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Every child likes to pretend. When I was growing up the
girls wanted to be Strawberry Shortcake and princesses and
the boys wanted to be G.I. Joe and any superhero. I was
blessed to have a brother three years younger than me and
whenever we played together it only made sense to me that he
was the designated sidekick. Whatever I chose to be, he
would play the supporting role. If I was The Lone Ranger,
he was Tonto (or “Trigger”); if I was Superman, he had to be
Jimmy Olsen or Lex Luther; and if I was Batman he had to be
Robin, “the Boy Wonder.” Understandably, my brother had a
problem with this arrangement.
Nobody wants to be the trusty sidekick.
We want to be the best. We’ve been trained that way since
our birth. It is our mission in life to be the best and to
“be all we can be.”
When it comes to our spiritual lives;
however, Jesus asks something of us that flies in the face
of all we hold dear. In Matthew 20:27-28 Jesus says,
“Whoever wants to be first must be your slave, just as the
Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to
give His life a ransom for many.” This is the same Jesus,
Savior of the world, who hit His knees and cleaned the road
filth, created by He and His Father, from between the toes
of apostles that didn’t seem to get it. He even washed the
feet of the one named Judas that would later betray Him. If
anyone had the right to be first, it was Christ, but He used
this opportunity to teach a lesson in leadership that the
disciples would not soon forget.
John the Baptist also realized his role
in the grand scheme of things. As the forerunner for
Christ, John had gathered quite a following of his own.
With the crowd on his side, he made a profound statement
that stopped them in their tracks in John 3:30: “He must
become greater; I must become less.” John realized his role
and was quite comfortable being the best man, instead the
center of attention. John summarizes the whole of Christian
life. If we want to fully follow Christ we must be willing
to allow Him to be number one in our lives and we in turn
must be willing to take a back seat.
I don’t know whether you are Batman or
Robin, but I do know that the roles of leader, Savior,
judge, and mediator have already been masterfully filled by
one man over 2000 years ago. Are you willing to be Robin?
-Kent Jobe
Youth and Family Minister
College Avenue Church of Christ |
