And his mother and his brethren came to him, and could not get to him because of the crowd.
Luke places this scene right after the parable of the sower and the warning about how we listen. The Lord's mother and brothers arrive, and the crowd keeps them from Him. A small family interruption becomes the moment Jesus defines who counts as His relatives.
The barrier was physical: a packed house. The claim behind their message was not. Those closest to Him by birth expected first call on His time.
If His mother and His brothers came to Him, they thought, He would listen to them. They put forward natural claims, as if these should come before the carrying on of God's work. That He would not allow... The house was full; they could not get in (Luke 8:19). So they stood outside and sent word for Him to come out to them. Had He done that, He must have stopped His work, for a crowd sat around Him, and He was speaking to them. It seems He must either stop His work, or refuse the claim of natural ties.
Why would Mary interrupt Him at all? One writer traces it to her natural affection. She was watching a Son who never spared Himself.
She saw Him give Himself to His service, with no thought of self or ease. He followed it day by day and never spared Himself in the slightest. Morning, noon, and night, He never tired of seizing every chance to be busy with His Father's work. So far as her natural affection governed her, she must have been alarmed for His sake.
Matthew and Mark place this event before the parable of the sower. Luke puts it after, for a reason that is not chronological.
If we look at Matthew and Mark, we will probably conclude that this incident with the Lord's mother and brothers did not happen at this exact point. But Luke here again follows an order that is moral rather than historical. The Word received in faith produces fruit for God, light for men, and introduces into true relationship with Christ Himself.
Refusing the claim was not a failure of love. The Lord had paid every duty a son owes. But something else was at stake now.
He next disowns any link with Himself based on natural family, even His mother and His brothers. He owed love to all, and He owed obedience to His mother, and He paid it all in full. But now it was a question of the Word of God, and nothing else would do. So even before His death and resurrection there was a complete moral break. Human nature does not understand the things of the Spirit.
Commentators differ over how far this refusal reaches. Some read it as the Lord setting aside His national link with Israel, with His natural affection fully intact.
His mother and His brothers came to Him on the ground of natural relationship only. Yet the Lord had every natural affection. On the cross we find Him remembering His mother and placing her in John's care. But His answer here amounts to this: "I am not on that ground now — my mother and my brothers are these, who hear the word of God and do it." Israel was now given up as to that position. The Lord owned as His relations only those whose hearts and consciences the word of God had reached.
Others hold that Luke's account carries no such verdict on the nation. They note that Luke gives no time marker here:
This follows the parable, though Luke gives no note of time here. Older translations add "then," but Matthew and Mark give the event its historical place, before the parable. Christ owns those who hear the Word of God and do it as His relatives, and this implies no disowning of natural ties in Israel.
The relationship Jesus names has an order. Willingness comes first, then knowing, then doing.
Someone may ask: How can I know the will of God? First of all, there must be a willing mind. This the Lord Himself declared — "If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority"... There is first the hearing and then the doing. In the Lord's words, "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it."
- Crowd — The house was full, so His family could not reach Him. Answering their message would have meant stopping His preaching.
- Claim — They pressed a natural claim over God's work, and He would not grant it.
- Cost — He had paid every duty He owed His mother in full. His refusal here is about the Word of God, not about affection, as the cross showed when He placed her in John's care.
- Change — Luke tells it after the sower to show a moral order. The word received brings fruit, then light, then relationship with Christ Himself.
- Confirmation — The tie He owns is hearing and doing: a willing mind first, then obedience. Blood ties do not create it.
And it was told him [saying], Thy mother and thy brethren stand without, wishing to see thee.
Jesus is teaching a crowded room when word reaches Him. His mother and brothers are outside, and they want to see Him. His answer settles a bigger question: are the closest ties to Him made by birth, or by something else?
Matthew and Mark place this scene before the parable of the sower. Luke sets it straight after it, and one writer reads that arrangement as part of the argument.
Verses 19-21 add another striking fact. If a person receives the word rightly, it brings him into relationship with Christ Himself. The Lord shows here that the relationship He was going to acknowledge was not based on flesh and blood. It rested on spiritual realities — on hearing the Word and doing it... If we look at Matthew and Mark, we will probably conclude that this incident with the Lord's mother and brothers did not happen exactly at this point. Luke again follows an order that is moral rather than historical.
The family stands outside and sends in a claim. One writer sees more than a family matter behind it.
They put their family tie forward to hinder the work that was going on. It was surely a trap cleverly set by the enemy. The Lord refused that interference. As so often happens, God overruled the mistaken act of His mother and brothers in triumph. He used it to bring out how the Lord would regard all those who did the will of God. "My mother and My brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it." Such are born of God, and He would own them as in the closest of ties.
Refusing the claim was not coldness. One writer holds two things together: the Lord's natural affection, and a tie that only grace produces.
His mother and His brothers came to Him only on the ground of natural relationship. Yet the Lord had every natural affection. On the cross we find Him remembering His mother and entrusting her to the care of John. But He replies here, as much as to say, "I am not on that ground now — My mother and My brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it."... It was not something found in nature, but something grace produced. Since grace produced it by power through the word, this settles the principle that it might go out to the Gentiles as well as to the Jews... In these three verses we have a sentence of judgment on Israel.
Commentators differ on how much weight the scene carries. One hears a sentence passed on the nation. Others hear Luke simply honouring the word of God, with no verdict on Israel.
