The Lord of the Sabbath, Pt. 2

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In the Gospels, one group shows up again and again—usually frowning, objecting, and plotting against Jesus––the Pharisees. What was their problem with Jesus? Pastor Nick Gatzke examines back-to-back interactions involving heads of grain, a withered hand, and a holy day. Discover how Jesus handled the Pharisee’s objections and what it means for us today.

Mark 2, we see that Jesus has arrived and announced the greatest of all kingdoms was at hand. Jesus announces the arrival of the kingdom of God. And through his words and through his actions, he is displaying that he himself is the king. And the opposition is rising.

Follow with me as we start in Mark 2:23. This is what it says. It says, “One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain.  And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: which it is not lawful for anyone but the priest to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him. And he said to them, the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath. Again, he entered the synagogue and a man was there with a withered hand. And they watched Jesus to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath so that they might accuse him. And he said to the man with the withered hand, come here. And he said to them, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or do harm, to save life or to kill? But they were silent. And he looked around at them. The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him.”

The law was given to help people see God more clearly, to highlight the contrast between their sin and God’s holiness. And it was not given to produce a people who were enslaved. It was produced to people who would grow in holiness and faithfulness. And now Jesus puts himself squarely right in the middle of it all in the place of God himself. And he does so by saying, I am the son of man. And he does so by saying, I’m the Lord of the Sabbath.

If you are observing the Sabbath as a Jewish person, observing the Sabbath as part of what made the Jews Jewish, it was the core of their identity. And Jesus comes along and he says that, then everything you thought about your spiritual identity, is now challenged. The thing abiding by the law that you thought put you in favor with God is now questioned because Jesus is here and God is with us. He is the Lord of the Sabbath, the Lord over the law, and the Lord over all of the people.

And so what is it for you, I wonder? What peace of your spiritual identity are you tempted to believe puts you in the greatest favor with God? I think we all have some temptation toward this end to have secondary or tertiary issues of identity that we elevate to the primary. What is it for you? Think about that. For some of us, it might be the notion that we’re conservative. I’m a conservative first, and I hold fast to my convictions. Maybe that’s a theological conservative. Maybe it’s a political conservative, but it’s a core piece of your identity that you think brings you closer to God. For some of you, it might be considering yourself to be a loving and accepting person. I’m described in a lot of ways. But the thing that describes me the best is a loving and accepting person. And I know that’s what brings me closer to God. For others, it might be your denominational identity. I’m a Baptist or I’m an evangelical or I’m a Presbyterian or whatever that identifier might be. Maybe for some, it’s your donations to help the poor. Or maybe it’s your volunteer work. Or maybe it’s something else. The list can go on. And hear me, all of those are fine things. They’re good things. All of them can even be godly things. But they aren’t the core of your religious identity. Why? Because the king has come. And he is the Lord over all things.

Megan Phelps Roper grew up ensconced in the beliefs of her family who were part of the Westboro Baptist Church. If that name sounds familiar, you’ve probably seen them on the news at one point or another. The Westboro Baptist Church was a group of people who have been officially classified as a hate group as they have been known broadly across the United States for some time at picketing and protesting a variety of sensitive events and equating the tragedy of those events like the funerals of fallen U.S. soldiers or the Sandy Hook school shooting or other political events while proclaiming God’s judgment upon the United States, specifically for a variety of sins like homosexuality, like judgment against Jews and Muslims and even other Christian denominations.

And growing up in that environment, Megan said that she truly believed that what she and her church were doing made them closer to God than everybody else. And their expressions that were widely considered to be hateful were actually, she believed, to be expressions of love as they called down judgment upon others as a warning to the rest of culture. Her spiritual identity led her to believe that she was in the right with God through association. And she couldn’t have been more wrong.

As an adult, she talks about leaving her family, leaving her legalism, and leaving the religion of solemn, joyless obligation. Has she found something better? I don’t know. But what we do see as an example points us to the truth that Jesus presents himself as the only antidote to solemn, joyless religious obligation. Your spiritual identity and standing with God is found in him. He is the Lord of the Sabbath, and he defines your spiritual identity with God because he is the king. The next short account in chapter three is meant to illustrate the principle.

It’s the fifth account of rising opposition to Jesus, and it comes to show that he is indeed the Lord of the Sabbath. He had already healed on the Sabbath previously — we saw that in chapter one — and here he’s going to respond to the Pharisees’ accusation very clearly for everyone to see. Picture it. Try to enter into the room of the synagogue. It’s packed, and Jesus… the religious leaders in the corner giving him the eye. What’s he gonna do today?

And Jesus rose and spoke and he calls to front a man who had a disabled hand. Chances are the man was mortified. I mean, after all, everybody already knew the man had a withered hand, but no one likes their shortcomings to be displayed for all to see. And reluctantly, he works his way through the crowd. He moves to the front, and Jesus makes the best type of spectacle out of that guy. He asks the room while looking at the Pharisees a two-part question. Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm? He’s obviously referring to the man’s hand and his great need and the opportunity to meet that need. For Jesus, it’s clear that need, true need, poses a moral imperative. If the opportunity to meet the need is there, true religion engages to meet the need where it can.

