positive light of God, if you want to call him the divine eavesdropper, because he listens to everything we say, obviously. He knows what we say before we say it. But in Malachi 3.16, it says, Then those who feared the Lord spoke to one another. These are people who love the Lord. They spoke to one another. It says, And the Lord listened and heard them. So a book of remembrance was written before him for those who fear the Lord and who meditate on his name. That's something else when you think about that. People that love the Lord are talking to each other, probably encouraging each other in the Lord, and probably exalting the name of Jesus Christ, the Lord God Almighty. And God says, I'm writing all that down. There's a book of remembrance for all that. So keep that in mind. So the desire that these people had, these disciples had, was a desire for rank. That's what they're arguing about. Who gets this spot? Who gets that spot? Because we know, and get this, this is on the heels of Jesus telling them he's going to Jerusalem to be killed. They discount that completely. Then some metaphor or something, we'll figure that out later, because we know he's going in to set up his glorious throne. What we want to know as his disciples is who gets which position when we get there. That's what they're talking about, rank. Karen and I, obviously we've talked about it, we were up in Canada. And we went out to a restaurant and I asked the service person there, because I'm in Canada. And some of you don't know, but my sports hockey, I'm a big hockey fan. And I didn't have any hockey stuff on, no jersey, no jacket, none of that, just like this. And I asked him, I said, hey, you're from Ontario, Canada, hockey. I said, who's your hockey team? And he looks without even thinking about it, he goes, oh, the Washington Capitals. And I was like, are you kidding me? You're in Ontario and your team's the Washington Capitals? I was like, I've been going to the Washington Capitals game since 1974 when I was a little kid, when they first made the team. Of course, I loved him right away. He got a good tip. But he said, the reason why I love and root for the Washington Capitals is they got Alex Ovechkin. He's the greatest hockey player of all time. And I thought, well there you just ranked Ovechkin at the top of the heap for all hockey players of all time. I was like, what would Wayne Gretzky think about that? Who's calling the shots on who's the greatest? But we tend to do that. We rank everything. I used to listen to the radio when I was a kid. And they used to always do, I think it was like the Billboard Top 100, you know, and I think every weekend they would play it and you'd see, well, who's moving position? Who's at number one this week? You know, some Beatles song or something would pop up. You're like, oh, that's number one, you know, this week. We rank musicians. Who's the greatest blues guitarist of all time? And somebody's going to tell you, oh, it's so-and-so, it's B.B. King, or whoever they think it is. We rank everything, and that's what these disciples are doing. It's just in the fiber of who we are as human beings. And sadly, in our fallenness, we tend to pervert it a bit. And here, they're asking about the rank of themselves. Who's going to be the greatest? Who's going to be number one? Adam Clark's commentary, he says, they wished to know whom he would make his prime minister, who would be his general, who would be the chief chancellor, who would be the supreme judge, et cetera, et cetera. Is it not he who first became the disciple? Or he who's the nearest relative? Or he who's the most frequent to entertain Jesus? Or he who's the oldest, maybe? Merely as to years? Could this inquiry have proceeded from any but the nine disciples who had not witnessed our Lord's transfiguration? Peter, James, and John were surely more spiritual in their views. And yet, How soon did even these forget that his kingdom was not of this world? It's not of this world. It's significant, and I don't want to pass through this text without calling your attention to verse 35, because you think, well, God doesn't waste words in Scripture, so why does it tell us that Jesus sat down? He sat down. That is the official position of teaching. So Jesus is opening his formal rabbinical school, if you will. When he sat down and called his 12, what he was signaling to them and signifying was, I have something very important to teach you. And they would come and sit at his feet. And they knew school was in session. That's why it says he sat down. And what was the important teaching that he had? It was this. If anyone desires to be first, he shall be last of all. and the servant of all." Servant of all. I was reading a commentary of R.C. Sproul's and I actually found this over at Ligonier's website. But R.C. Sproul says, I remember the story of when Winston Churchill had a verbal tiff with one of his servants. Churchill had been abusive with his language as he chastised his servant. The servant had all that he could handle, and he talked back to Churchill in the same tone of voice that Churchill had spoken to him. Churchill said to his servant, who do you think you are talking to me like that? The servant cowered, but he said, Sir Winston, that's the way you talk to me. Churchill responded, ah, but I am a great man. And then Sproul writes, it was probably the lowest point of Churchill's life when he appealed to his own greatness to excuse demeaning one of his servants. What Churchill didn't understand at that moment was that greatness is found in service. And that's what Jesus teaches us. That's the Christian demeanor. Is that we're to wake up every day and do our prayers, do our devotionals, and go out to serve people. To serve people. The pastor of the church should be the servant leader of the church. It shouldn't be the church serving the pastor, it should be the pastor washing feet, serving the people. The Christian husband should be serving the wife, serving the children. The Christian mom should be serving the children and serving the husband. It's reciprocal. We all serve each other. And every healthy church I've been a part of, and I consider this a healthy church, that goes on. It's the beauty. When Jesus says, they'll all know you by your love, that'll be the unique thing that people see. And I believe