Mark 10:43, 45, “…whoever would be great among you must be your servant…For even the Son of Man came not to be served But to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many.”
When God enters time and space He defines all things by Himself. Yes, ALL things must now draw their definition from the disclosure of Him through whom and for whom all things exist—God the Son, Jesus of Nazareth. All concepts, all ideas, all morality, all virtue, all ethics, all priorities, all purposes, every tree and bird and star and atom, every story and song and hope and fear, every ambition and plan and goal—ALL things exist through this Christ and for this Christ and must, therefore, find their definition in this Christ.
In this passage, we see Jesus apply this principle to the desire to be first, to ambition. If we are to embrace ambition, we must embrace it as it has been defined in Christ crucified and risen……If God Almighty comes as servant, comes to lay down His life in the place of His enemies, then all perceptions of ambition and power and greatness must be aligned to this. This is GOD….there is no greater reality…..our definitions of greatness, of ambition, of being “first” must bow down and hear their true names proclaimed from Calvary. What is greatness declared to be at the cross? Service even to death…..What is it to be first? To be last of all and servant of all. What is ambition? To lose one’s life in self-giving service that self and others might truly live. Why? Because even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to pour out His life as a ransom in place of His people.
