NOTES for Mar 9:33-41

Exactly so—as soon as we begin this interesting argument about who is greater, we immediately become fighters for a monopoly on possessing Christ: whoever has the more correct faith has Christ, and I have the most correct faith! This almost instinctive desire is based on the good intention of earning more of God’s love. For besides purely selfish motives—which we all resolutely condemn—we want to be greater, more important, and more exclusive, because in our world such people always receive more attention, more recognition, and more love. But God’s love is not like that. It extends to the great and the small, the righteous and the unrighteous; it cannot be earned by good behavior or by correct faith. Before it, admiring our own greatness—which is highly questionable in comparison—is absurd; we cannot put it in our pocket and declare it our property. The only way to receive it is to accept God, to accept Christ, to accept every little or grown child—for we are all children—created in God’s image and loved by Jesus.