Here are My mother and My brothers! For whoever does the will of God is My brother and My sister and mother

 

 And they went into a house.  Then the multitude came together again, so that they could not so much as eat bread.  But when His own people heard about this, they went out to lay hold of Him, for they said, "He is out of His mind."  And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, "He has Beelzebub," and, "By the ruler of the demons He casts out demons."  So He called them to Himself and said to them in parables:  "How can Satan cast out Satan?  If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.  And if a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand.  And if Satan has risen up against himself, and is divided, he cannot stand, but has an end.  No one can enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man.  And then he will plunder his house.

"Assuredly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation" -- because they said, "He has an unclean spirit."

Then His brothers and His mother came, and standing outside they sent to Him, calling Him.  And a multitude was sitting around Him; and they said to Him, "Look, Your mother and Your brothers are outside seeking You."  But He answered them, saying, "Who is My mother, or My brothers?"  And He looked around in a circle at those who sat about Him, and said, "Here are My mother and My brothers!  For whoever does the will of God is My brother and My sister and mother."

 

- Mark 3:19b-35 

 

Yesterday we read that Jesus then withdrew with His disciples to the sea.  And a great multitude from Galilee followed Him, and from Judea and Jerusalem and Idumea and beyond the Jordan; and those from Tyre and Sidon, a great multitude, when they heard how many things He was doing, came to Him.  So He told His disciples that a small boat should be kept ready for Him because of the multitude, lest they should crush Him.  For He healed many, so that as many as had afflictions pressed about Him to touch Him.  And the unclean spirits, whenever they saw Him, fell down before Him and cried out, saying, "You are the Son of God."  But He sternly warned them that they should not make Him known.  And He went up on the mountain and called to Him those He Himself wanted.  And they came to Him.   Then He appointed the twelve, that they might be with Him and that He might send them out to preach, and to have power to heal sicknesses and to cast out demons:  Simon, to whom He gave the name Peter; James the son of Zebedee and John the brother of James, to whom He gave the name Boanerges, that is, "Sons of Thunder"; Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Cananite; and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed Him.  

 

 And they went into a house.  Then the multitude came together again, so that they could not so much as eat bread.  But when His own people heard about this, they went out to lay hold of Him, for they said, "He is out of His mind."  And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, "He has Beelzebub," and, "By the ruler of the demons He casts out demons."  So He called them to Himself and said to them in parables:  "How can Satan cast out Satan?  If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.  And if a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand.  And if Satan has risen up against himself, and is divided, he cannot stand, but has an end.  No one can enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man.  And then he will plunder his house."  Beelzebub was a corrupted version of a name for the god Baal, worshiped by the Philistines (2 Kings 1:2-16).  In fact, Baal meant "Lord" and was used for a number of pagan gods; but this name Beelzebub, used among the Jews, meant prince of "the dung heap" or lord of "the flies."  Here he is called ruler of the demons.  My study Bible says that the impossibility of demons fighting against themselves illustrates the irrational pride and envy of the scribes from Jerusalem in their opposition to Jesus.   Jesus uses simple logic with them:  how could he work to cast out the demonic if he were working through the power of the leader of demons?  How can Satan cast out Satan?  Christ must be the stronger man who binds the strong man (Satan) and can then plunder his goods; that is, Christ can set free those held captive by Satan.  It is Christ who can plunder his house, taking faithful human beings as His own.

 

 "Assuredly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation" -- because they said, "He has an unclean spirit."  My study Bible defines blasphemy against the Holy Spirit as blasphemy against the divine activity of the Spirit; that is, blasphemy against pure goodness.  Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, whose divine activity these scribes knew from the Old Testament Scriptures in which they are experts, will not be forgiven because it comes from a willful hardness of heart, and a refusal to accept God's mercy -- especially the mercy in action of Christ's works of liberating those held captive by demons.  My study Bible also adds that the patristic writers are clear that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is not an "unforgivable sin," nor does Jesus call this sin "unforgivable."  St. John Chrysostom teaches that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit would be forgivable if a person were to repent of it.  Jesus makes His declaration here knowing that those who blaspheme the Spirit are calling pure, divine goodness "evil,' and are beyond repentance through their own choice.

