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This section begins with the third and most complete Passion prediction (20:17-19). Here Jesus once again teaches his disciples that it is necessary for the Messiah to reach his glory through suffering and death.
It is remarkable that immediately after this prediction, James and John (through their mother) request the places of greatest honor in the kingdom (20:20-28). The subsequent context suggests that the rest of the disciples also crave places of honor (vv.24-28).
Jesus responds that greatness in the kingdom has nothing to do with status or power over others. Rather, it involves (1) submission to the will of God, even if this submission includes suffering (drinking the cup of Christ; cf. 26:39); and (2) humble service toward others in the Christian community. Jesus himself models this kind of self-sacrificial service. Indeed, the very salvation Christians enjoy is the result of Jesus' willingness to pursue the path of servanthood, even unto death.
Jesus exemplifies the spirit of servanthood in the healing of the blind men (20:29-34), in his triumphal entry (21:1-11), and in the cleansing of the temple (vv.12-22). In 20:29-34 Jesus, the royal Son of David, humbly stops to serve needy blind men along the way by healing them. In ch. 21 Jesus enters Jerusalem as its King, and yet his kingship is entirely different from “the rulers of the Gentiles” who exercise self-serving, brutal oppression over their subjects (cf. 20:25). Jesus enters not on a horse, the symbol of brute force and authoritarian rule, but on a common donkey, pointing to his humility (21:5). As the servant of God, Jesus “cleanses” the temple, driving out those who have turned the true worship of God into a means of selfish advancement (vv.12-13; cf. Mal 3:3-4). In this connection, Jesus declares that the essence of true worship and religion is not empty ritual that has lost its meaning, but vital faith in God (21:18-22; cf. 9:13; 12:7).