182 GEERT VAN OYEN communitarian aspect seems somewhat underestimated. Most of the time one thinks in terms of individuality when serving and becoming last are concerned. Each individual person should decide for themselves what the paradoxes mean. And rightly so; the personal dimension of freedom and responsibility should never be excluded from one’s actions. But does not Mark’s text contain also the idea that service in the spirit of Jesus should be realized within a group of people who are all trying to live according to these principles ? According to Mark, Jesus wants to create a new “ family ” of people who do the will of God (3,35). Unfortunately, within the Gospel of Mark this does not seem to be very successful. The personal stories of the disciples are a failure in that they do not correspond to what Jesus demands: Peter denies Jesus, James and John do not understand him, Judas betrays him. And as a group they are not able to behave according to Jesus’ expectations: they fall asleep instead of keeping awake one hour when “the hour has come ” (14,32-42), and “all of them deserted him and fled” (14,50). The reader could start wondering if the disciples’ incomprehension, manifested through their thoughts and through their actions, is actually one of the reasons for the failure (at a human level) of Jesus’ personal project! According to Mark’s story line, Jesus did not succeed during his lifetime to create a community that lived in accordance with the rules of his teaching. One could imagine a completely different story if Jesus had succeeded in doing so. It would not have been the story of the failure of a group of people, but a witness to the force of an alternative way of life. The Markan story of the paradox of Jesus’ message and life is a tragic one. He dies in loneliness, aware that his disciples have abandoned him, despite his promises to be with them whenever they take care of the “ children ” or when they serve the last ones. By living in accordance with Jesus’ paradoxical teaching, the followers of Jesus will experience his presence (despite his physical absence). And thus, if one goes beyond the boundaries of the story told by Mark, another paradox — a historical one — appears: after Jesus’ lonely death a new religious movement of people begins, a movement in which the message that was not understood during his lifetime, is transmitted. Without entering into concrete ethical guidelines for today, one can say that this historical paradox is repeated each time people today read or hear Mark’s gospel, and especially the paradoxes. Just like the disciples, contemporary readers, as a group and as individuals,