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Indeed a banquet in Horde. For down the middle there are long tables groaning under mountains of food, the best food, the best wine. It looks like David Jones' food hall and seated at the table, scores of people feasting, rejoicing, celebrating. They're having fun and it's us for I recognize the

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faces. All of us are there eating, enjoying, delighting in one another's company. There's something odd. Something odd about all of us. Our arms are stiff and our elbows don't work. And because we cannot bend our arms, we cannot feed ourselves. And yet all of us are eating. And then I see how each feeds the other. None looks

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after himself, but each looks after the person opposite, putting the food to his lips. So none goes without and all have plenty. And in this scene of delight and of festivity, of rejoicing, there's one discordant note. It's sort of a shrill, electronic buzz. It's the alarm, it's morning, and it was all a dream. Or was it?

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According to the first instruction at the preface of our service this afternoon, I am to preach a sermon on the duties of priests, the necessity of this office in Christ's church, and how the people ought to esteem those who hold it. And I want to try to do that by looking at the passage that is said for the

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gospel for an occasion like this. It's on page 44 of the Bibles that are provided. It is from Mark's Gospel, chapter 10 and verse 35. And it is a passage which takes up in its own way, some of the substance of my dream. And I want to make a comment about the ministry on which Mark will embark, and then

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I want to say something to Mark and then perhaps a word to the rest of us. But the first thing that I observe in this passage is the truth that life is in death. Jesus is on His way to Jerusalem for the very last time, and He strides out, and there's something about Him, perhaps His manner, perhaps His presence,

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that astonishes those who are following Him. They're all struck. And for the third time, He tells them of the purpose of His journey. In verse 33, He says, "We are going up to Jerusalem, and the son of man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him to the Gentiles,

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and they will mock him and spit upon him and scourge him and kill him, and after three days he will arise. I'm going to Jerusalem to be rejected, killed, but I shall rise from the dead. He is to be executed. He knows that He sets His face towards it, but He will pass through death, never to die again." And a little later in

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verse 38, He tells us what that death is. It is a cup which He must drink. It is a baptism with which He must be baptized. It is the cup of God's wrath, all a pent-up fury of the creator of heaven and earth, a fury that expresses itself in a disordered creation, a fury that expresses itself in insickness and disease and

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death, in alienation and loneliness and despair, a fury that will finally express itself in rejection, and judgment, and horror. That fury is going to burst upon Him. He'll be overwhelmed by it. God's rejection that says to proud and stubborn and independent men thus far shall you go and no further, that rejection

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will flood over Jesus Himself. And He tells us in verse 45, why? Why He must drink this cup? Why He must undergo this baptism? He does it to give His life as a ransom for many. Like a martyr, He will surrender His life in the place of a lot of others. His life will be the price to be paid to liberate people from an

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obligation from which they cannot free themselves. He's like a soldier, a soldier who goes overseas into the battlefield, a soldier who risks injury, imprisonment, a soldier for whom death is a reality, who does it all so that those at home might face none of it, so that those at home might be free from danger, so that

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the lives of those at home might be safe and secure. And so Jesus goes up to Jerusalem to death, to drink the cup of God's wrath, to be flooded with the anger and the rejection of God that others might not. He bears on His shoulders what is due to fall on the shoulders of others. He takes on Himself what is

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due to Me. And in that death there is life. In that death there is freedom from death. In that death there is freedom from the crippling and the distorting effects of guilt. In that death there is freedom from fear, in that death there is freedom from the power of sin. In that death there is life and joy and peace and richness and

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splendor. In that death there is the love of God and the security of being known and loved and treasured by the creator of heaven and earth. Now all of us, all of us are somehow or another, concerned about life. And in this part of our world, life has a great deal to do with having, having things, having property, having comfort, having

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security. A great deal to do with having and letting others know that you have it. Having it and showing it off. But in the end all you need is a piece of land, that is six feet, by two feet, by six feet. And much more important than having things is having one's hope and one's trust in this death. Much more important is having moved one's

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confidence from things and put it in the Son of God who loved me and gave him so for me. Much more important than having things is knowing that the anger and the rejection and the horror of God that was due to me has already been spent on him. Life is in death. He's dead. And where is your life? It is that truth and the ministry of that truth to which

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mark is to be ordained. And I say to you, my brother, as we engage in this service today, remember this as you look at the people around you. You are their servant and not their master. For in the setting of that teaching about Jesus' death there was a dispute and the dispute concerned rank and precedence and honor. And James and Jonathan Seams had missed the point.

