Mark 3:34

And looking round on them that sat round about him, he saith, Behold, my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.

This was called by Clarke "the adoption of the obedient"![12] It should never be lost sight of that, in the last analysis, it is obedience to the will of God that separates the saved from the lost. Undue stress upon the doctrine of justification by faith, making it read, "by faith only," has obscured this fact in much of the current religious literature.

Looking round on them ... is a graphic detail provided by Mark, and Matthew added another, "He stretched forth his hand towards his disciples" (Matthew 12:49). Did anyone copy anyone here? No! In these two accounts, there is eye-witness reporting; one noticed Jesus' look, the other his gesture.

As John Wesley said:

In this preference of his true disciples, even to the Virgin Mary considered merely as his mother after the flesh, he not only shows his high and tender affection for them, but seems designedly to guard against those excessive and idolatrous honors which he foresaw would, in after ages, be paid to her.[13]

In our Lord's pronouncement here is revealed the glorious nature of the privilege of Christian discipleship. Those who follow Christ, believing in him and obeying his teachings, are considered as the true family of God, being endowed with a relationship to Christ that is superior to that of fleshly mother, brother, or sister. And what is that relationship? It is union with Christ in the spiritual sense, incorporation into his spiritual body, identification with him and in him and "as Christ."

[12] W. N. Clarke, Commentary on the Gospel of Mark (Valley Forge: The Judson Press, 1881), p. 56.

[13] John Wesley, New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1972), en loco.