What Mother and What Brethren?

"What Mother and What Brethren?" – Matthew 12:46-50 For us mortals, the most important person is our mother; it is a very strong bond. But when Jesus is told that His mother and His brethren are outside, He makes plain, clearly and precisely, who His true family was. What binds one person to another most deeply may not be blood, but the mind and the heart: true kinship is to belong to the body of Christ. And that kinship rests on a common obedience, because the Lord's family are those who hear the word of God and do it.

I. Who is my mother? and who are my brethren? (Matthew 12:46-50).

A. The bond with a mother is the strongest a human being knows.

1. She is the one for whom we would dare to do anything.

2. The one who was there in the bad times, who carried us when we could not walk, who taught us step by step.

3. Even for the person who has done much evil on the earth, the most important thing is his mother.

4. Out of a hundred people, surely ninety-eight will say their mother is what matters most.

B. Jesus came to live as a man so we might learn from Him.

1. He grew in the womb of Mary like any other human being: with dreams, with hunger, with joys and with sorrows.

2. He came to this earth simply to die for us.

3. And on that road He came to leave us how our steps ought to be.

4. He came to live out all His traits as a man, so that we might live them as He lived them.

5. As if to say: it is not impossible to live as I lived, because I am human.

C. His answer sounds harsh, and it is a teaching.

1. Anyone would say: she is His mother, they are His brothers, how can He say something so hard?

2. For we quickly feel sorry for Mary, who was standing behind Him, and for His brothers, with whom He played as a child.

3. We are quick to make ourselves better than anyone: in circumstances and in troubles.

4. But Jesus made plain in that moment, clearly and precisely, who His true family was.

II. Only the word instructs us for eternal life.

A. We hear very little of what we truly ought to hear.

1. The word of God is the only thing that can instruct us for that eternal life we strive for.

2. Everything Jesus teaches us is so that we may attain eternal life.

3. That eternal life looks far off, never near; and we prefer what is here, what is vain.

4. The only way to attain it is through the word, because in it are the steps of Jesus.

B. How many hours do we spend on the phone?

1. Half an hour at a stretch without noticing, sometimes an hour; and we do that all day long.

2. And how long does it take to read a chapter of the Bible? Two or three minutes.

3. And those three minutes passed in the day and we did not do it.

4. Because the things of this earth are more pleasant, the vain things we think really fill our being.

5. Let us be conscious of it and take out at least those couple of minutes.

6. No wonder things must be repeated; otherwise one lets them pass and takes them lightly.

C. The sayings of the earth against the word.

1. We pay more attention to foolish sayings than to the word of God.

2. We say: blood is thicker. These are sayings of this earth, and we take them for ourselves.

3. When we have believed a doctrine, we ought to have another mind: the mind of Christ.

4. And Christ said: my family are those who do the will of my Father.

5. We live by sayings, by what this one says and that one says, as though they were verses of the Bible.

III. My mother and my brethren are these which hear the word of God, and do it (Luke 8:19-21).

A. The Gospels record the same account.

1. Those words stayed engraved in all who heard what Jesus was saying.

2. Luke was not with Jesus — Luke went with Paul — and he sought to gather that information, and he found it too.

3. Matthew was one of the disciples, so he heard it and wrote it.

4. So we know it was something very important that Jesus wanted to teach us.

B. Family is loved just the same.

1. For family one fights, and to family one speaks as well.

2. Mary stood weeping at the feet of Jesus when they killed Him, and Jesus told John to take charge of her.

3. And His brothers, after Jesus rose, also believed.

4. What must be understood is what carries weight, what the order of things is, and what value we give each thing.

5. Obedience to the word matters more than ties of blood; we must weigh what truly counts.

IV. For neither did his brethren believe in him (John 7:5; Mark 3:21).

A. The family of Jesus did not agree with Him.

1. In John 7 they tell Him: go to Judea, show who you are so that people may know.

2. In Mark 3 His own went out to lay hold on Him, for they said He was beside Himself.

3. It often stirs envy when people see others with power and authority, all the more when it is family.

4. Among brothers there are sometimes quarrels over whom father or mother loves more.

5. And it is not understood that a mother loves her children with the same love, though she may be more demonstrative with one, according to each child's nature.

