Several times in the Gospels the disciples ask Jesus who will be great in the Kingdom.  It’s not a bad question.  In fact, it’s a question I encourage younger people to ask themselves.  How you define greatness makes a difference…and you cannot know unless you ask.  It’s the question we should be asking when we are young and should keep asking all our lives.  Yet, one time in particular the disciples ask Jesus what it means to be considered great or more literally to have the appearance of greatness.  It’s a totally different question, isn’t it?  It’s one thing to have a genuine interest in the qualities of greatness and another to desire only the outward show of greatness.  It’s a relevant point in our lives because we too can be distracted from the pursuit of truly great qualities toward what passes for greatness.  Jesus called it becoming Benefactors whose susceptibility to flattery eventually corrupted them.  “None are more taken in with flattery than the proud, who wish to be the first and are not.” What’s the antidote? In Luke 22:26 Jesus tell us.  First, we are to be neoteros or people who are always new at something, always learning, always novices.  Nothing keeps us humble like always being a beginner at something. All of the truly great people I know have been continuous learners all their lives and have inspired me and others. Second, we are to be those who serve – diakonos.  The phrase is one who serves with confidence and competence.  In a world that rewards self-importance and the artful cultivation of ego, the friends who have continued to serve, to volunteer, to inconvenience themselves when it would be so much easier to simply be a benefactor are priceless.

I want you to meet a friend of mine, Todd Hendricks. He has wrestled with this in his life and I’ve asked him to share a few minutes of that with us this morning.

2.  What does God desire for us?

Deuteronomy 26:18: 16 The LORD your God commands you this day to follow these decrees and laws; carefully observe them with all your heart and with all your soul. 17 You have declared this day that the LORD is your God and that you will walk in obedience to him, that you will keep his decrees, commands and laws—that you will listen to him. 18 And the LORD has declared this day that you are his people, his treasured possession as he promised, and that you are to keep all his commands. 19 He has declared that he will set you in praise, fame and honor high above all the nations he has made and that you will be a people holy to the LORD your God, as he promised.

Our problem is we want the fame and honor first without the obedience. We do not believe in the long discipline required so we go after the promise without the process.

3.  How do we get to fame and honor in God’s way?

First, we start with the most basic fundamentals of morality in a society. Really fundamental things. He had to tell them because they didn’t know and He had to start from the beginning – at the lowest level. Look at the recurring phrase “purge the evil from among you.” It is used 9 times in these chapters. One of those is for intentional murder. Twice for false prophets and worship of other gods. Twice for contempt of authority. Three times for sexual sin. Once for abusing a brother Israelite and once for making a false witness.

All these have something in common. They are about fidelity. Fidelity to relationships and fidelity to God. In other words, the breakdown of basic fidelity and integrity is fatal – both to an individual and to a community. Why is God so harsh on these? Because they are the very foundation of people living together. Without a basic obedience to them there is anarchy and chaos. Infidelity leads to death one way or the other. It destroys both the person and the fabric of the community in which they live. Without a basic shared belief in the value and importance of trust there are only the alternatives of lawlessness or the other extreme – the tyranny of a few.

A couple of years ago I shared with you a piece written in 1924 by Lord Moulton in The Atlantic. In it, he describes a condition he terms “obedience to the unenforceable.” Moulton said there are three great domains of human action. Positive law at one end and free choice is at the other. Obedience to the unenforceable is in between. “To me, Manners (another word for voluntary obedience) in this broad sense signifies the doing that which you should do although you are not obliged to do it. I do not wish to call it Duty, for that is too narrow to describe it, nor would I call it Morals for the same reason. It might include both, but it extends beyond them. It covers all cases of right doing where there is no one to make you do it but yourself.”  Let me read some from his essay.

“The dangers that threaten the maintenance of this domain of Manners arise from its situation between the region of Absolute Choice and the region of Positive Law. There are countless supporters of the movements to enlarge the sphere of Positive Law. In many countries — especially in the younger nations — there is a tendency to make laws to regulate everything. On the other hand, there is a growing tendency to treat matters that are not regulated by Positive Law as being matters of Absolute Choice. Both these movements are encroachments on the middle land, and to my mind the real greatness of a nation, its true civilization, is measured by the extent of this land of Obedience to the Unenforceable. It measures the extent to which the nation trusts its citizens, and its existence and area testify to the way they behave in response to that trust. Mere obedience to Law does not measure the greatness of a Nation. It can easily be obtained by a strong executive, and most easily of all from a timorous people. Nor is the license of behavior which so often accompanies the absence of Law, and which is miscalled Liberty, a proof of greatness. The true test is the extent to which the individuals composing the nation can be trusted to obey self-imposed law.”

