Are You Related To Jesus?

Alba 5-12-2024

ARE YOU REATED TO JESUS?

Mark 3:31-35

Mother’s Day is a special time for us to honor mothers. That is a good thing to do. And hopefully, we honor them all year long, not just on this holiday. Sadly, many of us do not realize how good our mother was until she has passed on and then we cannot show her the honor she deserves.

Thomas Edison once said, “I did not have my mother long, but she cast over me an influence which has lasted all my life. The good effects of her early training I can never lose. If it had not been for her appreciation and her faith in me at a critical time in my experience, I should never likely have become an inventor. I was always a careless boy, and with a mother of different mental caliber, I should have turned out badly. But her firmness, her sweetness, her goodness, were potent powers to keep me in the right path. My mother was the making of me. The memory of her will always be a blessing to me.”

What a fine tribute Thomas Edison paid to his mother. Hopefully he told her some of those things when she was alive and still able to hear it.

So the words that Jesus spoke as recorded in our text for today, Mark 3:31-35, sound quite strange, and may be strange for a Mother's Day sermon. Somehow it seems out of character for Jesus to say what He did. But He had a purpose.

Here is what happened (Mark 3:31-35) : “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.'”

1. Did Jesus Forget His Mother?

For all we know, Jesus lived at home until He was around 30 years of age. And even though it seems that Joseph was no longer in the picture, more than likely he had died, still Mary was there in the home. Actually Scripture gives us quite a bit of information about Mary, the mother of Jesus.

She is the young maiden who was specially chosen to be the mother of God's only begotten Son. She was the woman who gave birth to Him. She nursed Him. As a mother she did for Him the things a small child would need. Luke 2:40 says that, “the Child grew and became strong in spirit, filled with wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him.”

Scripture also tell us what happened when Jesus was 12 years of age. The family had gone to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. Jesus had stayed behind when they were going home. When Mary and Joseph found Him, He was asking and answering questions from the teachers in the temple impressing them all. In spite of the concern that caused Mary and Joseph, Luke 2:51 says that “He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them.” And verse 52 says that “Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.”

Jesus was a good boy. Wouldn't you expect Him to be? I think Mary had to be a very special lady to be entrusted to care for God's own Son.

Now Mary and Joseph had other children. Mark 6:3 and Matthew 13:55 give the names of His brothers. James was the eldest, Joses the next, then Simon and Judas. We cannot be sure which was the youngest because of the different order they are listed in the two references.

The name Joses was a common abbreviated form of Joseph. Judas has been conventionally known as Jude. And from the same passages of the Gospels that name four brothers, we learn also that Jesus had sisters.

So why would Jesus have asked, “Who is my mother, or who are my brothers?” Jesus is the one who was able to even discern what other people were thinking. Certainly He would not be so forgetful as to not remember Mary or His brothers!

No, He didn't forget. In fact, as He hung, nailed to that cross paying for your sins and mine, He looked down at His mother and committed her to the care of John, the apostle. But what He was doing now was using this opportunity as a teaching moment. It was to show that, while there are physical family connections, there is also a spiritual family we can take part in. So no, He did not forget His mother. But then the question is: