Jesus’s True Family (Luke 8:19-21)

Luke concludes this section on what it means to have faith—the quality of hearing, trusting, and following God’s word—with Jesus’s family looking to find Him. They are apparently outside of the place where Jesus is teaching and can’t get to Him due to the crowd. When Jesus is told that they are looking for Him, he uses the moment to define what His true family is. It goes beyond blood relation, beyond tribe or race. Those who exhibit faith in Him. Those who trust His teaching and follow it. These are His true family.

We don’t get the sense here that Mary and Jesus’s brothers are hostile to Him, nor are they embarrassed. Other gospels can be read that way. (And possibly other moments in Jesus’s ministry.) We know from later accounts that Jesus’s brothers come around to faith. And we know from Luke’s account that Mary is already inclined to faith.

The exciting part of this moment is that it reveals something about us. We can be a part of the family of God! If we will hear His revelation, trust in His ways as being best, and follow His teaching like children of a loving Father, we are in!