This is a message by Pastor Mark Fox of Antioch Community Church in Elan, North Carolina. For other sermons from Antioch, you can visit the church website at antiochchurchnc.org. Now, let's turn our hearts to the word of God. Today's text is Mark 10, 32 through 45. I'll give you a moment to flip there. All right, starting in verse 32. And they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem. And Jesus was walking ahead of them. And they were amazed. And those who followed were afraid. And taking the twelve again, he began to tell them what was happening to them, or to him, saying, See, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the scribes. And they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles. And they will mock him and spit on him and flog him and kill him. And after three days he will rise. And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to him and said to him, Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you. And he said to them, what do you want me to do for you? And they said to him, grant us to sit, one at your right hand, one at your left, in your glory. Jesus said to them, you do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized? And they said to him, we are able. And Jesus said to them, the cup that I drink, you will drink. And with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized. But to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant. but it is for those for whom it has been prepared. And when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant at James and John. And Jesus called them to him and said to them, you know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. But it shall not be among you, but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. Well, good morning and welcome again to Antioch Community Church, those who are with us. physically and those who are with us virtually. We're glad that you're here. So we are on the way with Jesus as we've been talking about. Time is short for the Savior to accomplish the purpose for which he has come. He's discipling the disciples. We've been talking about that for several weeks. He's discipling disciples, preparing them for the next step of their journey and the journey that he's on. We've seen the Lord give foundational truth. I hope you've been taking note of this. The foundational truth he gave us several weeks ago about marriage, what is marriage. He gave us foundational truth about children, how precious they are in God's sight. He gave us, last week we talked about the foundational truths about money, right? The rich young ruler had broken the first, the most important commandment. He shall have no other gods before me. And we've talked about the centrality of the gospel all the way through it. He's told them about the high calling that we followers of Jesus have to be what? To be servants. and to sacrifice because it's a hard calling and yet it is an essential one. Jesus is going to repeat that message about being a servant several times and then he will demonstrate it in the most powerful demonstration of servanthood that the world has ever seen, will ever see, when he laid himself down upon that cross. Let's look at this passage today and then under three headings. Walking ahead, calling them in, and then giving his life. Verses 32 through 34, interesting. This is the first time that Jesus is said by Mark to be walking ahead of his disciples instead of in the midst of them or with them. It's also the first time that Mark tells us that they're on their way to Jerusalem, which means they're going what? They're going up. to Jerusalem. Jesus said that we're going up to Jerusalem. Even though they were headed south, Jerusalem sits 3,500 feet above where they were at that time. So it was a difficult climb because Jesus was going to give his life there. But isn't it interesting that Jesus is not lagging behind like a prisoner on his way to be executed. He's out front. He's leading the way. There's a determination. I think they see the determination in the face of Jesus. They see that he's determined. As Isaiah said, he set his face like flint. And then Luke repeats that in his gospel. Jesus set his face like flint. He was hardened to the purpose for which he had been sent. James Edwards writes, when it comes to humility and suffering, Jesus does not only teach, He leads the way. Jesus never told his disciples. He never tells us to do something that he has not already done and demonstrated for us how it is to be done. So Mark tells us the people, did you check this? The people who were following him were amazed and they were afraid. I think the disciples were amazed. I think the crowd was afraid. We're not sure. We're not told. But maybe they were amazed because they had never seen Jesus like this. This was a face on Jesus they had never seen. He was still the servant of God and filled with compassion for his people. But man, he was focused on the purpose for which he had come. So what happens when Jesus sees that they are afraid and they're amazed? It says once again, he takes the 12 aside. He loves his disciples. He still does. He loves every one of us, and he takes us aside. If we're willing to go aside with him, he'll take us aside every morning when we wake up. He'll take us aside every day, and he'll teach us what it means to be a follower of the Lord. He takes them aside, and again, he tells them what's about to happen. Have you noticed that this is the third time Jesus has told his disciples what's going to happen? In Mark chapter 8, this is the most, this one in chapter 10, this is the most complete. Jesus adds to this story. In Mark chapter 8, He told them the Son of Man would be, He would suffer many things. He would be rejected by the chief priests and the elders. And He would, they would kill Him and then He would rise after three days. And then in chapter 9, he added that he would also be betrayed into the hands of men. So there's a betrayal element that he adds in chapter 9. Same story, but he adds that element. And now Jesus adds that he will be betrayed and he will be turned over to the chief priests and the scribes. And the chief priests and the scribes will condemn him to death. This is mind-blowing. And then he says, and they will turn him