Jesus knew that his actions and words were threatening the Jewish and Roman leaders of his day. He knew that if he continued to attract people to his teaching to love God, not fear him; to have faith in power of God, not the power of men; and to love one another as we love ourselves, the people with power would try to silence him and make an example of him to frighten people so they would not follow and imitate him. Jesus knew his followers were worried about him. Jesus was worried about them. Jesus was worried about himself. And he knew his friends had questions they were afraid to ask. So he taught them that to lead people to God, we must be a servant to those we lead; we must welcome and care about everyone like we would a small child; we must accept the resistance, rejection, and abuse of those who feel that their wealth and power are threatened when we imitate Jesus. Do we want to lead people to God by imitating Jesus, we must serve them, we must receive them as we would a small child, and we must accept the consequences.
