The Suffering Christ
- Kaitlyn Harville
- Mar 31, 2021
- 7 min read
I have recently (once again) come across Mark 10:35-45, and I have been considering the implications of Jesus' words in this passage. This text is often preached on and talked about from the perspective of "servant leadership" and what "power" looks like the the Dominion of God. And I think those are important parts of this text. Scripture, in my experience, rarely has just one dimension to it however.
Mark 10:35-45 reads -
James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” And he said to them, “What is it you want me to do for you?” And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” They replied, “We are able.” Then Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.”
When the ten heard this, they began to be angry with James and John. So Jesus called them and said to them, “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”
Jesus had set his face toward Jerusalem. He had been teaching his disciples, and just before this passage he predicted his death for a third time. Earlier in the chapter, Jesus had taken little children up into his arms and told his disciples that it was to “such as these that the kingdom of God belongs” (10:14). And immediately after Jesus’ third Passion Prediction, James and John come to Jesus asking questions like little children.
“We want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” Something tells me that this wasn’t quite what Jesus meant when he had told them to receive the Kingdom like a child. Even still, he asks what it is that they want. To sit with Jesus in glory, they say. One at his right, one at his left.
What is Jesus’s response? “You do not know what you are asking.” (10:38) Looking ahead in the Gospel narrative, there will be two people at Jesus’s right and left: two thieves. And it will not be in glory that they are beside him, but in the anguish of crucifixion. Jesus’s throne is not one of glory and triumph, but a cross of suffering. His crown will be one of thorns.
Jesus then asks what might have seemed like a strange question. Are you, James and John, able to drink the cup I drink? Are you able to be baptized with my baptism? Perhaps this twofold question is an attempt to tie together the Gospel narrative. The baptism reference calls our minds back to the very beginning of Mark’s story. At Christ's baptism, we are tempted to see the vision of glory that perhaps James and John have in mind in their request. We can tend to focus on the heavens being opened up and forget that when Jesus came up out of the waters of baptism the Spirit immediately drove him into the wilderness to be tempted. Immediately there was spiritual warfare. Immediately there was struggle. From the very beginning of Jesus’s ministry, he sets the stage for what following him will look like, and it is not a life of glorious ease.
As this baptism reference calls our minds back to the beginning of the Gospel, the cup reference calls our minds forward in the narrative. Perhaps it’s a reference to the cup at the Last Supper, the cup of Jesus’ blood to be poured out for all. Perhaps it is a reference to the cup that Jesus asks to be removed from him in the Garden of Gethsemane. Either way, it is a cup of intense suffering. A cup leading to death, even death on a cross.
“Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” What Jesus is asking James and John is whether or not they will be able to share in Jesus' own suffering.
“Oh yes,” say James and John. I just imagine Jesus giving a tiny, sad smile in response. “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized.” (10:39). I imagine his eyes glistening slightly with the weight of recognition of the full story for these two disciples. I imagine him thinking to himself, "You're right. You’ll share in all I will share, even though you don’t really understand what that means right now."
After the other disciples hear about this little exchange and about James and John’s request for glory, they get angry. So Jesus delivers a message that he has delivered time and time again. The glory and the power in the Reign of God is not what they envision. It is not one of top-down hierarchy like they see in the world around them. Rather, the greatest of those in this heavenly Dominion are servants to all. Just as the Holy One, the one who had all power and glory, did not consider even his own equality with God as something to be exploited by emptied himself to become a servant, so we too are called to empty ourselves and to be servants.
As I said, I’ve heard this text preached a lot from the standpoint that we shouldn’t seek after power and glory in the same way that James and John were doing. This text is used to talk about power and about service, which again I don’t deny at all. But I think I hear myself in James and John in a little different way. It’s not that I don’t understand that I, as a Christian, am supposed to be a servant of others. I think I understand the upside-down power of this counter-cultural Christ. I find, instead, that I don’t always understand what it really means to share in the suffering of Christ. I hear myself in what James and John say to Jesus in verse 39. “Oh yes, Jesus, I can handle this! Your cup? Your baptism? Sure! I am able! I got this!” And that tiny, sad smile that I imagine Jesus giving the sons of Zebedee, I imagine him turning on me. “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized.”
What does that mean? It is often difficult for me, in my context as a white American from the Bible Belt, to have any concept of what it means to share in the sufferings of Christ. I’ve certainly had heartaches and troubles, and even some traumatic experiences, but how could I ever claim sharing in Christ’s own suffering?
This brings us to Lent. In its small focused way, every year from Ash Wednesday until dawn of Easter Sunday, I am forced to confront the suffering of Christ. In Lent, however, I am also forced to recognize the Suffering Christ found in my siblings of this human family around the world.
I am forced to recognize the Suffering Christ in the racial strife and unjust systems that lead to division and hatred that exists in this country.
I am forced to recognize the Suffering Christ in the poor, underinsured and under-resourced, and homeless peoples in their oppression which comes at the hands of those who lord their wealth over others, whether by openly tyrannical means or by the façade of benevolent empires.
I am forced to see the Suffering Christ in the women who have been brave enough to stand and say "Me too" when it comes to calling out the world and the Church for abuses and sexual harassment and sexual violence. And I'm forced to see the Suffering Christ in the women who can't say "Me too" because the pain is too much to bear in voicing their traumas.
I am forced to see the Suffering Christ in the LGBTQ+ population, especially those who have been cut off from work, family, and friends. And I am forced to see the Suffering Christ in those who are forced to remain closeted for fear of losing everything, including their own lives.
I am forced to see the Suffering Christ in the many, many sufferings of this world.
Lent and Holy Week brings us face to face with the baptism of Christ and the cup that Christ drinks every day in the dispersed Body in the World. We learn anew each year in these 40 days leading to Easter that there is a stark reality to suffering. Sometimes we experience it for ourselves, and sometimes we see it plainly in the eyes of the person next to us. No matter where we see it, the reality to suffering is present.
It's in the midst of this realization of the Suffering Christ in myself and in my family across the globe that I truly ache for Easter. I ache for resurrection. I long for fulfillment and wholeness to be brought not only to my soul but to the soul of every person.
If you're in this time of Lent and feeling the increasingly more heavy weight of Holy Week, then know you are not alone. The Suffering Christ is with you, sharing in that baptism and sharing in that cup. You are being held, even when you feel like you're falling apart. The Suffering Christ sees and knows. And this is not the end of the story. Easter and all that it means for us is still on the horizon. There is a promise for fulfillment.
While we wait, please know you are not alone. I see the Suffering Christ in you. No matter how big or small you feel like your suffering is, Christ is there with you in it. And where Christ is, there I want to be also. Christ is with you, and I will be too.
I'm opening up a forum on this blog to allow prayer requests to be posted as we approach the end of Holy Week. I'll be praying over each one posted and am happy to engage in conversation if you want it.
May the Suffering Christ be present to you in a tangible way as we long for Resurrection.
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