This comes next in Luke, though with no note of time, in spite of the older English "then" — Matthew and Mark give the event in its historical place, before the parable. Christ owns as His relatives those who hear the Word of God and do it, and none of this disowns natural ties in Israel.
Another writer draws the same contrast between the two accounts.
What follows here sets natural ties aside in divine things and approves nothing but a relationship founded on the word of God heard and done. Flesh has no value; it profits nothing... It is not as Matthew puts it. There it comes after the formal giving up of the nation to apostasy, with a new relationship brought in. Here it is simply God's approval of those who keep and value His word. The moral place given to the word of God matches the mind of Christ.
The verse names them but tells us nothing about them. Writers have argued for centuries over who their parents were. One writer sets out the first of the explanations:
That they were sons of Joseph by an earlier marriage. So Origen, the late Bishops Westcott and Lightfoot and Dr. Salmon. It is the traditional, so-called "Catholic" view, which holds that Mary stayed a virgin all her life.
He rejects it, on legal grounds and on a text he says its defenders overlooked.
Bishop Lightfoot championed the first view well, but it cannot stand. On that view one of Joseph's own sons would have been his eldest son, and so his heir by law. In a sermon that Lightfoot quotes, Origen says that Scripture nowhere speaks of Mary having other children. But he must have forgotten Psalm 69:8, a psalm about the Messiah.
- Sown — Luke places this scene right after the parable of the sower. The order is moral, not historical: it shows what the received Word produces.
- Heard — the tie Christ acknowledges rests not on flesh and blood but on hearing the Word, and then doing it.
- Refused — His family pressed a claim that would have stopped His work. He turned it down, and God overruled their mistake to show how He regards all who do God's will.
- Owned — natural affection stayed real: He cared for His mother from the cross. But the tie that counts comes from grace, not from nature.
- Widened — the Word works in power to form this bond, so it could reach Gentiles as well as Jews. Commentators differ over whether Luke also means a sentence on Israel.
But he answering said to them, My mother and my brethren are those who hear the word of God and do [it].
In Luke's Gospel this scene comes right after the parable of the sower. The family outside arrives just as the Lord has finished explaining what the seed of God's word does in a human heart. His answer is not about relatives. It is about who can claim the closest tie to Christ, and on what ground.
Family arrived to stop the work He was doing. His answer does two things at once: it names His true relatives, and it leaves natural ties standing.
Natural relationship was put forward to hinder the work that was going on. It was no doubt a trap, laid by the enemy with skill. The Lord refused that interference. As so often happens, God overruled the mistaken act of His mother and brothers in triumph. In this way He brought out the light in which the Lord would regard all those who did the will of God. "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it." Such are born of God, and He would own them as in the closest of ties. Natural ties are not to be disowned. The Lord, when hanging on the cross, provided a home for His mother.
A tie to Christ must rest on something. Here the Lord names it.
The Lord sets His seal on this testimony. The thing in question was the word. The word drew to Him and to God those who were to enjoy the blessing, and the word was the basis of all relationship with Himself. So when they spoke to Him of His mother and brothers — the family that linked Him to Israel by natural descent — He declared that He acknowledged as such only those who heard and obeyed the word of God.
The verse does not stop at hearing. Doing is where the Lord fixes the relationship.
He did not stop at hearing the Word, however. He declared that those who do the will of God were His real relatives. Their relationship to Him was vital.
And the names He gives to that obedience are family names.
He gives the dear titles and the dear names of relationship to the person who does God's will in this self-willed world... That obedience — how blessed it is to think of it! It is not a feeling that fades. It is not self-esteem, which will come to an end sooner or later. A broken heart can obey. A broken heart can be subject. That is what I call real life.
Family pressure has a limit. So does any claim built on blood alone.
For us too, if our natural relationships interfere with our obedience to the Word of God, we must refuse this interference. This makes it clear: the Lord's mother and His brothers had no more claim on Him than any other believer has.
On a later day a woman in the crowd called Mary blessed for giving Him birth. The Lord's reply ran along the same line.
She had realised that Christ was not like others. He stood out from the crowd, and there was blessing in being linked with Him. What she had not understood was how that could happen. The best she could think of was natural bonds. So His mother would have a blessing no one else could share. She was indeed blessed among women. But there were blessings for others, and these were even higher than Mary's: "blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it." The key to being linked with Christ was not a natural relationship but a spiritual one.
Commentators differ on how far the words reach. Some see the Lord closing accounts with the nation He belonged to by birth.
His mother and His brothers came to Him on the ground of natural relationship only... Israel was now given up as to that position. The Lord owned and acknowledged as His relations only those in whose hearts and consciences the word of God had taken effect. It was not what nature had put there, but what grace had produced.
Others read it more mildly. Those who hear the word, writes J. A. Trench, "are owned by Christ as His relatives, without any implied disowning of natural ties in Israel."
- Sown — the seed of the parable and the tie of this verse are one and the same. The word of God is the basis of all relationship with Christ.
- Heard — hearing alone is not the test; what He owns is the word that has taken effect on heart and conscience.
- Done — obedience completes the tie, and it is within reach of a broken heart, not only a strong one.
- Owned — to those who hear and do, He gives the warmest family names He has.
- Open — no birth or bloodline secures this place. Anyone who hears and keeps the word gains a blessing higher than Mary's.