What makes for a great name? What makes for a great name? What makes for a good reputation? Well, you know where I'm going with this just by the title of this sermon. True greatness isn't what you think. There is a way that the world, that natural man thinks about greatness and goodness and reputation and all that. And then there's God's way of thinking about it, God's way of looking at it. When's the last time you did something truly great with your life? When is the last time you were great? What were you the greatest at? Were you the greatest student, the greatest athlete, the greatest musician, or worker, or you name it? And generally, you know if you were this because you were picked first, you were in first place in whatever thing that was. But if this passage is true, and I believe it is, then you should know this, the greatest you have ever been in your whole life, the greatest you ever were, was when you were serving someone else. Think about that. The greatest you ever were was when you were doing something for the Lord and for someone else. When you were grinding out work for someone. And maybe, and to add to it, maybe this person didn't even notice. Or worse, this person mistreated you and took advantage of you when you served them. And yet, you continued on with thanksgiving in your heart and a smile on your face, just wanting to be a blessing to others. But yet, you were grinded down by someone else. Let me tell you something. That must mean, according to Jesus, that there was greatness to that service. The greatest you have ever been was when you did something for someone or gave something to someone. And they could never pay it back. And you are just so content and happy about that. You don't even know it. You don't even remember it doesn't even occur to you. That's when you are the greatest. You see, service is the most basic pattern of life in the Kingdom of Heaven. Because it's patterned after the King, right? It's patterned after Jesus. If you want to know what the Kingdom of Heaven is like, then you really should get to know who is like. Jesus, the king, it's patterned after his own life. And here we have a summary statement, a summary biography of Jesus Christ in this set of verses. At the end here, it says the son of man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. And so the question. That is, if you want to know if you're walking in the kingdom and walking with the kingdom pattern and principle in your life, then ask yourself, am I serving anyone? Am I serving him? Am I serving someone else? Ask yourself, am I a servant? And I think we could agree, Christian to Christian, we could get a lot of things wrong in life. We could mess up on a lot of things. But one thing that will never be despised in the eyes of God is when you make your life to be like Jesus' life, amen? And you're never more like Jesus than when you humble yourself to serve others like he did. Now, this principle is a really life-changing, life-altering principle in the world. To think that to be great is to serve, to humble yourself, would be just absolutely earth-shattering, and especially, we know it was, because in the minds of these disciples, they're vying, they're positioning themselves for positions of greatness in the Kingdom of Heaven. And so Jesus is going to teach them, no, it's about service. But this thing that Jesus is teaching about service isn't actually something new. It's not new at all. You know that Jesus, when He came and died and resurrected and poured out His life through the Spirit on the church, and now all who come to faith in Jesus Christ, this thing that Jesus has done is He has raised up a new humanity. a humanity that's supposed to be like it was in the beginning, before the fall of man and sin. So I want to do just a quick Bible study with you to show you why the idea of service, or the concept of service, is so original to humankind. It's so original to the way God made you. So if you would, just for a brief moment, go with me to Genesis 1. Genesis 1. You have to understand this because Jesus is not pulling a rabbit out of a hat. He's not trying to bait and switch anyone. He's trying to show you, I have come so that a new humanity would be raised up. A humanity that honors the living and true God. The new man, out with the old, in with the new. And so here it was, as God created mankind, this is what he said, verse 27 of Genesis chapter one. He said, so God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them. Verse 28, and God blessed them and God said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth. Now you might say, whoa, wait, I thought we're talking about service and now you're reading a verse about dominion and subduing things. Yes, so God has made man in His image, and He made man to be a ruler. Not ruler of the universe, but to rule in the place of God on earth. He gave Adam and Eve this special charge. You could say they're vice-regents. In their innocence and purity, they are to rule. They are to have dominion over all the world. Keep that in mind. Now you ask, how are they supposed to do that? How are they to get this done? Well, now turn with me to the next chapter. Genesis chapter two. Go to verse 15. It says the Lord God took the man. So God zooms in on that sixth day of creation when he makes man and he takes the man and he puts him in the Garden of Eden. And now, you know, these famous words here. Maybe your Bibles read them just a little bit differently, but my Bible says, he put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and to keep it. To work and to keep. So