Mark 10.35–4535 James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him and said to him, ‘Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.’ 36And he said to them, ‘What is it you want me to do for you?’ 37And they said to him, ‘Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.’ 38But Jesus said to them, ‘You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?’ 39They replied, ‘We are able.’ Then Jesus said to them, ‘The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; 40but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.’
41 When the ten heard this, they began to be angry with James and John. 42So Jesus called them and said to them, ‘You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. 43But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, 44and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. 45For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.’
I expect those of us who are parents or who have looked after a baby know what it’s like to experience a baby screaming. We cannot ignore it; we want it to stop; we will do what’s necessary – feed, wind, change a nappy, whatever it takes.
The baby is born with the ability and the need to exercise power – and very often its exercise of power is successful. We get up in the middle of the night, stop what we are doing, meet the child’s needs.
Interestingly, it is a power that is born of weakness – an infant exercises the power of weakness over adults who are a thousand times more powerful
Jesus often spoke of the power of children, the power of the last and the least, of the ones without the powers of the world, these are the ones who show us what power in the kingdom of God looks like
I wonder if James and John were given too much unconstrained power in their childhood? Jesus after all nicknamed them Sons of Thunder and it was their mother who pushed them forward, wanting for them positions of power. Certainly in this story they were after power over others – they were power hungry – they had of course misunderstood the nature of the kingdom that Jesus is pointing us to
They do have previous history about power and its abuse. There’s a story about Jesus looking for an overnight stay in a Samaritan village and the villagers turn him away because he is a Jew. James and John suggest to Jesus that he should call down fire on the village and burn them up. The exercise of violent power, not unknown in our world of missile armed drones.
That story carries a hint of a couple of older stories of Moses and Elijah – the powerful and revered prophets who called down fire from God on their enemies: the prophets of Baal for Elijah and the rebellious group in the desert for Moses. And then of course there’s the fire and brimstone called down on Sodom and Gomorrah. Is that the power that James and John were wanting to exercise?
Did James and John think of themselves as latterday Moses’ and Elijahs when they asked Jesus to have them on his left and right exercising power over everyone in his kingdom?
John, it seems, especially knew about the exercise of power because, as the gospel tells us, he was well in with the high priest and the corridors of power.
And their powergrab led to anger amongst the others – who it seems, might well have been biding their own time before making their own – Judas and Peter for example
The philosophers have had different ideas about the primary driving force in human beings –seeking pleasure, seeking meaning, reproduction and power
Is this will to power, to dominate, innate within us? I think it is and it is at the heart of what we refer to as sinfulness – the desire, no doubt connected with self preservation, with survival of the fittest, and our evolutionary history perhaps, the desire, often hidden deep inside us to get our own way for our own good
Because we all have power over others around us. Certainly, some of us have more obvious power than others, but we all in one way or another exercise power over others. It might be the raw force of physical violence, especially as we have seen it historically and today over slaves, women, children; it might be the power of money; or of rhetoric and persuasion; or the more subtle ways in families; and no less in business and in churches. Indeed no one can doubt now the terrible ways in which power has been abused in the church, in our own Church of England amongst others.
Every decision we make, from which product to buy in the supermarket, to takeovers in business, to political party policy decisions, they all involve the exercise of power. Those who think that it is only ‘them’ who have power are gravely mistaken. And of course, one of the easiest way to attribute power to others is through the conspiracy theories – it’s the hidden controllers and manipulators behind everything, so it is often said, on social media and in the pubs and clubs – the Jews, the media barons, the intelligence agencies, even aliens. We are powerless – they are the powerful ones
So if the exercise of choice – which is really just another name for power – is for each one of us inescapable and daily, even hourly, and in relation to everyone we meet, and no less over those across the globe whom we never meet – those whose products we buy, coffee, tea, sugar, flowers, chocolate, if we must make choices and decisions and so must exercise power, how do we tame the will to power that the screaming baby is born with – the baby we all once were?
Another way of asking the question is how does Jesus deal with the power grab by James and John?
First of all Jesus asks them to clarify what it really is that they want: ‘what is it that you want me to do for you?’ They want him to collude in the power grab. And they come out with it openly – they want the traditional places for the exercise of power.
He leads them on – are you able to drink the cup that I drink?’ They think that he is already halfway there in agreeing to share power with them – are you hard enough to exercise that kind of power, he seems to be asking. And they confirm that they are – they are hard enough to exercise power over others – and they all know what that means as they have blatant and ruthless Roman power all around them.
Jesus then, I think rather sadly says that they will indeed drink the same cup as he will – of suffering and death – but not in the way they are thinking of. It all then blows up when the others hear about it and start arguing between themselves – they all want, perhaps secretly, the power over others that James and John have openly asked for.
Jesus gathers them all and speaks to them about his way, the way of his kingdom, as he still speaks to us today. Yes, we do all have power over the lives of others, but it’s all about what we want power for. Is it for ourselves and for our satisfaction? Or is it for the good of others. Are we to be masters or servants? Are we to choose the way of life that brings life to others even though such a choice costs –‘ the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many’.
And he did and he does, and we are his followers, servants not masters because the real power is the power of self giving love
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