The Question Of Our Time

Today’s sermon is on the subject of authority, based on the text above.

It is no overstatement to say that authority is the question of our time. Wherever one looks in our world today, in family, government, business life, and the church, the conclusion seems unanimous. Authority is in a bad state of erosion. Why is this so? What can be done about a matter so vital to people in every aspect of life?

The story St. Matthew tells us in today’s text speaks directly to the problem of authority, and it offers the solution to the problem. That’s

claiming a great deal for this story which seems at first to be little more than an ambitious mother wanting preferential positions for her two sons. Much more than that is there. All who have ears to hear let us hear!

The Stereotypical Jewish Mother - in All of Us

The mother of James and John wanted Jesus to insure them the right and left hand places in his Kingdom. We all know the stereotype of the meddlesome but well-meaning Jewish mother, but it is really only natural for all parents to want the best for their children. (As St. Mark tells this same story, the request comes from the sons themselves and no mention is made of the mother. [Mark 10:35-37] Never mind the detail; the point is the same.)

The point of the request about instant places of authority is that it won’t mean authority. It will mean authoritarianism, which has nothing to do with genuine, God-given authority. Immediate arrival at prestigious and statusloaded places bypasses all the things that really count. These are first and foremost, a clear sense of serving. It means capacities, competence, responsibility, perseverance, moral strength, and devotion to the truth whatever the consequences. Authoritarianism eats up all one’s energies in keeping others at bay, defensive maneuvers to insure one’s own power, hostility to others who appear as threats, and the need to incessantly flex one’s own trappings of authority.

Without even knowing it, no doubt, Mrs. Zebedee was setting her sons up for disaster. As we look at her, however, let’s recognize the "Jewish mother" in all of us. Wanting to occupy the place of authority is a mightily seductive force.

I learned something about that at the tender age of nine. As a fourth grader I had a marvelous teacher whose name was Tillie Laughlin. Her name alone is a hint of her awesome gifts as a teacher; she was no ordinary person and as long as I live I am in her debt for her gifts in teaching us the basics of the English language. Diagramming sentences was her forte, and she made us diagram until we could see subject/predicate, noun/verb, and prepositional phrases in our sleep. (I envision her now, wincing, at our national pasttime of misusing the adverb "hopefully"!) One day in class she let me be the teacher for two minutes. There I stood, where she always stood. I could ask the whole class a question and see the hands shoot up. Then I could choose who would answer. It was dazzling for me to be able to choose from all those hands. I thought that was what being a teacher was mainly about, and it was a delicious sense of power that had suddenly seeped into my nine-year-old mind. But what was happening to me had nothing to do with being a teacher, and everything to do with enjoying ordering others around. This is why I can appreciate Mrs. Zebedee’s eagerness to get her boys in the front seats ahead of anyone else. With a little effort and imagination, you can see the same thing in your own life.

Still to Be Seen in Our Time and Life

Jesus was talking about the rancid fruit of misplaced authority in his response to the Zebedee family, mother and sons alike.

... if you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them and their great ones exercise authority ... it shall not be so among you.

(vv. 24-26)

Every day in our world, people are frustrated and brutalized by authoritarian muscle-flexing. Businesses fail. Families flounder. Armies collide. Hatreds simmer. Over and over again the sad spectacle recurs, one person seeking to dominate the other. Or one group gaining leverage over the other.

One reaction to that is despair over all authority. Being victimized by authoritarianism, people give up on everything that even looks like authority in its rightful form. Then things go from bad to worse. The world can’t get along from day to day with no authority whatsoever; things won’t work at all. Anarchy is no solution; rather it is a compounding of the problem. Listen carefully and look thoughtfully to yourself if you are ever told by intelligent people that they see you resisting "authority figures." The words may be more true than you want to recognize. This is not to say that all authority figures are legitimate and must be accepted without question. Ferdinand Marcos was an authority figure in the Philippines whose ouster was a work of God. Tyranny is an offense to God, whose will is for liberation in the fullest sense of the word. But that liberation he brings about does not destroy authority. It makes us free to recognize it, welcome it, and when it comes to us, use it in the right way for the good of all.

The Authority of the Servant

"He who would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave."

