#17 Thicker than Blood
Series: Mark
May 17, 2020
Chuck Sligh
NOTE: PowerPoint presentation is available for this sermon by request at chucksligh@hotmail.com. Please mention the title of the sermon and the Bible text to help me find the sermon in my archives
TEXT: Please turn in your Bibles to Mark 3:31.
INTRODUCTION
I’ve heard of some funny things that have happened at weddings.
Illus. – Thom Rainer tells of Fifteen Crazy Things that Happened at Weddings. – I won’t read them all, but let me share a sampling with you…
• One time, the bride fainted during the wedding. Four times!
• Another time an uncle was supposed to read 1 John 4:18: “There is no fear in love; instead perfect love drives out fear.” But instead of FIRST John 4:18, he read John 4:18 which says, “For you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband.”
• In another wedding the soloist was singing when a fly flew into her mouth, stopping the solo cold and causing the congregation to erupt in uncontrollable laughter.
• At an outdoor wedding on a farm, the bride and groom were joined in the front by a goat as the vows began.
• Most of these were caused by circumstances beyond their control. One wedding went wrong when the groom’s ex-wife stood in the back of the sanctuary yelling “not” as the pastor read each phrase of 1 Corinthians 13.
Despite all the things that can go wrong in a wedding—and there’s hardly a one that happens without some kind of hitch or blooper—there’s a reason why weddings are such happy affairs: They celebrate the creation of a new family.
Family is important.
• It’s the first institution God created.
• It’s the most important unit of society.
• It’s the formative hotbed, for good or for ill, for all of us.
There’s something about families. Our families can be the source of our greatest joys and deepest heartaches. There’s more emotion attached to our families than any other unit in society. Just watch TV: Almost every show has one or more characters who have unresolved daddy or mommy issues, or marital woes or multiple divorces. This is because family resonates so deeply in the souls of all of us.
So yes, family is important, but today we’ll see that Jesus teaches that there is a relationship deeper than physical family ties and there are more important responsibilities than our duties to our families.
Let’s look at Jesus’ family in Mark 3:31-35:
I. NOTICE FIRST OF ALL IN VERSES 31-32 THAT SOMETIMES FAMILY MEMBERS AND OUR CULTURE TRY TO PULL US AWAY FROM GOD’S WILL AND PLAN.
Verse 31 says, “Then his mother and his brothers came, and, standing outside, they sent someone in to call him.”
Now to understand my point, you have to look at verse 31 in its full context. Verses 20-35 have what several of my commentaries refer to as a “sandwich structure” which is found here and in five other places in Mark. This sandwich structure is where Mark begins a story (the bottom slice of bread), then switches to another story (the middle of the sandwich), and then finishes the original story at the end (the top slice of bread).
So last time we were in Mark we saw in verse 20 that Jesus’ family thought He was insane and set out to take him by force back to His family and village. We saw that they were motivated by love, but they were acting against the plan and will of God because they did not understand His mission and purpose, and most of all, they did not understand that He was God.
Then comes the middle of the sandwich when Mark interrupts the story of Jesus’ family with the story in verses 21-30 of the scribes ascribing to Satan Jesus’ works and Jesus’ response to them, pointing out that their logic was absurd, and that they were in danger of committing the unforgivable sin.
Now in verses 31-35 Mark returns to the original story he introduced in verse 20—the top slice of bread. His family has come to take him home by force to save His life, but when they get there, the crowd is so large and impenetrable that they could not get to Him through the dense crowd. And binding Him and hauling Him off was dangerous in the midst of such a large and intimidating crowd following such a popular leader. So from the outside they called for Jesus on the inside and most commentators surmise that the word spread from person to person until it got to the inner circle of people Jesus was teaching and interacting with.
Family is important, but sometimes families work against God’s purposes. Jesus had a mission and He was following God’s plan. It was inevitable that it would lead to conflict with the authorities and eventually to His execution. From the time He was a child, He set out to do the will of God the Father and His death at the hands of the authorities was part of that plan.
The family of Jesus was well-intentioned, but they were wrong. Oftentimes when people come to Christ, the strongest opposition they face comes from their own families, especially if their families are of a different religion or denomination. Their family members are not always acting in bad faith though. They often are genuinely concerned about their children because they don’t understand the Bible and genuine faith that results in a changed life and obedience to Christ’s commands. They don’t want their kids to become religious nuts. Sometimes they feel threatened by the changes of their kids, assuming they are judging their family or acting “holier than thou.”
Verse 32 says, “And a crowd sat around him, and they said to him, ‘Look, your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.’”