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Apparently they'd not heard the bit about death. They'd heard that he was going up to Jerusalem. Perhaps they imagined that the King Deliverer was going to establish his great kingdom. Perhaps they were hoping that there would be some kind of coup d'etat and great David's greater son would sit on the throne. And so they asked Jesus this question in

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verse 37. Grant us to sit one at your right hand and one at your left in your glory. Give us the place of prominence. When it all comes to us, give us the position of fader, of honor, of prominence in your kingdom. Now the other 10, when they heard about that request were indignant. For I guess they were concerned about their rank. For none of us wants to

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miss out. And Jesus says, "You know that those who are supposed to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them and their great men exercise authority over them, but it shall not be so among you. Whoever would be great among you must be your servant. And whoever would be first among you must be slave of all." In the pagan world, exploitation must greatness. Those

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with power, lord it. That's what powers for. And that's the idea of this word, the idea of a foreign power ruling for your disadvantage and his advantage. Those who have authority exploit. Now you hold in contempt, says Jesus the world rulers. In your pocket their coins jangle, coins that claim that they are divine, coins that claim they are benevolent, but

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they tax, they exploit, they brutalize. And you in this request, you behave exactly as they do. It should not be amongst you, servanthood marks greatness. Whoever would be great among you must be your servant. And whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. A servant, a slave, persons whose activities are directed not towards their own interests,

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but towards those of another. For you says Jesus questions of rank are transformed into acts of service because of what Jesus himself did, who came not to be served but to serve, who will serve. Now Mark is to be ordained into what is a very high calling. As you'll hear in a few moments, he is to be ordained so that someday God will put into his care

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into your care the bride of Christ, looking after Christ's body is your responsibility. And the service will tell you how, by teaching and forewarning, by feeding and providing for the Lord's family, by seeking the scattered sheep, by instructing from the scriptures, by ministering the doctrine and sacraments and discipline of Christ, by driving away

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false and strange doctrines. You are being ordained, in other words, to minister the death of Jesus, to minister the truth that the Son of God gave his life as a ransom for many, to minister so that all of Christ's sheep will know that he gave his life as a ransom for them. You are being ordained to care for Christ's bride by teaching the scriptures

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evangelistically, pastorally, in large groups and small, to crowds and to individuals, you will bring the mind and the word and the character of the Father to bear on the lives and the situations yes and the sins of his people. I guess behind this service of ordination is the view of that composer of the often quoted notice that appeared in the post-offices

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of England during the dark days of World War II, that instructed all men between 1860 to report for military service apart from the blind and the insane and the clergy, because that person who compiled that notice recognized that the one thing mankind cannot do without, no matter how straightened his circumstances, no matter how perilous his situation, what

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he cannot do without is a word from the lips of the living God. And that is what you ought to be ordained to do, but how will you do it as a servant? Having worked with you for ten months, I don't imagine you will ever climb into a pulpit unprepared. Some clergy do that, I suspect perhaps from sloth, or pressures, or other interests, and the ministry

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of the word willts, but not with you. I think for you the danger might lie at the opposite extreme, at that extreme where knowledge outstrips life, so that we sprout what we do not know and teach what we have not lived, so that we stand before our people in trousers that are too big, into which we have yet to grow, and that is not a pretty sight. Or perhaps

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from that extreme where truth seduces us so quickly into the joy of position, because where I know and understand I am more than another man, where truth produces pride and is in conflict with love, and where truth becomes a means of personal triumph. I think for you and me, the danger is at that extreme where God comes to be addressed in the third

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person, and where theology ceases to be an expression of a life lived in the presence of God, and maybe time me to remember that the first recorded occasion on which God was addressed in the third person was in his paradise where that wildly and devious creature said, "Did God really say you may not eat in the fruit of the gun?" For theological

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thought only breathes in the atmosphere of relationship. And if we succumb to the dangers of that extreme, then we serve the bride of Christ no better than if we were never to open the Bible at all. So my brother, as you come this afternoon, let me suggest you look around and see God's people, the people of whom you are the servant and not the master.

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And very quickly and briefly, a word for those of us who will be the blessed recipients of Mark's ministry. And the word to us is, he may be your servant, but you are not his master. For this word about greatness, this word about servanthood is a word for all of God's people. Worldly rank, privilege is out, and it is inconsistent with the ministry

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of Jesus. All of us are called to be servants. And if you want to know how to serve Him, let me suggest three things. Pray for it. Pray that He might be faithful to His task, faithful to the promises that He will make this afternoon, faithful to the intention to which He will give expression. Encourage Him, secondly, to be true to what He has said.

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Well He takes on weighty responsibilities and to keep them He will need your friendship and your love, your support, and very occasionally your criticism. And thirdly, you will help Him best, perhaps, by getting on with your ministry. What God would have you do as a servant in the midst of His people? Do it. That will help Him much more than telling Him what He

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ought to do. Or He doesn't need you to tell Him. God's told Him. The Bible tells Him. The prayer book tells Him. Doesn't need anyone else. Just letting Him get on with it. Let's be come to that sad but not infrequent state, where a person might say, "I may not be much good. My ministry may not be particularly effective, but I prefer what I do to what

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you don't do. I prefer the ministry that I do to the ministry that you talk about." Lord Jesus said, "In the midst of this dispute, whoever would be great among you must be your servant. And whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of man also came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many."

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Oh, we pray. Father, we do thank You that You have not left us in the dark, but that You have spoken to us in Your Son and in the Scriptures. And we pray, Lord, that through those Scriptures You would come and address each of us today as needs be addressed. Refresh us.

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But teach us those things that we need to learn so that we might be fitter, servants of one another, and through that, therefore, better able to bring glory to your name. And we pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.