Luke 6:9 NIVUK
[9] Then Jesus said to them, ‘I ask you, which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to destroy it?’
A number of years ago, I heard about a rather amusing protest on a Scottish island.
It took place in the Western Isles, on a small island dominated by a strict religious group called the Free Church of Scotland – colloquially referred to as the ‘Wee Frees’.
In areas where the Wee Frees are the majority, Sunday is observed as the Sabbath with absolute perfection. Not only shopping malls are closed – every single shop, bar, restaurant and facility of any kind is closed. People stay at home, or in their hotels, and do not work at all.
It does sound kind of restful.
However, the local ferry company decided that they wanted to run a ferry to a Wee Free dominated island on a Sunday, something the Wee Frees on the island abhorred, because they saw it as being insensitive to their culture.
So they decided to protest.
But they could not protest on a Sunday.
So when the ferry arrived the following Sunday, its passengers were greeted on arrival by a lot of banners proclaiming that Sunday should be kept special, and that the Sabbath day should be remembered and kept holy, but with no-one actually holding them – they were just heaped against a wall.
The passengers simply walked passed them and continued their business – or, at least, as much as they could on a Sunday when everything was closed.
Protests about keeping Sundays special have been raging for centuries. I’m not going to get embroiled in them now, because that is not the purpose of this post, except to quote this often overlooked passage from Romans:
Romans 14:5 NIVUK
[5] One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind.
How you treat each day is up to you, and something for which you are accountable before God.
Jesus entered into this debate on more than one occasion. But His entry into it highlighted a much bigger issue: the religious authorities’ contempt for the poor. They were simply using Sabbath-keeping as a spiritual disguise for their disdain.
I don’t believe for one second that the Wee Frees were, or are, doing that – in fact, I don’t think they were at all.
But in Jesus’ day, the religious authorities were.
And it astonishes me – absolutely astonishes me – that even some Christians do the same thing nowadays. Not necessarily with the Sabbath, but they often hide behind their religious culture and rules and show utter contempt for the poor and the needy.
Allow me to give you a few examples:
Churches with dress codes on the door. I came across this in Romania, as I stated on a previous post. Has it not crossed anyone’s mind that there are people struggling to feed themselves who simply can’t afford to meet these rules? They are an unjustified barrier against people coming to Christ! More than that, they are profoundly unBiblical - see James 2:1-4.
Right-wing, conservative, small-state politics that support the privatisation of key and critical human rights, such as health care and education. Such policies perpetuate poverty. That is not our calling! The Bible is absolutely clear on our obligation to help the poor, not trample on them for profit (Psalm 72:12-13, 82:2; Proverbs 22:9, 22, 28:27 for some examples).
Campaigners against debt relief for all caught up in the above policies. The Bible compares debt to slavery (Proverbs 22:7). We should be campaigning to end this, not continue it!
Racist and protectionist immigration and asylum policy campaigns. The Old Testament has many, many verses that teach how foreigners among us should be treated with fairness and justice (Exodus 12:49, 22:22, 23:9; Leviticus 19:33, 24:22; Numbers 15:15-16; Deuteronomy 24:17, 27:19 among many others). We cannot, as Bible-believing Christians, advocate for anything else.
But what was happening in Jesus’ day was actually quite shocking. The needy would have a need. They would come to Jesus to alleviate that need.
And the religious leaders would try to turn them away because it was the Sabbath.
Jesus was very much against this, as we will see. He even struck out at the Pharisees for using religion and tradition to get out of helping those in need:
Mark 7:6-13 NIVUK
[6] He replied, ‘Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ‘ “These people honour me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. [7] They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.” [8] You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.’ [9] And he continued, ‘You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! [10] For Moses said, “Honour your father and mother,” and, “Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.” [11] But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is Corban (that is, devoted to God) – [12] then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother. [13] Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.’
What irritates me profoundly is you still get people nowadays who look to justify their treatment of the poor and the indebted and the migrant with a thin veneer of religiosity – just like those Pharisees.
But there us nothing religious about it. Nothing at all:
James 1:27 NIVUK
[27] Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
True religion does not hide from our responsibility to care for the poor and needy.
Anything else is false religion.
In this post, we will look at two groups of people who were in need on the Sabbath – that most ‘religious’ of days. We’ll look at what the rules are and how those needs were met.
Let’s examine first of all The Need.
The Need
Two needs are clearly outlined in Luke 6:1-11.
The first of these is feeding.
Luke 6:1 NIVUK
[1] One Sabbath Jesus was going through the cornfields, and his disciples began to pick some ears of corn, rub them in their hands and eat the grain.
Simply put, the disciples were hungry. They needed to eat. They were in a field full of food.
It makes sense, then, that they should eat.
The second need in this passage is healing.