This sets up a drama, for you have to understand the importance of family in ancient and Jewish society. Tribe and family were everything to them. In Jewish society in that day, and in ancient societies in general, the individual as an autonomous unit independent of tribe and family was inconceivable. It just wasn’t a thing back then. One’s identity was wholly related to his or her solidarity with tribe and family. The culture of the day demanded submission of the individual to the group.
So everyone in that crowd would have expected Jesus to go to His family when summoned and comply with their collective wishes. But that was not to be, as we’ll see, not because Jesus wanted to flaunt cultural tradition, but because of a higher spiritual principle.
Sometimes our culture puts pressure on believers to conform to their values. But Paul says in Romans 12:1 – “And do not be conformed to this world: but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” Jesus was determined to follow the perfect will of God, not the cultural norms of His day.
II. IN VERSES 33-34 JESUS TAUGHT THERE IS A RELATIONSHIP THICKER THAN BLOOD. – Verses 33-34 – “And he answered them, ‘Who is my mother, or my brothers? 34 And looking about at those who sat around him, he said, ‘Here is my mother and my brothers!’”
What did Jesus mean by this question and answer which would have shocked His hearers in that day? What it did NOT mean was that He was severing family ties—nor was He implying that we should either.
Jesus upheld the institution of the family His whole life.
• As a child, He submitted to parental authority. – In Luke 2:51a we read, “And he went down with them [speaking of His earthly parents, Joseph and Mary], and came to Nazareth, and was submissive to them…”
• Jesus upheld the honoring of father and mother and castigated those who didn’t do so, as in the disgraceful use of Corban, a loophole in rabbinical tradition that allowed a son to neglect caring for his parents in old age by dedicating his assets to the Temple (Mark 7:10-13).
• Furthermore, in his final hours of life, as He hung in agony on the cross, Jesus thought of His mother and made provision for her care. – John 19:26-27 says, “When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold your son!’ 27 Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold your mother!’ And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home.”
Although in chapter 10 Jesus would acknowledge that Christian commitment might sometimes bring division in a family, He never suggested that His followers should voluntarily break family ties. That’s what cults do; but Jesus always maintained that we should honor our family commitments if we can.
Rather than implying the severing of family ties and neglecting family duties, Jesus was teaching that there was a relationship DEEPER than the kinship of flesh and blood. There is a SPIRITUAL kinship based on a relationship with God the Father. That relationship begins by being born into God’s family. All who are the children of God the Father by the New Birth are therefore spiritual brothers and sisters. That’s why we sometimes refer to fellow Christians as “Brother So-and-So” or “Sister So-and-So.”
Jesus was saying that He had established a new kind of family which is superior to the human family, for it is eternal. Its ties are stronger, more satisfying and more demanding. Those who were in Jesus’ spiritual family were far dearer to Him than the human family with whom he lived for thirty years!
Those who have found Christ understand this deep tie we have with God and fellow believers.
Illus. – I have some unsaved family members. I love them so dearly in many ways for the ties of blood are deep and strong. But in other ways I have a deeper relationship with a brother or sister in Christ I have just met than I do with these loved ones because we share the same Lord, the same desires, the same goals, the same values, and the same purpose in life. Many of the concerns of their lives are alien to me, and some are even antagonistic to my values and goals. And when I share the deepest longings of my heart for God or talk about church matters with my unsaved loved ones, it’s like I’m speaking a foreign language to them and it falls on deaf ears. On the physical and emotional plane, no tie is deeper or dearer. On the issues of deepest importance to my spirit and psyche, no tie is deeper than my spiritual family.
Our relationship with God and the family of God is thicker than blood.
III. IN VERSE 35, JESUS TEACHES THAT THE EVIDENCE OF A TRUE SPIRITUAL FAMILY RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD IS OBEDIENCE TO THE WILL OF GOD – “For whoever does the will of God is my brother and my sister and mother.”
Jesus is not saying that we are saved by doing God’s will. As R. Kent Hughes put it, “Obedience does not originate relationship with God (faith does that), but obedience is a sign of it.
We’re saved by being born into God’s family, which occurs when we place our trust in Jesus Christ and His work on Calvary. But how will we know and how can others know we are in God’s family?—By doing the will of God.
Put another way, doing the will of God is the key to experiencing “family” with God. This was true even for Jesus. Early in His ministry Jesus said, “My food…is to do the will of him who sent me.” (John 4:34)
And in the Garden of Gethsemane, in deep psychological agony and bloody sweat pouring out His veins, Jesus cried, “…Abba, Father, all things are possible for you; take away this cup from me: nevertheless not what I will, but what your will.” (Mark 14;36)
Jesus was not being saved by following God’s will. As God, He did not need to be saved. But following God’s will was an evidence of His relationship with the Father.
