Matthew 12:46-50 - Homiletics

The Lord's mother and brethren.

I. THEIR INTERVENTION .

1 . The reason of their coming. We know that even later in our Lord's ministry his brethren did not believe in him ( John 7:5 ). They seem to have been Hebrews of the Hebrews, exceedingly zealous of the Law. They had heard, it seems, of the rupture between Christ and the Pharisees. They knew that the Jews at Jerusalem had sought to kill our Lord because of the cure of the impotent man at the Pool of Bethesda on the sabbath day, and now these Pharisees from Jerusalem ( Mark 3:22 ) had accused him of being in league with Satan. They had been accustomed to regard these rabbis of the holy city with the utmost reverence. Doubtless they felt a deep affection for the Lord, though they could not realize his Divine authority. They were in a great strait, full of perplexity and anxiety. They seem to have thought that the Lord's intense earnestness and excessive labours had affected his mind ( Mark 3:21 ); and they came in mistaken tenderness, but yet out of real love, to check him, to save him from the consequences of his rupture with the Jerusalem authorities, and perhaps to bring him back to the quiet of Nazareth for the much-needed rest. His blessed mother came with them; she knew, as no one else could know, the mystery of his incarnation; she had kept and pondered in her heart the many wondrous circumstances which attended. the birth of the holy Child. We cannot tell what her feelings were; doubtless she feared for his life; perhaps, too, there was something of disappointment, mingling with her deep love. This humble laborious life, spent in doing good among the poor and afflicted, was not what she had expected in him to whom the throne of his lather David had been promised by the messenger of God. Perhaps, as at the marriage feast at Cana, she thought of advising him how to act , in all love and tenderness, but yet not fully conscious of his Divine majesty, not wholly realizing the relations in which he now stood to her. It must have been very hard for a mother who had nursed him as an infant, and cared for him in his youth, to understand always how high he stood above her in the awful dignity of the Godhead. It was not for her to control him; it was not flu' one compassed with infirmity, holy though she was according to the measure of human goodness, to guide and counsel the Holy One of God.

2 . The message. "Thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee." Their intentions were good in the main. They loved the Lord Jesus, but they feared and probably reverenced the scribes and Pharisees; they wished to prevent our Lord from breaking with them. Worldly policy can never really advance the cause of true religion. Sometimes those who love us the best tempt us the most; in mistaken affection they urge us not to deny ourselves, not to take up our cross, not to do this or that work for Christ.

II. THE LORD 'S REPLY .

1 . He does not admit their authority. He was subject to his mother once, but from the time of his solemn consecration for his Divine mission earthly relationships must give way to the work of his sacred office. He loved his mother tenderly; he thought of her in his death-agony. But he was come to do the Father's will, he was about his Father's business; she must not interfere. "What have I to do with thee?" he had said to her once before, when she attempted to direct him; for she Was human, he was Divine.

2 . Spiritual relations with Christ closer than earthly ties. He has taken upon him our humanity; we are members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones. True Christians who abide in the Lord are nearer to him than they were who knew him after the flesh till they learned to know him so no more, and believed in him as the Divine Redeemer. "Whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother;" near to him as his brethren were, near to him as his holy virgin-mother. Blessed words! He welcomes our love; he makes us his own, very close and very dear to him; dear to Christ the Lord as brother, sister, mother, if only we do the heavenly Father's will. It is the blessing of the true disciple. May it be ours!

LESSONS .

1 . We must not presume to question the wisdom of God's dealings with men. "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?"

2 . No motives of worldly policy should be allowed to interfere with work for Christ.

3 . Try earnestly to do the will of God; it makes us brethren of the Son of God.