NOTES for Luk 8:17-18

We can have quite varied relationships with the Word of God, but in today's Gospel reading the Lord singles out only two main points. First, there is attention, the readiness to listen to the Word. God speaks quietly, and in order to hear Him, one needs outward and inward silence and the desire to hear Him. And second, Christ speaks about putting the Word into practice. "Take care how you hear," and in explaining this, the Lord calls the one who hears and acts on it the one who "has." Such a person understands God's Word, and it fills him with life; it itself becomes his life. But the one who does not hear, and especially does not put the Word into practice, that is, listens in vain, loses even the very ability to hear.

In essence, the only One who truly hears the Heavenly Father and fulfills His will is the Lord Jesus Himself. Therefore those people who follow Him on the path of hearing and fulfilling the Word of God become close to Him; they become His family. And this kinship of ours with the Lord Jesus is no less strong than the bonds of blood kinship that connect people. That is why the Lord says that those who hear and fulfill the Word are honored with the name of His brothers and His Mother. And for all of us it is exceptionally important that Jesus' family, His Church, is gathered by Him not according to signs of bodily kinship, but according to obedience to the Father. That is why His Mother became the Virgin of Nazareth, who said: "Behold, the handmaid of the Lord." This is precisely how all of us enter His Church, though we are so far from His people.