Then His brothers and His mother came, and standing outside they sent to Him, calling Him.  And a multitude was sitting around Him; and they said to Him, "Look, Your mother and Your brothers are outside seeking You."  But He answered them, saying, "Who is My mother, or My brothers?"  And He looked around in a circle at those who sat about Him, and said, "Here are My mother and My brothers!  For whoever does the will of God is My brother and My sister and mother."  My study Bible tells us that Christ's relatives have not yet understood His identity and mission.  He points to a spiritual family based on obedience to the will of God.  My study Bible also notes that in Jewish usage, brother can indicate any number of relations.  Abram called his nephew Lot "brother" (Genesis 14:14); Boaz spoke of his cousin Elimelech as his "brother" (Ruth 4:3); and Joab called his cousin Amasa "brother" (2 Samuel 20:9).   Christ's brothers mentioned here are either stepbrothers (that is, sons of Joseph by a previous marriage) or cousins.  Christ had no blood brothers, as Mary had only one Son, Jesus.  In John's Gospel, Jesus commits His mother to the care of His disciple John at the Cross (John 19:25-27), which would have been unthinkable if Mary had other children to care for her.

It's interesting that just as we're told Christ's fame has spread throughout all the territories of Israel (that is, Galilee, Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea, beyond the Jordan, and even among the Jews of the Gentile regions of Tyre and Sidon -- see yesterday's reading, above), so at this time we begin reading about opposition to Jesus' ministry.  We first read about the scribes who've come from Jerusalem.  Allies of the Pharisees, they accuse Jesus here of working through the power of Beelzebub, whom they call the ruler of the demons, whom Jesus names as Satan.  This is opposition indeed, as Jesus teaches them that they are blaspheming the Holy Spirit at work in their midst to heal those who are demon-possessed.  Since we're told that Jesus and the disciples "went into a house" and that the multitude was so great "they could not so much as eat bread," we can conclude easily that the accusations of the scribes stem from envy and jealousy.  For elsewhere Mark reports Jesus' teaching that it is their positions that truly mean the most to them:  "Beware of the scribes, who desire to go around in long robes, love greetings in the marketplaces, the best seats in the synagogues, and the best places at feasts, who devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. These will receive greater condemnation" (Mark 12:38-40).   So within the religious establishment, vehement opposition is coming to Christ, the Son, the One whom we call Messiah.   Would we not expect something different if we were writing this story ourselves?   Would we not have a sort of  "magical thinking" that of course the Prince of Peace would be embraced and accepted, particularly by those who longed for this day, who were experts in the Scripture, who considered themselves the true sons of Abraham and Moses?  Yet, that is not the story of the coming of Christ into our world as the human Jesus.  And then there is the story of His family.  They have likely come just because of Christ's overwhelming renown at this point, the multitudes who come to see Him, and knowing of the religious authorities' opposition to Him.  Perhaps they are greatly concerned that they need to bring Him home for His own good, for the fuss the family may be dealing with.  We know that His mother has always understood her Son in accordance with the announcement of Gabriel (Luke 1:26-38) and the prophecy of Simeon (Luke 2:25-35).  Perhaps after all, she is reminded of Simeon's prophecy that a sword would pierce her own heart.  We know that she confidently encouraged the first sign in John's Gospel (John 2:1-12).  But would she know all the tumultuous unfolding of this ministry?  That was in the hands of God -- and there in this thought comes Jesus for us all.  For the expectations of the world for the One whom Gabriel said would be called "the Son of the Highest," whom the "Lord God" would "give the throne of His father David,"  Who "will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end" are quite impossibly different from the actual fullness in the unfolding of these words, in the ways that we are taught to understand them, and in the persecution of the Son as Isaiah's Suffering Servant (see Isaiah 53).  For Christ's mission into the world is one that exposes the world's own flaws, its rejection of the purely good, our own envy and jealousy, our failure to accept truths we don't want to hear, our own limited ability to accept God's will when we don't like it.  For here is where Jesus comes in to teach us all, to say that "whoever does the will of God is My brother and My sister and mother."   This is not a rejection of His natural mother and of His extended family, but it is the final word, the bottom line.  Even Peter will be in for a strong rebuke when Peter denies that Christ should suffer or die (Matthew 16:21-23).  We don't like it when God's plans don't conform to our expectations of what is right and good.  But God's plans are more than the kind of plans that we make for life, for God's plan reveals us to ourselves.  God's plan will show to us that we need repentance and change from selfishness, to embrace what love is and teaches, and that we need to learn God's ways for ourselves, to become "like God" as we follow Christ's commands.  Jesus comes into the world, and His highest loyalty is to God, not to our fantasies and desires and not to our delusions about ourselves and the world.  For this is what love is and does:  love "suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never fails" whereas we know only "in part," and so we look to the One who comes to bring us to the fullness of perfection, and for whom we meanwhile abide in faith, hope, and love -- love being the greatest of these (1 Corinthians 13).   Let us look to His love, and place our faith and hope where it firmly belongs, for everything else will someday fail.