Monday of Pentecost 19

October 12, 2009

The lesson for today (Matthew 12:1-21) shows the Pharisees ramping up their efforts against Jesus. They have decided that He cannot possibly be the Christ so they need to be rid of Him.

The first episode is when the Pharisees see some of Jesus' disciples plucking heads of grain as they walk through the grainfields on the Sabbath. The Pharisees see this as a transgression of the third commandment. Jesus responds by bringing to memory what David did when his men were hungry, they ate the bread of the Presence which was lawful only for the priests to eat. What is going here? Jesus' point is that the Sabbath law was made for the good of man but when that law does not serve man (in preparing food for eating for example) then it is no longer serving its divine purpose.

The second episode is similar. Jesus goes to the synagogue and finds there a man with a withered hand. The Pharisees ask Him if it is lawful to heal on the Sabbath. The concept is the same here. The Pharisees believe that the Sabbath law is all encompassing but Jesus works with the concept that the Sabbath was made for the benefit of man, man was not made in order to keep the Sabbath. So His answer is: "It is lawful to do good on the Sabbath" and He heals the man with the withered hand.

From this point on the Pharisees are on the lookout for a way to destroy Jesus. So Jesus is forced to withdraw from there and continue His ministry of teaching and healing elsewhere until the time is right.

Of course the principles at play in this pericope are the same as we experience today. Just this weekend I went to a presentation of the Judgment Day by a local congregation. The message was one of Law. They portrayed one boy who was saved because not only had he accepted Jesus as his savior but he also spent his days witnessing to his faith in Jesus to his friends. This was conveyed as a contributing factor to his being saved as if faith was enough to get him started but then obedience to the Law was required to get him the rest of the way to heaven. But the Bible does not speak this way. The Bible says that we are saved by grace through faith and this is not of ourselves it is the gift of God lest anyone should boast. We are not saved by our obedience in any measure. We are saved by Christ on the cross purchasing with His own precious blood the forgiveness of our sins. The Law is meant to show us our need for Jesus on the cross and to show us that we cannot do it ourselves. Oh how I wish the members of the local congregation who put on this show could have gotten that right!