it's not just simple love, agape love, that God pours out and that goes on the horizontal to each other, but that we love each other in real tangible ways as we serve each other, as we have needs, whether it be to pray for each other or to help each other out, as we saw in the video earlier on missions, to bring food to people, whatever it might be, that we're to be servants one to the other. This is what walking in the Spirit looks like. You know this passage, the fruit of the Spirit is what? Love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law, and those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. James Packer wrote a book a number of years back, Your Father Loves You, and in that book he writes, what work does Christ set his servants to do? The way that they serve him, he tells them, is by becoming the slaves of their fellow servants and being willing to do literally anything, however costly or irksome or undignified, in order to help them. This is what love means, as he himself showed at the Last Supper when he played the slaves' part and washed the disciples' feet. When the New Testament speaks of ministering to the saints, it means not primarily preaching to them, but devoting time and trouble and substance to giving them all the practical help possible. And then I like this last sentence. He says, the essence of Christian service is loyalty to the king, expressing itself in care for his servants. It's in love for Christ that we serve one another. And to illustrate this, Jesus gives this wonderful visual illustration. It says in verse 36, Then he took a little child, set him in his midst, and took him up in his arms. Isn't that a beautiful picture? Jesus just takes this little kid up in his arms, and then he says to him, and you can just imagine this kid looking at the disciples, as he's teaching, and he says, whoever receives one of these little children in my name, receives me. Whoever receives me, receives not me, but him who sent me. And to really fully understand that, you have to understand in that culture, you know, we look at babies and we're thrilled, we're passing them around and loving on them. Children were not looked upon in that way, in that culture. They were insignificant. They weren't held in high regard. They're weak. They're vulnerable. Most children lived past the age of five. So you didn't know how many of the kids were even going to make it. They had actually had. Completely and utterly dependent on other people for everything. And then you look in the scriptures, and that society's in that day's view of children, but that's not Jesus' view of children at all. I mean, it says in Matthew 18, he teaches, it said, "...Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven." And he's not talking about that we have childish understandings and things. He's talking about our inability to really do anything for ourselves in the salvation. We see ourselves as weak and vulnerable and completely dependent on God, and we cast ourselves on His mercy, right? That's how you enter into the kingdom of God. In Matthew 19, you can see the same attitude of culture in his disciples. In Matthew 19, it says, little children were brought to him, to Jesus, that he might put his hands on them and pray. But the disciples rebuked them. Can you imagine? The master doesn't have time for these little kids. Get these brats out of here. That's the way it reads. Get these kids out of here. They're rebuked and kept them back. And you know the story. Jesus says, let the little children come to me. Do not forbid them. For of such is the kingdom of heaven." Another example for him. And when you see in the triumphal entry, that great story in Matthew 21, chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying out in the temple. And what are the children crying out? These are kids. They're crying out, Hosanna to the son of David. And they were indignant and said to him, Do you hear what these are saying? And Jesus said to them, Yes, have you never read? He goes right to the scripture. Have you never read out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants you've perfected praise? Or you could say, you know, you've ordained praise, right? Out of these kids. Yeah, the kids recognized Jesus enough to give Him the praise that He was due, unlike, sadly, the chief priests and the scribes. Hendrickson, in his commentary, says, Undoubtedly, children felt attracted to Jesus, wanted to be with Him. Whenever He wanted a child, there was always one present, ready to do His bidding, to come when He called to them. So also here. There's always a kid around, right? Jesus. He's looking around, He's got His disciples. Oh, there's a kid. He picks up the guy. I don't know who the kid was. I don't want to speculate. But he's right there. And that's his prime example. He picks up this little defenseless kid and says, you need to be more like this guy. That's what he's basically telling them. Calvin, in his commentary, this is my last Calvin quote. But Calvin, in his commentary, gave his own definition of humility. And he says this. He says, that man is truly humble, who neither claims any personal merit in the sight of God, nor proudly despises brethren, or aims at being thought superior to them, but reckons it enough that he is one of the members of Christ, and desires nothing more than that the head alone should be exalted. that all the glory should go to Christ. I'm nothing. I'm just a doulos in the hands of Christ to be used as he wishes. And yet he takes somebody with that kind of a heart and exalts them. And puts us in high positions. It's astounding. It's all a paradox. It's all backwards from what the world says. But this is the teachings of Christ. Oh, I told you I was going to leave these off, but I've got to... I can't tell what time it is. Oh, you've got plenty of time. So Jesus chose these children, this child, one of little significance, little dignity in that culture, and basically says, if you receive him in my name, you receive me. And if you receive me, you didn't just receive me, you received, who's he saying, the father who sent me, is what he's talking about there. Alexander McLaren says, it is as if he had said, look, this is how you must serve. For you cannot help the weak unless you open your arms and your hearts to them. Jesus with the child