This week we are looking at an event from
history where Jesus closest followers asked Jesus a question that we can find
ourselves asking today. Jesus closest followers wanted to know who of them
would be the greatest in the kingdom of Heaven. The disciples basically
approached Jesus as a group and basically said to Jesus “Hey Jesus we have a
question that we want to ask you so that you can help settle an argument that
we are having. So Jesus, here is our question: Which one of us will have the
highest status in the kingdom of Heaven? Which one of us will be viewed as
being most important in your kingdom? Which one of us is superior to the rest?
Which one of us is the best disciple over the rest of the disciples?
We discovered that there is something that
lurks under the surface of every one of us that desires to compare ourselves with
others. There is something that lurks under the surface of every one of us that
desires to be viewed as being superior to others. There is something that lurks
under the surface of every one of us that desires to be viewed as being more
important than others. There is something that lurks under the surface of every
one of us that desires to be viewed as deserving of a higher status than
others.
And it was this desire to be viewed as
deserving of a higher status than the rest that had emerged to the surface in
the form of this question that the disciples asked Jesus. And it is this desire
to be viewed as deserving of a higher status than the rest that can emerge in
our lives as well. And as Matthew continues to give us a front row seat to this
event from history, we see Matthew record for us how Jesus responded to this
question that had emerged from each of the disciples desire to be viewed as
deserving of a higher status than the rest. So let’s look at Jesus response
together, beginning in Matthew 18:2-4:
And He called a child to
Himself and set him before them, 3 and said, "Truly I say to
you, unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the
kingdom of heaven. 4 "Whoever then humbles himself as this
child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew tells us that Jesus responded to the
disciples question by bringing a child into the middle of their conversation
and stating that “unless you are converted and become like children, you will
not enter the kingdom of heaven.” Now did you notice what Jesus just said to
His disciples? Unless you are converted you will not enter into the kingdom of
Heaven.
In other words, Jesus basically said to His
disciples “The fact that you just asked Me this question reveals the reality
that you are not at a place where you are ready to be a part of the kingdom of
Heaven. For you to be a part of the kingdom of Heaven you need to be converted
and become like children.”
What is so interesting is that when Jesus uses
the word converted here, this word literally means to experience an inward
change that results into one entering into a certain state that possesses
certain characteristics. And that state, those characteristics that His closest
followers needed to possess in order to enter into the kingdom of Heaven, were
those possessed by the very child that Jesus placed in the middle of their
conversation.
Now for us living in 2020, we cannot even
begin to wrap our minds around how mind boggling this statement by Jesus would
have been. We cannot even begin to comprehend how controversial and unsettling
Jesus words would have been to His closest followers.
You see, in the Jewish culture of the 1st
century, children had no rights under the Law. In the Jewish culture of the 1st
century, little thought or value was directed toward children. In the Jewish
culture of the 1st century, the high rates of infant mortality
reinforced the view of children as physically weak and vulnerable. In the
Jewish culture of the 1st century, children were utterly dependent
upon their parents are required to submit to them in a way that they were not
to be seen or heard. In the Jewish culture of the 1st century,
children were viewed as possessions and were excluded from adult society and
lived in the margins of society.
In the Jewish culture of the 1st
century, for Jesus to even bring a child into the middle of their conversation
would be shocking. In the Jewish culture of the 1st century, for
Jesus to say that to enter the kingdom of Heaven, a person would have to
embrace the status of a child would have been scandalous.
And if that was not shocking and scandalous
enough, Jesus continued by stating that “Whoever then humbles himself as this
child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Jesus basically said to
His closest followers “So you want to be the greatest in the kingdom of Heaven,
well here is the thing: to be greatest in the kingdom of Heaven requires that
you embrace that same status that this child has, which is the lowest status.”
Jesus painted this word picture because Jesus
wanted His closest followers to clearly understand that just as a child in the
Jewish culture of Jesus day had no self-rule and must submit to the will of
their fathers, their involvement in the kingdom of Heaven would require a
surrender of status and a submission to the will of God the Father. Jesus then
continued to answer the disciples question by revealing the implications that
would come to those who embraced such surrender of status and a submission to
the will of God the Father as part of the kingdom of Heaven in verse 5-6:
"And whoever receives one such child in My name receives Me; 6
but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it
would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck, and to
be drowned in the depth of the sea.
Now can you imagine yourself as one of Jesus
closest followers. Can you imagine what they were thinking? How they were
feeling? You ask Jesus who among you will be the greatest in the kingdom of
Heaven; you ask Jesus who among you will have the highest status in the kingdom
of Heaven?
And instead of getting the answer you were
hoping or expecting to get, Jesus basically tells you that you are not at a
place where you are ready to be a part of the kingdom of Heaven. Jesus
basically tells you that to enter into the kingdom of Heaven, you would have to
embrace the status of a child, who had no status. Jesus basically tells you
that to enter into the kingdom of Heaven, you would have to surrender your
pursuit of status and instead surrender to the will of God the Father.
And then Jesus basically says to you that the
person who demonstrates that they are receptive to the child that He had placed
in the middle of their conversation, a child who was universally viewed by the
culture of the day as having no status or rights, will be the person who will be receptive to
the things of Jesus and the kingdom of Heaven. Jesus explains to you that true
greatness in the kingdom of Heaven is demonstrated in how on welcomes one who
has no status, because to welcome someone who has no status is to welcome
Jesus. To welcome the least of the Kingdom of Heaven is to welcome the King of
the Kingdom of Heaven.
And if that was not
enough, Jesus then tells you that for whoever would cause a child, like the
child that Jesus has placed in the middle of your conversation, who has no status,
but has placed their confident trust in Jesus, to be
brought to a downfall by influencing them to selfishly rebel against God; it
would be better for that person to have a large, heavy millstone that was moved
by the power of donkeys to crush grain to be placed around their necks and them
be thrown overboard into the open sea.
Now imagine yourselves as one of Jesus closest
followers. Jesus has just blown up every category that you had held when it
comes to status, to position, to greatness. Jesus has just told you that
everything that you had learned and embraced in the Jewish culture that you had
been raised in was wrong.
What would you be thinking? How would you be
feeling? How would you respond? However, before the disciples could respond,
Matthew tells us that Jesus hammered His point home in what He had to say next.
Friday, we will look at what Jesus had to say
next…
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