Matthew 23 NLT
Don’t let anyone call you ‘Rabbi,’ for you have only one teacher, and all of you are equal as brothers and sisters. And don’t address anyone here on earth as ‘Father,’ for only God in heaven is your Father. And don’t let anyone call you ‘Teacher,’ for you have only one teacher, the Messiah. The greatest among you must be a servant. But those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. (8-12)
Jesus is not being critical of teachers in this passage. As one who teaches often, and who invests in teaching others who teach, I recognize the calling and the responsibility of being a teacher. What Jesus is being critical of is the false gap we often create between the student and the teacher or the clergy and the laity. Equality and justice are buzzwords today, and there is a sense among the misinformed in our society that the church and Christianity are the proponents of inequality and injustice. Nothing could be further from the truth. Instead, it is Jesus who stands against elitism and who told the religious elite of His day that we are all equal as brothers and sisters under God.
We are equally dependent on God. He alone is our Heavenly Father, which means that He has the supreme rule in our life. He alone is our teacher, which means that all truth comes from Him, and even as teachers we must teach His word and His message and not our own. We are all equal as servants and we must be the servants of all. Instead of exalting ourselves, as our individualistic, social-media driven society wants us to do, we should be humbling ourselves and lifting others up. True humility is not when we put ourselves down; that is just self-deprecating false humility. True humility is when we lift those around us above ourselves.
There should not be different levels of class or spirituality in the local church. Yes, we have teachers, we have pastors and we have leaders, but before God, we are all equal as brothers and sisters. Every believer is a priest before God, and every church member has certain privileges and responsibilities before God to serve and minister to others. The problem with the “man of God” system that sees the pastor or teacher as someone who is super spiritual and who has better access to God than the typical church member, is that it creates prideful leaders, and even worse it creates lazy church members. The church leader must see himself as the servant of all. Additionally, the church members must realize that they have as much responsibility to seek God, pray, serve and witness as the pastor does. This is what it truly means to be equal—not just equal access to justice, but equal accountability to be holy and to serve all.
