Mark 6:1-6 – Ingratitude limits spiritual growth

It’s humiliating to read in Mark 3:21 that the Lord’s own earthly family thought that He was out of His mind. It must have been devastating to think that His own earthly brothers and the very people from His same town whom he had loved, would not accept Him. Since then, He had also gone on and done some mighty things – teaching, delivering, healing, and even raising the daughter of Jairus. In this passage we see the Lord making another attempt on his part to reach out to them again. One would have thought news of what had taken place in His ministry would have made His people and family in Nazareth more receptive to His claims and ministry.

He now brought His disciples to His hometown. When the Sabbath came He went to the synagogue to teach. And as expected, His teachings amazed the people. Two things in particular had amazed them: His wisdom and His miracles. Here was an untrained teacher, who spoke with great authority lucidly. It was more than anything that they had heard. But their unbelieving hearts led them to make some disparaging remarks. “Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren't his sister here with us?" And they took offense at Him.    

Here was a clear reflection of what they thought of the Lord. He looked so ordinary. They remembered Him as the carpenter and just a common Galilean laborer. And the more they talked the more contemptuous they became. In calling Him Mary’s son, they were giving a below-the-belt blow. In their culture, a son was never identified by his mother but always by his father, even if the father was dead. The remark they made about Him being Mary’s son was insinuating that His mother was a prostitute and He was an illegitimate child. To think that these were the very people He grew up with. It must have cut Him deeply. And our Lord came to terms that in His own hometown, people found it hard to accept Him. Their unbelief had stifled their own progress and His ministry among them. The things Christ could have done were frozen by their unbelief. Matthew 13:58 provides us with this perspective: And he did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief. The Lord had been amazed by faith many a times, but in His own hometown, it was doubt and unbelief that had amazed Him.

We all know the quip that says: familiarity breeds contempt. Here was a clear cut demonstration of that. The situation in His home town must have saddened the Lord, and who would not? Here’s a caution! Just as familiarity in the natural can breed contempt, the same can happen in the spiritual realm. We may take the generosity of God’s grace for granted and become insensitive to His dealings. Here’s a reminder to ensure that we don’t trivialize or minimize the gracious work of God in our lives. Let’s respond to Him with hearts of thanksgiving and cultivate a life of belief and thanks-living.