Mark 3:20-21 NASB

Crowd control was becoming a problem. Mark gives us a word picture by describing the situation. It was so busy that Jesus was unable to enter a house and have a meal in peace. The word of healing had gotten out and He was overwhelmed with the response. This caused concern from two groups of people.

First, His immediate family was concerned and sought to remove Him from the situation (Mark 3:21, 31-32 NASB). The Greek word for brother is “adelphos”. This word is translated in two ways, the son of a mother or as a fellow Christian believer. The fellow Christian believer is always the son of God. My Catholic friends try to say that this word can be translated as “cousin” thereby trying to say that Mary stayed a virgin through her life. The Greek simply does not allow for this translation. Jesus had physical blood brothers. Albeit, these were half brothers since Joseph was not the father of Jesus.

In the context of Mark’s Gospel, Jesus has just started his earthly ministry.  He just chose the twelve and is getting started with teaching, healing, and casting out demons.  Jesus went from an unknown person to a radical miracle working preacher in a matter of a relatively short time.  His family was astonished at his preaching and sought to take custody of him.  The implication is properly translated as “He has lost His senses”.  One of the interesting things about Jesus’ life is that his immediate family did not believe in Him until after the crucifixion.  After that James came on board as a strong leader in the early church.  I believe that Mary knew all along because of the information that we have in Luke.  But then,  she was one of them that came to take custody of Jesus (Mark 3:32 NASB). Perhaps she was having her doubts. It may be that Jesus had such a radical change in His earthly life when his ministry began that all of them were astonished and felt the need to take custody.

Mark 3:22-30 NASB: Secondly, the religious leaders became concerned. They recognized that He had spiritual power beyond their understanding. Therefore, since they were self-proclaimed experts on Torah, the Scribes claimed that Yeshua was possessed by a demon.

Take a close look at the parable because I have seen many of these verses pulled out of context to be used for a massive amount of applications.  Jesus makes a logical argument that if Satan is divided against himself, he is finished.  Then he develops the argument further by saying that in order for Satan to plunder the strong man’s house, he first has to bind the strong man, (God).  Or it could mean the opposite, if Jesus plunders Satan’s house, then he first bound the strong man (Satan).  Either way the effect is still the same.  I believe that the best interpretation of this is that Satan is the strong man, look at what Wiersbe said on this:

“The analogy in Mark 3:27 refuted their first accusation (v. 22) showing in fact (lit., “on the contrary”) that the opposite was true. Satan is the strong man. His house is the realm of sin, sickness, demon possession, and death. His possessions are people who are enslaved by one or more of these things, and demons are his agents who carry out his diabolical activity. No one can enter his realm to carry off (diarpasai, “plunder”) his possessions unless he first binds the strong man (shows he is more powerful). Then he can rob (diarpasei, “plunder”) the realm, releasing the enslaved victims. At His temptation (cf. Mk 1:12-13) and through His exorcisms Jesus demonstrated that He is the Stronger One, empowered by the Holy Spirit (cf.  Mk 3:29). His mission is to confront and overpower (not cooperate with) Satan and to deliver those enslaved by him.”^[2]

Now let’s look at the argument for the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.  There has been a lot of controversy on these verses.  Many Christians argue over what exactly is the blasphemy.  I won’t make an absolute statement on this but would rather point out the meaning in context.  Wiersbe holds that this is a rejection of the saving power of Jesus or a open hostility toward God. In such a way that the people defiantly choose not to believe in God even though the evidence points to God.  That is consistent with this passage.

It may also be noted that the Scribes and Pharisees were attributing the work of Jesus with the work of Satan.  Notice that the Holy Spirit is not mentioned by anybody but Jesus in this passage.  When Jesus was rejected, He noted that it was not His work that was rejected but rather that of the Holy Spirit.  In effect, Jesus was working through the humanly body in cooperation with the Holy Spirit to cast out demons, effect miracles, and teach.  God is one God. When Jesus was working on earth, He was not working in isolation from the Father and the Holy Spirit.  They were all working together.  Therefore, the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is rejection of God’s work in its entirety.

Putting it together, Satan was bound by the work of the Godhead.  His kingdom on earth was rapidly coming to a close because God bound him.  When Jesus died on the cross, that was the final step in redeeming the world, thus ending the reign of Satan over the sons of Adam.  Now, the Holy Spirit is working to convert followers of Satan to be followers of God.  Jesus was saying that attributing His work to Satan was blasphemy of the Holy Spirit (Mark 3:30 NASB).  In my understanding, this would be a rejection of the work of God until death.  This is based on the thief on the cross.

Matthew 27:42-44; Mark 15:32; Luke 23:39-43 NASB

Matthew and Mark tell us that the robbers on the cross were all insulting Jesus saying that He was not the true King of the Jews.  In other words; Jesus was not who He claimed to be.  This qualifies as blasphemy. Luke develops the story of the thief further by demonstrating that even though the thief did not believe in Jesus, he came to a simple belief while he hung there.  Jesus assured the thief that he would be with Him in Paradise.  The ultimate blasphemy was a total rejection of the work of God through Jesus.  When the thief repented, he was saved.  By the way, the first man to enter heaven outside of Jesus was a thief worthy of death on a cross!

1 Corinthians 3:16-17; Ephesians 2:21-22; 2 Corinthians 5:17 NASB

Back to Mark:  In the book by Philip Yancey and Dr. Paul Brand called In the Likeness of God.  Yancey discusses DNA for a bit in the book.  When a cell in the body is closely examined, each cell carries the DNA of the human body.  That chain of information carries the exact blueprint that a human body requires in every aspect to be uniquely human.  No two people have the same DNA.  Think about this, when we enter God’s kingdom, we become a new creation and are incorporated into the body of Christ as members of His body.  Our spiritual DNA has changed, we have the blueprint of God stamped on each cell in our body as we become the temple of the Holy Spirit.  Think about it.  At conversion we become endeared to Christ as members of His body, completely changed forever.

Returning to the passage:

Then the clincher, v. 28.  Jesus wants to impress on them the gravity of what they are accusing Him of.  Grieving of the Holy Spirit, the only unforgivable sin.  The work of the Holy Spirit is to bring men to Jesus, to bring them to repentance and to grow them up in Christ.  If a person rejects the Holy Spirits leading in their lives for their entire life until they die. In other words, they die before they are saved, or redeemed, or have salvation, however you want to say it, they aren’t making it to heaven.   They have committed the unforgivable sin.  This is because they ignored the working of the Holy Spirit in their lives for their entire life.  Notice that the reason Jesus mentioned this was because of v. 30, “because they were saying, “He has an unclean spirit.””  Jesus being a righteous God, was giving a warning.

Judaism and Christianity are in agreement. We have a mutually exclusive belief in God. Simply put, the only way to salvation is through one God. All other gods are false and lead to destruction. Biblically speaking, there is only one path to heaven. When God’s leading is rejected to death, there is no other form of salvation. The rejection of the Holy Spirit till death, is an eternal sin that will not be forgiven.

Mark 3:31-35 NASB

Terms of endearment.  What a powerful statement, when we accept Jesus and make Him Lord of our lives.  We will do the will of God, and we will demonstrate that we have eternal life.  We have moved from physical brotherhood of family to the brotherhood of believers. Yeshua was simply saying that once a person enters God’s Kingdom, we all share an intimate kinship (Jn 1:12-13 NASB).

^[2]John F. Walvoord, Roy B. Zuck and Dallas Theological Seminary, The Bible Knowledge Commentary : An Exposition of the Scriptures (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1983-c1985), 2:117.