Well, I want to testify to the Lord's healing. While we were singing, He is the Lord that healeth thee, I felt sudden relief in my back. Praise God. Thank you, Lord. We're going to read from Matthew chapter 20. This is the sixth sermon in the series on women of faith. Matthew chapter 20 and verses 20 through 28. Then the mother of Zebedee's sons came to him with her sons, kneeling down and asking something from him. And he said to her, what do you wish? She said to him, grant that these two sons of mine may sit, one on your right hand and the other on the left, in your kingdom. But Jesus answered and said, you do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink and be baptized with a baptism that I am baptized with? They said to him, We are able. So he said to them, you will indeed drink my cup and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with, but to sit on my right hand and on my left is not mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared by my father. And when the ten heard of it, they were greatly displeased with the two brothers. But Jesus called them to himself and said, you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you. But whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave. Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many. Father, we bless you for the privilege that we have of being slaves. You have blessed us, Father, in saving us from hell and enabling us to be slaves. And after having done everything we want our testimony to be, we are unprofitable servants. We have done that which is our duty to do. Help us, Father, to have more and more godly attitudes recognizing that we serve out of an infinite debt that we owe to you. And so we can just do it out of love, never thinking that we need to pay. Father, we pray that you would bless us, your people, as we dig into the scriptures, into the life of Salome. And I pray that this would be edifying to all. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Well, I really think that Salome has been given a bad rap in modern books. And she's been given a bad rap because of the one time that she tried to misuse her relationship with Jesus, but I don't think she should be defined by that one time. She really is a wonderful woman of faith, and I believe that the last chapters of Matthew hint that she learned from this event, and I hope that we can learn from this event as well. Paul says that there is no temptation There's a universal principle that there is no temptation except such as is common to man, which means her temptation is common to man. Any one of us can fall into this. And so I want us to listen and learn from this remarkable woman. Now let's start by defining who she was. As I've already mentioned, Salome is normally pronounced Salome. Some people pronounce her name Salome, and the Greek actually is Salomein with an N on the end. And I think all three pronunciations have the emphasis on the second syllable, but the standard really is Salome, at least in the English language. I am 100% convinced that she was Mary's sister and that Jesus would have grown up calling her Aunt Salome. There was probably a very close bond that was there, knitting those two families together. And especially since Jesus' brothers were not yet believers, and Salome's sons and daughters were believers, I think there was probably a tighter spiritual knitting of Jesus to Salome's family than to his own siblings. And you can see that even at the cross, contrary to all social conventions and expectations, Jesus did not entrust his mother's care to his next oldest brother. He entrusted it to Salome's second born son, John. And so that in a nutshell is my view of who she is, but I do want to admit that there is debate on her identity. And I'd like you to turn first of all to John chapter 19 and verse 25. John chapter 19 verse 25 says, Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. Now the debate stems around whether this verse should be translated in a way where it illustrates two women by the cross, three women by the cross, or four women by the cross. The two-woman theory says that it is Mother's sister is Mary the wife of Clopas and is also called Mary Magdalene, so they would translate the chi in the Greek as even rather than as and. While it's technically possible, there are just way too many other problems with parallel texts, and so most commentators do not hold to that view. The second theory says that there were three women, Jesus' mother, his sister who was the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. And my view is the same as the New King James. There are four women. Actually, I've got 27 versions, and all of the versions translated as four women there. Hendrickson, Brochure, many, many other, I think a majority of the commentators that I have, give very, very cogent reasons as to why John 19.25 can only be describing four women. Now, if that's the case, then there's a lot of implications that flow from that. Just as an example, it's extremely unlikely that Mary's sister would be named Mary. That could be a stepdad, but dads don't usually name their kids the same name. It's extremely unlikely that Mary Magdalene was married to Clopas, and I won't get into all of the reasons for why that is the case. But if all of these versions are correct, that there's four women, Then, when you lay the various Gospels side by side with each other, it becomes very quickly apparent that this one woman is described three different ways. She is described as the mother of Zebedee's sons in Matthew. Mark calls her Salome, and