Luke 6:6 NIVUK
[6] On another Sabbath he went into the synagogue and was teaching, and a man was there whose right hand was shrivelled.
Now, while being in the cornfields on the Sabbath was something of a distinct occasion, this was not the only time when Jesus was in a synagogue or the Temple and was met by a glaring need for physical healing. And you can understand why people would come to Him at those times. If He was in the area, they would know where He would be. It stands to reason that they would reach out to Him there.
So people seeking to be healed by Jesus on the Sabbath during worship was not exactly uncommon:
The demon-possessed man (Luke 4:31-37)
The crippled woman (Luke 13:10-17)
The man with an abnormal swelling (Luke 14:1-6)
The healing at the pool (John 5:1-16)
The healing of a blind man (John 9:1-34)
From these it’s not exactly hard to see where Jesus stood on the Sabbath, as He told the Pharisees:
Mark 3:4 NIVUK
[4] Then Jesus asked them, ‘Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?’ But they remained silent.
Mark 2:27-28 NIVUK
[27] Then he said to them, ‘The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. [28] So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.’
In other words, the laws around the Sabbath, which were part of what distinguished the Jewish people as different from the other groups around them (see Nehemiah 13:15-22 for a good example) should not at all stand in the way of people receiving help in their time of need.
We get it. We understand it. It’s something that isn’t an issue in most cultures and, if we’re honest, should never be, but what did The Rules say about it? Was Jesus breaking the law when He healed on the Sabbath?
The Rules
Exodus 20:8-11 NIVUK
[8] Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. [9] Six days you shall labour and do all your work, [10] but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. [11] For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
This seems a relatively simple command. On the Sabbath, rest from your work and remember your Lord.
Easy enough, right?
And do you know something else?
If you read through the five books of the law, you will read nothing there – not one single command – that the disciples broke while doing this.
In fact, their actions were entirely in line with this command:
Deuteronomy 23:25 NIVUK
[25] If you enter your neighbour’s cornfield, you may pick the ears with your hands, but you must not put a sickle to their standing corn.
The disciples were only rubbing ears of corn and eating the grain, yet the Pharisees wanted to accuse them of reaping, winnowing, harvesting and preparing food – all of which they had banned on the Sabbath.
Ridiculous, isn’t it?
And then we move onto Jesus’ healing of the man with the withered hand.
Again, there is a slight whiff of ridiculousness about this one too.
This man had an ailment that affected his ability to work and to support himself. We have no idea how much pain and inconvenience this would have caused him. However, I am sure that anyone in his condition would be very keen to get rid of it as soon as possible.
So when Jesus notices him, among everyone gathered in that synagogue, how do you think he would have felt?
You see, priests with a condition like his would not be permitted to offer sacrifices to God (Leviticus 21:16-23). This was then extended, so that people with a defect were not permitted to enter the Temple courts.
But that particular extension is not in the original Jewish law. It was added later.
The Jewish leadership wanted a perfect picture of worship. No-one like him was allowed in to the Temple.
So for Jesus to single this man out in the synagogue was quite something.
But for Him to heal such a man on the Sabbath? Even more so.
Look at the argument one synagogue ruler had against healing on the Sabbath:
Luke 13:14 NIVUK
[14] Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, ‘There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.’
And that did not go down well with Jesus:
Luke 13:15-16 NIVUK
[15] The Lord answered him, ‘You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? [16] Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?’
The rules around what should and should not be done on the Sabbath where taken apart by Jesus in a quote from Isaiah:
Mark 7:6-8 NIVUK
[6] He replied, ‘Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ‘ “These people honour me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. [7] They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.” [8] You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.’
And that’s just it. That’s where often well-meaning Christians get it wrong and needy people who need Christ are locked out.
Jewish law was originally codified in what’s known as the Pentateuch or the Torah – the first five books of the Bible. Over centuries, rabinnical commentary and debate was added around it, until it got to the extent that the finished volume was way bigger than the original.
These additional comments didn’t make life simpler for Jews who wanted to live a godly life.
They actually made life a lot harder.
Hence Jesus’ searing rebuke for the Pharisees and the teachers of the law:
Matthew 23:13 NIVUK
[13] ‘Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to.
And some of these rules were ridiculous. It’s said that a Jewish man’s house was on fire. He contacted his Rabbi to check if it was okay for him to use a phone on the Sabbath to call the Fire Brigade. It took the Rabbi half an hour to confirm that he could, by which time his house had burned down.
We might mock, but we Christians have also had centuries in which to add traditions and interpretations to Jesus’ teaching to complicate our own lives, and we have absolutely done it.
I know of churches that God-fearing Christians cannot attend because they need a letter of recommendation from another congregation from the same denomination to attend.