here it is, the role of man is first designated to Adam. Here's how you achieve dominion, work and keep. Now, This word work is a very special word. Maybe in your Bible, you already have it translated the right way. The English standard version that I have is a little bit. It's a good word. Work is a good word, but it falls short, I think, of the original Hebrew word, which is the word Abda. Obed and that very word that Hebrew word is the word to serve Okay to serve we see this word come up a huge amount of times in the Old Testament so just as 15 the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to serve it and to keep it to serve it and to keep it and Let me show you where else you see this word, obed or abda. So the famous passage that I love to go to is Joshua chapter 24. Joshua chapter 24. Joshua has conquered the promised land with the Israelites, and as they're settling into the promised land, he's telling the people, do not go after the gods of the nations. He says to them, Joshua 24, choose this day whom you will, what? Serve. There's that word. Whom you will work for. Who you will serve. Who you will obed. Who you will abda. whether the gods of your fathers served in the region beyond the river, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell, but as for me and my house, we will what? Serve the Lord. So when God created mankind, He created them to exercise dominion by serving. By the way, this word is also the same word for worship. It's pretty fascinating. The word serve is the word for worship in the Old Testament. Obadiah is the man whose name means a worshiper of Yahweh. I worship Yahweh. Obed. So service Let me just help you see this. In the mind of Jesus, He is saying, I am resurrecting a new humanity. My kingdom is to be a resurrected humanity that the original intent of God will be restored unto. That they will be servants who shall one day inherit the earth by their service. That they shall be workers for good. Do you see what I'm saying? Do you understand that this concept of service was actually the original plan of God? But you know what happened. You know what happened. Adam and Eve, they became Self-serving when they took the fruit and they said we want to be as God's ourselves They rebelled against God and they turned that they they turned that whole concept of service and Dominion and they flipped it over and perverted and polluted it into what we see is all around us today that whole unholy Trinity of me myself and I Everything is about me myself. I me me me I That is what has happened because of sin. The truth that is revealed in this passage in Matthew 20 is that service is the pattern of true greatness. And that truth reveals the lie. That lie that tells you true greatness is found in self-service and being all about yourself and entitlement and pride. That me-first attitude is a lie. Notice me. Promote me. Take care of me. That is not the true way to greatness. And I just want to tell you this. If Jesus is making this offering about being great, then you should know it. God wants you to be very great. God Almighty wants you to be very great. He wants you to be great. He is aiming you at the target of glory. He wants you to pursue honor. He wants to bless you with these things by making you like His own Son, Jesus, who is the truest servant. With these thoughts, I want to declare just the main point that I'm making in all of this sermon today. The main thing is this, a very simple statement. As Jesus so humbly served, so disciples must so humbly serve. That's it. That's it. Remember what Jesus says to his disciples on the night when he was betrayed? John chapter 13. I have washed your feet as an example for you to do. 1 John 3.16 says, If God so loved us, we also ought to love the brethren. We also ought to love one another. As Jesus has so humbly served, so disciples must so humbly serve. This principle, Jesus wanted those disciples to know that He was with on the way to Jerusalem. He wants you to know it today. As He is, so you must also be. As He did, so you must also do. This is true greatness before the face of God. Now, I've divided this up. I think there's three parts to this set of verses that we've read at the beginning here. I think it's pretty clear how they're organized. The first would be the prediction of Jesus' suffering, death, and resurrection. The prediction. Now, a couple things we should know as we come to this point, as we come to this heading here, or this division. And we have to remember that this prediction is not the first time Jesus has said this to his disciples. Do you know how many times Jesus has already said these words to his disciples? Twice. This is the third time He makes a prediction that when they go to Jerusalem, He is going to suffer and die and rise again. The third time. And each time gets a little bit more detailed. Jesus reveals a little bit to the disciples. More and more. By the way, I just want to say this. Jesus predicted that He would go to Jerusalem, suffer, die, and on the third day be raised. And here's the thing about that. It happened, y'all. It happened. Just think about that. That means... that you should trust Him. Has anyone else predicted that they would go to Jerusalem, suffer and die, and in three days be raised from the dead, and then that happened to them, just like He said? No wonder the disciples, when they saw Jesus resurrected, they cried out to Him, My Lord and my God. My Lord and my God now the disciples aren't there yet in this passage and neither are we as we read through the gospel of Matthew, but just think about