Tuesday, February 7, 2023

Who is My Mother and My Brothers?

 

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 3:31-35


I truly love this. Jesus does not disparage blood relations here, but He does say that our relationships with those who are born into the family of God are superior because they are eternal. The only way to enter God’s family is by a new spiritual birth from above.


When a sinner (all of us) trusts Jesus as His Savior and Lord, he experiences this new birth and joins the family of God. He now shares God’s nature and can call God His Father.  This rebirth is of God and is accomplished by His beautiful work of grace in our heart. 


He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.—John 1:11-13


For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.—Ephesians 2:8-9


Our job is to trust Him and obey Him. 


For whoever does the will of God is My brother and My sister and mother."


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Supporting verses…


There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, "Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him."

Jesus answered and said to him, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."


Nicodemus said to Him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?"


Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit."John 3:1-7


Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart, having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever, because


"All flesh is as grass,

And all the glory of man as the flower of the grass.

The grass withers,

And its flower falls away,

But the word of the LORD endures forever."


Now this is the word which by the gospel was preached to you.—1 Peter 1:22-25


as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.—2 Peter 1:3-4


For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, "Abba, Father." The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,Romans 8:15-16