John calls her his sister, that is, Jesus's sister. And so Salome was Christ's aunt on his mother's side. And I think all by itself, that explains why she feels that she should be coming to Jesus and asking for this favor, because Jesus really was the closest to her two sons. And because of that tight spiritual and physical relationship, it made sense to her that her sons should be preferred. But it also brings up a very fascinating side note that many commentators have mentioned. They have noticed that many of the apostles were either relatives or close friends to Jesus. I've already mentioned that James and John were first cousins on his mother's side, and while there is debate On some of the other relationships, many scholars believe that Simon the Zealot, James the Less, Thaddeus, and Thomas were first cousins on their adoptive dad's side. And this is based on Hegesippius' claim that Clopas was the brother of Joseph, the adoptive father of James. And there does seem to be some exegetical hints of that. Now, we can't be certain of all of these facts, but F. W. Farrar claims that, quote, no less than half of the apostles would have been actually related to our Lord, and a majority of the rest were closely connected to each other in some way. For example, In Luke 5 verse 10, it says that Peter was a business partner with James and John. Well, that makes those three pretty tightly connected. And then Matthew 4.18 says Andrew was Peter's brother, so that makes the four of them pretty tight. And then it seems that Bartholomew and Philip were brothers, and Eusebius claims that Thomas and Matthew were twin brothers. And so there were very tight connections between these men even before Christ called them. Now, what difference does this make? Well, I think it helps to temper some of our modern carefulness about having relatives serving in the same church. I have read many modern churchmen who would say it's utterly inappropriate to do in the church today what Jesus did with the disciples. And so there's a false sense of propriety, and I think in the process they insult Jesus. The fact of the matter is that if these relationships are even approximately true, it shows how frequently God's grace and callings line up with natural relationships. God can pull a Matthew or an Apostle Paul out of the blue, but He often raises up leadership within local assemblies that are either related to each other or are friends of each other. And I bring this up because there's a lot of marriages happening within this church, and within the next 50 years, it is highly likely, highly likely, that there are going to be elders and deacons who are more and more related to each other. I'm related to Gil, and I think that's perfectly appropriate. Nothing wrong with that. More of those kinds of relationships will almost be inevitable in the next 50 years. If you lived in a small town, it would be even more inevitable. And so it should not be thought to be a strange thing that father and son, brothers and friends, will find God calling them to the same ministries or within the same business or at least the same line of work. It's just the way God normally works. Now that, of course, can lead to the very problems that we will see in today's sermon. But the fact that there can be problems with relatives working with each other should not in any way be an automatic bar to such things happening. My dad was a pastor. My brother and I were called to be pastors. If we all worked in the same town, we'd be likely working in the same church. So who was Salome? First point says she was Mary's sister. That's John 19.25, and thus the aunt of Jesus. Second, she was the mother of the apostles James and John. We know that James and John and Peter were in the inner circle of Christ's relationship, his closest friend was John, Salome's second-born son. Now, why do I call him the second-born son? Because of the 20 times that James and John are mentioned together, 19 of them mentions James first and then John second, and the third one was only mentioning the order in which he's calling people, so they happen to be in that order there, but it doesn't deal. with age. It's almost certain that James was firstborn and John was the secondborn. But Jesus, here's the point, Jesus was very close to all three. Application, Well, if Jesus needed close friends, we all need close friends. But this is part of what factored into Salome figuring that making James and John the first in the kingdom was an obvious thing to ask. And with the other apostles vying for that position, you can read about that on your own in Matthew chapter 18, and there's parallel passages on that. They're all wanting to be first in the kingdom, right? She may have felt the need to get on the stick, and we need to ask before some of the other apostles get Christ to put them first. And we'll be showing that relatives and friends should not be allowed to influence us away from Christ's instructions. That's the main point. Third, Salome was married to Zebedee, a very wealthy fisherman. When you look at all of the passages that I put into your outline about Zebedee, you will discover a number of clues that commentators have picked up on to say, yes, this was a wealthy businessman, a fisherman, wealthy enough to have plenty of servants, wealthy enough that when James and John, his sons, and Peter, the partner, left, And Zebedee is the only partner that's left. Oh, they could carry on with all of the servants just fine. Wealthy enough that they were able to financially support Jesus and James later, and John later, and