It is difficult to be a servant when we always want to ask “What’s in it for me?” We pretend to care about others when we are only interested in ourselves.

Likewise, Jesus disciples in today’s Gospel are more interested in “What’s in it for me?” than truly following Jesus and being a servant.

We naively think that we can bargain with God assuming that if we only do what is expected of us, then we can get what we want.

But “drinking the cup” and being “baptized with Jesus’ baptism” is not what we think it is. It is an invitation to die.

Jesus “ransoms” us from our always having to worry about “What’s in it for me?” so that we can be free to genuinely care for others and ask “What can I do for you?”