Next week is Palm Sunday and two weeks from today, God willing it, we shall celebrate Easter. Today's Holy Gospel serves to get us ready for Holy Week - it puts into focus all the things that we will hear next Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday. For you see, today's Holy Gospel takes us to the very heart of Jesus' mission as He says, "the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many."

It is for this very reason that the Lord Jesus sets His face toward Jerusalem. He journeys to the holy city, the place of the temple, to give His life as a sacrifice for our sin and so fulfill for us all the promises of God in His very blood. Jesus and His disciples are on the road. Jerusalem is their destination. Mark points out that the Lord's disciples were amazed as they travel with Jesus. The disciples had good reason to be amazed. They had heard with their own ears the words of our Savior, words which are spirit and life. Words which opened to them the Kingdom of God as our Lord taught with authority, unlike the scribes and the Pharisees. Never had they heard a rabbi like this Man who unlocked the Scriptures in their presence. Then there were the miracles. These disciples were with the Lord in the storm and after He had stilled the sea they would wonder out loud, "Who is this man that even the wind and the waves obey Him?" The blind received their sight. The ears of the deaf were unplugged. Lame legs were restored to movement. The dead were given life. Amazing words. Amazing actions. An amazing Lord.

The Evangelist Mark notes, however, that the disciples moved from being amazed to being afraid. They were afraid as they faced the future, for the future that loomed before them was Jerusalem. And the Passover which they would celebrate there would be marked by the death of their Lord, the very Lamb of God. Jesus does not shield His disciples from this truth. He tells His disciples what is about to happen: "Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and to the scribes, and they will condemn Him to death and deliver Him to the Gentiles; and they will mock Him, and scourge Him, and spit on Him. And the third day He will rise again." There you have it. A summary in two verses of the whole Passion History which we have been hearing each Wednesday evening in the Lenten Season.

Jesus confronts the fears of His disciples with the announcement of His approaching death and resurrection. The Lord does not evade the reality of what is about to happen. He does not try to lessen His disciples' fears by skirting the fact that His trip to Jerusalem is a journey into death. He offers no false comfort, no superficial consolation. The Lord Jesus came to us to give His life as an atoning sacrifice for our sin. He was born in our flesh that He might taste death in our place. He will not turn aside from the work that is His alone to do.

James and John quickly change the subject. "Teacher," they say, "we want you to do whatever we ask." Ever patient with His bumbling disciples, the Lord says, "What do you want me to do for you?" Then comes the request: "Let one of us be at your right and the other at your left in your glory." In other words, let one of us be vice president and the other secretary of state. Let one of us be in charge of production, the other in charge of marketing. James and John want to make a quantum leap right over the mocking and the scourging, the suffering and the dying. James and John ask for a place in Jesus' glory.

Jesus says, "You do not know what you ask." The sons of Zebedee do not know that what they are asking for - a place in Jesus' glory - means not power and prestige but the cup of suffering and the baptism of death. James and John wanted to be kingdom-builders. Their request was pious - they wanted to be at Jesus' side in His glory. But the glory of Jesus Christ is not the glory of this world with its kingdoms and corporations. The glory of Jesus Christ is His cross. James and John would come to know that glory as they would also drink the cup and be plunged into Jesus' death. James would face martyrdom approximately eleven years later under the sword of Herod Agrippa. John would have a lonely tenure of exile on the Island of Patmos before he died of old age. A poet puts it like this:

Two brothers freely cast their lot
With David's royal Son;
The cost of conquest counting not,
They deem the battle won.

Brothers in heart, they hope to gain
An undivided joy;
That man may one with man remain,
As boy was one with boy.

Christ heard, and will'd that James should fall,
First prey of Satan's rage;
John lingers out his fellows all,
And died in bloodless age.

They join hands once more above,
Before the Conqueror's throne;
God grants prayer, but in His love
Makes times and ways His own.

James and John didn't get the places that they asked for. They were given places better than they could imagine, but not the same. James is given to serve His Lord by martyrdom. It is given to John to endure a long life of discipleship. He will outlive his peers and experience the loneliness of exile on the island of Patmos. God doesn't answer our prayers by giving us the same as everybody else. He answers our prayers in His own way, in His own time.

James and John, as well as the other disciples who were indignant with their request, would learn that lesson. Discipleship is not about getting more or less than somebody else. Discipleship is not about earthly achievement and human power. Discipleship is not about our hyper-activity in an effort to secure a place for ourselves in Jesus' glory. Discipleship is union with the Lord Jesus Christ, being baptized with His baptism and drinking the cup of His suffering. Jesus says, "whoever of you desires to become great among you shall be your servant. And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all."

Jesus' words illustrate His person and work. We behold the greatness of our Lord as He takes on the form of a servant and becomes obedient unto death, even death on the cross. The coming days of Holy Week will put it all in perspective as once again we see our Savior stoop to serve us by His suffering and dying.
Indeed, we do confess the truth when we sing,

  "My song is love unknown, My Savior's love to me,
  love to the loveless shown that they might lovely be.
  Oh, who am I that for my sake
  my Lord should take frail flesh and die?"

But die is what Jesus Christ did. He died for us, the righteous for the unrighteous. The Eternal Son of God made Himself to be the Servant and the service He rendered took Him to Calvary. Raised from the dead, He lives to serve us by giving us the fruits of His ransom.

That is why we call this gathering "Divine Service." God serves us. He is the host, chef, waiter, and food. We come only to receive, for there is nothing that we can give in exchange for the gift of salvation. And in receiving these holy gifts of Jesus' body and blood given and shed for the forgiveness of our sins, we behold the greatness of our Savior who made Himself to be the Servant of our salvation. Our song is love unknown! Amen.

The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.