perhaps some other apostles later. Luke 5, 9 through 11 says that he was business partners with Simon Peter, and so Peter himself was not poor. He was not poor. This is where many of the children's books get it completely wrong when they present these people as poor, uneducated, rough-around-the-neck, lower-class peasants. Nothing could be further from the truth. They were very educated, as the Greek of their epistles shows. A lot of people say, how could fishermen, how could peasants write the way they wrote? Well, they actually had some privileges. And just the way Zebedee is mentioned in the Gospels, you get the impression that he was a very, if not the most prominent, a very prominent man in Capernaum. Commentators point out that Zebedee had enough clout through his social standing and probably through his wealth that John 18.15 says that John was well-known by the high priest and could enter and come and go from his courtyard without raising any alarm whatsoever. For someone in Capernaum to be that well-known by the high priest in Jerusalem, he had to be a very prominent man. The point is, Jesus did not despise the wealthy. That's the point. This explains why some of these apostles were able to finance their own missions trips. But I also bring up this background information because it does factor into why it was so easy for Salome to presume upon Jesus without thinking she was doing anything wrong, anything appropriate. And we'll talk about that in a bit. But to get a real feel for Salome, we also need to understand why she is presented in the Gospels as a wonderful woman of faith. I think you're going to miss the impact of the lesson in the main passage that we will look at if you think of her as mercenary, selfish, self-serving, anything along those lines. She was none of those things. Her sin was so subtle that any one of us can fall into it. Any one of us can fall into it and not even think we're doing anything wrong. That's why I deliberately picked Salome as the woman who can teach us how to guard against letting blood be thicker than baptism waters, okay? Our story shows that our relationship to Christ takes precedence over our relationship to family, even though both forms of relationship are very important in the Bible. Now, there are five evidences that Salome was a wonderful woman of faith. First of all, she is presented in the Gospels as being a strong believer. Now, that much I think is super obvious, and you can even see it in the passage we read in Matthew chapter 20. Even though she had misunderstandings concerning the nature of the kingdom, she believed in the kingdom. She believed Christ was going to do exactly like he said and set up the kingdom. But Matthew 27 and Mark 16 indicate that she had put her faith in Jesus right from the beginning of His ministry, and it was a faith she had in Him through to the end. She was one of the women who stayed at the cross of Christ despite the danger of associating with Jesus. Now, when you compare the Gospels, to me, those Gospel accounts, when they're all put together, imply that the soldiers had chased most of his friends and relatives away, and there is many who are watching from afar, it says, but Salome is one of those women who refused to watch from afar. She pushed her way back to the cross despite this danger. She was one of three women who brought embalming spices to Christ's tomb. The point is she's a believer, and a true follower of Christ. And there are hints that she had a very, very gracious boldness. And even here, when she says, grant that these two sons of mine may sit, one on your right hand and the other on your left in your kingdom, it's easy to so focus upon what is wrong with that statement, that we miss what is powerfully right about that statement. Just think about, by Matthew chapter 20, the crowds have become so disillusioned with Christ that they have abandoned Jesus, not Salome. No, she still firmly believes that He would establish His kingdom as He said that He would. Okay, second, she was a very generous and selfless woman. Luke 8.3 implies that she was one of the women who had generously provided for Jesus and His disciples out of their substance. Now, other versions say they provided for Jesus and the apostles out of their wealth or out of their belongings, and the rest of the verses I've put into your outline show that she and her husband had considerable wealth, but she did not hold on to that wealth. She shared it generously. She was a steward. She had a kingdom vision. By the way, the fact that the text says that these women shared with him out of their wealth implies that it's not just men, you know, who can have decision-making with regard to finances. There really does need to be a joint decision-making on these kinds of things. Husbands should listen to their wives who might have insight on what kind of ministries we ought to be financing. But let's move on. The next point shows that she wasn't like some wealthy people that I know who only throw money at ministries and never get their hands dirty. She was not like that at all. She got personally involved in serving. So whenever Christ and his disciples came into Capernaum, and he was there more frequently than any other town, whenever they came through, there's good evidence to suggest that he stayed at Salome and Zebedee's house. And there are other ways in which she showed her Christian grace of hospitality. but she also left her town of Capernaum whenever he came into Galilee. It wasn't just when he came into Capernaum, and I think this is okay. I mean, her