Read Luke 8:19-21

The oddest people in the world are the folks we are kin to.

Jesus must have believed it one day when His mother and brothers showed up, attempted to interrupt His work and take Him home. Matthew and Mark also record the incident, Mark adding that they did it because Jesus’ family thought He was mentally ill (Mark 3:21).

Mary heard the angel say that her first baby was to be the Son of God, Israel’s long-awaited Messiah (Luke 1:33-33). She heard Simeon, with the eight-day-old Jesus in his arms, say now he had seen the Lord’s salvation (Luke 2:30).

Mary and Joseph heard the 12-year-old Jesus refer to the temple as “my Father’s house” (Luke 2:49). Luke records that Mary pondered the meaning of these things (Luke 2:51). Yet now, perhaps under the influence of her other sons who didn’t believe their older brother was Messiah (John 7:5), Mary joins them in an attempt to halt Jesus’ ministry. For His own good, of course.

Jesus uses the situation, not to denounce their misguided intervention, but to show us how inclusive He is.  Indicating all His disciples, Jesus says (Mat. 12:49-50 paraphrased), “Whoever obeys God, doing the will of the Father, is My family. Nobody—absolutely nobody—is left out.”

If your earthly family is small, Jesus’ words are good news. We have family. We have an Elder Brother, a loving Father.

Read Luke 8:1-18

Can we say anything new about the parable of the sower?

We all know about the four kinds of soil. We all know what happened to the seed. Do we remember what immediately follows? Jesus said truth would be disclosed, even if it seems hidden at first (8:17).

So what should we do about the obvious truth Jesus teaches here? Jesus says we had better take it seriously and act on it (8:18).

Notice that the seed remains the same throughout. “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8). It is we hearers who are different.

Four kinds of hearts pulse to life in this story. First the hard-hearted, who hear but are so hardened they will not heed what He is saying (vv. 5, 12). Then Jesus calls our attention to the shallow-hearted. They think the gospel “cute” or “nice” but if it requires effort, forget it (vv. 6, 13).

Next come the half-hearted. These people know the way to God, but they don’t act on it (vv. 7, 14). Notice Jesus links this response to personal responsibility. The devil doesn’t make them do it. They’re just busy with their own affairs.

Last of all is the kind of person every teacher lives for, the whole-hearted. He or she hears, the message takes root, and that life produces a golden harvest, a well-lived life obedient to Christ (vv. 8, 15).

Read Luke 7:36-50

Jesus could be pretty blunt sometimes.

Evidently He had said nothing when Simon denied Him the common courtesies of the day. Now He lets Simon have it between the eyes (7:44-46).

Jesus wasn’t the only one who spoke plainly that day. The unnamed woman who washed Jesus’ feet with her tears, anointing them with expensive perfume, said no recorded words. But what she did spoke loud and clear.

Perhaps it was the custom of the day for outsiders to stand around listening at someone else’s social function. And, from what Simon said to himself, perhaps the woman was accustomed to advertising herself on street corners. Still, to do what she did took courage. She was so sick of her sin she found the bravery for desperate action. Perhaps she had talked with others who had found the unexpected release that came from having Jesus say to them, “Your sins are forgiven.” That woman was at the end of herself, willing to risk anything, for relief from the load of sin. She was not disappointed.

Notice that Jesus makes no effort to defend Himself to the other guests (7:49). Instead, He reassures the woman. Is this an application of the principle that light rejected prevents further illumination? These learned persons were never going to understand Jesus until they, like the woman, came in humble repentance for their sins.
At the point of our personal repentance, Who Jesus is becomes clear.

Read Luke 7:18-35

What on earth was the matter with John?

John should have had no doubts about who Jesus was? Their mothers were related, so they were family. Just six months older than Jesus (Luke 2:36), John must have grown up on his mother’s story of Jesus’ mother, Mary, visiting when both women were pregnant (Luke 2:39). Thirty years later John baptized Jesus. He must have seen the manifestation of the Holy Spirit on that occasion (Luke 3:22).

Yet now he sends a committee to inquire, “Are you the Messiah?” Why? What was his problem? And why didn’t Jesus just say, “Yes, I am the Messiah”? Wouldn’t that have been more satisfying to John than Jesus’ recital of what He had been doing lately?

Part of the trouble was that John was in jail, a discouraging situation. Maybe he had assumed he would be Jesus’ right-hand man, sharing a long, fruitful ministry with his kinsman. Now he couldn’t do anything. If Jesus had simply said, “Tell Cousin John, yes, I’m the Messiah,” that might have satisfied John for the moment. But with nothing but Jesus’ pat answer, in the long, lonely stretches of the night, John might have doubted again. Jesus’ recital of His acts of healing and compassion gave John’s mind something to chew on.

Notice that Jesus praised John, doubts and all (Luke 7:26-28). Shouldn’t this give us hope in our times of uncertainty?

Read Luke 7:11-17

Was it something in Jesus’ quiet authority?

Nobody asked Jesus to raise this young man from death. With the quick sympathy for which He is famous, Jesus said to the sorrowing mother, “Don’t cry,” and touched her dead son’s coffin.

The record says that when He touched it, the bearers stood still. Why? We have all seen pictures of funeral throngs in the Middle East. Everybody is jostling together, in motion, touching the coffin as they go. Why did they stop when this man touched it? Did the crowd grow suddenly quiet?

Only then did Jesus speak. Out of deep compassion for this sorrowing widow whose only source of support probably died with her son, Jesus calls him to life again. The record says that the young man sat up and began to talk. It’s a shame nobody thought to record what he said. Did he and his mother go home, walking along together? In time did he marry and give his mother grandchildren from her son who was dead?

Luke alone of the four gospel writers records this story. If Luke wanted to emphasize the tender compassion and love for suffering humanity of Jesus, the perfect Man, he could hardly have picked a better incident from Jesus’ life than this one.