B. Sometimes the enemies are those of one's own house.

1. Jesus warns of it, because He Himself lived it.

2. When someone is converted, sometimes those at home dislike it and are vexed.

3. Because it is the devil himself who rises against the one who has just been converted.

4. Now you are going to be a saint, now you are no longer part of the family, now you will not come to the party.

V. True kinship is to belong to the body of Christ.

A. What truly binds.

1. What binds one person to another most deeply may not be blood, but the mind and the heart.

2. The same blood is not needed for a deep union: with the same mind and the same heart we come to be one.

3. But we live pulling each other's hair: he wears me out, I cannot stand him, how he annoys me.

4. We take that stance easily, because bearing with our neighbour is not easy.

B. The kingdom of God is a society on earth.

1. A society in which the will of God is done as perfectly as it is in heaven.

2. We are part of the kingdom of God, we are His children, we are a family; God adopted us all as children.

3. That is why among ourselves we are brethren, and the kingdom belongs to the Father.

4. So should our life be, and the way we live together: as though we were in heaven.

5. That is what God seeks of us as a church.

C. Jesus alone had His will in perfect harmony with God's.

1. The Son of God, incarnate as an earthly man, achieved it.

2. We must achieve that same thing; that others have not reached it does not matter, I do want to reach it.

3. We think it impossible to be like Jesus because we live in this flesh; but if we set it as an impossible goal, then it will be.

4. Therefore all who have as their supreme aim to make their will coincide with the will of God are the true kin of Jesus.

5. To become His true kin not in word, but in deed: in how I behave, how I react, how I lose my temper.

6. It is not being perfect overnight: if today I failed, I repent again and try to do better.

VI. I beseech Euodias and Syntyche, that they be of the same mind in the Lord (Philippians 4:2).

A. Two women of the church at Philippi.

1. It is thought they were deaconesses and that they were joined to Paul's ministry.

2. But they came to a falling out: one believed one thing and the other another.

3. It does not say exactly what it was, but they did have a disagreement.

4. Paul had a good regard for them and a good memory of them.

B. Paul writes as a prisoner in Rome.

1. It is thought he had two to four years of life left.

2. Life is far more than what we live, than rising and working and doing it again.

3. He wanted to leave them all the teaching he could, so they would see Jesus as he saw Him.

4. So they would see what a disagreement here on earth is worth: how great does winning a quarrel make us?

5. Everything is so fleeting: today it is and tomorrow it is not. Yet that becomes the important thing in daily living.

6. That is why we must grow, to carry all this wisely, knowing how Jesus would act.

C. When love is in us, the heart beats.

1. Paul was a prisoner in Rome, but his heart was there with those two women.

2. So should our heart beat for one another: that we care and ask what is happening to this brother.

3. With much respect and much care, for it is not being gossips or meddlers, but sincere concern.

4. The pandemic brought much of everyone keeping to himself; but the heart must not grow cold.

5. We grow cold and apathetic, because it is more comfortable to live for ourselves at home and let others be.

6. But love and unity are the only thing that sustains us as a church.

D. Do not bring the offering with something against your brother.

1. They were not two ungodly sisters; but instead of uniting, they did the opposite.

2. We find it easy to bring the offering anyway and carry on as if nothing; and a month passes and the grudge is still there.

3. The sayings of the earth say: he did it to me, let him deal with it.

4. Or pride: let him come and ask my pardon, because I was not the one who did anything.

5. And they are utterly contrary to the sayings of Jesus, who on the cross said: Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

6. They were crucifying Him; and we stay proud because someone said something to us, since we are too great to be wounded.

VII. Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life (Proverbs 4:23).

A. Unity breaks when love is not what moves us.

1. I know this costs: that someone wound you, or wound your children, is not easy.

2. When we abandon the battle that love calls for and turn our back, the shot comes straight at us.

3. That is the great trouble: the death is not for the other, it is for oneself.

4. That one said this to me, that one did this: I forgive it, what does it matter? What I do not want is to live as one dead.

5. For if it is not love, what is it? It is hatred; though by the sayings of the earth we say it is not hatred, only that I will not allow this.

B. What must be guarded is one's own heart.

1. Never mind that one or the other: what matters is that I do not shoot myself.

2. The earth teaches us to harden: you did not deserve this, look how people treat you, look what he did after all the good you did him.

3. That is what the earth teaches; but that is not what Jesus teaches.

4. That is where disagreements come from: when we think we know how to do things better than the other.

C. Without unity we strengthen the enemy.

1. We think we are making ourselves great and protecting ourselves because we are wounded so much.

2. And what we do is give the enemy room to laugh at us.

3. Look at all Jesus did for them so they would be a family; and what there is, is discord, quarrelling and trouble among them.

