Context:
let the children come … the first shall be last and the last first
Parable of the workers
A man hires people throughout the day. First at daybreak,again midmorning, again at noon, three, and five o’clock. At dusk, he gathers them together and pays the first “what is right” for a full day’s work. When he pays all of the workers the same, the first grumble that they were treated unfairly. The master replies that he has every right to do what he wants with what is his. If he chooses to be generous to those that joined late, it’s his call. You got what was deemed right, just the same as the others.
- This is pretty identifyable. Most would be upset in this scenario
- For perspective: its not that the last people were lazy by not working all day - they were simply not hired (note they were still at the market looking for work) - nor that those that started early worked any less hard - they were right. We see it as the master being unfair to those that started early. Really he was just generous to those that started late.
- What are some ways that we can keep this perspective: that God’s owns all and he can do with us as he pleases, even if it feels unfair towards us?
- What we are given we are given to watch over, its not ours (Gen 1:26 “let him have dominion”, Ps 127:3-4 “Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth.”)
Jesus Predicts His Death
Speaking of keeping perspective when things feel unfair to us, Matthew places this little nugget. This is on the way to Jerusalem, so not nessarily chronologically next. Yet the placement fits well with the idea of the first being last and the last being first. It also perfectly illustrates how Jesus does not complain about his allotment from God. Instead he pulls his desciples aside and simply mentions it.
A Mother’s Request
On the heels of this aside, it reads almost like James and John walked back to their group and found their mom, told them about Jesus’s death, and she - wanting the best for her kids - wanted to get Jesus’s sign on to their authority in heaven before he left.
Jesus responds in context with the last section: that they don’t know what they’re asking for. He had just finished talking about the first and the last. If they wanted a seat at the right hand of Jesus, they were going to have to be made the lowest of the low, second only to Jesus. They respond in the affirmative and Jesus agrees. What’s cool is he doesn’t even doubt that they are able. He shifts instead to point out that they will but it’s not his position to give away.
He rounds off the conversation by clarifying that heirarchies are not the way of the Kingdom. He beats it again into the desciples that to be first, you must be humbled as a servant.
A “Random” Healing
This passage kind of funny to me. We just read an entire chapter and a half on making yourself as a child - humbling yourself - and discussions of how things will work in the Kingdom of Heaven. Then Jesus and the gang are walking out of Jericho, on their march toward death, and a few guys are shouting somethig over the crowd around Jesus. Jesus shouts back “WHAT?” and they respond “We’re blind! Can you help a brother out?” and Jesus heals them.
Now, it’s funny because it seems out of place but I believe this was somewhat intentional placement, almost to jar the reader back to what the normal day looked like for Jesus. Jesus spent his days healing and teaching. When he got a moment to discuss heavenly matters, he did so - going deeper with those that could handle it. Almost without fail, every time we see a teaching moment, people walk up asking (genuinely) to be healed, and Jesus would set aside his teacher hat and pick up his doctor’s hat.
- Examples from earlier in Matthew
I think the fact that the mention of “mvoed with compassion” is important. It would be easy to be upset in these types of scenarios. You’re talking about important stuff, and literally just explained to your desciples that you were about to die, yet people keep barging in with selfish requests! Jesus doesn’t respond by putting them in their place or getting angry but, rather, with compassion, teaches or heals. Not so much as a sigh. He perfectly displays exactly what was just taught: that he came to serve, not to be served.