that He made that prediction three times and it came true. Just like he said he is the true prophet of God But this is about Jesus right here going up to Jerusalem with his disciples. Everyone always goes up to Jerusalem if you're going to Jerusalem, doesn't matter where you come from in the world, north, south, east, or west. Jesus is coming down from Galilee, but he's going up to Jerusalem. That's because if you've been there, you know Jerusalem is what? It's a hill, it's the holy hill, it's a mount, Mount Zion. So you always go up to Jerusalem. And Jesus is beginning that ascent to Jerusalem, and this is the time when Jews from all over the world are crowding in and converging on Jerusalem because it's the holiday season of Passover. The biggest event in the life of the Jewish people, Passover, still is to this day. Going up to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. And so Jesus is just weeks away, maybe a little bit longer than a week or two away from being in Jerusalem and going through all the stuff that we know is called Passion Week. And so, you know, there's lots and lots of people, many, many crowds of people just surrounding Jesus, getting getting whooped up as he's still healing people and performing wonders and teaching on the way to Jerusalem. But Jesus withdraws. He pulls his 12 disciples aside and gives them this amazing statement. Once again, the son of man must go to Jerusalem to suffer and die. It's the most detailed prediction Jesus gives about his suffering and death to his disciples yet. He says all that's going to happen. He's going to be handed over to the Jews. That means Judas is going to do it. To the Jewish leaders. He's going to be condemned to death by them. But they can't execute an execution because that was against the Roman law. So they have to hand him over to the Romans, the Gentiles, the Gentile leadership. Jesus will be delivered over to the Gentiles, and then they will do their worst, or you could say their best to Him, which wasn't much, mocking, scourging, crucifying Him finally. And yet you see the light shining through, though, because He says He's going to be risen from the dead. And it's really here in this prediction that you need to see the special nature of Christ as He makes His prediction in regards to His service. It's this, Jesus was such a willing servant. He was such a voluntary servant. Think about how clear He makes this before the disciples. We are going to Jerusalem. I'm going to be handed over to the Jews. I'm going to be handed over to the Gentiles, condemned to death. I'm going to be mocked. and flogged, and crucified." And see what Jesus says. He says, see, we are going. We are going. He sets His face. He knew exactly all that He would face. He knew with 20-20 vision, clear as day, centered on the, you could say, centered on the cross hairs of the cross, what He would go through. And He says, we are going. This is an incredible, incredible prediction. I think it's passages like these, verses like these, that lets the whole world see with unmistakable clarity the black and white of it. If anyone can read these words, they would automatically say, who would ever still go? Would you go? Who would ever still go? Who would ever still endure all this? And we know who would. And we know who did. It was Jesus Christ. I mean, you could look no further than these verses to see who the King of Heaven really is. He knew how He would be treated. How He would be taken. How He would be tried and torn and ultimately crucified. He knew exactly how humiliated He would be. And He still went. And so you've got to ask yourself why and think about this in terms of service. It was to glorify God and to serve the human race by sacrificing himself for them. And so what does this mean for you? What does this mean as you think about service? Maybe you are facing just that kind of daunting service. Maybe it's something you feel like is a grind or that's beneath you. Maybe you are just tired of kind of the regular rhythm of service and no thanks and no thankfulness and no reward and all of that. I don't know. Maybe you're just looking to step out of your comfort zone and to serve in some way, but you're a little nervous about it because it'll be costlier because it'll be uncomfortable. And I want you to know That if this passage is true, then I don't want you to think about all the struggle that you're going to go through with your service. I want you to think about the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. I want you to think about, and I think it's the Holy Spirit that wants you to think about to saturate your mind with the passion of the Christ. When you serve, don't look at how hard it is on you. Don't look at how much it's going to cost you. When you serve and you're trying to form that mindset of service, saturate your mind with the work of Jesus on the cross. Because here's the thing, that's exactly what Jesus did. His mind was full of the cross. His mind was full of the trial, and the mockery, and the scourging, and the persecution, and the humiliation that He was going through, and He still went. And so for you, and for me, and for us as we serve God and serve others, the thing that should be saturating our minds is, what Jesus has done. What Jesus did. What Jesus went through. Because when we focus on what Jesus went through, we're going to focus on and saturate our minds with the willingness of Jesus to make Himself low, despised, impoverished, humiliated for His Father's glory and for your salvation. And you know what this does, right? It's just what I quoted