Address

The people wanted a king. Why did they want a king? Because everyone else had one. And kings led their people out into battle and, presumably, won. So they want a king rather than their tribal Judges, and they tell Samuel so. They sound rather like children, demanding a puppy and not thinking through the consequences! Samuel goes to God who says, essentially, don't take it personally. Tell them straight what having a king will really be like, the burden it'll put on them so they're clear what they're getting into.

Samuel does, forcefully, and later he's proved absolutely right, but the people still cry, "We want a king!" Everyone else has a king. We should have a king. They want to fit in. Be normal.

Fast forward to Jesus and this extremely interesting passage concerning family who want life to be normal like everyone else's. This certainly qualifies as a difficult passage, and its very difficulty makes it most likely to be true.

Let's get the context first: Jesus has begun his ministry; has gathered disciples and is traveling about the countryside healing and driving out demons, which is essentially healing too. Now verse 21: "When his family heard about it they set out to take charge of him. 'He is out of his mind,' they said." I guess the modern-day equivalent would be that they sought to get to him before he ended up sectioned under the mental health act. Now, this verse appears only in Mark and it's often over-looked; in fact I remember someone denying that there could be such a verse, even though that person was very well-versed in the scriptures. You can understand the reaction, because we have this picture of Jesus' family being the great example, of Mary as supportive and she certainly is; but if we try to say that she understood Jesus' ministry from the word go, we're maybe on shaky ground. If we were Jesus' family, we like to think that we would be thrilled at all he was doing, but the truth is that we might well be embarrassed, and we certainly wouldn't understand where it was all heading. Having a rabbi in the family was a great honour, but one who was annoying all the establishment figures? That's not how it was supposed to go.

Mark is the Gospel writer who shows Jesus and those around him at their most human, and that's exactly what's going on here. Later, Jesus family came around - or some did: Mary was at the crucifixion and James, Jesus' brother, was to become the leader of the church in Jerusalem, but for now they're confused. I guess they want their life to be normal and just like everyone else's. So I don't think we should get hung up on this passage or try to deny it. Jesus lived a human life within human parameters and misunderstanding and distancing happens. The sad thing is that their opposition gave the scribes a way in to try to undermine all he was doing.

I admit that if you have a happy family and have been brought up with support from your parents and siblings, this passage must seem awful. But for those of us who don't have conventional families, or whose family has been far from supportive or families that are actually abusive, then this passage speaks to us of a reality and there's a great reassurance in finding that the Bible understands our less-than-perfect situations. Jesus didn't always have it easy with his family, so when we're struggling and maybe facing opposition from our family and friends and pray about it - or cry about it - he understands. That's a lovely thing.

But the very lovely thing comes at the end of the passage, another statement that worries a lot of people. Verses 34-35: "And looking at those who sat around him, he said, 'Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.' " I think we might find this statement extra difficult today, because there is massive stress laid on family, on blood-family: look at all the advertisements for heritage research, and the programmes like "Long Lost Family." Jesus here is pointing to a greater link than blood, the faith that links us. It's not exclusive of his actual family, it's a massively inclusive statement that wraps around us all.

Life is messy, and there's no such thing as a 'normal' family, and Mark is unafraid to show that in his Gospel, and that's good. It reminds us that God understands the messiness of it all, and that we are welcomed in, loved, just as we are and given true support through the Holy Spirit. I don't think you can really get better than that, can you?