Mark 10:35-52

If you want to be great in God's Kingdom you may already be on the wrong track. Greatness in the kingdom is the byproduct not the objective. Being great is contrary to the path of discipleship, so much so, that the ones who are truly great are unaware that they are great. Any disciple whose objective is to be great and will use service as a means to that end will soon become distracted by his true objective.   Nowhere in Scripture do we see Jesus in anyway pursuing greatness; rather, He seeks service. The way of the disciple is not up, but down.

We don’t know if James and John were less pious than the other disciples. They may have just had more initiative. We do know they were men of faith. They fully believed Jesus would have a Kingdom and they wanted to be all in. For all their failures, at least they did have a high confidence in Jesus's kingship.

This passage is filled with irony. To be at the right and left of Christ at the moment victory was finally won was given to two bandits on their crosses. Also, at the last supper it appears that Judas the traitor and John the youngest were the ones who ate next to Jesus. There's also the last irony that the Son of Man (see Daniel 7:13-14) did not come to receive, but rather to give service.

If a disciple should not seek position of power neither should a disciple keep people from the Lord. The healing of blind Bartimaeus is a practical example of the wrong thinking of the disciples about greatness. They actively try to keep an unimportant person away from Jesus. What could Bartimaeus possibly do for Jesus? The disciples were keenly aware that the coming Kingdom would involve struggles.  They wanted to make sure those who got access to Jesus had something useful to bring to the cause.  While we ought to try to be like Bartimaeus and his faith, there is another lesson here for us also.  Do not be like the disciples who used their power to be an impediment to those who would find Christ.