husband's off in the boat working, her children are grown, they're not at home, there's no little children to be taken care of, so why shouldn't she go travel when he's somewhat close, in the same province anyway? And Mark 15, 40 through 41 indicates, whenever Jesus and his disciples would come, Salome would join with some other similar women in ministering to the group's physical needs. Now it says that they ministered to him, even though it's very clear they were ministering to all of the apostles, so there's a Christ-centeredness to her ministry. Anyway, she probably washed their clothes, cooked their meals, went on errands for them, follow them around on their route whenever it was close enough to be able to do so. So we can deduce she was a very generous and hospitable and service-oriented lady. Though this request in Matthew 20 evidences some selfishness, or at least giving in to the selfishness of James and John, That was not her defining characteristic. Most people who knew Salome would probably say she didn't have any selfishness whatsoever. For example, when Christ called Peter, James, and John to be his disciples, their departure would have put a real strain on the family because it went from four partners down to one partner. doing all of that work. Now, he had servants to help him, but there's no indication whatsoever that she objected to this. In fact, she supported them fully in following after Jesus. And her other ministries that I've described show that at least in terms of finances and sacrifice, she was not selfish in the least. So her business does not take priority over Jesus. Jesus comes first. She gave up those things for Christ. And then last but not least, she was devoted to Christ at a time when he was becoming more and more unpopular. And even after this humiliation, she doesn't leave in a huff like some people do. She was not offended with Jesus. She continues to be loyal to Jesus and devoted to his cause right through to his death and after. And I think we can learn from this to not get offended when our efforts are rebuffed or when our opinions are disagreed with or turned down. So Salome was a godly saint and a woman of faith. She took this rebuke with grace. And I'd like us to now try to learn what we can from the sin that this woman of faith engaged in. I believe it started with the desire to please her sons and want to advance her sons at the expense of the other disciples. And I put, maybe I'm wrong in this, but I put the primary blame upon her sons because it's obvious to me that they used her. Let me give you three reasons why I have come to this conclusion. First, passage we read, Matthew 20, verses 20 through 21, says that she said to Jesus, Grant that these two sons of mine may sit, one on your right hand and the other on the left, in your kingdom." So it's clear that she did indeed say these words. But if you flip over to Mark, you'll see that the sons are the driving force behind her own words. They were the ones who put those words into her mouth. Mark 10, 35 through 38 says this. Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to him, saying, Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask. And he said to them, What do you want me to do for you? They said to him, Grant us that we may sit, one on your right hand and the other on your left, in your glory. But Jesus said to them, You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? Now, Mark is clear that it is their words and their ideas, and Jesus addressed his rebuke to them. We see the same thing in Matthew chapter 20. Even though she says these words, Jesus rebukes her sons, beginning at verse 22 of Matthew 20. But Jesus then entered and said, you that's plural, y'all do not know what you ask. So he's clearly attributing what she said to the plural you, to them. You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with, they said to him, we are able." So in order to reconcile Matthew with Mark, we need to say that word for word, everything that Salome said in Matthew 20 verse 21 was what her sons told her to say. These words are their words. Second, Jesus doesn't rebuke Salome. He rebukes the two brothers. Though she's wrong in accommodating their request, they were more wrong in using her. And third, verse 24 says that the disciples were greatly displeased with the two brothers, not with Salome. They knew where these words were coming from. And there are two harmonizations out there, one by Bettner and the other by Chaney, that show how this can all be reconciled. So when you slide the two passages together, count for every word, here is what went on. Both the mother and the sons come to Jesus, kneeling down before him. Then the brothers say, teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask, which is a pretty bold, wide open statement. Really, that's never appropriate. Don't ever say yes to whatever we ask. But anyway, kind of weird that they were that bold. But he doesn't rebuke them for that. When he asks what they want, they signal to mom to say what they had instructed her to say. and then they agree with her. Okay, so that's how it went down. Now this means that the first sin of Salome was the sin of being an undiscerning obliger. An obliger does things for others at their request without considering the consequences and the costs of doing so. Obligers have a hard time saying no. This is one of several scriptures that has been a royal rebuke to me as an obliger, as a person who keeps saying yes to ministry requests without asking God and His leading, and then I have way more on my plate than