held to his bosom is the living law of service. And the child nestling close to him because sure of his love is the type of the trustful affection which we must evoke if we're to serve or to help. Right? That we're held close to Jesus in a love relationship, ready to serve our neighbor, our fellow servants. And he says here, in my name. We'll receive one, he says, in my name. In other words, unto Christ. Because of love for Christ. And it's interesting here, and I think, that when Jesus uses this exact same language to commission the disciples in John 13, 20, he says, most assuredly I say to you, and now he's turning to the disciples. He's talking to the disciples. This is the night before Jesus' betrayal here, or the night of his betrayal. He says, most assuredly, I say to you, he who receives whomever I send receives me, and he who receives me receives him who sent me. It's the same language that he used as he commissions his disciples to go forth as his apostles that he used here earlier in Mark's episode, really saying, it's got to be somebody like this child that I commission and that I send. James Brooks says, greatness in the kingdom consists not of position, but of ministry, but of ministries. So John's confession I think you could look at this in a couple of different ways, but I think with all this going on, and John gets it, and in Mark 9.38 it says, Now John answered him, saying, Teacher, we saw someone who does not follow us casting out demons in your name. We forbade him because he does not follow us. But Jesus said, Do not forbid him, for no one who works a miracle in my name can soon afterwards speak evil of me. For he who is not against us is on our side. For whoever gives you a cup of water to drink in my name, because you belong to Christ, assuredly I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward. J.D. Jones picks up on this wonderfully. He says, a sense of wounded dignity breathes through the very words we forbade him because he followed not us. They looked upon themselves as the only accredited and authorized agents of the Lord Jesus. They were indignant that an outsider should take to himself what they considered to be their prerogatives. But whatever the motives that animated them, the practical result was an act of exclusiveness, narrowness, and intolerance. They ruled this man, whom they ought to have received as a brother, out of their communion. They tried to stop his work. They denied his right to work at all. and all because he did not belong to their little circle. They never stayed to inquire what kind of man he was. They paid no heed to the fact that he must have had some kind of faith in Christ, or he would never have used Christ's name. They disregarded the fact that the man's ministry was obviously owned and blessed by God. They denied the right of anyone outside their circle to work in the name of Christ at all. They set themselves up as the exclusive channels of Christ's grace, and the sole dispensers of His power. We forbade Him, says John, not because He followed not thee, but because He followed not us." That's a key takeaway, guys. And when you think of that, and you apply it to your own little church, and the church up the street is baptizing people left and right, praise God for that. or your own little denomination. And there's these other denominations that seem to be being blessed by God. And the congregations are growing. And you look and you think, well, Lord, our congregation hasn't grown in years. Praise God for that. He doesn't only work in our little circle, whatever that circle looks like. And yes, he doesn't only work with Southern Baptists. He works with anybody who names the name of Christ truly and is willing to humble themselves and serve him. And John had to learn that lesson. You also see here the impossibility of neutrality. He says, he who is not against us is on our side. And Jesus says in Matthew 12 30, he who is not with me is against me. He who does not gather with me scatters abroad. There's no neutrality in Christendom. It doesn't exist. Either people are at enmity with God, or they've been brought out of darkness into His marvelous light. There's no neutrality. And make sure when you talk to people that they understand that. If they haven't come to Christ, they have to understand there's no neutrality. You've decided to reject Jesus Christ, His gospel. You've rejected it outright. And you've put yourself as one who's against Him. You know, it's not just, I'm going to remain neutral and see how it all plays out. The Bible doesn't give us that possibility. And he does talk here about rewards, doesn't he? He says, whoever gives you a cup of water drink in my name because you belong to Christ, assuredly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward. And you instantly, in your mind, I'm sure, go where I went, which is Matthew 25, where Jesus says, then the righteous will answer him and say, Lord, when do we ever see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you a drink? When do we ever see you a stranger and take you in, or naked and clothe you? When do we see you sick or in prison and come to you? And the king will answer and say to them, assuredly I say to you, And as much as you did it to one of the least of these, my brethren, you did it to me." So again, it's not only does he call us to humility to do slave service to one to another in his name, but he also says, when you do that, I'm going to reward you. And you think, well, Lord, that's not right. And the Lord would say, no, it's grace. It's grace. Let me end with that, and we have enough there to think about for the rest of today, I think. Our Father and our God, we thank you for your word. And Lord, I see so much of myself in the foibles of these disciples. Lord, not understanding. Lord, at times not humble. Lord, seeking rank instead of seeking opportunity to minister to people. Lord, please, by our work of your grace, we pray that you would enable us, Lord, to humble ourselves, to pick up our cross and follow you daily. And Father, we thank you for that. In Jesus' name, amen. And I'm gonna pronounce the benediction over you. And then members of the church, please, I'll give you five minutes to do anything you need to do, and then we'll have our meeting. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.