The second part of the question, Jesus applies more broadly. Is it lawful on the Sabbath to save a life or to kill? Now he speaks of the greatest need. The hand is one need, but to save a life is an even greater need, and it highlights their hypocrisy all the more. Would they be willing to meet any need at all? Would they be willing to meet even the greatest need if it conflicted with their idea of purity? And their response is stunning because they don’t say a thing.

The king had come. The kingdom was at hand. And those who were religious were so duty-bound to their rules that they were hard-hearted and indifferent to the needs of those around them, even if they had the greatest need. And so verse five says that Jesus looked at them and he was angry and grieved. And he told the man to stretch out his arm and it was healed. You see, their desire for purity led them to indifference to the needs around them. Their spiritual identity did not compel them toward actually doing good. It compelled them toward indifference. What does your spiritual identity compel you toward?

Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “it may well be that we will have to repent in this generation. Not merely for the vitriolic words and the violent actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say, wait on time.”

Russian playwright Anton Chekhov once said, “they say philosophers and wise men are indifferent. Wrong. Indifference is a paralysis of the soul, a premature death. But Jesus was not paralyzed, nor was he indifferent, and his true followers won’t be either.”

And so when you take a step back and you look at the beginning of chapter two all the way through the beginning of chapter three together, and you see all of these accounts of what Jesus is doing and the accusations that are mounting, you see the result is that they held counsel on how to destroy him. It’s one thing to try to marginalize somebody. It’s another thing to try to silence them. It’s another thing to try to imprison them. But it’s even more serious than all of those things. They wanted him dead already.

And he’s just getting started. In their mind, the evidence was mounting and clear. He disregarded the rabbinic custom of fasting. He ate with the sinners and the tax collectors. He healed on the Sabbath. He claimed to be the Lord of the Sabbath. He himself claimed to be the Son of Man, and he even presumed to forgive sin’s accusation.

And we see the reality of all of those accounts together that is highlighting the authority of Jesus as the king. Yes, he has the authority to eat with sinners, even the worst kinds of sinners. He has the authority to dispense with fasting altogether because he’s the bridegroom. He has the authority to heal on the Sabbath because it is the good thing to meet needs. He himself supersedes the Sabbath as he is the Lord of it. And he even has the authority to forgive sins.

The king has come. And he has all authority. And Mark is showing us that Jesus’s authority is clear for those who oppose him. Those who saw what he did and heard firsthand, they were there. They didn’t reject Jesus because they didn’t believe that he could do the things that he said. They saw it happen. They rejected him in the face of overwhelming evidence that he could do these things. They saw the lame man walk. They saw the withered hand be healed. They saw his power. They just didn’t want to accept him as the king.

That’s the question for you. Will you accept him as the king? Will you recognize that your true spiritual identity is found in submitting to Jesus as the king? Not just as the teacher, not just as the miracle worker, but the king.

After Amy and I had, let me rephrase that. After Amy, had given birth to each of our three children. Before you were allowed to leave the hospital, at least in the state of Massachusetts, the nurses had you bring the car seat up to the room so they could check it over to make sure that it was safe and to make sure that you knew how to secure the child safely in the car seat. And then, and only then, would they let you leave.

And as many of you know, when you’re driving home with a new baby from the hospital for the very first time, there’s this surreal sense of awe and fear as you transport this fragile, precious cargo. I’ve heard it said that that moment actually pales in comparison to the fear that happens. On the scary day when they turn 16 years old and you are the one handing the keys over to them to drive the car. And you move over to the passenger seat and they move over to the driver’s seat. It’s a big moment in your life when you hand someone else the keys.

I love the way John Ortberg describes it when he says, “Up until now, I’ve been driving. I chose the destination. I chose the route. I chose the speed. You’re in the drive-along seat. But if we are to change seats, if you’re going to drive, that means I have to trust you. It’s about control. Whoever is in this seat is the person in control.”

You know, a lot of people find Jesus handy to have in the car as long as he’s in the ride-along seat because something might come up that requires his services. Jesus, I have a health problem. I need some help. I want you in the car, but I’m not so sure I want you to be driving the car. But if Jesus is driving, I’m not in control anymore. I’m not in charge of my life anymore. If he’s driving, I’m not in charge of my wallet anymore. If I put him in control, then it’s no longer a matter of giving money now and then when I’m feeling generous or when more of it is coming into my life. Now it’s his wallet. And that’s scary. If Jesus is driving, I’m not in charge of my ego anymore. I no longer have the right to satisfy every self-centered ambition. No, it’s his agenda. Now I’m not in charge of my mouth anymore. I don’t get to gossip and flatter and cajole and deceive and rage and intimidate and manipulate and exaggerate. I get out of the driver’s seat and hand the keys over to him. I’m fully engaged. In fact, as I do that, I’m even more alive than I’ve ever been before. But it’s not my life anymore. It’s his life. The king has come.

And the question for me and the question for you is very simply, will you follow him as the king? Because that’s where your true spiritual identity is found, when you submit to him as the king.

Let’s pray. Father, we all want to be the king, and if we can’t, we build another hill to be the king of that hill. And yet, God, today we recognize and we thank you that a greater king and a greater kingdom has come. And so I pray for all who are here and all who listen that in the depths of our soul, there would be a deep and profound surrender to the king because he is trustworthy of it. The Lord of the Sabbath, the Lord of the law, the Lord of my life. We thank you for him. Amen.

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** This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy, but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.