Words of Jesus Podcast - Born Into The Family

Episode Date: September 30, 2022

Who is my mother?  "Whosoever does the will of my Father is my brother, my sister and my mother.” Being born again is a process.  There is conception (a seed is planted), then, gestation and finally birth. Strive to be a vessel for duplication of Christ. This mystery has been hidden since the foundation of the world. How far along are you in the process? Look at your works. Works are the measure of our faith. What we believe, we do. "Hear and Do" equals building your house on the rock. It always comes back to faith and works.  Think Red Ink!***Ch. 28: JESUS’ MOTHER AND BROTHERS COME TO SEE HIMWHILE JESUS was talking to the people, his mother and brothers came to the house but were unable to enter because of the large crowds which thronged about it.            A messenger came to Jesus, saying:            “Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee.”            But Jesus replied to the messenger:            “Who is my mother?  And who are my brethren?”            Then Jesus stretched his hand in the direction of 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.”***If you were family, you would hear and do; Hear the word of God is my mother - womb - a place to develop (pregnancy), seed of Christ, Abraham, Abraham's seed, not all who say, "Lord, Lord…" works are required; seed remains -does not sin, born again; do the right thing every time; daily life is what we are judged on; born-again, salvation, seed of Christ, miscarriage, environment not hostile, ***Scriptures:  Matthew 12:46-50; Mark 3:31-35; Luke 5:19-21

Think Red Ink Ministries presents The Words of Jesus series with Don C. Harris Hello friends and welcome once again to the Words of Jesus series. We're going to continue to talk about what Jesus had to say and what he taught. We're going to look behind some of the words that he said, see if we can understand some things that perhaps were a mystery to us before. I don't know, maybe you understand everything. I don't know. Maybe you understand everything. I don't. Man, I always appreciate reading what he has to say, hearing what he has to say, and extrapolating from that

how he thought. I want to think like Jesus. Not only do I want to talk like him, I want to think like him. I don't want to just parrot what he says. I don't want to just repeat something that I memorized. I want it to come from the inside. I want that oracle of God, man. You ever experience it, you just get hooked. Get into a situation that is on the verge of exploding into an inferno. You've been in situations like that with your family, with relationships, with your boss, with your kids. You've been there. And you notice, you say what's on your mind.

You tell them, I just need you to speak my mind. Or I'm just saying. I always love that people say. They say something horrible and then they say, well, just saying well don't how about that um but you get into those situations and you find out that you need to say you speak your mind and it just makes it worse it just explodes right in front of you how would you like to have that fire extinguisher effect to a situation like that? Everything's just kindling all around you, and things are smoking and boiling,

and it looks like any minute it's going to pop into flames. And you come into a situation like that and speak as the oracles of God. God tells you how to handle that. And you say the right thing to the right person at the right time. And it's just like cool water over all those hot coals. You ever experience that friend you're going to be so addicted to hearing the voice of god i don't know that you're gonna go to work in the morning i don't know um we're in chapter 28 in our little book called the words of jesus and uh this situation was that j Jesus was talking to the people his mother and his brothers came to the house but were unable to enter because of the large crowds which thronged about it a

messenger came to Jesus saying behold thy mother and thy brethren stand without the desire to speak Odd response. Wow. What? What are you saying? Then Jesus stretched his hand in the direction of his disciples and said, Behold, my mother and my brethren. For whosoever will do the will of the Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, my sister, and my mother.

Wow, where's this going? What's this all about? Well, friend, you know what he's this going? What's this all about? Well, friend, you know what he's talking about? He's talking about what we have been talking about for the past few shows. And that is how salvation is a conception and a gestation and a birth. You didn't see that?

Did you miss that in what he was saying? He's saying those who do the will of my father do the will of my father oh boy there you go that works salvation again no i'm not i'm not writing this book i am reading this book every time you turn around you find where jesus says you're gonna have to do something you're gonna have to do your faith you going to have to do something. You're going to have to do your faith. You're going to have to do it. And so he's saying that people who hear my word and do it, those are the ones that I consider to be my family.

Now, Jesus, as we started, oh, wow, how long ago when we started this series I was talking about the fact that he had very little affinity for his family from his what I called his bar mitzvah forward he did not consider his mother to be a mother like as in mommy and it it was woman, was it not? He spoke to her as a woman. Do this or do that or whatever. I'm sure it wasn't an antagonistic thing. I'm sure she understood exactly what was going on, and she was just honored to be his mother,

not necessarily to be held up in some sconce or people lighting candles to her. As a matter of fact, there's a situation, we'll run into it, in the book where Jesus is teaching the people. And some little Catholic was out in the audience and said, Blessed be the womb that bare thee and the paps which thou hast sought. What was that? What is that? Well, that's some feminist out there in the audience that wants to make sure that the women get some credit for Jesus, I guess.