I once read of another church that met in a very non-descript, ordinary building, but refused to put a sign outside the church to state that it was a church because ‘if God wants to send people here, He’ll do it anyway – He doesn’t need a sign’.
We should these as absolutely absurd – because they are.
But the problem is that they are also dangerous.
They are dangerous because they put man-made obstacles in front of the God-made Gospel.
They put a stumbling stone in the path of seekers after God.
I don’t know if anyone has seen any ‘Star Trek’ shows. There is a lot of mention there of a ‘Prime Directive’ not to interfere in the natural development of alien cultures.
Do you know what our ‘Prime Directive’ is?
Matthew 28:18-20 NIVUK
[18] Then Jesus came to them and said, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. [19] Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, [20] and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.’
We are not to be curators of a long gone culture, we are to be communicators of the living Gospel. Anything that prevents us from fulfilling this mission has to go (see Hebrews 12:1-3 – these things should be classified as ‘every weight’ as they are an unnecessary encumbrance to our spread of the Gospel).
This means that all traditions and ways of doing things have to be challenged so that the path of the needy to get help from Jesus is cleared.
And yes, that might mean that we have to get rid of some long treasured ways of doing things. And yes, there might be nothing inherently sinful or wrong about them.
But everything any church does – absolutely everything – must be geared to its ‘prime directive’ of communicating the Gospel in a relevant way to people living in its cultural context.
So traditional churches should really examine if their use of ancient tradition, seventeenth century language and liturgy and hymnology are still appropriate for a culture that has long since abandoned them.
And even more modern churches can’t escape from this. They should examine what they do to ask of aspects such as public, uninterpreted speaking in tongues or some of the more ‘out there’ aspects of Pentecostal worship are appropriate for public services when non-Christians are present or watching online.
1 Corinthians 14 sets the standard we all must adhere to. Our worship can’t be esoteric and weird; it must be intelligible for the people in our host culture.
So is it?
If it isn’t, then our church is not really a church, it’s more of a social club.
And a mighty strange one at that.
So what we see here is the Pharisees trying to restrict the ability for needy people to get the help they need by using religious laws that have no Biblical basis. This still happens. We can be absolutely clear about that. And people are still being hurt by it.
And the only way to resolve this issue is to examine what we do so we can ease their way to find Jesus.
This is often controversial. Like the Pharisees, there are many people who hold as sacred the things their church does, even if the Bible says they are not.
So what was The Answer? How did Jesus respond to them? How did they respond to Jesus?
The Answer
Luke 6:10-11 NIVUK
[10] He looked round at them all, and then said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He did so, and his hand was completely restored. [11] But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law were furious and began to discuss with one another what they might do to Jesus.
We often read passages like this quickly, as if they don’t really matter.
But if we truly pay attention to this, there is a strong challenge to us all.
Let’s look firstly at Jesus’ Answer.
And His answer is simple: He heals the man regardless of their sensitivities.
The Pharisees, with their groundless objections, will not stop Him relieving this man’s need.
While dealing with their somewhat absurd objection to the disciples eating corn grains in a cornfield, Jesus’ response tells them why:
Luke 6:4-5 NIVUK
[4] He entered the house of God, and taking the consecrated bread, he ate what is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions.’ [5] Then Jesus said to them, ‘The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.’
In other words, even their great hero King David violated sacramental law. By comparison, eating a few grains of corn was nothing.
Matthew went further:
Matthew 12:5-8 NIVUK
[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.’
Priests work on the Sabbath. Priests receive remuneration and reward for that work.
Therefore, priests break Sabbath law.
And so do all pastors, children’s workers and any other full time church staff whose ministry takes place on a Sunday. They breach everything the ‘Keep Sunday Special’ groups fight to enact.
Mark adds even more to this:
Mark 2:27-28 NIVUK
[27] Then he said to them, ‘The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. [28] So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.’
Sabbath was designed for us to rest, reflect on God and repent. It was not designed for us to be so tightly bound by rules and expectations that we are terrified we might break them.
That is not rest.
The principle here is that any rule or ritual we put in place must be mindful of its original intent and not detract from it, or prevent seekers of God from fulfilling it.
And anyway, Jesus is Lord over it all, not us.
There is here something worth noting. When Jesus was confronted with a serious need on the Sabbath, on not one single occasion did He give in to the legalistic naysayers and do what they wanted. On every situation – every last one – He cut through the man-made regulations and met the need. Without exception.
But what about The Pharisees’ Answer?
This is where things take a very serious turn:
Luke 6:11 NIVUK
[11] But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law were furious and began to discuss with one another what they might do to Jesus.
Matthew wrote that things took an even more serious turn:
Matthew 12:14 NIVUK
[14] But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus.