over to the Gentiles. we all know now what they didn't know then this meant he would be turned over to Roman soldiers and Jesus says they will mock him and they will spit on him and they will flog him and they will kill him and after three days he will rise you know it's interesting the first time Jesus told his disciples about his impending death in Mark chapter 8 Peter pulls him aside and rebukes him remember that pulls him aside come on let's don't get carried away here this is not gonna happen to you And then in chapter nine, after Jesus has told the three, as they're leaving the Mount of Transfiguration, about what's about to happen, what happens? Those three start talking to each other about which one is the goat, you know? Wonder which one of us is the greatest of all time disciple, you know? I hope it's me, I think it's me. And so they're arguing with each other about who's the best disciple. So this is the third time. Surely the third time's the charm. Surely they'll get it this time, right? Nope. Same thing. The disciples again will jockey for position, this time starting with James and John. It's the only time in Mark's Gospel that James and John are mentioned without Peter. The only time in Mark's Gospel where Peter's left out of the conversation is Mark's retelling the story. And it's essentially because they're trying to cut him out. He's in the inner circle, but they're saying, Jesus, we know you like Peter and all, but look, it's us, right? Isn't it interesting how they approach Jesus with this question? They first ask Jesus for a blank check. Just imagine, they're kind of saying, Hey, hey Jesus, you know us, right? We're the Thunder Boys, right? You gave us that title, right? Thunder guy, yeah, James and John. Hey look, we've been with you through thick and thin, man. Whenever you need anything, we've been there. So look, we're gonna ask you a question, all right? It's gonna be a question. And our first question is just, will you just say yes to whatever we ask? Will you give us a blank check no matter what we ask? Have you ever done that? You ever done that with your parents, kids? All right, Dad, don't say no. I'm gonna ask you something, but don't say no, okay? You can't say no, Dad. And I love the way Jesus responds. He could have responded a number of ways as we parents have responded to our kids at times, right? He could have responded a number of ways. He responds in the exact same way that next week, Lord willing, we'll see he responded to blind Bartimaeus. He asks a question, he says, what do you want me to do for you? Now the contrast between Bartimaeus' question and James and John's question could not be any starker. Bartimaeus wants to see Jesus. I mean, with eyes that really work. He wants to see Jesus. James and John want to be Jesus, or at least as close as that could possibly get. Bartimaeus wants to follow Jesus, and James and John want to be beside Jesus when he is in his place of glory. Oh yeah, Lord, we're gonna give you the center place, because that's the Jewish custom. The most important person's in the center. We understand that, but we want to share your glory. Hello. We want to have some of that glory, just kind of bask in that glory ourselves. That's not too much to ask, is it, Lord? Boy, the eye. sin can so easily rear its ugly head. Can it? Right? It's just there. I remember years ago when we were meeting on the campus of Elon Celebration and there was a young man named Bob and Bob was he was he was coming to know the Lord he was following the Lord and he I think he was really growing in the Lord and then I I heard from one of the students you know how word filters back to to the pastor Bob's kind of taking a left turn he's He's not walking with the Lord anymore. In fact, he's wanting to do some things that we know Christians aren't supposed to do, and therefore he's saying, I don't know if I believe in this whole Jesus thing anymore. So I went to see Bob. I made an appointment. I said, Bob, let's have lunch. We got together, and I'll never forget, I said, Bob, I said, man, you were doing so well. Sounded like Paul to the Galatians. You were running so well. What hindered you? But I said, hey, Bob, listen. You know, don't you think, if you're getting ready to make decisions that are going to cut the Lord out, don't you think you should respect the Lord in your decisions? I think I used the word respect because I remember his response. He said, I think the Lord should respect me. I said, oh, that's a bad answer, Bob. That's not a good answer. You know, so we talked about humility and servanthood and he was having none of it. Well, you know, the Lord did respect James and John because he tells them first, you don't know what you're even asking. You don't even understand what you're asking. And then he says, will you be able to drink the cup I drink? Will you be able to be baptized in the baptism? And we understand from the Old Testament that drinking a cup usually meant judgment. Right? When Babylon drank the cup, it was judgment. When Israel drank the cup, it was judgment. And now Jesus was getting to drink the cup of God's judgment upon sin, upon the whole world. And then baptism, what does he mean by that? I think one of the explanations could be that Jesus was getting ready to be immersed, baptism by immersion. He would be immersed in the horror of being separated from the Father so that we will never have to face that horror ourselves. And they said in their hubris, we are able. And then Jesus says, you know what, you will drink the cup and you will be baptized. And what was he saying there? He certainly wasn't saying they could also be saviors. He was saying, look guys, you don't understand now. I understand what you don't see. You will suffer greatly. You will be persecuted. You will be ostracized, and maybe he was even talking about how they would die, but you will suffer. He said, but the place you're asking for is not mine to choose. I think what Jesus also, we know Jesus was saying to us is it's a renewed call to discipleship and walking with the master, accepting the suffering that he leads us through. Like we heard in the breakfast this morning from our brother Josh, you know, when we're going through suffering, our hands should be out. Okay, Lord, what do you want me to learn? What are you trying to teach me? What do you want me to do as a result? But look, no one, no one can drink the same cup that Jesus drank. He's the only one who could do it. And then verse 10, let me paraphrase verse 10. When the ten heard about it, they became indignant in James and John because they didn't think of it first. Okay, maybe that's not really what's going on. Maybe they weren't angry that James and John were asking for a place that they really wanted to ask for and just hadn't thought of it. Maybe they were also indignant because James and John were asking for a place where they would be close to Jesus in the next life, and they wanted to be just as close to Jesus in the next life as they are in this life. This was the 12 who were following him closely. We don't know. In either case, Jesus calls the disciples in for a lesson on what it means to be a disciple. Now, verses 42 through 44 gives us a lesson on leadership that we should learn well. you Leadership, leadership in the family, leadership in the church, leadership in the business, leadership in the government, leadership in the community, wherever there are leaders, these principles should apply. Jesus says, first of all, the way of the world is to use power to exercise control over others. He even said, you know how they do it, they lord it over. The word there for exercise authority is a Greek word that means to gain mastery. or power over others. And Jesus says, that's the way the world works. Because of sin, because of brokenness, that's the way it works in the world. You should never be surprised when there are power struggles in the world, because that's how it works. Those who can gain power will gain power, and usually they will exercise control and lord it over those who don't have power. We see it in every realm, from business to education to politics, community organizations, HOAs, it doesn't matter what it is, you're gonna see this power struggle. Where should we not see this power struggle? In the church. Jesus rejects this model. He rejects this model for the Kingdom of God. He says in no uncertain terms, it should not be so. It shall not be. And the word there literally means, it is not this way among you. It should not be that way among brothers and sisters in Christ. And then he goes on to say, But it shall not be so among you, but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. Now we know this made an impression on the disciples, especially Peter. And I say especially Peter because we know that Peter writes about this later when the churches have been dispersed and Peter writes his first letter. 1 Peter is written to the churches of the dispersion, right? They're all over the world. He writes in 1 Peter chapter 5, he says, verses 2 and 3, I'll just read it to you. He says, He's writing to the elders, to the elders of the churches. You see, you still exercise oversight if you're a leader, but you don't do it like the world. not under compulsion, but willingly, as God would have you, not for shameful gain, but eagerly, not domineering over those in your charge, but being examples to the flock." Now where did Peter get that idea from? Where did he hear such countercultural teaching? He heard it from the Lord. He reminds the elders what Jesus had said to the disciples on the way to Jerusalem, that whether you are an elder charged with oversight of the flock, or whether you're part of the flock without leadership responsibilities, it doesn't matter the sheep following the Lord, or the elders following the Lord, to fail to be a servant. not simply to fall short of some ideal, but it's to choose to stand outside of what the Lord has called all of us to do and to be. Jesus said, It shall not be so among you. When you're tempted to rise up and ask for that place of honor like James and John, when you're tempted to exercise authority in such a way that puts people in their place and damages spirits and pushes people away from the Lord, then you've taken a step out from under what the Lord has called us to be, and any of us can do it, and all of us have done it at different times, because it is the way of the flesh. Edwards writes, the preeminent, I love this quote, the preeminent virtue of God's kingdom is not power, not even freedom, but service. Boy, how much we talk about power. and how much we talk about freedom, especially in the land of the free and the home of the brave, but the preeminent virtue is service. And Jesus demonstrated that. Did he have freedom to extricate himself from that path? Did he? He told his disciples, look, I could call a legion of angels, 100 legions of angels, and God would send them immediately. He had power, he had freedom, but he chose to be a servant. He raises the stake even more when he says, whoever will be first among you must be slave of all. Now look, we hear that word and we think, wow, that's pretty strong. The disciples would have heard that word and it would have been a slap in the face. It would have shocked them about as much as the camel going through the eye of a needle we talked about last week. Remember, they were astonished. They were tremendously astonished. They said, who can be saved? And here he says, you wanna be the top dog? All right, be the slave of all. And they're thinking, wait a minute, the slave is at the very bottom rung in that society and in every society where there are slaves. The slaves are the people, persona non grata. They have nothing. They're nobody. You don't have to call them by name. You just tell them what to do. And they're at the bottom. Lord, you're telling us to get at the bottom of the rung so that we can be at the top? That doesn't make any sense. It does in the economy of God. It does from the Savior who left glory where he had everything to come to earth and to give his life for people like me and you. Greatness belongs then not to those who are great, Greatness belongs to servants. Jesus was teaching the future leaders of the church, right? He was teaching the future leaders of the church that, hey, the church is gonna come about under your care, under the Holy Spirit, and your care will not exist for the sake of those who lead it. No leader is more important than the congregation, and no church