Mark 3

Jesus is in alignment with many rabbis when he asks, “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath?”

Name calling is the last resort of the weak.

The Bible gives no sense that the family is an end in itself.

Do antisemitic appeals to the Bible always constitute an abuse of scripture? Would that it were so simple.

Yes, Jesus is possessed—by a new vision of what it means to live in community and in relationship with God.

My forebears were a little shortsighted with their strict sabbath codes, but they weren’t entirely wrong.

When Jesus names the need for deep social change, people think he's possessed.

It's inevitable that the story of Jesus healing in Capernaum won't end well.

It's the "unforgivable" part that gets me. How can there be an unforgivable sin? 

In Jesus’ day—as in ours--redefining the family is a provocative act with far-reaching social, political, moral and spiritual implications. If we were to isolate Jesus in Mark 3 from the moments in the other gospels in which Jesus interacts with his family, we might conclude this story with George Aichele’s sharply worded assertion, “Mark’s Jesus is no supporter of family values!”

We might be tempted to adopt a vague notion of “faith” as the only criterion for inclusion in this family, but Jesus’ teaching will not allow us to separate faith from faithfulness or discipleship from submission.

If anything remains sacred in our culture, it’s the family. Yet Jesus challenged the family’s ultimacy.