to you earlier. It causes an overflow. What happens? When we think about God's sacrifice, it fills our mind with His love for us, and the more we cherish and store up and saturate our minds and hearts with God's love for us, the more it spills out for others. And so, what does the passage tell us, 1 John 4? We loved, why? First love does. So when you think about service in your starting point, at your starting point of service, always be thinking about the cross of Jesus Christ. Amen. OK, so the second heading is this. It's the petition. So the first part is the prediction. The second part is the petition. That first part lesson is the lesson of the first part is to saturate your mind with the sacrifice of Jesus. And this lesson in the second heading is to be ready and willing to share in the sufferings of Jesus. So let's look at this. This is actually quite humorous. You have a mother come and make a certain plea on behalf of her two grown men children. How cute is that, isn't it? A mom gets involved for the sake of her sons. It really is the plea of James and John. The mom does it, but Jesus turns and has this confrontation with his disciples about it. Let me show you what I mean here just as I go through this. It's the plea to be great in the kingdom. Just like the world thinks, who gets closest to the glory seat? Now, just think about this. Jesus is trying to get His disciples ready. He's withdrawn from the crowds. He's pulled these disciples to Him. He's withdrawn from the crowds to get them in their minds thinking about His horrendous death that's coming soon. Just maybe a few weeks away. Maybe days away. And as He's just with His disciples, here comes one of their mommies. Pushing through. He's telling them the weightiest things ever. And here comes mom. Hey, Jesus, I have something to ask of you. She falls at his feet. So dramatic. She falls at his feet. Give me what I ask. Can you make my boys better than everyone else? Can you make my boys better than everyone else? Now, there's something really awesome about this woman, right? What does she do? She comes to the feet of Jesus. She asks, Lord, make my sons great in your kingdom. She says, say that these two sons of mine are to sit at your right and your left in your kingdom. This is a huge statement of faith. This is a beautiful faith for this woman. I mean, most of the people in Jesus' day, in this day that we have this passage written, most of the people did not yet understand Jesus was a king. They did not understand the kingdom of God, but she knew that Jesus was the king and his kingdom was about to break forth in all of its awesome reality. And so that's awesome, but yet her faith is mixed with worldly error. This can happen in people. This can happen in believers, right? We just get off base. We tend to try and mix worldliness with true faith, and it just doesn't go well for us. It doesn't ever go well. But she has an awesome confession, but her prayer request is not one that is, you could say, praying according to the Father's will. Some people have said that, and I actually like this identification, some people have said this woman is Salome that you read about, the woman who was with Mary at the foot of the cross. Salome was the sister of Mary, Jesus' mother, which would have made James and John Jesus' first cousins. And that would add some sense to this because now you have Jesus' aunt, coming up to Jesus and playing on a family relationship here. Jesus, hey, we're family. My sons are your cousins. Now, that's just speculation. I don't know why she wasn't named in order for that reason, but I do think there is a reason why she is a part of this story. It is to show, I think, how ridiculous in the eyes of God Vying for worldly greatness makes you look. I mean, just think about this. These are two men wanting to sit on thrones of eternal glory, right? What a request. Now, mommy, could you ask Jesus if he would give that to us? Can you? I'm too nervous, right? It just totally betrays their greatness. It makes them look ridiculous. And this is what worldly greatness amounts to before God. It looks puny. It looks silly. You know, the Lord holds this kind of thinking in derision. He sits on his throne and laughs at it. And we should too. We should not be this way. We should not be this way. And so he answers her by looking to the brothers. He says, you don't know what you're asking, but then he changes it. And again, a little tricky in the language here. He says, are you plural? Meaning he looks to the sons. Are you guys, are you sons able to drink the cup that I am able to drink? Now they say, and they answer this, they say, we are able or we can. And Jesus says, you will. Now there is a, there's a, there's a number of things happening in this when it talks about the cup. The first thing is the cup that Jesus was about to drink. was both unique and shared. Its uniqueness is just in the fact that Jesus is the Son of God, God in the flesh. And there is no one who could drink down the cup of God's punishment, God's wrath for sin. Nobody could do it because no one is God. This cup, when I say it's unique, is the cup that Jesus prayed for in the Garden of Gethsemane. You remember when he said, Father, will you let this what? cup pass from me, yet not my will, but yours be done. Because Jesus knew he was about to bear the forsakenness of God, his own father. He was about to bear the weight of sin and the wrath of God against sin in and of himself. And no one, no human could ever do that. Only Jesus could do that. Now, let me tell you why this cup is general or it's