He was told, “Your mother and your brothers are standing outside
and they wish to see you.”
They told him this because they thought it ought to preempt his mission and take precedence over preaching the Kingdom. There was little that they could imagine that was more important than honoring one's parents, the first commandment of the second tablet of the law pertaining to one's neighbor. And Jesus did not say such bonds were not important. He did, however, say that the he and the Kingdom must come first. He said, "loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me" (see Matthew 10:37). At the same time he said that those who did put the Kingdom first would receive "a hundredfold" "brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands" (see Mark 10:30). There was a new principle at work in the Kingdom that took precedence over ties of blood since, as Paul wrote to the Galatians, "those of faith who are the sons of Abraham" (see Galatians 3:7). With this John the Evangelist also agreed, when he wrote that "to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God" (see John 1:12).
He said to them in reply, “My mother and my brothers
are those who hear the word of God and act on it.”
In today's Gospel Jesus gives us a pithy summary of all that we have already said. The Kingdom was a reversal in which, among other things, faith and spiritual bonds took precedence over human wisdom and mere blood relations. None of this was actually a sleight to Mary who was doubly related to Jesus, both as his mother in the natural order, but also in the order of grace, in which she received and consented to the word of God as conveyed to her by the archangel Gabriel. She had no additional agenda that she desired to impose on the life of her Son. She didn't always understand his plan or act in perfect synchronicity with it. But she remained humble and docile enough to be redirected and even reshaped whenever it was necessary. Thus, if she came to see Jesus and there wasn't presently a spare moment to do so, we can't imagine that she took offense. More probably, she happily joined with the crowds in listening to his wisdom. It was, after all, a greater wisdom than that of which we read in the Proverbs of Solomon. Even more than Solomon was the heart of Jesus, the true King of kings, a stream in the hand of the Lord. It was a stream of living water capable of imparting the Holy Spirit to those who heard, just as the woman at the well discovered.
The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life (see John 4:14).
When we are tempted to take offense at some reversal the Lord has said let us be aware of the human tendency to assume we're always right, that although "the ways of a man may be right in his own eyes" "it is the LORD who proves hearts". We don't know our world or its purpose as well as does its creator. We don't even know our own hearts or their deepest and most intrinsic desires as does the one who shaped them all. Whenever we submit to the will of God his ways are eventually vindicated and our mistakes become gradually evident. Let us learn from Mary to maintain a posture of humble docility that is willing to at least entertain the idea that the Lord might be right this time too, and to be redirected by the current of grace that is gushing forth from the heart of Christ.
Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water (see John 7:38).
No comments:
Post a Comment