The greatest in the kingdom of heaven

It’s the 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time and today’s gospel reading is about our Lord Jesus Christ teaching his disciples about two important issues, first is another prophecy of his passion and death and his resurrection and most important of all, who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. You can read this gospel passage in Mark 9:30-37.

“After leaving that place, they made their way through Galilee; but Jesus did not want people to know where he was because he was teaching his disciples. And he told them, “The Son of Man will be delivered into hands of men. They will kill him, but three days after he has been killed, he will rise. The disciples however did not understand these words and they were afraid to ask him what he meant.

They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, Jesus asked them, “What were you discussing on the way?” But they did not answer because they had been arguing about who was the greatest. Then he sat down, called the Twelve and said to them, “If someone wants to be first, let him be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little child, placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around him he said to them, “Whoever welcomes a child such as this in my name, welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me, welcomes not me but the One who sent me.”

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Last week’s gospel reading was the first time that our Lord Jesus Christ told his disciples about his impending passion and death on the cross. In today’s gospel, our Lord Jesus Christ tells his disciples for the second time about his coming death and resurrection. But his disciples still did not understand what the Lord was talking about.

Remember when the Lord first told them about his passion and death; Peter rebuked the Lord, saying “God forbid that this would happen to you.” Jesus replied to Peter saying, “Get behind me, Satan. You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.” Well, his disciples were obviously still thinking the way human beings do because they just didn’t understand the ways of God.

Today, more than 2,000 years of Christianity have passed and we have come to know all the Doctors of the Church and great theologians who in so many ways very well explained in so many sermons, homilies, books or publications their thoughts about the salvific plan of God from Genesis to Revelations, there are still so many who call themselves Christians who still cannot understand the ways of God. This is why people are losing their faith.

Mind you, I’m not saying that we already understand the ways of God. There are still so many of us who do not understand the mysteries in our Christian faith, which is hard for our human mind to understand or comprehend. If some theologians had different interpretations of our faith… how much more for a lay person who never studied theology in a seminary? This is why we call what we believe in God as faith. But you may ask, what is the opposite of faith? Most people would say… doubt.

I researched on this issue and I found that a better word as the opposite of faith is reason. This is why people believe who have no faith in God or worse… atheists who do not believe in God at all say that people of faith are irrational for believing in something that cannot be explained by reason or presented by any evidence. It is for this reason why we should strengthen our faith with our trust in God and you can only have this trust in God if you know that God loves you and most of all, learn to love a God we cannot see.

Finally we arrive at the last part of today’s gospel when our Lord Jesus Christ noticed that his disciples were arguing amongst themselves as to who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? The Lord Jesus then took a child and put it in their midst and said, “If someone wants to be first, let him be last of all and servant of all.” Whoever welcomes a child such as this in my name, welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me, welcomes not me but the One who sent me.”

Why did our Lord Jesus Christ use a child as a model for our faith? We read in Luke 18:17, “Amen, I say to you, whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it.” I’m sure that this teaching was strange to his disciples who were all adults, especially at that time in Palestine when children were not even counted or had no rights at all. Then our Lord Jesus Christ teaches them the way to the kingdom of heaven is to have a childlike faith. One of my favorite apologists of the Catholic Church is Tertullian. He was truly a great theologian, but somehow towards the end of his life he lost his childlike faith and created his own cult. This is the danger of brilliant people whom God gives much in knowledge to know more about the ways of God, but in the end loses their childlike faith.

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