shared. It's because It's because this is the cup that every Christian must also drink. Every disciple. It's the cup that pours you out for something besides yourself. Jesus says that James and John will, in fact, drink this cup of suffering. They will. And they do, actually. They become truly great in the eyes of God. They truly drink of this cup of suffering. You know how you know, read Acts chapter 12. James, this one here, this brother of John, the son of Zebedee, he becomes the first apostle to be martyred. He's the first one to lose his head for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. John, his brother, lives a long life of endurance and yes, very, very gruesome suffering until he dies in prison because of his allegiance to God and service in the Kingdom of Heaven. So these two men, these two sons, they become truly great. They truly do drink the cup of suffering. I've included some verses here in your outlines to understand this shared cup of suffering that all Christians are to be a part of. All Christians are supposed to partake of. So then what's this about Jesus declaring that He won't grant James and John the position next to Him, but only the Father does this? I think some people tend to look at this like, is Jesus limiting His knowledge? Kind of like He says when He talks about His return, He says, the day and the hour I do not know, but only the Father who is in Heaven. You know this verse, right? When He's going to return. Some people say this is what He's doing here. He doesn't know that. In His earthly life, He doesn't know these things, but in Heaven, He will know these things. I don't think that's what it means. I think it simply means what it says. I think you could simply take it as what it says, and that's just this. It's already been decided. It's already been figured out. It's already been appointed from the beginning in the counsel of God who is going to sit in my right hand and my left, it's already been decided. It's not based on the mother's plea. It's not based on anything James and John are going to do here. It's already been decided. But I also think he says this because I think it has an effect on us as we read it. Because I think, If Jesus says it's already been decided, we're kind of thinking like, okay then, well, Jesus, could you give us a hint? Could you tell us who it is? Could James and John really be it? Or any disciple for that matter? Which one will it be? And I just think that's the point because Jesus is saying, I think Jesus is implied, implicitly saying, look, will you still serve? Will you still share in the cup of suffering? Will you still endure scorn, ridicule, if your name is never known for it? Will you still lay down your life if you don't get a memorial made for you, if you don't get a plaque, if you don't get an applause, will you still do it? Will you still lay down your life, even if you know that when you get to heaven, someone else might be sitting next to Jesus? Will you still do it? This is why all this matters to you, this section, right? Because Jesus wants you to share in His sufferings. Are you willing to serve if it's costly? Are you willing to give if it's sacrificial? Are you going to forsake a life of ease and pleasure and self-service and take a number in the lineup of sufferers? Of servant sufferers? Will you let go of your name and position if it means that Christ's name is great? Are you willing to get out of your comfort zone to serve another? Because if you wish to serve, then this is the cup you have to drink. Service is going to hurt, y'all. Everybody wants to serve until they get treated like a what? A servant. Are you willing to drink the cup? Are you willing to drink the cup? By God's grace, you will be able to drink the cup. To know Jesus in His sufferings. And to bless the world as you suffer and labor for the Kingdom of Heaven. The final section is this, the proclamation of Jesus coming into the world. Jesus gives the reason why He came into the world, to serve. The other disciples are indignant with James and John, and you might say that all this means is it takes one to know one. We already know from reading the Gospels that the disciples had already been up to this manner of behavior. Already. Matthew 18 verse 1. They're arguing about who is the greatest in the sight of God. Mark chapter 9, I think it's verse 33. They're already arguing about who is great. The disciples were just like James and John. And you know how it is. When we get mad about what we see in others, all that nastiness, it looks disgusting to us because of the way other people are. And really, you know, it's time to check yourselves because kind of the more of a rise we get out of being bothered about someone else, those things are within you, within us. Jesus says there's a worldly way of greatness, just like look around the kingdoms of men, the Caesars, the altars, the monuments, the nation building, the empires, the cliques. You know, you could translate it to today. You know, it's all rewards, rankings, placement, big accounts, big numbers, big views, big shows. And Jesus says, no, actually, the Kingdom of Heaven sees greatness as being like a servant, of being like a deacon. That word is deacon. And then being like a slave. Being like a slave. The Kingdom of Heaven greatness is obscurity, ridicule, sweat, tears, prayer, hiddenness, faithful plotting, waking up early, doing work that nobody else will do. It's thanksgiving and joy and effort and striving and endurance and patience for a word, that great and wonderful word from the Heavenly Father. On the day you