I can do, and God's looking at me saying, well, I didn't tell you to do that, you know? I can imagine Him saying that. And so, This issue of needing to run requests past the Lord before we say yes, I think is a very, very important one, even to the demands of our children. And by the way, you do not have to have an obliger personality to fall into this sin. Anybody can fall into this sin. The apostle Peter is not an obliger by a long stretch, and yet Galatians chapter 2 tells us that he fell into this sin because of peer pressure. So he didn't want to hurt the feelings of the Gentile Christians, but he did so through peer pressure and the fear of man. Let me read you Galatians 2, 11 through 12. Now when Peter had come to Antioch, I withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed. For before certain men came from James, he would eat with the Gentiles. But when they came, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing those who were of the circumcision. And the rest of the Jews also played the hypocrite with him, so that even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy." So this desire, this strong desire to please one segment of the church, ended up hurting another segment of the church, and actually ended up compromising a scriptural principle. So peer pressure and other forms of needing to please others can be such a dangerous sin. The essence of this first sin is captured in Galatians 1.10, and I'm reading from the New American Standard Bible. For am I now seeking the favor of men or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ. That's pretty stark contrast there. Avoiding the related sins of giving favors to those that we love, trying to please men, succumbing to peer pressure. These are sins that need to be avoided if we are to be servants of Christ. And at the cross and at the tomb, we discover that Salome did indeed learn that lesson. She did not care what the Roman soldiers thought. She made sure she was by the cross with Mary and John. She was willing to offend others in order to please Christ. She had learned her lesson. The second sin was misusing her position with Christ. For her to come before Christ in this way, especially after all of the other apostles have been arguing and vying for this position of being first in chapter 18, clearly shows that she thinks her sons somehow have the right to get on the getting while the getting is good. Why does she think they have more right than the other apostles to do? Well, I think there's only three things that I could think of, and the most obvious reason is that they were related to Christ. As I've already mentioned, she was the aunt of Jesus, and you need to understand Jewish social custom to get a feel for what was going on in this passage, because back in those days, you didn't just apply for jobs. you always got an intermediary who would pull the strings for you, okay? And so whether it's getting into a government position or on the Sanhedrin or getting a job with somebody else, you got somebody that knew them who could pull the strings for you. And even though James and John obviously desired this position for themselves, none of the apostles, though they wanted the position, dared. They didn't have the courage to ask him outright. So it would have been much more tactful to have an intermediary ask for the position. Normally, parents were the big go-betweens for big business deals, for getting a son or a cousin into government, cousins even. Many times people would act for them. So Salome was a natural pick. I think John and James probably figured, you know, all of these apostles are vying for this position. We need to act quickly. And Salome says, don't worry, I've got a woman's touch. You know, I'm an older woman and I'm an aunt. I think I've got some pull with Jesus. I think there's some cultural tradition that's entering into this situation. Now, here's the problem. And this is the part that we need to remember. The subtle underlying assumption of all of them is that blood is thicker than religion. I think that's the assumption. It's so easy to allow blood relations to dictate spiritual relations. And this is one of the reasons why so many people in seminaries and in other places just say, you can't have relatives serving with you in the same session or in the same diaconate. And to me, that is, even if they're eminently qualified, they say, no, don't do that. To me, that is, a fleshly way of dealing with a potential problem. The biblical way is to deal with the sinful attitudes and actions as they arise and not to opt for sanctification by man-made rules. When I was called to the previous church, my father-in-law was an elder, but I was pleased that the pulpit committee And the church and the presbytery all handled this biblically. They did not allow blood relations to stop the ball from rolling, but on the same token, they made sure there were things, checks and balances in place, so that blood relations did not get in the way of spiritual relations. Okay, let's do away with that. Let's just apply the same concept to church members, because any of you can have this happen to you. I have known relatives who have left the church because they were disgruntled that their daughter did not get as much time in the music team as others. I know at least two cases of people who left the church because a son, in one case, a cousin was under discipline. Now, they admitted that this person should be disciplined for fornication, but they felt like they had to go with their relatives. Blood relations were thicker than Christ relations, and that should not be. Let me give another example. I know a pastor's wife in an independent church who has tremendous influence and say in what goes on in that church, and newcomers would never have guessed that she had such influence because she's so humble, just like Salome bows down before Jesus, and yet this pastor's policies are all dictated by flesh-and-blood opinions rather than Christian principles. In Matthew 12, when Christ's mother and brothers came to him asking for his audience, he didn't give them any favors. And my reading of the passage is that Jesus' siblings were using their mom, they couldn't do it on their own, so they're using their mom to try to manipulate Jesus into doing something. And Jesus saw right through that manipulation and he said this, who is my mother and who are my brothers? And he stretched out his hand toward his disciples and said, here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother. When we become Christians, we enter a spiritual family, and while we still have love and loyalty to our kin, I think that's biblical, our loyalty to Christ should never be superseded by our loyalty to relatives. And Christ said in verse 23, to sit on my right hand and on my left is not mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared by my Father. Okay, enough on that. Another reason which may have caused her to rationalize that she had the right to ask for higher favor for her sons than the other apostles would get was that Uncle Zebedee and Aunt Salome were helping to support the disciples out of their family coffers. I mean, what would happen to this ministry if we didn't give any money? I think it would fold, wouldn't it? Now, you might smile that I even suggest such a ridiculous thing as that. But really, when you start examining churches and parachurch ministries, you begin realizing money talks very loudly, very, very loudly on the part of ministers who do not have the attitude of Christ. They have to tread very, very carefully on what they preach on, what they don't preach on, lest some of the big donors stop donating, or actually, lest they offend any of their patrons. I've actually had more than one pastor in Omaha tell me that they would never preach on topic X, and I won't tell you what that topic is, and they said, because we'd lose tithers. And you can imagine that conversation didn't go very well. We got into a very heated argument over that, because I think that's being totally unfaithful to Christ, who has called them. But as we're arguing, other pastors come along and say, man, we wouldn't do that either. Money talks. It still talks in the churches of today. Now on the part of the people who give, there is often the feeling that the church, or for that matter, the Lord owes them something. They give with invisible strings attached. Now, they'll never say that there are strings attached, but the feeling is there. And perhaps in this situation, there was the unexpressed knowledge that the disciples were in some way beholden to her, and by all rights, she and her sons deserved a good stake in the future kingdom. After all, she has sacrificed so much for the kingdom. Well, Christ's response shows that this is a pagan way of thinking. This is the way of the Gentiles. One other point that may have factored in was that she had worn her fingers to the bone for Christ and his disciples. Now, perhaps she and we would not be so crass as to say this outright, but there are often strings attached to service within the church. We need to realize that our service does not obligate Jesus in the least. Not in the least. In fact, Jesus said after we have done everything that we have been commanded to do, we should say this, we are unprofitable servants. We have done what was our duty to do. Luke 17 verse 10. That's the attitude we ought to have, is that we give and we serve with no strings attached. In other words, we serve out of gratitude for our salvation. We have an infinite debt that we owe to the Lord, and we're just doing it out of love. If there was any strings attached, it would be we're giving because we could never pay back the Lord, right? So we're indebted to him. Sometimes relations, money, and service can very subtly become a means of promoting our ideas or our programs or ourselves. And if people don't move the way we want them to move, or they don't realize that there are any strings attached, then we can manipulate the situation by hinting that we might not give any more money or we might step off of that committee. Now, if they accuse us of manipulation, it'd be so easy to deny that and take a humble attitude. Oh, I don't want to interfere with the ideas of other people. I mean, it'd be best for everybody if I just dropped off this committee. I'm very busy anyway. I don't mind if somebody takes my place, and I don't want to tell people what to do." In other words, our manipulation can be very much camouflaged with humble words. So notice the dramatic show of humility and submission displayed by Salome as she bows low before Jesus. And Mark says, all three of them bowed before Jesus. Verse 20 says, then the mother of Zebedee's sons came to him with her sons, kneeling down and asking something from him. A great show of humility. Let's look at the request and what Jesus does with it. She said to him, grant that these two sons of mine may sit, one on your right hand and the other on the left, in your kingdom. But Jesus answered and said, you do not know what you ask. Now because it's in the plural, he's addressing the two sons or maybe all three of them, none