Just a few weeks ago the Olympic Games in Paris ended. For two weeks we were excited to watch many US athletes winning as they competed in various sports. They had put a lot of effort and determination to win not only their medals, but also fame, our recognition and appreciation. However, each person has some area in life to strive for greatness—competition is part of our daily life. It can be sport, politics, business, science, or just human relationships. We want to prove or at least to appear to be better than those who are around us. These can be noble and good desires, but as everything in this world, they also can twist and become obsession, a source of jealousy, of ill and destructive emotions that can lead to pursue empty and fleeting goals in life.

In the gospel reading for this Sunday, we read as the disciples argued among themselves who was the greatest among them. The perspectives of the coming of the kingdom of God, the miracles, and fame that accompanied the ministry of Jesus made them think that that was the moment to secure for themselves the best positions in this new reality to come. As we know, even religion can become a place of competion and rivalry that leads to divisions and disorder. We have too many examples of that in the last two thousand years of Christianity.

However, Jesus is not surprised by their reaction, he knows his disciples well. Actually, they seemed to be embarrassed to find out that he knows exactly what they had argued about on the way. And he doesn’t rebuke them but takes advantage of the moment to point out to a different nature of his mission. Because to serve others does not mean to dominate or to act from the position of superiority, it means the opposite, to take a lower place from the one we serve.

In order to illustrate his lesson Jesus takes a child as an example. In ancient society, children were powerless, deprived of any rights, at the bottom of the social ladder. Jesus makes a child’s simplicity, dependency and trust a point of reference for his disciples. Only by become like one of them the disciples can truly respond to the call of Jesus.

But to have that kind of attitude we can only accept it; it is to be received from Jesus himself. Every winner knows that the path to victory is paved with many failures. It is not different with the path of Christian life. But in that journey, as we fall and stand up and start all over again, we are not alone. Christ is our path and our victory. Christ who comes to serve us so that in turn we may learn how to serve others. Only by accepting his help and his service to us we may become like him, we may receive the Spirit of the one who came not to be served but to serve.