go to be with Him, He will say, well done, good and faithful what? Servant. Enter into the joy of your Master. Jesus gives the summary statement for why He appeared in the world at all. I have come. He says a number of these summary statements throughout the Gospels. This is one of them. I have come to serve and to give my life as a ransom for many. Son of man. By the way, that's Jesus' favorite term to call Himself. It means Messiah. It means Christ. It means the One who is bringing in the new creation The One who will organize the world through His kingdom, or reorient the world through His kingdom. It's the Messiah, the Son of Man. That's Jesus' favorite term for Himself. He says He's come to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many. You know, this term ransom, it means a couple things. Actually, there's a couple layers to it. For the Jews, this word ransom had a very long-standing definition. If you go back to Exodus 30, verses 11 and 12, and Exodus 30, verses 15 through 16, God ordains this practice, this command that when children are born, there's to be a ransom price paid for them. And this ransom price is so that they could be numbered among the people of God, and so that their guilt would be atoned for. You know what atonement is, it's a covering for your guilt. And we see this whole idea of ransom in the Jewish worship system. A price had to be paid to be counted among the people of God and have your guilt atoned for. But in the Roman idea, The gentile idea, the idea of ransom, had a specific definition that was in regards to slavery. You see, if I was a slave and I wanted freedom, I would have to pay a ransom price for my freedom. That ransom price had to be what I was worth in the eyes of the master, whatever he decided the price should be. So I would have to come up with a way to pay this ransom price, and it didn't happen often because slavery was hard. It's hard to get out of that. Or, here's the other thing, the other way a ransom could be made, is another slave takes my place, right? So that I could go free. That's the ransom slave. Another slave takes my place. Another servant takes my place so that I can go free. Another servant takes your place so that you can go free. So take this out. What did I just say, the three things here? Ransom the Jewish way, to be numbered among the children of God, to have your guilt covered, and in the Roman way, someone stands in your place so that you can go free. But which is Jesus talking about? How about all of the above, y'all? Jesus is bringing the two together to show that He, the Son of Man, is going to be the ransom price. that by believing in Him, all who believe in Him, all who receive His service, can be numbered among the people of God, could have their guilt atoned for, their sin taken away, and can now go free and have freedom because another one, another servant, the Son of Man, has stood in their place. Amen? That's what the ransom price means. And Jesus said, this is why I have come. That's it. I have come to be the ransom price so that all who believe in me can be numbered among the people of God, can stand clear of guilt and innocent in the sight of a holy God, and can now be free, free from slavery to fear, free from slavery to self, free from slavery to darkness, free from slavery to slavery, free from slavery to sin and Satan's power Free from all of that, because another has taken your place. Amen. That is the greatness of the service of Jesus Christ. The humiliation of Christ, all that Jesus predicted, that is what it cost Jesus the delivering over to the Jews and then the Gentiles, and then delivering over to mockery and scorn and scourging and torture and death. Look at that cost and look at what it has afforded you now. Because He served. And that's the exact lesson that we come away with today as we think about just this as I close. Choose today to be a servant of Jesus and all others. You see, when Jesus pays that ransom price, and now you can go free, it's not free so that you can use your freedom as some sort of way to appease your flesh, as Galatians chapter 5 says. It's freedom so that you can serve. I love what Martin Luther, the reformer, said. You know what a Christian is? A Christian is Lord of all. Not in an idolatrous way. What he means by that is a Christian is free of all. He's no longer under Satan's power, no longer under sin's condemnation, no longer under the curse of the law. He is free of all that. That's what a Christian is. Free. Free at last. Free totally. Free fully. Free finally. A Christian can be bound to the cellar wall of some dungeon somewhere, and there's nothing in all the world that can take away that Christian's freedom. They can be working, serving, laboring under any heavy yoke, but if they are a Christian, if they are in Christ because of that ransom price, they are free. That's the reality. But you know what he says? Luther went on to say, a Christian is Lord of all, and a Christian is also servant of all. Because He's Lord of all, He is now free to serve all. And in serving all, we live out that kingdom pattern, that kingdom pattern of service, just like our King Jesus did. Just like He did when He came into this world. to serve, washing feet, healing the sick, raising the dead, casting out demons, teaching all who would come to Him, offering the easy yoke, and ultimately, dying on the cross and rising again. This is the service of Christ the King. This is the service that He calls us to bear witness to and to live out as we lay ourselves down humbly and sacrificially for Him and for others. Amen.