PENTECOST 16 - B

Ego, Invisibility and the Little Child

(Parts adapted from the writing of The Rev. Stephen Lewis, National Director of the Calling Congregations initiative of the Fund for Theological Education, based in Atlanta, GA.)

I have an ego.

Maybe it is worse than that – perhaps I am narcissistic. I am sure some of my behaviours are.
Through whatever paths and interactions in my life that have brought me to this place, I have come to think that I deserve certain things; that I am owed certain things, that I am more important than a lot of people around me.

I am hoping you are not as bad off as I am. But consider this – I know this is wrong. I know all about empathy, compassion, values, faith, and all of those little things Jesus said about first being last, and eyes of needles.

Maybe I have some real problems, but I can’t help myself sometimes; I get irritated when things don’t work out my way, I get angry at people who do things that I think waste my time, and I genuinely am not a nice guy.

All of this is true, by the way, but I am also trying to make a point – and the point is this – when left to our own devices most of us become narcissistic. We become self centred. We become self important.

Many of us have the wherewithal to move beyond that, or to set our needs aside for others; but it is hard.

Ever wonder why every second passage in the Bible is about learning to get over yourself?

Because the one thing that is really in the way of authentic life is “me”

***

Our society suffers from a debilitating addiction to a "greatness" understanding of leadership. Families feed this addiction to their children. And an addiction to being the best or greatest in ministry, whether it is about leadership or building institutions, is a pandemic virus in the church. The earliest strand of this deadly addiction can be traced back to the church's origin. It is the very question the disciples are arguing about in this text.

Fortunately, Jesus has a response: he provides some answers about how we might break free from our addiction to unhealthy forms of greatness by re-imagining church leadership. This re-imagining is a necessary revolution, it is a rebellion against not only the way things are. But the way they have always been... and it is still the same old message, be more like God.

In our reading we find Jesus schooling the disciples on what greatness looks like in his ministry. He says to the disciples, "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all." Notice, he does not say what we have to do, but what we have to “be”. We have to let go of all of that power grasping, all of that ego, and “be”

Jesus then tells his disciples, "Whoever wants to be first must be servant of all." Notice that he does not say servant to all, but servant of all, which suggests that the disciples are called to be servant leaders regardless of what other people seek to be. Servant leaders practice greatness by being givers who serve together through shared leadership, responsibility and accountability.

Jesus then models what leadership looks like for the disciples. He summons a young child to come to him. Children symbolize God's blessing. symbolize the continuance of their family's salvation and inheritance into the future. In the Gospels, children also symbolize the character a person must possess to enter the city of God (Mark 10:15). In spite of the symbolic status children hold, we find their voices silent for the most part throughout the Bible. I want to suggest that children symbolize the voiceless, those at the margin of the community.

Jesus welcomes the child to the center of the community and wraps his arm around her--the voiceless one--and suggests that if we want to be great, then we must practice welcoming the voiceless to the very center of the community. Expand the community's center to include those people at the margins. Make the margins the new center of the community because this is where the welcoming presence of God dwells. Otherwise, we alienate ourselves from the very presence of Jesus and the One who sent him. This is what greatness looks like in Jesus' ministry.

So what does this mean for us? We who love our churches and traditions, must re-imagine our ambitions and concepts of greatness. We must adopt new practices of insignificant greatness. We must cultivate the next generation of church leaders to exhibit these practices. Why? Because, ultimately, what is at stake is the church's future, its witness and its relevance in the world. A church that fails to be the welcoming presence of God ceases to be the church.

So this is an invitation to you to re-imagine what the practices of greatness look like in this church. It is an invitation to re-imagine the kind of church leadership that cares about the ongoing formation and practices of the next generation of church leaders. This is also an invitation to imagine practices that cultivate your capacity to develop a community of disciples who share authentic leadership.

To create a safe space for Christians to explore their vocation in the world.

To spend more time asking provocative questions rather than giving patent answers.

To model what greatness really looks like in Jesus' ministry.

To welcome the voices and the vocations of young people in the community.

To expand your community's center to include the voiceless.

And to make the margins of the community the new centers of congregational and denominational life.

This invitation is not for the faint of heart. It is not for those who are concerned with being popular. There might even be some economic reprisal if you join this movement. Some of you might face a social crucifixion. Some of you will undercut your upward mobility into the priestly class and denominational leadership. However, what is at stake is our alienation from the presence of God, a divided and unhealthy life and a community of gifted people who will continue to be underutilized in God's grand vision for the church in service to the world if we disregard this invitation and do nothing.

This is the invitation to re-imagine greatness; it is the call of the Gospel. So how in this world do we muster the courage to join this movement and become who we are intended to be?

Let us pray
Gracious God, we long to know your Presence, To feel the movement of your spirit. Lead us, O God, into practices from which our spirits shrink because the demand is so great. Give to us quiet confidence, just a simple trust. Let us be true to that which you have entrusted to our keeping, The integrity of our own soul. For us, God, this is enough.
Amen.