The kingdom of Heaven is upside down in its pursuit of status...

Today, after a break due to current events, I would like for us to jump back into a conversation that Jesus was having with His disciples. In this conversation, Jesus painted this word picture so 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. So let’s look at what Jesus had to say next, which we see in Matthew 18:7-9:

"Woe to the world because of its stumbling blocks! For it is inevitable that stumbling blocks come; but woe to that man through whom the stumbling block comes! ⁸ "If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; it is better for you to enter life crippled or lame, than to have two hands or two feet and be cast into the eternal fire. ⁹ "If your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out and throw it from you. It is better for you to enter life with one eye, than to have two eyes and be cast into the fiery hell.

Jesus hammered His point home to His closest followers by explaining that while stumbling blocks, those actions or circumstances that leads one to act contrary to proper belief, and instead embrace false belief are a part of life in a fallen broken world, for the person through whom those stumbling blocks come, there will be great pain and displeasure. And because of the reality, Jesus explained to His disciples "If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; it is better for you to enter life crippled or lame, than to have two hands or two feet and be cast into the eternal fire. "If your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out and throw it from you. It is better for you to enter life with one eye, than to have two eyes and be cast into the fiery hell.”

When Jesus refers to hell, he was pointing the crowds to a place called Gehenna. Now Gehenna was the place where the Jewish people of Jesus day believed that God would exercise His final judgment. Now you might be here this morning, and your natural reaction to Jesus statement here is “Dave is Jesus serious here? I mean, you don’t actually believe that Jesus is literally saying that we should pluck out our eyes or chop off our hands if they cause us to rebel against God. I know that there are some legal systems that do such things, but are you saying that Jesus would want us to do such a thing?” So, this morning, is Jesus literally saying that we should chop off our hands or feet, or cut out our eyes, if they cause us to rebel against God?

The answer to that question is a resounding no. And there are two reasons why the answer is no. First off, just because a person only has one hand, foot, or eye that doesn’t mean that a person couldn’t still selfishly rebel against God with their other arm, foot, or eye. Second, Jesus has just explained that we are guilty when we cause someone who demonstrates such humble surrender and submission to God to stumble so as to rebel and reject God. And that desire to cause someone who is open to the things of God to stumble so as to rebel and reject God has nothing to do with one’s eyes or hands; that desire has everything to do with one’s heart. You see, Jesus is not being literal here.

Instead, Jesus is using an exaggerated metaphor to reveal the seriousness of such selfishness and rebellion against God and its ability to cause people to reject the message and teachings of Jesus and experience salvation. Jesus uses this exaggerated metaphor to reveal the reality that anything that would cause someone to fail to follow Jesus and live in a right relationship with Jesus must be removed or eliminated at all costs. Jesus used this exaggerated metaphor to reveal the reality that the danger of selfishness, rebellion and sin, requires drastic action to avoid such selfishness, rebellion, and sin.

Jesus is explaining that it would be better for a person to lose the part of their body that was causing them or causing others to selfishly rebel against God and still be able to live in relationship with God than have all of the parts of their body, only to be in a position where they could be judged worthy of the eternal punishment that one would experience from God in Hell. Jesus then left no doubt when it came to what His answer to their question was and why He answered their question the way that He answered it with what He said to conclude His conversation with His closest followers in verse 10-11:

"See that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that their angels in heaven continually see the face of My Father who is in heaven. ¹¹ "For the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost.

Jesus concluded the answer to the disciples question by commanding them to “See that you do not despise one of these little ones.” What is so interesting is that the word despise literally means to look down on someone with contempt as being of little value or worth. Jesus then provided the reason behind His command by explaining that their angels in heaven continually see the face of My Father who is in heaven. Now while this verse is often used to argue that people have guardian angels, that is not Jesus point here.

Jesus point here with this statement is that angels, who serve as messengers of God are in the very presence of God and have constant access to God. Jesus point behind this statement is that those who looked at such a child, like the child that Jesus had placed in the middle of their conversation, as being of little value and worth because of their lowly status, would have to answer to God for how they viewed and treated that child. They would have to answer to God for how they viewed and treated that child because Jesus, as the Son of Man had come to seek and save the lost. When Jesus says that He is the Son of Man, He is identifying Himself as the Messiah that had come from God as God in a bod to usher in the kingdom of God here on earth.

Jesus here is revealing the reality that as the Son of Man, Jesus came to seek and bring back to relationship with God those who were outsiders that were far from God and had been lost as a result of their selfishness and rebellion. As the Son of Man, Jesus came on a mission to rescue from eternal separation from God and bring back to God those who were outsiders that were far from God as a result of their selfishness and rebellion. Jesus came on a mission to provide all humanity the opportunity to experience the forgiveness and the relationship with God that they were created for, but had been separated from as a result of their selfishness and rebellion, through His life, death, and resurrection by believing, trusting, and following Jesus as Lord and Leader.

And it is here, in Jesus answer to the disciples question, that we discover a timeless truth about the kingdom of Heaven. And that timeless truth is that The kingdom of Heaven is upside down in its pursuit of status. The timeless reality is that just as if was for the disciples, 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.

However, when we are saying to ourselves, or telling and arguing with others “I should have the highest status. I should be viewed as being most important. I should be viewed as being superior to the rest, we are revealing the reality that we are not ready to be a part of the kingdom of heaven. Instead of pursuing greatness at the expense of others by placing ourselves above others as being superior in status to others, true greatness in the kingdom of Heaven requires that we surrender the pursuit of status so as to place others before ourselves.

True greatness and involvement in the kingdom of Heaven requires a willingness to surrender the pursuit of status and instead demonstrate a submission to the will of God the Father. True greatness and involvement in the kingdom of Heaven is demonstrated in how one 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 true greatness and involvement in the kingdom of Heaven requires a willingness to take drastic action to remove or eliminate at all costs that anything that would cause someone to fail to follow Jesus and live in a right relationship with Jesus.

So here is a question to consider: What status are you pursuing? And what does the status that you are pursuing reveal about your position in the kingdom of Heaven? Are you pursuing a status that is driven by a desire to be viewed as being more important and superior to the rest? Or are you pursuing a status that is driven by a desire to place others before yourself and surrender to the will and desires of God?

You see, here is the thing, Jesus never chided His disciples for pursuing greatness. Instead, Jesus redefined what is means to be truly great. Jesus redefined true greatness as being willing to serve others so as to place others before yourself. And that is what it means to follow the example of Jesus, because as Jesus pointed out in Mark 10:42-45:

"You know that those who are recognized as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them; and their great men exercise authority over them. ⁴³ "But it is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant; ⁴⁴ and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be slave of all. ⁴⁵ "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many."

You see Jesus never asks us to do something that He has not already done. And this morning, the timeless reality is that the kingdom of Heaven is upside down in its pursuit of status. Unlike the culture around us, which promotes and pursues upward mobility for the benefit of self over others, the kingdom of Heaven pursues downward mobility that places others before themselves…