Jesus says to his disciples: "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all."

I read somewhere that:

• The Wall Street Journal is read by the people who run the country.
• The Washington Post is read by people who think they run the country.
• The New York Times is read by people who think they should run the country.
• USA Today is read by people who think they ought to run the country, but don't really understand the Washington Post.  They do, however, like their statistics shown in pie charts.
• The Los Angeles Times is read by people who wouldn't mind running the country if they could spare the time and if they didn't have to leave L.A. to do it.
• The Boston Globe is read by people whose parents used to run the country and did a far superior job of it, thank you very much.
• The New York Daily News and the Boston Herald are read by people who aren't too sure who's running the country and don't really care as long as they can get a subway seat.

Gracious God, be patient with us and teach us to be masters of ourselves, that we might serve others more faithfully.  Be with us now and open your Word to our hearts and our hearts to your Word, in the spirit of Jesus who came not to be served but to serve.  Amen.
Then they came to Capernaum and when he was in the house he asked them, "What were you arguing about on the way?"  But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another who was the greatest.  He sat down, called the twelve and said to them, "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all."

Jesus and his disciples are walking to the village of Capernaum.  On the move again, as they always are in Mark's Gospel.  Jesus hears the disciples arguing.  When they arrive at their destination, Jesus asks: "What were you guys arguing about?"  "Nothing, Lord.  It wasn't an argument, just a friendly discussion."
Jesus must have overheard for he calls them together:  "Here are the qualifications for greatness: whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all."  The disciples were as slow as some of are to catch on.  For a chapter later, Mark tells us, James and John approach Jesus and ask if they can sit one at his right hand and one at his left in his glory.  Talk about dumb and dumber!  Mark tells us that when the other disciples heard this they were angry with James and John.  Now there's an understatement.

Jesus calls them together again and says, "You know among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them and their great ones are tyrants over them.  But it is not so among you.  Whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all, for the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many."

Servant leadership:  whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.  Our reaction to those words of Jesus is not unlike that of the fellow who went to the doctor because he was tired and run down all the time.  The doctor checked him over and said: "The best thing for you to do is stop drinking, go on a diet, and start jogging."  The man was thoughtful for a moment and then asked, "What's the next best thing?"

Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.
There is a saying:

If you want to be happy for an hour, take a nap.
If you want to be happy for a day, go fishing.
If you want to be happy for a month, get married.
If you want to be happy for a lifetime, inherit a fortune.
If you want to be happy for eternity, help others.
Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.

Now, to be sure, there are positive aspects to living in a therapeutic culture.  The downside of a "feel good" culture is that it produces self-centered, shallow, selfish people who feel they are entitled - folks who are convinced they are here to be served, not to serve.  A therapeutic feel-good culture does not produce many folks who fully understand the words of Jesus, "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and the servant of all."

This morning I salute, thank and honor so many of you who have come here to serve, to learn about service, and to grow in faith and faithfulness - lay leaders, Board and committee members, church school teachers, choir members.  You are the strength of this parish.  You make possible the ministry and mission of this congregation.  The sharing of your gifts of time and talent which you also give to the communities where you live make a tremendous difference and are a vital part of your ministry in the world.

Few things are more important today than leadership!  The late Robert Greenleaf, Director of Management and Research at AT&T, Professor at Harvard and MIT, developed this New Testament concept of servant leadership and applied it to the corporate world.  He advanced the notion that great leaders are first of all servants.  Exactly what Jesus said and lived out.  "The servant leader," Greenleaf taught, "Is servant first.  The best test of leadership is simply. . .do those served grow as persons?  Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous?"  The world desperately needs that kind of thinking and that quality of leadership.

After the great blackout of a few weeks ago, Bob Herbert wrote in the Boston Globe:

"There was the disturbing sense, natural in the long dark hours of the night, that much of our trust is misplaced, that in instance after instance the people in charge of crucial aspects of our society are incompetent or irresponsible, or both, and that American lives are far more at risk than they should be because of that."