I don't know what the heck could be their purpose in that. But this woman wanted to make sure that some woman somewhere was honored by being the mother of jesus did jesus say oh well bless your heart thank you next time i see her i'll tell her you said so no he said no no no, no. Blessed are those who hear the word of God and do it. You see, bearing me as my mother is not necessarily, it's no big accomplishment on any one woman's part. He didn't allow that crowd to even think that Mary was anything other than a woman who yielded herself to God and who was obedient to God and gave birth to the Son of God. I mean, you say, well, that's all.

Well, that's a big deal. But it wasn't her. She didn't create the Son of God. The Son of God was created in her. Man, she's nothing more than a bottle. A bottle isn't its contents. You understand what I'm saying? So there was no need for that. Jesus rebuked that. He made it real clear

that there was such a thing as a person that he considered to be family. And more so, because when he said these are my brethren and my sister and my mother, all these, notice he didn't say father. My brothers and my sister and my mother all these notice he didn't say father my my brothers and my sister my mother i consider these people here who hear the word of god and do it now at that particular time could be mistaken i don't know it wasn't there but i understand he had brothers that didn't believe in him i think james was one of them um that you know the brother of our lord that didn't believe in him. I think James was one of them.

That, you know, the brother of our Lord. But I don't think that he was necessarily with them. And I think Jesus knew that. You know what? They're not in my meetings. Where are they? Why are they out there? Why aren't they here? Why hasn't mom been here since we unlocked this

motel and had to set tables up? Where's she been? You see, he says, these are, this is my mother, my brother, my sisters, these people who hear the word of God and do it. Now, was he being unnecessarily cruel to his sisters and his brother and his mother? I don't think so. I don't think so at all. Like I say, I think Mary understood fully what was going on there. But Jesus was making a statement even that went past the idea that we need to consider people who are obedient to the scriptures, obedient to the word of God are obedient to the scriptures, obedient to the word of God, obedient to Jesus Christ as brethren. These are our brethren.

And Jesus considered them to be brethren. And, of course, his sisters and his mother. But the other thing that I think that we can see in this is where we started out was that this idea that these people, whomever they happen to be, that hear the word of God and do it, Jesus considers them to be his mother. Now, to tell you the truth, when you read along there and you see, you know, these are my brothers and sisters. If he'd have said that, if he'd have just said, these are my brothers and sisters, I'd understand that fully, wouldn't you?

You'd understand that, okay, the church people, people who love him, the people who follow him he considers them to be family brothers and sisters but mother you only have one mother how many how many mothers can you have you only have one well how is it he says i consider these people to be my mother what in the world could he mean by that brother and sister got it mother i'm wondering well when you look at salvation according to the scriptures when you look at these concepts that we've been looking at for the past few shows um when you consider that salvation is not an instantaneous experience any more than a woman having a baby is an instantaneous

experience. The scriptures and the prophets and the people who wrote the scriptures used the picture, if you will, the metaphor, the picture, if you will, the metaphor, the parallel, the simile of pregnancy as a depiction of what happens to a person when they become born again. And when they come to Christ,

what happens to them when they come? What's going on? Well, Paul elaborates on this. Jesus talks about it and he mentions it in places just like this. That he says that there is a seed planted. There's a seed planted there. We can see conception in this. Isn't that easy to see the seed being planted?

It's easy to see. So to see the seed being planted? That's easy to see. So there's a seed being planted. Well, if the seed is planted, then the conception has taken place, but there's no baby. There's no baby. There's no person involved yet. What happens is that seed takes hold and when it takes hold this the seed being fertilized it takes hold it starts to become a being

and the bible teaches that that seed is christ faith in Christ brings us into the family of God. How? It goes all the way back to Abraham. Not to Moses, not to Noah, but to Abraham. And Paul, as he's teaching on this, concludes. Well, I don't know if he concludes, well I don't know if he concludes, but he culminates his message by saying that, so if you have faith in Christ, then are you

Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. You see what's happened here? We have the seed of God planted within us for the purpose of, as Paul says, that Christ might be formed in us. Man, there's a... Do you see a picture of a pregnancy? I do. Till Christ be formed in us. And the old prophecies of the Old Testament that talks about, you know,

this has come to, how did it say? That this woman has come to the birth and there's not strength to bring forth. You remember that? Well, many of us who are Christians have never come to the birth. The seed's there. It's growing. We created an environment for that seed, hopefully that's not hostile to its environment, making a hostile environment for this seed to grow and flourish and nourish and everything that it needs to grow many times we create such a hostile environment by our sins and by our uncaring by our slothfulness and by our treatment of our

fellow man and by our lack of faith and all these kind of things that cause all these troubles that we we create an environment for that seed that is indeed so hostile it miscarries and you're in need of another seed you're gonna have to try this again i know this goes against people's grain i know that they have trouble with all this stuff that to think that that a person could come to Jesus and walk away not saved. But friend, it happens all the time. And you better consider for your own good that it could have happened to you. Just because you asked Jesus to come into your heart, he said that this way, not all who say to me, Lord, Lord, are going to enter the kingdom

of heaven. Really? Wow, man, when I think about it, that's all I did. Yeah, I know. I've been meaning to talk to you about that. You see, it is works. It's works coupled with faith. Putting this thing together and creating a pregnancy that this seed has something to to to grow in to grow by and we need to come to the birth but many of us haven't reached that birth i know you tell people you're born again but you don't even know what it means uh you tell people you're born again, but you don't even know what it means

You tell people you're born again, but it's more a matter of hope with you than it is with That it is with faith. I Hope I'm born again Nobody wants to say that but isn't that the truth? I hope we are I happen to know that I'm not You know and if you say you're not, why, shoot, people go nuts. So I remember I had a son that came back from seminary and asked me, how do you know you're born again? I said, I'm not. What do you mean? I'm not born again.

The Bible says he that is born again doth not commit sin. For his seed, what's that? His seed? His seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin because he's born of God. I don't even understand what that means. Now, I don't live in a life of sin now.

I'm not sinning today didn't sin yesterday don't plan on sinning tomorrow or next week or next month but that doesn't mean that i'm born again see born again is when all things are gone all the horrible things in life are gone and all things are become new i've still got a lot of problems i've still got a lot of things in my head that uh you know that need to be dealt with and worked on i'm coming to the birth don't worry about me i'll be fine but uh if if what i experienced as you know asking the lord jesus christ is my into my heart as my personal Savior, if I look toward that experience, boy, there's just not much to Christianity. There's just not much there at all. Maybe it's for people that are better than I am or something.

I come from rough stock. And maybe it takes a little while longer to knock the edges off. I don't know. But I am honest about it. I have to be honest about it. And if it is indeed true that you are born again simply by asking for it, then it didn't mean much to me. It didn't change me much. The only thing that changed me is when I

started keeping His commandments and I started listening to Him every day and I quit disobeying my own conscience all of a sudden life started working all of a sudden my ears opened up all of a sudden my eyes opened up i started understanding things my life got better and better and it's getting better today it'll be better tomorrow than it is today now that i can testify to and frankly i see a lot of Christians and think, if that's born again, I don't know what it's worth. I really don't.

You know how many people have looked at your life and said, if that's Christianity, I don't want anything to do with it? Well, they're looking at somebody's life because I hear that a lot when you're out in the world and you're talking about these things to people. I hear that a lot. They're looking at somebody. If that's being born again, I'm not interested. Wow, man, these things, well, you're scaring me.

You know what? I don't really mean to scare you, but, you know, what is it going to take? What's it going to take for us to back up, just back up and say, you know what? Perhaps I missed something somewhere along the way. Because, listen, you know what? Born-again wives, they don't snap at their husbands and get mean to them and try to run their lives and try to climb up their back and constantly fussing at them and make their husbands miserable so they don't want to come home anymore and that they end up having a mistress at their job site or whatever else is going on.

That's not a born-again wife. A born-again husband doesn't come home and kick the cat and treat his children bad, treat his wife bad, throw stuff around and be in a sour, rotten mood and kicking stuff over and not doing his duty and not mowing the grass and not taking care of the house, not paying the bills and not being responsible. That's not a born-again man. Where'd you get the idea that it was?

Oh, God doesn't care about what you do. He only cares about what you believe. Hogwash, hogwash. You realize how much trouble me and you are going to be in if our judgment day is not us standing before God, giving an account of our lives, but all of our friends and family, giving an account of my life? You're going to ask them? I don't think this is a good idea. Well, you know what? You shouldn't be afraid of that. Your life should be lived

so that if he did call your friends and your relatives up and say you know give your account of dawn well i'll tell you something hey nice guy i appreciate him well if he says something he really means it he says he's going to do something he'll do it if it kills him he loves people he gives away what he owns he gives away gives away his time and his talent and his money, and he cares for the lost. He tells people the truth. He's just, wow, you know, I aspire to be a guy like that. Look, I got no confidence that any of that could be said about me. But wouldn't it be nice if you could? Wouldn't it be nice?

