...for [Jesus] was teaching his disciples, saying to them, "The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again." But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.
Then they came to Capernaum; and when he was in the house he asked them, "What were you arguing about on the way?" But they were silent, for on the way they had argues with one another about who was the greatest.
-Mark 9:31-34

In Mark's gospel, Jesus' disciples get it wrong more often than not. Here, they get it wrong twice: they lack the wisdom and courage to ask Jesus to help them understand the meaning of his teachings, and they spend their time arguing about which one of them is the greatest.

Whenever I read these stories of the disciples, I can't help but roll my eyes a little bit. I write them off as silly, or shallow, or slow. It's so easy for us to see their mistakes. If only it were as easy for us to see our own!

I have been thinking, lately, about how short life is, and how precious, and how easily we waste an hour here, an hour there. And when I think of these disciples, arguing over their status, and afraid to ask about Jesus' rising from death, I know that we so easily do the same thing. We get so caught up in our own short-sightedness, and miss the new life that God offers.

True, we don't have Jesus walking around in the flesh; we can't ask him face-to-face to explain the things we wonder and worry about. But we are invited to seek God's grace and to forget about our own status in the eyes of the world. We are called to seek God's Kingdom, and to turn away from the voices that call us to seek ourselves, to seek money or power or an easy life.

What does this mean to you? At the end of the day, are we like the disciples that Mark's gospel describes? Are we afraid to seek God's presence, to deepen our faith? Do we find it easier to seek our own good?

This week... how can we do things a little differently?