"So," said Jesus, "there are last who will be first; and there are first who will be last."
This parable shows how God gives his rewards differently from men. Men pay only for work that is done; but God gives his pay to those who are willing to work for him, whether they are able to work or not; for while men look at the deed, God looks at the heart.
Every day Jesus was drawing nearer to Jerusalem, and his twelve disciples with all the multitude of those who were following him, fully expected that in Jerusalem Jesus would reign as the King of Israel. He had told them before, and more than once, that he was going up to Jerusalem to die there; but their minds were so fixed upon thrones and kingdoms and worldly power that they could not understand his words.
Now Jesus called together his twelve disciples, apart from the crowd.
"Listen!" he said, "We are going up to Jerusalem, and there everything that is written in the books of the prophets about the Son of Man shall come to pass. He will be given up to his enemies, the chief priests and the scribes, the teachers of the law; and they shall sentence him to be put to death, and shall hand him over to the Romans to be mocked and beaten and nailed to a cross to die; and on the third day after, he will rise from the dead."
But the disciples did not understand what these words meant. They were just as certain as they had been before, that he was going up to Jerusalem to take the throne and rule, and they even talked among themselves about the chief offices in his kingdom and who should have them.
When they were drawing near to Jerusalem, but still in the land of Perea, a woman came to Jesus with her two sons. This woman was named Salome; and she was the wife of Zebedee, and the mother of James and John, two of the leading disciples of Jesus. She bowed low even to the ground before Jesus, and begged him to grant her a favor.
"What is it that you want?" said Jesus to her.
"I want you to promise me," said Salome, "that in your kingdom these two sons of mine shall sit, one on your right hand and the other on your left."
"You do not know what you are asking," answered Jesus. "Can you drink of the cup that I am to drink? Can you receive the same baptism that is coming to me?"