FAMILY. Mark 3:21, 31-35.

Sara was baptized at 8. Her drunken father, standing at the back of the sanctuary, shouted, “Hooray for Sara!” as she came up out of the water.

Sara figured baptism was proof of salvation: you believed in Jesus, and proved it by baptism. But she writes that what neither she nor her father understood was that BAPTISM IS A TRANSFER OF ALLEGIANCE.

“When I came up out of the water, soaked and relieved not to have gotten water up my nose, I was a member of a different family, the daughter of a different father.”

After Jesus began His ministry, His relationship with His family changed. After Jesus began to draw huge crowds, His mother and brothers and sisters came to talk to Him, thinking He had lost His mind.

“When His family heard about [the crowds], they set out to restrain Him, saying, ‘He’s out of His mind.’ … Then His mother and His brothers came, and sent word to Him. A crowd was sitting around Him and told Him, ‘Your mother, Your brothers, and Your sisters are outside asking for You.’

“He replied, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking around He said, ‘These are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother’” Mark 3:21, 31-35.

Why does Jesus deny his family in this moment? Because they are missing the point. They are denying Him through their doubts—and those who obey Him are acting as His true family.

Jesus uses harsh words:

“If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple” Luke 14:26.

Does Jesus want you to hate your family? No. But He wants you to love Him so deeply that you choose Him over everyone. Jesus speaks with the assumption that no one is closer than family. But if needed, you must give them up to know Him better: no one should come between you and your allegiance to Jesus.

Do you love Him more than EVERYTHING and EVERYONE else?

ΑΩ