Restoration of Human Nature

As Jesus journeyed towards Jerusalem, the Gospel from Mark recounts his third and most detailed prophecy of his impending Passion. Despite the repeated references to suffering, his close disciples, just like us, found it challenging to grasp the idea that Jesus was to establish his Kingdom through his suffering and death. God’s counterintuitive plan for the world’s salvation is a struggle we can all empathize with.

Humans naturally recoil from suffering, so we cannot be too hard on the disciples. It took them a long time to finally accept this fact, which is the same with us. From this perspective, it is easy to understand James and John, the sons of Zebedee, requesting a special favor. “Grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.” 

In response, Jesus told them they did not know what they were asking. Then he asked them, “Can you drink the cup that I drink or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized? “They said to him, ‘We can.’”  Then Jesus told them to sit on his right; the left was not his to give. After the exchange, the other ten became indignant.

Perhaps the other ten were resentful of James and John because the brothers had expressed a desire for prominence before they could. They, too, wanted to be the ones sitting on the left and right of the king, hoping for a share in his power. This desire for power, a clear example of our fallen human nature, is a struggle we share with the disciples. It prompts us to consider our desires and the need for divine assistance.  

The teachings and life of Jesus contradict the disciples’ understanding of power and prestige. First, he emphasizes the importance of suffering and the ability to sacrifice one’s wishes and serve the other person. The whole world would be Christian if it weren’t for the mandate of suffering and service. These two demands of the Kingdom of God are stumbling blocks that keep us from having a fuller faith.

The redemption of our fallen nature is central to Christianity. After sin entered the world, human nature was sullied but not wholly destroyed. Jesus assumed our human nature in everything but sin by being born of the Virgin Mary. She was spared from the destruction of sin through her Immaculate Conception, which gave her a pure human nature. Jesus, without an inherited fallen nature, was able to atone for the sins of the world because he did not owe the debt; we did. His death in atonement for sin encapsulates the two themes of suffering and being a service to others.

Suffering and service are difficult because our fallen nature fights against them. Because of sin, we are inclined to be selfish and self-serving. Imagine two small children fighting over a toy. When the adult demands a child share his toy with another, the one relinquishing the toy under duress is unhappy, and one could say he suffers by giving away what he doesn’t want to part with. In a grander sense, adults share the same inclinations. There is a reluctance to accept suffering, and serving others is tantamount to losing power and control. Unaided by divine help, human beings do not want to be servants, let alone suffer.     

With the divine assistance of grace, human beings are more apt to reject their fallen natures and embrace their new natures offered through Christ.  The more grace is accepted and used, the greater a person’s potential to shy away from selfishness and, when appropriate, embrace suffering as true disciples following their master’s lead.

When service and suffering are part of the Christian life, we more fully incorporate the salvation Jesus offers. We are called to walk in Jesus’ footsteps, serving others and mounting the wood of our crosses.  This why St. Paul preaches, “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh, I am filling up what is lacking* in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church.” Salvation is a gift, but a gift that requires the participation of service and suffering.

When we incorporate the themes of salvation more closely, we care less about where our seats will be in heaven because, on earth, we are already beginning to live that life.