David Gergen, author of Eyewitness of Power, the Essence of Leadership, advisor to five presidents - Nixon to Clinton, has written:  "The President could roll back his tax cuts (which mainly benefit the wealthiest one percent of Americans) and propose that the savings be redirected toward a broad social cause like improving the lives of children.  If the war (against terrorism) is about securing their safety, after all, why should we not be equally concerned about securing their health and education?  We need," he says, "a new sense of national purpose."

Until the Government comes up with a common vision for our life as a people, the Church certainly has one. And something more: a personal vision of faithful living, modeled on the example of Jesus.  The Church at its best has this vision of servant leadership and a commitment to peace and justice, health and education for children and building communities of inclusivity.

These are our marching orders, as Christian citizens we have convictions and a voice and there are ways to be heard.  And we have something else:  We have a community that tries, best as it is able, to live in the world, in the nation, in the city following the example of Jesus who came not to be served but to serve.
There are encouraging signs that even in our feel good, therapeutic culture, there are a growing number of folk who, like yourselves, seek to serve.  William Willimon, Chaplain at Duke University, tells of a visit to the Duke campus a few years ago from a representative of "Teach America."  Teach America tries to recruit this nation's most talented college graduates to go into some of this country's worst public schools.  This is their way of trying to transform our schools into something better.  The representative stood in front of a large group of Duke students, a larger group, Willimon says, than he would suppose would turn out for this sort of thing, and said to them:  "I can tell by looking at you I have probably come to the wrong place.  Somebody told me this was a BMW campus and I can believe it by looking at you.  And yet, I hope to talk someone into taking the toughest job you will ever have.  Two of our teachers were killed last year.  But by chance, if one or two of you are interested, I've got these brochures.  Meeting over!"  Willimon says, with that the whole group stood up, pushed into the aisles, ran to the front and fought over those brochures.  "I learned an important insight that evening," he says.  "People want something more out of life than happiness.  People want to be part of an adventure.  People want to be part of something greater than their lives."

It reminds me of the observation of one of the biographers of Abraham Lincoln, who writes of him: "In finding a cause that was bigger than himself, Lincoln actually found himself."  It reminds me of something Jesus said, about losing and finding your life.  Those who seek to follow Jesus as servant leaders must never become carried away with the naive notion that faithfulness to God and the Gospel will ever be easy.   The road is rocky. Resistance is real!

I believe it was Saint Augustine who said, "The road that stretches before us will test our heart, more than it will tire our legs."  So we gather here as the people of God week after week to receive our marching orders, to remind each other that God is with us in the struggle for justice and peace, and to look around and know we do not go our way alone, for God goes with us and we have each other in this beloved family of faith.

And from time to time we have a "Gospel Sunday" and sing the old, old songs of faith and good news and know once again, as those who have come before us in this place and who have sung those same songs, have known that it does not depend on our unaided strength alone.

The God who calls us to be servant leaders will not abandon us when the road is rocky and resistance is real, but empowers, strengthens and sustains.  With the grace of God some day, somewhere, some place, our experience might be like unto the experience of the prophet Isaiah that day in the temple in Jerusalem.
In the listening, whispering wind we will hear the voice of God:  "Who will I send and who will go for us?"  And we will say, trusting in the promises of God, "Here am I, send me."

In the spirit of our Lord Jesus Christ, our brother and our friend, who came not to be served but to serve.  Let all the people say amen and amen.

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple.  Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings; with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew.  And one called to another and said:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
The whole earth is full of his glory.”

The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke.  And I said, “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”

Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs.  The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.”  Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?”  And I said, “Here am I; send me!”

They went on from there and passed through Galilee.  He did not want anyone to know it; for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.”  But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.

Then they came to Capernaum, and when he was in the house he asked them, “What were you arguing about on the way?”  But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another who was the greatest.  He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.”  Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”