Becoming family with Jesus

SCRIPTURE:

Then Jesus' mother and brothers arrived. They stood outside the house and sent in a message, asking for him. A crowd was sitting around Jesus, and they said to him, “Look, your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside, and they want you.” Jesus answered, “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?” He looked at the people sitting around him and said, “Look! Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does what God wants is my brother, my sister, my mother.” Mark 3:31-35

OBSERVATION:

The Lord is sitting in a house, with a crowd all around him, listening to Him. Then the Lord’s natural mother and brothers arrived, determined to take him away because they fear he has lost his mind. Probably amused, the crowd tell Jesus “Look, your mother and brothers and sisters are outside, and they want you.” Even using this occasion to bring out a powerful Scriptural truth, the Lord asks “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?” Then, after looking around at those listening, He proclaims “Look! Here are my mother and brothers! Whoever does God’s will is my brother, my sister and my mother!

His family were worried about him, even His mother Mary, and His brothers still did not believe He was the Messiah at this stage. He had been making statements as if He were equal to God Himself, and His family were naturally alarmed. Nevertheless, the Lord’s statement showed that at this phase of His life, He had already moved on from a natural life as a carpenter’s son and moved closer towards fulfilling His main task as the Son of God and Savior of the World.

The Lord’s statement also shows implicitly the will of God since the beginning of creation. As the apostle John wrote “God is love”, and that profound statement could not hold true if God was at some point alone with no one but Himself. Instead “God is love” is only possible because there was love between God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. And the great thing is that because God loved His Son so much, He made a plan to make a larger family consisting part of His creation, men and women all over the world who would respond to His call, and love Him as He deserves for the great and good God that He is. And giving His Son Jesus to make the way is what makes this plan possible. All glory to His name!

Very important for us to note in this verse is the statement “Whoever does God’s will”. The Greek tense means whoever continues to do God’s will. It is not a one time “I did God’s will once, or I did God’s will previously”, it is “I continue to do God’s will”. We who claim to follow God must continue to do what He wants. Later Jesus warned “Not everyone who called Me Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of Heaven but only he who does the will of My Father in Heaven.” Again, note that it is he who does, not he who did. We need to press on, to continue in our salvation by continuing to do God’s will. We fail at some points, but we must come back, to continue to seek to do His will, and let Him empower us and change us to do so. We are in the family if we follow the Father’s will, and we are out if we do not. It is not about individual actions but about the way of life. The Christian life has ups and downs but our part is to keep pressing on, always with that goal in mind, to please God!

APPLICATION

Let us meditate on our lives at this point and ask ourselves if we are seeking to do God’s will. Is there an area that we are purposely going against His will? Are we giving the devil a foothold in anything? Do not be deceived to think that we have received our ticket to Heaven, and can thereafter live life however we want.  We only have eternal life as long as we remain in Jesus, and to remain in Jesus is to be willing to obey His commands. We can’t do it in our own strength, but if we continue to seek Him and to be led by His Spirit, He helps us follow His will more and more. Praise God for the great future He has prepared for us as part of His royal family!

PRAYER

We thank You and praise You, Father in Heaven, that You invited us to be part of Your family in Heaven. We are so grateful and thankful for Your great love. Give us the strength we pray to continue to seek Your will in everything. Forgive our sins where we turn back to our old ways. Lead us back to that place where we seek to do Your will in all honesty and sincerity. Help us and preserve us, we pray. In Jesus name, Amen.