Live Free with Josh Howerton - The Path to True Greatness | Ep. 149 | Thursday August 31, 2023

Episode Date: August 31, 2023

True greatness comes from humility. In contrast to what the world says, Jesus taught that greatness is found in serving others, not being served. Let’s re-think our ideas of greatness and value, and listen to the Holy Spirit's guidance towards humility. For more information, visit lakepointe.church/dailydrive

Thanks for tuning in to today's Daily Drive with Lake Point Church, a daily dose of God's word for your morning drive. When the word, not the world, becomes the majority of your week, your life will start to change. For that reason, our prayer is that God will speak to you through today's devotional. For more digital content to feed your faith, visit lakepoint.comit. Church slash daily drive. And now let's dive in to today's devotional. Hey, welcome to the Daily Drive podcast. My name is Mike Bro, and grateful to hang with you for a few minutes today. Man, I hope you've been having a great summer. It's been an awesome for our family, and I've been praying for all you students who may be heading back to school in a few days, or maybe it's already started for you. Man, I'm so grateful for the way so many of you are alight with your friends, your classmates, your teammates, and thankful for the way a whole bunch of you students hang here on the podcast every day.

And we just finished a little section in the New Testament called the Beatitudes. It's the intro to the greatest sermon ever preached. It's a message where Jesus talks about the pathway to true happiness and deep fulfillment. And we taught it out like rungs on a ladder with each rung building upon the one before it. So if you miss any of it, you can go back and you can check it out. And I thought that before we launch into what we're going to be doing for the next several weeks, we would just hang today on another ladder. It's commonly known as the social ladder.

every culture has one, and we all tend to look at it to see where we might stack up. When Jesus started talking about his kingdom, his closest followers began to jockey for position. They began to wonder how they were going to stack up. They began to argue about who might be the most important, who might become the greatest in the kingdom. So Jesus gets them all together, and he says this to them in Mark chapter 10, he says, Guys, listen up. You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles, the Romans, how they lord it over them and their high officials exercise authority over them, then he gives them these

four words, not so with you. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the son of man, talking about himself, did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. I'm telling you, those four words, not so with you have helped me as a leader, as a husband, as a teammate, as a friend, as a neighbor. It's helped me in traffic on social media, at restaurants. When I'm tempted to power up on somebody and think I'm better than them, I hear the Holy Spirit whisper, come on, bro. Not so with you. And when Jesus talked about how those empowered lorded it over other people, these guys do exactly.

exactly how the system worked. I mean, they were living in the first century Roman-dominated society. And in that society, there was a definite social ladder that indicated your worth, your status, your standing as a person. At the very top of the Becking Order were a group known as the royals. No one could touch the royals. They laid claim to the top rung. In fact, most emperors even laid claim to deity. They saw themselves as God. The next rung from the top was the Senate. This was an exclusive All-Boys Club of 600 powerful and wealthy men. They called all the shots in Rome because they controlled all the wealth of Rome. Can you imagine living in a society where the wealthiest people called all the shots?

I can't even fathom that. Right under the Senate was the equestrian class. Anyone who would guess what animal was associated with the equestrian class? Yeah, you're right. Bunny rabbits. No, these guys were guys who bought and sold horses, stowling. and studs. And as a guy who grew up in Lexington, Kentucky, the horse capital of the world, I understand the blue blood mentality of the equestrian class a little bit. There's still lots of

old money and status attached there. And they were esteemed as the high class in ancient Rome. And again, isn't it kind of funny that people attach social status to a mode of transportation? Again, can you imagine living in the country where people were held in higher regard because they had a nicer, fancier, cooler way to get around than her neighbor did? I can't even imagine that. Now, these three categories were known as the patricians or the upper class, and we're talking less than 2% of the entire population. Then came the rest, which were known as the plebeian or the lower class. Moving down the ladder, there were citizens, and to be a citizen meant you had certain rights. You could vote, you could own land, you couldn't be punished without due process of law, you

had a right to a fair trial. Now, citizens were. not in the same class as royal senators and equestrians, but they had all the same rights. Not so with the next class. Underneath the citizens were the freedmen. This class of people were free, but they didn't have any rights like the citizens did, and this group included immigrants, foreigners, including most of the Jews who were living in the Roman Empire. And they, of course, had their own social class system among themselves. They would say, we Jews may not be the official Roman citizens, but at least we're not like those heathen Samaritans. Again, I can't imagine living in a society where worth a society based on nationality or race or skin color or heritage.

And can anybody guess who occupied the bottom rung of the social ladder? Yep, the slaves. And in the Roman society, slaves were not only not free, they had absolutely no rights. They weren't even considered people. They were property. Slaves did not have a say in anything. The only two things slaves could do were obey and serve. In Jesus' day in that culture, the pursuit of status had a definite link to life satisfaction.

The goal was to get to the top. Man, if I could just move up or wrong, then, then I'd be somebody. If I only had more, then I'd be satisfied. And the Romans had a name for their latter climbing ways. It was called the Cursus Honorum, or the race for honor. Now it would take a person a long time to climb up the ladder, but they could come down in a hurry. And the Romans had a word to describe people who lost their status, who lost their wealth, their power. And when you translate the word into English, it is the word we use for humility.

Humility in their eyes was not a virtue. It was an absolute tragedy. Now, with all that in mind, I want you to hear Jesus say again, Not so with you. The rest of the world may kill themselves climbing this ladder. Not so with you. He's telling us the Romans were wrong. The world is wrong.

Humility is not a tragic fall. It is the beginning of the rise to true greatness. Greatness is something you actually descend into. For whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant. And whoever wants to be first must be the same. slave of all, for even the Son of man, did not come to be served, but to serve, and give his life as a ransom for many. I'm praying that this day will find all of us descending into greatness, just like Jesus did. Embrace humility today, and when your pride and ego wants to rear its

ugly head, hear the Holy Spirit whisper, not so with you. Praying for you, today. See you next time. Thanks for tuning in today. For more biblical teaching and worship, join us for our church online live weekend services on Saturdays at 6 p.m. and Sundays at 9.30 and 11 a.m. Central Standard Time. Also, if this podcast was helpful to you, would you be sure to rate, review, and share this podcast to help get the word out? For more information about all digital ministries of Lake Point, visit lakepoint.com. church slash daily drive.