“It is the fundamental principle of democracies to bow to the decision of the majority. But in accepting this we do not surrender ourselves to the rule of the majority in all things, but only in those things which are of a kind fit to be regulated by Government. We do not admit, for instance, the right of the majority to decide whom we should marry or what should be our religion. These are but types of a vast number of matters of great interest in life which we hold to be outside the decision of a majority, and which are for the individual alone to decide. But in form the power of a Government has no restrictions. It has the power to do everything, and too often it forgets that this limitless power does not leave the scope of its legislation a matter of absolute choice on its part, but a choice fettered by a duty to act according to the trust reposed in it, and to abstain from legislating in matters where legislation is not truly within its province. And what is true as to the scope of legislation is also true to a great extent as to the nature of that legislation. But there is a widespread tendency to regard the fact that they can do a thing as meaning that they may do it. There can be no more fatal error than this. Between ‘can do’ and ‘may do’ ought to exist the whole realm which recognizes the sway of duty, fairness, sympathy, taste, and all the other things that make life beautiful and society possible. It is this confusion between ‘can do’ and ‘may do’ which makes me fear at times lest in the future the worst tyranny will be found in democracies.”

These commands in Deuteronomy are the most basic positive laws that should rule our relationships with each other. We do not hold authority in contempt. We do not bear false witness. We do not abuse people. We are not predators or adulterers.

Second, we have to understand the right relationship between the strong and the weak in a society. We have to live within the ethics of power. There is nothing in Deuteronomy about the redistribution of wealth but there is a great deal about the responsibility of those with wealth. The poor are not a problem to be solved or to be cared for by strangers or institutions. Again, this is not a law but is an expectation. It is one of the fundamentals of living together and not isolated from one another.

So that is what we see defined in the 24th chapter. It is a picture of what it means to obey the unenforceable. It is not a tax and it is not every man for himself. It is the second step in becoming what God has in mind for us – to be “set in praise, fame and honor” not of our own making but of his. Acquiring those things on our own and in our own ways makes us leave people behind – especially those who are of no use to us. God’s way is to keep us bound to each other and responsible to each other. These things come from the hand of God but we are taught to believe we can produce them on our own. When we do they are destructive – even fatal. When God gives them to us – as He desires to do – they are life-giving and benefit the lives of others. We are blessed in order to be a blessing. Only obedience can prepare us for these things. Otherwise, they destroy us and those around us.

What are the terms of the relationship between the strong and the weak? We can read them here:
Do not take a man’s livelihood. Don’t deprive him of his ability to make a living and provide for his family. (24:6)

Do not demean a man in front of his friends and family. Let him keep his dignity in spite of his circumstances. (24:10-13) Do not rob him of his self-respect.

Do not defraud a man because he is poor and cannot defend himself. Do not withhold his wages or make him worry that he will not be paid. (24:14-15)

Do not take advantage of people who are strangers or foreigners to you. Do not take advantage of those who are without fathers or husbands to protect them. (24:17)

Do not scrape the barrel or make sure you have taken the last cent of profit. Leave something for those who depend on your good fortune or your success or your being blessed by God.

4.  Then and only then when we have practiced the fundamentals of morality and fidelity and practiced the ethics of the responsibilities of blessing will we be ready for the promises God has in mind.

16 The LORD your God commands you this day to follow these decrees and laws; carefully observe them with all your heart and with all your soul. 17 You have declared this day that the LORD is your God and that you will walk in obedience to him, that you will keep his decrees, commands and laws—that you will listen to him. 18 And the LORD has declared this day that you are his people, his treasured possession as he promised, and that you are to keep all his commands. 19 He has declared that he will set you in praise, fame and honor high above all the nations he has made and that you will be a people holy to the LORD your God, as he promised.

That is God’s desire, isn’t it? He wants a people he can trust with praise, fame and honor and who will not use it for their own purposes. He wants a people who are faithful to him and to each other. He wants a people who care for each other in spite of their great differences and disparities. Not the poor envying the rich or the rich despising the poor. He desires to make us a treasured possession together.