of them knew the full implications of what they were asking. In verses 17 through 19, Jesus had just finished telling them that he was going to be betrayed and mocked and scourged, he was going to be crucified in Jerusalem very shortly. And so it's just so shocking that right immediately after talking about the cross, they're asking for a crown. It's very insensitive to what he's just said. And any of us can be guilty of not listening very carefully to what is being said because we are so wrapped up in what we're going to say next. It's weighing heavily on our hearts and we miss the context. Well, even that side issue can be solved, I think, if we have servant's hearts. But even though they were utterly insensitive to the timing and the context of what Christ had been saying, you've got to appreciate their faith in Jesus. Rather than totally rebuking them, he challenges them with this statement. Are you able to drink the cup that I'm about to drink and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? And they said to him, we are able. Again, they have no idea what they're promising. In fact, in chapter 26, everybody says exactly the same thing, that there's no way that they're going to deny Jesus. And within hours, they fall asleep in Gethsemane. They abandon Jesus, and they flee from him in his hour of need. As Meyer points out, they would only be able to drink the cup of suffering after they were endued from on high by the power of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. And that's true of any of us. We will all fail, there but for the grace of God go we, right? We would all fail if we do not have the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit to faithfully enable us to faithfully fulfill our callings. Anyway, Jesus predicts that they will be faithful, verse 23. So he said to them, you will indeed drink my cup and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with, but to sit on my right hand and on my left is not mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared by my father. Now some commentators say that this is a prediction that they'll both be martyred. That's the way I take it. Others say, no, it's just talking about them facing similar persecution to what Jesus did. We don't know which way for sure. When the other apostles discover what has happened, they are outraged. Verse 24 says, and when the ten heard it, they were greatly displeased with the two brothers. Now, the hypocrisy of this is they had exactly the same attitude in Matthew chapter 18. Jesus had said back then, Therefore, whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Now, they had missed that lesson, and they missed the lessons on forgiveness in chapter 18, and the call to leave all, forsake all, and follow Christ, chapter 19. His words in chapter 20, verse 16, so the last will be first and the first last. All along, Christ's point is that self-seeking is not rewarded by him. Okay, those who want to be great must give up all and seek Christ first. Now here he amplifies on that teaching and we'll read verses 25 through 28 again. But Jesus called them to himself and said, and I want you to notice that Jesus doesn't let controversies lie in the hope that they will resolve themselves. Rarely do broken relationships resolve themselves. He takes the initiative, he calls them to himself, and he starts discussing things face to face. And by the way, every time that sin bubbled to the surface, Jesus used as an example to teach them how to grow in Christ. And I think we ought to do the same with our kids. Sometimes we're just mortified that our kids have sinned yet again. And we should thank the Lord and say, OK, Lord, thank you. This is another opportunity for me to instruct and disciple my children. Anyway, in this case, he teaches them about how to be more biblical in their view of authority. And I think all of us can learn from these lessons. He says, you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lorded over them, and those who were great exercised authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you, but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant, and whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave, just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many." Now that little paragraph isolates five things that are critical to understand about authority. He deals with the nature of authority, the source of authority, how to receive authority, the exercise of authority, and the purpose of authority. First, the nature of biblical authority is totally different than the Roman or the Greek concepts, or I would say the American concepts, or even the modern Christian concepts. Totally, totally different. According to the Bible, authority is not inherent in a person or in an office. That's new to some people. It is not inherent in a person or in an office. Biblically, you can have a lot of power in an office and have zero authority whatsoever because God's not blessing it, right? Climbing the ladder so as to get into office might give you influence and power. Power is dunamis. But God's authority, that's exousia, only flows to those whom He has granted authority. Nor can authority be shared from one person to another. In other words, I can't technically give authority. If God's not called you to a position, I could say, okay, you've got authority to do something. Well, you might be empowered to do something, But unless God gives you authority, you don't have that authority. And Romans 13 applies this even to civil governments and says, there is no authority if