If this was true for Christ, how much more is it true for us? We are the children of God, but our awareness of the sweetness of being in God’s family is based on our obedience. When we’re disobedient, we’re still God’s child, but we feel estranged. A sense of fellowship is restored only when we confess our disobedience and begin to do the will of God again.
When we make our wills His will, we experience a dynamic relationship with God, but also with others who are doing the will of God in their lives too. We call these others doing the will of God the “family of God.” Living in obedience to our Father alongside the family of God is a deeply enriching experience.
Jesus says in Mark 10:29-30 – “Truly I say to you, There is no one who has left house, or brothers, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake, and the gospel’s, 30 who will not receive a hundred times as much now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come, eternal life.”
Jesus is talking about the sense of family that comes to the obedient.
CONCLUSION
What Jesus said must have come as a blow to Jesus’ family. But in time, at least some of them would come around. Mary would come to understand Jesus’ role after His resurrection. And James would later convert to Christ and become the leader of the Jerusalem church and pen the book of James. Another brother, Jude, would also write his own inspired letter under his own name.
Yet at the time, this was a “hard saying”—a bitter pill for Jesus’ family. They must have returned home defeated because they had not “saved” their brother. In the end it was their Big Brother who would save them, or at least some of them.
After looking at today’s text, what does God want you to take away from this sermon?
First of all, I want to ask you, are you “in” or “out”?
There’s something interesting and telling in this story we should pay attention to. Twice, in both verse 31 and 32, we’re told that Jesus’ mother and brothers are “outside” and that the crowd is on the “inside” with Jesus. That’s ironic since for thirty years Jesus had been on the “inside” of their household. Normally family is on the inside and the crowds are on the outside, but here the order is reversed.
This tells us something both ominous and hopeful: Those who assume they’re close to Jesus should reconsider and those who assume they’re far from Jesus should take heart. Often people grow up in church or a Christian family and assume that they are close to Jesus vicariously, that is, because of their family’s faith. Just because you grew up in a garage does not mean you’re a car. And just because you grew up in a Christian family does not mean you are saved Christian. We’re saved when we have believed for ourselves in Christ and committed our lives to him personally, not because of what someone else has believed or done in their spiritual walk.
But as I said, the fact that the crowd was on the inside brings hope to those who are on the outside. Only when you genuinely recognize that you are outside of God and His promises and recognize that Jesus paid the penalty for your sin and accept His free gift of salvation by faith can you have eternal life. If you’re on the outside, you can come to Jesus and be on the inside. I hope you’ll come inside today!
Second, if you are in God’s family, I want to warn you against “domestic idolatry.”
Next to God and His will, our earthly families are the most important thing in our lives. Today we’re witnessing the disintegration of the nuclear family and the consequences of that disintegration for our society are devastating.
But if we’re not careful, we can exalt the family to such an extent that we WORSHIP the family. In a brave effort to stem the tide, many have made the family everything. Everything is about the family; every sacrifice is made for the family; every focus is on the family; everything is judged by how it will help the family; the family takes precedence over all church and societal concerns.
Here’s the problem with that: every earthly loyalty—if it is made central—becomes idolatry. R. Kent Hughes says, “The truth is, many of the psychological problems in our families can be traced to parents whose affections bind rather than release and liberate. Avoiding the permissive destruction, which is ravaging our society, some parents perpetrate a possessive destruction, which is equally devastating. Jesus warned about this when he said, “Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me” (Matthew 10:37).”
What can we do to preserve our families but also not idolatrize it? The answer is to put love of God and obedience to Christ above everything else in our family’s lives instead of making family an end in itself. Our highest calling is to love God and obey Him, and doing those things may involve some sacrifices on our family time. Our families are strongest and closest when we are most dedicated to doing the will of the Father.
Illus. – When St. Augustine finally came to faith in answer to the prayers of his mother Monica, the two, according to his book, Confessions, stood in a window in the town of Ostia realizing that they were more truly kindred than ever before.
Two thousand years ago when Jesus gave His startling answer, He shocked His mother and brothers and all who heard Him. But what He said was both true and needed to be said because it teaches us that when we obey Jesus, we enjoy the blessed sense of being “family” with the whole family of God on earth. And a family enjoys singularity of goals and purposes and loves and desires when all its members are believers striving for the same high calling of God in Christ Jesus together. That’s one key to building a strong family that will stay healthy and vibrant.
