A Family Thing
Jesus' Mother and Brothers
31Then Jesus' mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. 32A crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, "Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you."
33"Who are my mother and my brothers?" he asked.
34Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, "Here are my mother and my brothers! 35Whoever does God's will is my brother and sister and mother."
Reflection of Bee:
Our life on earth has family ties, both natural and spiritual. At times, we may be closer to our spiritual family than to we our natural family. The reason is that we may spend more times to share and to pray together with our spiritual brothers and sisters who do the will of God. Relationship are formed and develop though spending time together. There is no shortcut to it.
Dear Lord,
Thank You for the big family of God You have given to me. Yes, we want to do Your will to fulfill the Great Commission You have for us. That Your family may get bigger.
Amen.
Reflection of Tommy:
Today’s speaker in my church talked about the absurdity of someone claiming that they love Jesus but dislike the church. As Jesus is the head of the body, the church, and we are His members, how can we love Him and despise the rest in our spiritual family. No doubt there may be a brother or sister in our church that are difficult, burdensome, irritating or even hurtful to us, but God called us to love them anyway just like how Jesus would.
We can do this by first thinking of them as someone who's hurting, rather than just as someone who causes hurt to us. That change of attitude may help us see them in a more compassionate light. It's also important to keep our focus on changing our own heart towards them, rather than on their actions. And, we need to do all these in love and acknowledging how the relationships in our spiritual family are ultimately more important and longer lasting than those formed in our physical families.
Dear Father, thank You for the good fellowship I had with the brothers and sisters in the church lately. I pray that we will continue to spend the time we have in encouraging and building each others up in our spiritual walk. And teach me not to show partiality but to love and care for one another and their needs like how Jesus would be. In Jesus’ Name I pray, Amen.