belongs to a leader or a group of leaders. They belong to the church. Is that bar too high? Well, hold on, Jesus is gonna raise it even further in the next part, the final verse. This is really the preeminent verse in many, many estimations of the book of Mark. This is why we become servants and slaves. This is why we lay down our lives for one another and not forsake serving for the sake of power or freedom. It's because that's the very posture of our Savior. This verse, we need to memorize it. We had to memorize it for the New Directions. Remember that, Tina? For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many." To serve means to give, and Jesus sets the standard for both. Here's another foundational doctrine that that verse, I want to make sure everybody understands, the foundational doctrine called Penal Substitutionary Atonement. Now those are big words. But it's very simple. Penal substitutionary atonement starts with the word penal. We hear of penal institutions where people go to pay their price. You go to pay your debt to society. You did the crime. You're doing the time. It's a penalty. And the penalty imposed by God on all of us is death. The wages of sin is death. Romans 6.23. So we are all, as we're born sinners, we're born into penalty. We're born into punishment. We're born guilty. So what does it mean then that there's substitutionary atonement? Romans 3, Paul says, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by His grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation, another big word, by His blood to be received by faith. Propitiation means that we gain favor and forgiveness. How do we gain favor and forgiveness so that we don't have to pay the penalty? What's the phrase there that we need to remember? It's, by His blood. Favor forgiveness comes by His blood. Penal substitutionary atonement means simply Jesus took our place because God's wrath had to be poured out upon a sacrifice. Guys, Cindy and I are reading this book right now by Lisa Childers. I probably have told you about it, but it's called Another Gospel. And she goes through this church that she was a part of when she was part of the Zoe Girls. She was going to this church, and the pastor, she found out, was a progressive Christian. Now, progressive Christians believe that if Jesus had to die to satisfy God's wrath, then God is a cosmic child abuser. She heard the pastor say that, and she said, what are you talking about? He said, Jesus didn't die because God's wrath had to be satisfied by his sacrifice. What are you talking about? He said, Jesus died because he was trying to give us an example of trusting and obeying the Father, even if it leads to a horrible death. Wait a minute, you're telling me Jesus died simply because he wanted to set an example for us so that we can trust and obey and not to take away our sins? No! Saints, penal substitutionary atonement is all through the scriptures. What did Adam and Eve have to do and what did God do for them to cover them? He covered them with what? Anybody under 12? What did he cover Adam and Eve with? Animal skin. So that means those animals had to do what, Blake? They had to die. Are you kidding me? So there was a blood sacrifice in order to cover Adam and Eve. What was it called in the whole Old Testament until 70 AD when Titus crushed Jerusalem? What was it called that the Jews did over and over and over again? Sacrifices. Why? Because there could not be forgiveness except by the remission, or there could not be remission of sin except through blood sacrifices. God set up that system, and remember in the Old Testament, whenever an animal died, did it take away the sin, or did it cover? covered, because those were imperfect sacrifices. But they all pointed to, read Hebrews, it pointed to the perfect, the final sacrifice of the Lord Jesus, who died not just so His blood would satisfy God's wrath and cover our sins, but so that His blood would What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. So when Jesus says, I have come to be a servant and to be a ransom, to pay the ransom price to God, that's what that means. I've just read this morning in John Piper's devotions, I'll close with this and then Josh is gonna come and share testimony that will bless your soul. John Piper wrote this today. He, Jesus, is alive to save. He's alive to give. And he's thrilled to be this way. He's not burdened down with your cares. He thrives on burden bearing, not burden giving. He loves to work for those who wait for him. He takes pleasure in those who hope in his steadfast love. His eyes run to and fro throughout the whole earth to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him. Jesus Christ is exuberant with omnipotent service for the sake of all who trust Him. John Piper said earlier in that talk, in that devotion, he said, would it offend you to know that when we're in heaven Jesus is going to be our servant? That's what the parable says is that the master of the house sat down and served those whom he had called to the table. Jesus has taken the position of a servant and he's called us into the same. Let's pray. Father, we are thankful this morning again to be reminded of the sacrifice that you made for us. We're thankful for the blood that not discovered our sins, but that takes away our sins past, present, and future, that those who are in Christ, for those of us who are in Christ, there is no condemnation. There is no horror of being separated from God even for a second, that we will simply pass from this realm into the next because of the finished work on the cross. And we celebrate that this morning. And Lord, help us to celebrate that by learning more and more to serve, to be a slave, to be a servant of all, not to puff ourselves up and not to put ourselves in places where we can be served, but look for ways we can serve others. And we pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Thank you for listening to this message by Pastor Mark Fox of Antioch Community Church in Elon, North Carolina. Antioch meets every Sunday for worship at 10 o'clock a.m. at 1600 Powerline Road in Elon. You can download other messages by Pastor Fox at antiochchurch.cc. You can also learn how to order his books or subscribe to his blog at jmarkfox.com. you