Tuesday: 7th Week in Ordinary Time-C-Cycle I
I Reading: Ecclesiasticus 2:1-11: Prayer yourself for an ordeal.
Gospel: Mark 9: 30-37: The Son of Man will be delivered into the
hands of men. If anyone wants to be first, he must renounce himself the last of
all.
The Second Prediction of Death: Intensive Training in the Death of
Christ (Mk 9: 30-32)
The thrust of this passage is the death and resurrection of
Jesus Christ. Jesus drilled the truth of his death and resurrection into his
disciples. It is absolutely essential that every man grasp the death and
resurrection of Jesus.
A person’s eternal destiny depends upon his/her grasping the
truth.
The fate of the Christian message depends upon the believing the
truth.
The fate of the world, mortal truth and justice, depends upon
people’s grasping and believing the truth.
1.
The preparation: Jesus got alone with his disciples (v.30)
2.
The lesson: Jesus taught his disciples that he was to die and
arise (v.31)
3.
The response: The disciples rejected what they did not wish to
see (v.32)
The Disciples’ Terrible Ignorance of Messiahship: A Problem of
Ambition (Mk 9:33-37)
The disciples, on more than one occasion, argued over who should
hold the highest position in the kingdom (Mt 18: 1-2; 20: 20-8; Lk 22: 24-30).
Their desire was for recognition and honour in an earthly kingdom. Jesus had to
re-educate their thinking. The same re-education is needed by all people. All
people have the same needs of for some recognition, prestige, authority,
position, money, esteem, physical satisfaction, pleasures etc.
There is nothing wrong with these needs. They are human and
legitimate and must be met, but people allow their hearts to be overtaken with
selfishness. People begin to want more and more to the point of lusting and
consuming and hoarding. They become prideful, covetous, worldly, ambitious, envious,
and hurtful even to the point of destroying and killing in order to fulfil
their lusts (Jas 4:1-3).
What Christ sets out to do is to challenge the lives and
re-educate people’s concept of greatness.
1. Jesus returned to
Capernaum (v.33)
a.
The disciples argued
b.
Jesus questioned what they were arguing about
2. Ambition can shame (34)
3. Ambition needs
instruction (35)
4. Ambition is a virtue,
but it must be directed toward the right goal: To SERVE (35)
5. Ambition for serving
proves a person’s discipleship (36-37)
a.
The illustration: Welcoming a child
b.
The lesson: Proves one’s discipleship
i.
Proved one has received Christ
ii.
Proved one has received God
Thought:
Ambition that leads to argument and division is wrong. Every ambition needs
instruction and right direction by the teaching of Jesus Christ.
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