What if your family had a given account of you? What if your wife was going to speak to the Lord about what a Christian you are? How would that go what if your husband was was assigned the the duty of speaking to the Lord about what a Christian you are I said I wasn't trying to scare you maybe I am a little bit now because really it's the way we live so we live every day the way we treat one It's the way we live every day, the way we treat one another. This is how we're going to be judged. So what'd you do for the widow? What'd you do for the orphan, the fatherless?

What'd you do? I mean, I hear them up here crying out to me that they're hungry. I'm looking for somebody to send. Is that you? Well, I'd love to help them, you know, but I got a boat payment this month. Or some other silly thing. Alright, did we get off our subject? I don't know. It's

always the subject, isn't it? We want to do the right thing for the right reasons because we want to please our God. We're not trying to dodge hell. We're not trying to dodge hell. We're not trying to dodge flames. We're not trying to just so to speak stay out of jail. What we want to do is we want to be good citizens. You show me a guy you know the difference between a guy who wants to be a good citizen and a guy who just doesn't want to go to jail? No. I'm afraid that in Christianity we're just populated with people who don't want to go to jail? No. I'm afraid that in Christianity, we're just populated with people that don't want to go to hell.

I can't understand why you'd want to. So what makes you different than anybody else? So the idea here is that Jesus says if you listen to my words and you do what I say to do, I consider you to be a vessel for me to duplicate myself in you. In other words, you're my mom. You can be my mother. The world can use another Christ. It can use another Christian. It can use another person who is solely committed to doing what God wants done, to pleasing the Lord.

You could use a man like that, use a woman like that, but the only way this is going to happen is not by you tottering down the aisle and asking Jesus to save you. No, you're going to have to do it according to the Scriptures. And when you do, if you hear the Word of God and do it, Jesus said, now you're on it. Now you're in the kingdom of God. You're hearing the word of God doing it, you're building your house on the rock. You remember that at the end of the Sermon on the Mount? Those who hear the

word of God and do it. Hear the word of God and do it. Who was the fool that built his house on the sand? The one that heard the word of God and didn't do it. It's always about works with you, isn't it? Yeah, I guess it is. I guess it is. Look, I understand the faith alone idea, the virtue of being by faith.

I understand the virtue of living by faith and this all being by faith and God appreciates faith and without faith it's impossible to please Him. I get all that. But I just want you to know that if you want to check your faith, how are you going to do that? You're going to check your faith by your works. It's your works that are going to show you, it's your works that are going to tell you exactly where your faith is. If your faith is where it belongs and your faith is strong, your works are going to be plenteous and effectual in your life. If not, it's not there.

Let's be honest. Let's be what we ought to be, which are vessels that are worthy of carrying the seed of God that is being offered to anyone who will repent and go his way. Keep his commandments. He'll plant that seed within you and it will grow up into salvation.

That's where we're all trying to go, isn't it? That's where we're all trying to go. All right, our time is gone for today and we're going to, next time, we're going to be talking about the parable of the sower. Another great parable that I happen to love and I think that you will too. And there's much to learn in the parable of the sower. Jesus said about it, something you, I don't know,

might have escaped your attention. But he said that if you don't understand this parable, you don't understand any of them. Well, you know what that makes me want to do? I want to look at this parable and see, do I understand what this parable is saying? So you join us for that. We're going to love to have you for that as well. That's all for this time. Will you write to me?

I'd love to hear from you. If you'd like to, you can write to don at thinkwriting.com. Just that simple, an email address, send your questions or your comments to me, and I'll be glad to help you with them. We've made offers about the Reconciling the Resurrection DVD. If you'd like to have that, want to hear from you, I'll be glad to send it to you. Just tell me you want it. Give me your address and it'll just magically appear in your

mailbox. If you'd like to write to the ministry, you can do so at Think Red Inc. Ministries, P.O. Box 718, Pintown, New Mexico, 87827. Want to make your life go better? Think about what did Jesus say. You want to speak better? Think about what did Jesus say. You want to think better?

Think about what did Jesus say. All right, we'll see you again next time. Bye-bye. you've been listening to don c harris of think red ink ministries ThinkRedInc.com. That's ThinkRedInc.com. Join us again for the next episode in the Words of Jesus series. you