Wednesday, March 20
Readings: JER 18:18-20; MT 20:17-28
As we move deeper into Lent, the readings begin to give us glimpses of what is coming. Today we read of people plotting against the “faithful one” in both readings.
In the gospel, Jesus pulls aside his close friends and tells them trouble is coming and that he’s going to have to suffer. Ironically, that’s when the mother of two of his disciples comes up and asks Jesus for special places for her sons. She clearly understands that Jesus has power and is a special person, but she fundamentally mis-understands what that power is all about. But of course, when the rest hear this, they get all bent out of shape and discord emerges.
Jesus then has to do a quick teaching for everyone. He reminds them that they must not lord power over people like the rulers of the world. If they want to be great, they must serve.
Martin Luther King picked up on this theme in one of his famous sermons when he said:
“If you want to be important, wonderful. If you want to be recognized, wonderful. If you want to be great, wonderful. But recognize that [the one] who is greatest among you shall be your servant. That’s a new definition of greatness. And this morning, the thing that I like about it: by giving that definition of greatness, it means that everybody can be great, because everybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve. You don’t have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve. You don’t have to know Einstein’s theory of relativity to serve. You don’t have to know the second theory of thermodynamics in physics to serve. You only need a heart full of grace, a soul generated by love. And you can be that servant.”
In recent years, I have been learning more about the leadership of Ella Baker during the civil rights movement. Many people have not heard of her because she was the kind of leader that tried to help people organize themselves and develop their own strength. She said, “You didn’t see me on television, you didn’t see news stories about me. The kind of role that I tried to play was to pick up pieces or put together pieces out of which I hoped organization might come. My theory is, strong people don’t need strong leaders.” She also said that she, “always thought that what is needed is the development of people who are interested not in being leaders as much as in developing leadership in others.”
Both of these great leaders embody so much of what Jesus is teaching us today. King reminds us that ANYONE can be great because ANYONE can be of service to the world. Furthermore, we each have unique talents and abilities that the world needs and are ours to bring to the wider community – regardless of our perceived status.
Baker offers us an alternative to the singular leader model. She wanted to develop strong people who were interested in developing other strong people – not just getting people to follow them. She also deeply trusted that people – and especially oppressed people – had deep knowledge and insight as to how to address the problems that they faced.
For today, let’s be of service somehow and work to cultivate someone else’s leadership in our midst.
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