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Matthew 12:1-14
Lord of the Sabbath
1At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some heads of grain and eat them. 2 When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, “Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.”
3 He answered, “Haven’t you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? 4 He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread—which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests. 5 Or haven’t you read in the Law that the priests on Sabbath duty in the temple desecrate the Sabbath and yet are innocent? 6 I tell you that something greater than the temple is here. 7 If you had known what these words mean, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent. 8 For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
9 Going on from that place, he went into their synagogue, 10 and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to bring charges against Jesus, they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”
11 He said to them, “If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? 12 How much more valuable is a person than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”
13 Then he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other. 14 But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus.
This passage comes up in the lectionary at an interesting time for me. A Wednesday study group I participate in is reading a book by a Jewish rabbi named Naomi Levy. And one of the chapters in Levy’s book is on the subject of keeping the Sabbath. We Christians might tend to think of the Jewish version of keeping the Sabbath as strict and legalistic. But Rabbi Levy has a much different take on it. Here’s what she writes:
“Some think of the Sabbath as a day of prohibitions — you can’t do this and you can’t do that. But the Sabbath is really a day of permissions, a day when we can give our souls permission to dream again. How long can we keep racing around, spreading ourselves so thin, contorted by stress and worry? There’s so much within our grasp that we keep missing.”
She tells the story of a successful businessman who came to her complaining that his life felt hollow. He felt alienated from his wife and children. Her advice was to try keeping the Sabbath just one time. And when he found he could turn off his cell phone and be present with his wife and children — just for that one Friday night — he found a certain balance being restored to his life.
It seems important to keep that in mind as we read this story of Jesus and his confrontation with the Jewish leadership. In terms of the distinction Naomi Levy makes, it seems to me the leaders were thinking of the Sabbath as a day of prohibitions, but Jesus was seeing it as a day of permissions.
In the passage, Jesus and his disciples are criticized because the disciples had been picking and eating kernels of grain as they walked along. By the strictest interpretation of the laws of Moses, picking grain was considered to be harvesting and removing the husks so you could eat the grain was considered to be threshing. Both harvesting and threshing were forbidden on the Sabbath.
But Jesus reminds the Pharisees that during his conflict with Saul, David and his men had eaten the bread from the altar of a sanctuary, even though the laws of Moses said only the priests could eat that bread.
I think Jesus was making the point that the strict observance of the Sabbath could sometimes conflict with God’s commitment to the flourishing of his people. Jesus says that the Sabbath is not meant to be kept for its own sake, but for the well-being of God’s people.
It’s probably true that the main thing Christians think about the Sabbath is that it’s a day on which we’re called to worship. And heaven knows I’m all in favor of worship. But interestingly enough, the fourth commandment – the one that commands us to keep the Sabbath holy – that commandment doesn’t even mention worship. So there must have been other things in God’s mind when he carved it on the two tablets.
One, it seems, is that we need to rest and be refreshed. But what’s work for some people is play for others. For some people, a day of rest is spent taking a nap or getting their feet up and reading the paper. But others find it restful to plant flowers or mess around with their car – things that might tire the body but refresh the mind and the spirit.
Another good reason for keeping the Sabbath is that it reminds us that the world does not depend on our efforts to keep it running. We can trust God to manage the world, even if we lay aside our work one day out of every seven. By handing the world over to God and relaxing one day each week, we’re expressing our trust in God and not just in our own efforts.
The Sabbath is also an opportunity to invest in our relationships with others, as well as with God. Phones and email can only go so far in connecting us. Ultimately, the in-person relationships we have with others are a critical element in being the people of God. Our master spent a good part of his earthly ministry engaged in genuine conversation with others. And the Sabbath is a weekly chance to break away from the busy-ness in our lives and to deepen our relationships with other people.
Jesus asks what human activities match God’s intentions for the Sabbath. He clearly understands that it’s those things that “give life.” So maybe that’s the standard by which we should measure all of our Sabbath-day activities: Are they life-giving? Do they contribute to our health and flourishing, as well as to that of the people around us? Do they contribute to our relationships with God and the people in our lives?
Some of us have jobs that require us to work on Sunday. But intentionally observing some other day of the week as a ‘Sabbath’ keeps the spirit of this commandment. Even if your Sabbath is always Tuesday, if you keep it prayerfully and restfully, it seems to me you can still “keep it holy.”
Rabbi Levy’s parishioner made an interesting observation after keeping the Sabbath for a while. He said he was surprised to find that what he did on Friday night and Saturday had a profound effect on how he lived the other six days of the week. It somehow energized the rest of his life. He had permission to live more abundantly.
I can’t give you clear and concise rules for observing the Sabbath. But then again, neither did Jesus. These are just some things we should think about when we consider how we spend that one day in seven.
Let’s pray. Lord, we thank you for the gift of the Sabbath, and we pray that you would pour out your Spirit on us to help us rest and find your peace in it. Help us to be more thoughtful about how we use that day in our lives of faith. Amen.
Every Blessing,
Henry
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