At first it may seem strange, after the lesson which Mary had been taught at Cana, that she should have ventured thus to interrupt the Lord in His service. It can only be understood in the light of the incident, already referred to in Mark 3:20-2120And the multitude cometh together again, so that they could not so much as eat bread. 21And when his friends heard of it, they went out to lay hold on him: for they said, He is beside himself. (Mark 3:20‑21). Although it had been revealed to Mary who and what Jesus was, it could only be that she had devoted natural affections, and surely these would be both intensified and augmented as she witnessed His pure and holy life, a life wherein might be seen perfect love to God and man, divine and earthly claims (for He was subject to Joseph and Mary as a child) adjusted. That Mary did not see all the fragrance and beauty of the life of her Son may well be imagined, but what she did behold could not fail to make Him increasingly the absorbing object of her heart. When therefore she saw Him yielding Himself, without any consideration of self or ease, to His service; following it day by day, and never, in any, even the slightest, degree, sparing Himself, but unweariedly, morning, noon, and night, seizing every opportunity to be about His Father’s business, she must have been, in so far as she was governed by her natural affection, alarmed for His sake. It is only thus that the message that she desired to speak with Him can be accounted for or understood.
Before considering the Lord’s reply, it will be profitable to point out a characteristic of divine wisdom which is here displayed. Failures on the part of the Lord’s disciples and expressions of the enmity of the carnal mind are often recorded in the gospels. Yet all these are immediately turned to divine account, either for calling attention to some trait of glory in the person of Christ Himself, or to teach some valuable lesson of divine truth. Nothing more clearly proves that God is behind everything, that He uses all for the accomplishment of His own purposes, whether of grace or judgment. So is it with Mary’s interruption of our Lord’s address as here recorded. The parables of Matthew 13 make it clear that the Lord had reached a crisis in His ministry; and it is not too much to say that they could not have been uttered before He had broken off His connection, by His teaching, with the Jewish nation according to the flesh. It is this very thing which the Lord takes occasion to do from Mary’s message. How divinely perfect is both His wisdom and also the word in which it is enshrined! And who but a divine person could have foreseen everything, and made it subservient to His own objects!
The answer of the Lord to His mother and His brethren is worthy of our most devout attention: “Who is My mother? and who are My brethren? And He stretched forth His hand toward His disciples, and said, Behold My mother and My brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of My Father which is in heaven, the same is My brother, and sister, and mother” (Matt. 12:48-5048But he answered and said unto him that told him, Who is my mother? and who are my brethren? 49And he stretched forth his hand toward his disciples, and said, Behold my mother and my brethren! 50For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother. (Matthew 12:48‑50)).