Paul Walker, “Jesus Doesn’t Care Who is Related To Pocahontas”

Paul Walker    CEC  6/9/24   Mark 3   “Jesus Doesn’t Care Who is  Are Related To Pocahontas”

     My text this morning is the final part of the passage from Mark that we’ve just heard. Jesus has gone viral – he is so popular that he and his disciples can’t even find time for a roast beef sandwich. He is causing quite a stir -so much so that his family is either worried about or embarrassed by him. The word on the street is that “he has gone out of his mind.” So, his mothers and his brothers come to do an intervention. As the text says, “they went out to restrain him.” Looks like the Lamb of God is the black sheep of the family.  Every family has one, or two, or three, or more.

     So, let’s talk about family for a minute. The world has been filled with dysfunctional families since the beginning of human history. It started when Eve listened to the serpent and ate the forbidden fruit, then shared it with her husband. Then Adam, when confronted by God, blamed not only his wife, but God for giving Eve to him. Things just got worse when the had children. Sibling rivalry led to one brother murdering the other. And so began the history of dysfunctional families up to the present day.

     Because here is the thing: every family is to some degree dysfunctional – some more, some less, but all dysfunctional. That is because dysfunctional families are made up of people. People are dysfunctional. That is to say that we do not function the way that we are supposed to function. This is what the bible calls “sin”, but you can just do an honest inventory of yourself and see what I mean. Your body breaks down, your will power evaporates, your libidinal impulses run unchecked, you just can’t stop those voices from whispering in your ear. 

     As Jesus says, “ For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.” So, if Jesus is to be believed, then what happens when you take a bunch of dysfunctional people and put them all together in a family? You don’t just cancel out each other’s dysfunction, you just multiply it!

     This seems obvious, but no one really says it out loud because family is such an idol. Family identity is sacrosanct – it certainly is here in Virginia where everyone who cares about such things claim to be related to Pocahontas.  I tell people that, and I’m pretty sure I’m not related to Pocahontas. I guarantee you that at least 15 people will come up to me after church and say, “Great sermon. But I am actually related to Pocahontas.”

      But it is true in virtually all cultures, and especially first century Jewish culture. Your family was your identity and your security and your destiny, determining what you would do and where you would live. Why do you think Jesus was a carpenter? Family was everything – still a familiar trope to many of us.

     So, when Jesus’ family show up, they are expecting front row seats. Instead, they can’t even get in the door. And when someone tells Jesus that his family is outside waiting for him, imagine what they must think when He says, “Who are my mother and my brothers? And looking at those who sat around him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and brothers. Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.’”

     Here  Jesus is very much like the boy in “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” The emperor is a fop who spends vast amounts of the state’s coffers on his haberdashery. 2 tailors con him into believing that the outfit they are making will be invisible to the hoi polloi. Only the sophisticated can see it. Not wanting to be counted among the common the emperor “puts on the clothes” and parades through the town either nekked or in his skivvies. Nobody says a word, until a little child blurts out, “The emperor has no clothes!” Then everyone, except the emperor himself, realizes that they’ve been duped.

     Jesus blows up the idol of family.  Who are my mother and my brothers? He looked at those who sat around him. Hhhmmm, that prostitute is his mother. That tax collector who lines his own pockets is his brother. That upper class Pharisee consumed with her own importance is his sister. 

     What Jesus is saying to you and to me is that you are not defined by your family at all. If you’ve had a particularly difficult time, this is very good news. If you have by the grace of God had a good experience with you family, then it is also very good news. Because ultimately your family can’t meet your deepest need for identity, security and destiny – only God can do that. When you make family your idol you will always be let down. As C.S. Lewis says, “we may give our human loves the unconditional allegiance which we owe only to God. When human loves become our gods, they actually become our demons.” 

     In your neediness you must deal directly with God and not look to be fulfilled by family or anything else. Again, Lewis says, “our whole being by our very nature is one vast need; incomplete, preparatory, empty yet cluttered, crying out for Him who can untie things that are now knotted together and tie up things that are still dangling loose.”

     Jesus ends this passage by saying, “For whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.” And doing the will of God is nothing more and nothing less than believing in Jesus. Not very sophisticated, is it? Not sophisticated, but extremely powerful. Because believing in Jesus takes away all the sin and dysfunction in your life and in your family. The gospel is that radical – all your sin and dysfunction is canceled out. It is nailed to the cross and gone forever. 

     Maybe you are the black sheep of the family, the younger brother in the Prodigal Son parable. You’ve made royal mess of things and burned bridges with your blood relatives. I’ve got good news for you – your new family, your Christian family, has thrown out the record book of offenses. For the only thing that counts is believing in Jesus. His life is your life.

     And let’s say that you are the one that feels like you must deal with the dysfunction of the family – you feel like it’s up to you to be the one everyone turns to.  You are the older brother in the story. And maybe you even think that you are going to be the one to right the ship. Well, I’ve got good news for you – the one and only thing you can do is lay that burden down at the foot of the cross.

     Sure, you’ve still got to wade through the stuff of life – a husband who just doesn’t get you. Children that have grown up and left you. Parents who still wield too much influence even though you are grown. Your sister who is in her 3rd stint at rehab. But all of that cannot stick to you, because by believing in Jesus, you have stuck it on Him. And He has stuck it to the cross to be dealt with once and for all.

     Amen.