Saturday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 20, 2024

Mark 3, 20-21

Jesus came with his disciples into the house. Again the crowd gathered, making it impossible for them even to eat. When his relatives heard of this they set out to seize him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”

This little Gospel Reading tells us a great truth about the Lord Jesus.

St. Mark sets this account right after he tells of how Jesus summoned his disciples and just before he reports on the accusations of the scribes that he himself was possessed and that his power came from the demons.  Thus, the strong reaction of his family and the accusations of his enemies come at a time when his preaching and miracles have made him a formidable figure in the Jewish world who has established a structure to carry on his work — perhaps to some, a staff to organize and lead his armies.  

“Jesus came with his disciples into the house.”  When Mark wants to show events following other events, he uses a Greek word that roughly translates as “immediately after that”, but he does not do this here so we can think that the event of which he is to tell happened some time after the summoning of the Apostles.  Likewise, the Greek definite article does not appear before the word for “house”.  It is simply “a house”, and probably not Peter’s in Capernaum.  

“Again the crowd gathered, making it impossible for them even to eat.”  Mark uses a double negative in this sentence.  In Greek and in many other ancient languages such as Hebrew this meant an emphatic negative: “making it absolutely impossible for them even to eat.”  The people filled the streets outside the house, the house’s courtyard, and seemed to swarm even within the house.  They clamored for his words and begged for his healing.  This would have taken place at the time of the midday meal.

“When his relatives heard of this they set out to seize him.”  That is, they had been hearing reports of his activities and of the response of the crowds.  They wanted to lay hold of him because they thought that he was “out of his mind”, that he had lost his wits.  It is not clear what his relatives actually heard to make them think this.  Perhaps they had heard that the Pharisees hated him, or perhaps they were alarmed at his almost constant movements, going from town to town and taking hardly any time to eat or sleep.  It could also be jealousy, which even Pontus Pilate knew motivated the Jewish leaders to turn Jesus over to him (cf. Matthew 27, 18).

The reality is that Jesus Christ is the sanest men who ever lived.  He is the very apex of sanity and rationality.  At the same time, his actions seem to belie this: for no visible reason he abandons a stable life in a small town and hurtles himself through the length of Galilee and Judea, apparently cultivating the hostility of the authorities, mixing with the most unsavory characters, sleeping out in the open when he is not spending the night on a mountain in prayer, eating irregularly, and preaching when he has had no training in the Law.  What accounts for this is his passion for us.  The Lord Jesus, the Son of God, is out of his mind in love with you and me.  Mostly we hide from this fact, but it remains true.  He would do anything to save us, to prove his love for us, to get us to love his Father.  He expresses this himself: “I am come to cast fire on the earth. And what will I, but that it be kindled? And I have a baptism wherewith I am to be baptized. And how am I straitened until it be accomplished?” (Luke 12, 49-50).  This raging fire is his love, for “Our God is a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12, 29).  This “baptism” is his suffering and Death for us: he can hardly keep himself calm  until he undertakes it.  We can think of it this way: no one has ever wanted to be killed as desperately as our Lord did.  

His relatives were right: he was out of his mind.  And he still loves us today with that inconceivable love.