4. We cannot stop fighting for unity and for love; let us not grow weary and let us not harden.

5. We must be united to do battle against the enemy and his devices.

VIII. True kinship rests on a shared experience.

A. Those near in the family of faith are known.

1. Do you remember when we fought together for the church? Do you remember that trouble we had?

2. We have spent a whole life together, with many stories and many things lived to tell.

3. It is not like those outside the family of faith, who say: look how badly it goes for them, what they have is trouble among themselves.

4. That is not being a body, that is not having unity, that is not being there for whoever needs it.

5. When we see wrong things, of course they are said; but carefully, without adding sparks, because sometimes we say them wanting the other brother finished.

6. Things must be said and must be set right; but always watching with what intent one does it.

B. To be friends, people must weep together.

1. An old woman had lost a friend, and told without much sorrow that they had a good time together and laughed.

2. And she said: we were companions; but to be truly friends, people have to weep together.

3. We may have companions outside, and laugh with our blood family, of course.

4. But what truly makes us friends is the struggle, is weeping together.

5. When we overcome a hard step for the church, or when we wept with someone in trouble and saw him come through it.

6. The basis of true kinship is a shared experience and a shared interest: that we decrease so Jesus may increase.

C. True kinship depends on a common obedience.

1. To know Jesus intimately and to know how Jesus would really act.

2. Not by the sayings of this earth, but by what Jesus would say.

3. See how He answered: my brethren are these, who do the will of my Father.

4. We would have said: wait, let them through, it is my mother; and we would have left undone what we had to do.

5. We would do the very opposite of what Jesus did. Why? Because blood is thicker.

IX. Twelve men with one master.

A. Jesus chose common and different men.

1. Matthew was a tax collector; Simon the Zealot was a nationalist, of the Jews who gave all for their country.

2. Peter, Andrew, James and John were fishermen; the rest are thought to have been farmers or labourers.

3. Jesus did not choose great scholars, so that everyone would know this is something easy to learn.

4. If one lets himself be led, if one is meek and humble, it comes easily.

5. But if one digs in and says I am like this, and pride breaks out, he will never be willing to learn.

B. Three years of forming, and then the whole world.

1. They were with Jesus three years hearing the word of God and being formed, up to the last day.

2. When Jesus appears to them, Thomas doubted; and to the last days Jesus went on teaching them.

3. Philip went toward Turkey; Bartholomew to Armenia and Persia; Thomas to India; Thaddaeus to Syria and Mesopotamia.

4. James stayed in Jerusalem, as did John and Peter, who was between Rome and other places; and Matthew reached Ethiopia.

5. In those three years they learned all they had to learn so this word would reach us today.

6. It seemed so little, yet it spread through all the world; they saw the last breath of Jesus and went on telling who He was.

C. Meeting again in heaven.

1. We have brethren in heaven; some we never came to know because we were very small, but others we did.

2. We will go one by one; let us set it as our goal to meet there.

3. Because we are brethren in the faith and we have died to ourselves in order to love one another truly.

4. Of the disciples, the first killed was James, and the last was John, who lasted longest.

5. I imagine John, reaching heaven, with the other eleven waiting for him. Let that be our goal too.

6. They were united because all had received Jesus Christ as their Master and Lord; and people become friends when they share one master.

X. To love the church as the Lord Jesus Christ loves her.

A. Pride is easier to embrace than love.

1. What a sorrow when this does not exist; for the opportunity is there, but it is refused out of pride and rebellion.

2. Love costs and love hurts; that is why Paul said that love suffereth long (1 Corinthians 13:4).

3. Let us not embrace rebellion and pride more than we embrace love.

4. Our goal and our common life is Jesus and His teachings.

B. Let us dare to set things right.

1. Sometimes we failed and we do not even dare ask pardon: sometimes from pride, sometimes from shame.

2. Let us be brave, let us break the barriers and not leave things hanging as though they never happened.

3. It is easier to take that stance than to settle it; let us not take it: let us settle it.

4. Though the person says he does not want your pardon, I still want to ask it, because I am the one who wants to be free.

5. We are the family of faith: with a brother one quarrels and then speaks to him again. That is what we are for. Let us not be cowards.