What It Means to Be Truly Great

“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 a ransom for many.” — Mark 10:44–45

Have you ever had one of those moments when you’re so wrapped up in yourself and your own concerns that you completely fail to notice what’s going on around you? The disciples James and John have one in Sunday’s Gospel reading.

They approach Jesus and ask for a piece of his glory — to sit at a place of honor by his side. It’s quite an ask, but Jesus doesn’t rebuke them. Instead, he suggests they don’t know what they’re asking. Possibly they were so busy plotting their request they missed what he said moments earlier about what’s on the horizon: his arrest, death, and resurrection. Jesus asks them if they’re able to drink the cup he will drink, and they are quite sure they are: “We are able,” they say. Again, in their eagerness, they don’t really know what they’re saying.

The cup here is a symbol for suffering. It reminds us of the garden of Gethsemane, where before his crucifixion Jesus prays for the cup to be taken away from him, begging to be released from his destiny. It is also the cup of salvation, but salvation comes with a price: the cross. In other words, enduring the pain of transformation to awaken to new life. James and John don’t seem to understand what they’re signing up for.

 In his book Can You Drink the Cup?, priest and author Henri Nouwen reflects on the metaphor of the cup, using it to articulate the basics of the spiritual life. He says, “Drinking the cup that Jesus drank is living a life in and with the spirit of Jesus, which is the spirit of unconditional love. The intimacy between Jesus and [God], his Father, is an intimacy of complete trust, in which there are no power games, no mutually agreed upon promises, no advance guarantees. It is only love — pure, unrestrained, and unlimited love. Completely open, completely free. That intimacy gave Jesus the strength to drink his cup. That same intimacy Jesus wants to give us so that we can drink ours.”

Jesus’s sacrifice on the cross is the all-embracing act of service which will bring about liberation for all.”

You see, the way to resurrection is always through first dying to our own self-interest. Jesus flips the script on greatness and glory; he tells us he came not to be served, but to serve — and to give his life for others. Professor Joel Marcus of Duke Divinity School notes, “Servitude and sovereignty, then, are logical opposites, whereas our passage claims that the former is the pathway to the latter.” Jesus’s sacrifice on the cross is the all-embracing act of service which will bring about liberation for all.

This is what it means to be truly great: to give up your life for others. True glory comes not from being the best, not from the desire to be noticed, not from self-importance and making your mark, but through service. It’s in giving up the lives we thought we wanted that we embrace everlasting life in the glow of God’s love.

Read all of Sunday’s scriptures

Step Into the Story

Here are five ways to think about a new definition of greatness:

Music

In “The Mother,” singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile reflects on the sacrificial love of a mom — and how when we empty ourselves in love we’re filled with more than we could’ve imagined:

The first things that she took from me were selfishness and sleep
She broke a thousand heirlooms I was never meant to keep
She filled my life with color, cancelled plans, and trashed my car
But none of that is ever who we are

And in “Servant Song,” the Cape Town Youth Choir sings of how we’re all in this together. In God’s love, serving one another is mutual:

Pray that I might have the grace to let you be my servant too

Social Justice

Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles, a nonprofit that advocates for and serves formerly gang-involved and previously incarcerated folks, illuminates how a cycle of service — from being served to serving others — is what changes the world.

Work Life

New York Times reporter Priya Krishna profiles Grand Central barista Arnaldo Hernandez Mundo, who shows us service is really about relationship. When we approach our work with care and joy, it can have a simple but profound impact on our neighbors.

Visual Art

Like how Jesus upends our ideas of what it means to be great, Jamaican-born artist Alicia Brown uses portraiture to subvert traditional symbols of power rooted in European colonization and draw us in to see ourselves as connected to one another.

Mother Yein is Priest and Associate Director, Sacramental Life and Membership, at Trinity Church.