not from God. Interestingly, this could be seen even in the son's authority, as is stated in verse 23. Jesus said, but to sit at my right hand and on my left is not mine to give. but it is for those for whom it is prepared by my Father." Now, if that's true of Jesus, how much more so of us? Biblically, all original authority resides in the Father. Anyway, that discussion deals with the nature of authority. Second, this means that the source of any authority that we have is not the state, it's not the church, it's not any other human. The source of authority is also from the Father, through Jesus, to human representatives. And this, again, rules out vying for positions of authority. We're not called by God to a position, and the most we can do is to exert power, okay? Not authority. Verse 25 does say that the Gentile rulers exercise power over people, and that's the phrase lord it over, or lord, yeah, lord it over, that's power. But the phrase exercise great authority over is not the normal word for authority. It is literally against authority. Just look up the word, it's against authority and it's many times translated as to domineer or to be tyrannical. The point that Rushduni brings out from this is that human representatives have no authority in themselves and if they claim to have authority that God has not given to them, automatically they are tyrants. Automatically they are domineering. They don't have true authority. It's acting against authority, against God's authority. As the Puritans used to say, the only authority that should exist in the church is the authority of the scriptures. For these men to be vying for a position of authority is to bypass the nature of how authority flows. Position does not grant authority. Submission to God does. And so they had the wrong concept of the nature of authority, the source of authority. Third, they had a wrong conception of how to receive authority. We do not receive authority by stepping on people's hands and heads as we climb the ladder of success. Hendrickson renders the Greek as, the rulers of the Gentiles lord down upon them, and their grandees wield power down upon them. So the Gentiles receive authority, maintain authority by holding people down rather than lifting them up. Jesus said, no, authority is granted. Literally, the Greek is granted by the Father. Fourth, they had a wrong conception of how to exercise authority. Biblically, we exercise authority by serving God and serving man. Now, even if Jesus had not explicitly said that this was the case, you could have deduced logically that from the first three points. Since authority flows from God, and since God resists the proud, the only way to have true authority is in radical submission to God. But this does not make us weak and passive leaders who just Go along with anything that happens out there. I'll just give you one illustration. When I bring God's law to bear in people's lives, I don't know how many times people have said, judge not that you be not judged. Phil, you should stop judging us. Well, because I'm operating in terms of God's authority, it's very easy to respond to that. I just say, well, I'm not judging you. This has nothing to do with me. It has to do with God's word. God's word is judging you. And we're both under God's judgment. I'm just coming into agreement with God's word, and I want you to come into agreement with God's word. So it has nothing to do with our authority. It has to do with God, right, and his authority. So we exercise authority by standing in God's authority, not our own. And then finally, They had a wrong concept of the purpose of authority. The purpose of authority is not to conform people to our will. but to help people conform to God's will and God's authority. All of this was modeled by Christ who said in verse 28, just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many. So Jesus was about doing the Father's will, glorifying His Father, serving His Father, helping people to be reconciled to His Father. Now all of this means that those who are truly in authority over others are slaves and are not free to do as they wish. They are slaves. Romans 13 says this is true of even civil magistrates. They are servants of God and are not free to do as they wish or as they please. Likewise, those who have true authority sacrifice for others and are not self-serving. It's a right-side-up model of leadership, and the world's way is an upside-down model of leadership. The American pattern of success is to look after number one, let others fend for themselves. But Christ is our pattern for success in God's eyes. 1 John 3, 16 says, by this we know love because he laid down his life for us and we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. I think Salome learned this lesson so well that at the cross when everybody else fled and they're looking from afar, She, Mary, and John came right up to the cross and would not be shooed away. They saw their lives as expendable for Jesus, and their self-sacrificing love at the cross became a model for all of us for all time. May we too put off self-seeking, self-advancement, self-protection, and self-centeredness, and by God's grace put on the self-giving and the self-sacrificing love of Salome. Amen. the example of Salome, both where she got it wrong and where she got it right. And I pray that to a higher and higher level, each one of us would learn the servanthood that causes us to enter into true authority that flows from your throne. I pray that you would bless this your people with this lesson of Salome, in Jesus' name, amen.