Thus Jesus turns authoritarianism on its head, and points to the rightful blessing of authority. Servant, slave are the big words here. I realize that some of us can barely stand those words. I have had people tell me to my face not to even speak these words, so sure they are that servanthood means docile, submissive, capitulation to some great evil that has been suffocating their lives for a long time. I ask you to hear me when I say that servanthood is not capitulation, nor being a slave, a docile handing of one’s life over to forces which grind it to pieces.

When speaking of greatness and servanthood, being first and being slave, Jesus made the real point in one of the greatest words we have from him:

... even as the Son of man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many ...

Being a servant was not giving in to evil by laying aside all he came to accomplish. Being a servant was for Jesus the fulfillment of all he came to do. He accepted denial and mockery, scourging and crucifixion, in order that he might bear up on his own shoulders the weight that the sins of the world create. He is the suffering servant, portrayed in Isaiah 53: "upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and by his stripes we are healed." Our Lord destroyed the power of sin by bearing our sins, in his body, on the tree. That is servanthood. There is nothing docile or weak about it. It is the revelation of the strong grace of God that sin is forgiven at such an unimaginably great price as the innocent one who suffered for us.

Why We Love God and Serve Him

This Gospel I hand on to you. I am called to be a servant of this Christ. The reason why I love him and count it my highest good to serve him is because of what he has first done for me. Without that serving of my deepest needs, my life would still be caught fast in the wrong kind of authority. Isn’t that true of you as well? Can’t each of us make this confession, freely and from our hearts? Jesus Christ is the authority in our lives because of his servanthood. We love him, follow him, obey him, and give our lives to his service because his love has a home in our hearts.

Authority is a magnificent thing to see at work in daily life. When it arises from the Gospel and the indwelling Spirit of Christ it is never forced. We readily accord such people the authority that comes from their serving, and is necessary for their serving.

The Call to Young Christians

Young Christians, regard highly the authority of parents who love you sincerely. This is no claim to their being sinless, for they are not. But freely honor their authority as those who are over you and responsible for you in the Lord. Obedience to them is not burdensome. It can come freely, for they bear a responsibility for you and must think, act, and take care for the things that lead to your growth and happiness. Parents, accept your authority as those who serve your family with reverence for God who makes you his representatives. This calls for faith, prayers, strength in holding your convictions, and love in carrying them out for the good of your children. In an age of wholesale parental abdication of authority, your calling is to fill the vacuum. The day will come when your children will rise up and bless you.

The Call to the Whole Church

In the life of the church, authority is a great gift of the Spirit of Christ who alone is Lord among all who bear his name. The past year or two have been a nightmare of lies, accusations, covering up and general tantrums among the celebrity television evangelists whose names you know well enough from the day by day news. What happens to the authority of a public ministry when it has no moral substance? It is gone, and great numbers of people are betrayed. You have every right to look to your pastors for honesty about sin, sincere confession of it, and a firm grasp of the Gospel in making new beginnings day by day. In these times of pain for the whole church, let me tell you of a minister whose authority remains rock-solid because of her continuing servanthood.

A Radiant Servant, with Authority

I think of a woman whose ministry is concentrated on the people dying of AIDS in our city. She is quiet in her manner, but fearless in her daily rounds of prayer, counsel, medical help, and spiritual support for men and women (and now children) who have this irreversible disease destroying their lives. She has an authority because her mind is Christlike and her life is not cheapened by plastic images of great numbers, great wealth, great power in ministry. She washes the feet of the suffering day in and day out. I know her and honor her as a person of great authority. She works hard at honing her skills, and keeps growing in the competence required to minister effectively to people at the far edge of our society. Servanthood is not settling for the least in dedication. She is in earnest about her calling, and I see that depth in her spirituality most Friday mornings as she participates in a clergy group who meet regularly for prayer and study of the biblical texts we are all preaching. There is a certain beauty about her authority. It is so freely received by her, and freely given. Everything she possesses in the qualities of her mind and spirit go into the faithful giving of ministry to those she serves. Few know her. She has no great public status. Her field is uncrowded! She will never run a television ministry empire. Hers is the mind of Christ, and therein lies her authority. I listen to her with respect, and learn from her more than she knows.

Our world is constantly cockeyed in its rush to the places of honor, assuming that just being there equals authority. What the world needs is a voice, not when it thinks it is right but when it is wrong. Our God calls us to have the mind of Christ, who came not to be served but to serve - to the giving of his life. In responding to that call, he grants us an authority that is a lasting blessing. Use it well.