Murder might not be on the mind of those who defend tradition and ritual and rite, but unrighteous fury absolutely is. I have seen it. I have read about it recorded in history. Those who question man-made rules in churches often find themselves on the end of some utterly implausible explanations, utterly unreasonable theology and utterly appalling treatment.
I’m thinking, for example, about William Booth, who was forced for leave the Methodist church as it refused to allow him to work as an evangelist.
Or Hudson Taylor, whose shedding of ‘civilised’ Western clothing and wearing of traditional Chinese clothes as a missionary in China caused a massive scandal back home in the UK.
Those who see a need and seek to innovate to show just how relevant the Gospel is to their host culture often find that rather more traditional people back home fail to understand and criticise them.
What those people need to understand is that they are treating such innovators as the Pharisees treated Christ.
Jesus continued to minister regardless. So must they.
Jesus took His ministry all the way to the cross. So must they.
Jesus’ ministry, though deeply painful, led to the salvation of souls.
So will theirs.
If you find yourself in pain because of man-made rules being inflicted on you by those who have nothing to defend other than their own man-made tradition, I have news for you:
You are keeping the very best of company – Jesus Christ Himself.
Conclusion
Isaiah 29:13 NIVUK
[13] The Lord says: ‘These people come near to me with their mouth and honour me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is based on merely human rules they have been taught.
When I was a child, a man called Sam used to come round to our house. He took my father with him in the car and they would drive to Glasgow – arguing rowdily the entire way. So strong were their arguments that they would almost come to blows – Sam had to stop the car and threaten to throw my dad out on many occasions.
They would go about their business in Glasgow and then Sam would drive him home, again, arguing noisily the entire way.
Do you know where they spent their day?
The Bible Training Institute (which is now defunct).
The irony is that they were very close friends. Even more ironic is that their theology was pretty much identical.
However, they were two stubborn, hard-headed men who could not yield to the other or concede that they were wrong.
Anyone who didn’t know them and heard them arguing would have sworn they were enemies, but they were friends.
Their pointless arguing likely influenced my theology and approach to Christianity.
Meaningless debates over minutiae are not for me. Churches falling out over minor issues when you could barely fit a piece of paper between their theology to me is utter nonsense.
Making silly rules and enforcing them in such a way that you set up a barrier to other people seeking the Lord is, to me, absolute folly and a sin against the Gospel.
I simply have no time for that. I consider it to be a complete aberration.
And we have seen that aberration in play in Luke 6:1-11.
We have seen the two needs – for feeding and for healing.
We have seen the preposterous rules the Pharisees had set up, which bore no relation, and definitely not in principle, to those that had been originally set in place in the Torah.
And we’ve seen the answer to this, which was for Jesus to keep on ministering regardless, and for the Pharisees to unwittingly play their part in God’s plan of salvation, while condemning themselves.
Many years ago, while I was a missionary, I heard the true tale of a church in Croatia that understood this Gospel-first principle better than anyone else I have ever known.
They were a Pentecostal church. They were planting churches all around the Pula area in Istria.
But it wasn’t working in one village.
The informality and style of worship just did not agree with the villagers.
In a decision the likes of which I have never seen before or since, this Pentecostal church decided to plant a traditional Baptist Church in that village: complete with hymn books and a more formal style of worship.
And it worked.
The people of that village reacted warmly to patterns of worship that were familiar and acceptable to them, came to church and accepted the Gospel.
Sometimes, all that’s needed for the Gospel to impact lives is for God’s people to get out of the way: to set aside our rules and our systems and our theological high horses and simply let God work.
When we are willing to do that, God can do amazing things.
When we are not, sometimes He will do nothing.
I am sure there are people who have been hurt by the narrow-mindedness and mindless rule-keeping they have found in the church. I'm sure it has made it difficult for them to come to Jesus and have their needs met. I’m sure it has left a bad taste in their mouth.
If that is what you have felt, then, to quote one rock band I listened to while I was growing up, ‘The truth exists even though pious mud’.
Christians aren’t perfect. We will never be perfect. That doesn’t excuse what we do, but it does explain it.
Seek God. He is perfect. He will meet your needs like no-one else ever can.
And when you find Him, find a church where there are fewer traditions to bind you, and an open heart to what God is doing.
Even if He is doing a new thing.
Prayer
Lord, forgive me if my narrow-mindedness has put up an obstacles for people to come to know You. That was never my intention. Help me to be someone who welcomes people to You, rather than drives them away. If I have been put off from seeking You by silly rules, help me instead to see the real You and to find a place where other people worship You and not their rules. Amen.
Questions
Why did the Pharisees object to the disciples eating and Jesus healing? Were they correct?
What man-made rules can stop people coming to Jesus? What can you do about them?
How might you be more open to God doing a new thing in your life?
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