DGeMs- Daily Gospel eMessage
Dear Friend in the Lord,
Service of God: In today’s Gospel, Jesus reminds James and John, His apostles, “Anyone who wants to become great among you, must be your servant. . .” Ponder on, “Is our motive of the service of God’s people, sincerely for His Greater Glory, or our own desires for prestige, power and privilege?”
Fr Philip Heng, S.J.
Mark 10:32a, 35-40, 43-45
Jesus and his apostles were on the road going up to Jerusalem. James and John, the sons of Zebedee, approached him. ‘Master,’ they said to him, ‘We want you to do us a favour.’ He said to them, ‘What is it you want me to do for you?’ They said to him, ‘Allow us to sit one at your right hand and the other at your left in your glory.’
‘You do not know what you are asking’ Jesus said to them. ‘Can you drink the cup that I must drink, or be baptised with the baptism with which I must be baptised?’ They replied, ‘We can.’ Jesus said to them, ‘The cup that I must drink you shall drink, and with the baptism with which I must be baptised you shall be baptised, but as for seats at my right hand or my left, these are not mine to grant; they belong to those to whom they have been allotted.’
So Jesus called his disciples to him and said to them, ‘Anyone who wants to become great among you must be your servant, and anyone who wants to be first among you must be slave to all. For the Son of man himself did not come to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.’