Sermon
Second Sunday after Pentecost
Mark 2:23-28
June 14th, 2009
From the concise code of Jewish Law:
When one observes the Sabbath properly it is as though he has fulfilled the whole Torah, and one desecrates the Sabbath, it is as though he has denied the whole Torah. (from the Holiness of the Sabbath pg 21)
On removing a hangnail on the Sabbath-A hangnail that is mostly detached, and is causing pain, or is likely to cause pain, may be removed by hand or with the teeth, butnot with an implement.
Drying One’s Hair-While it is not permitted to squeeze the water out of one’s hair, it is permitted to dry the hair with a towel, and even to rub it to relieve any discomfort.
It is forbidden to open or close the door of an oven in which a fire is burning, because one is thereby either kindling or extinquishing the fire.
If one finds fruit beneath a tree on the Sabbath he may not even handle it, for it may have fallen off that very day.
One who spills liquid on the ground in soil where something will grow is in violation of the prohibition of sowing because the liquid may cause it to grow.
What I just read to you are some of the laws guiding faithful Jews on how to go about honoring the Sabbath day and keeping it holy. Those who seek to honor these laws often do so out of pure love and desire to honor God. However, whatever the motivation, such laws only place the emphasis of our worship back upon what we do over and above what God has freely given. Why cast aside God’s Grace? Why cast aside the Holy Saving Work of Christ for our miserable and useless works?
Most Christians have difficulty understanding why anyone in their right mind would want to turn God’s Grace into law the way the Pharisees did. Yet, we are guilty of doing the same sort of actions. Lutheran’s can be guilty of creating laws around all sorts of things, including how we are supposed to worship. I once heard a Christian say that those who fail to use page 5 and 15 in our liturgy are no longer honoring God in worship and yes there have also been many who have publically confessed that only LC-MS Lutherans are going to heaven. Such comments suggest that only by our actions, organization and structure are we truly saved and that just isn’t the case. It is by Grace we have been saved through faith apart from our works.
Our Gospel reading for today reflects upon turning God’s Grace into law. The Pharisees accused Jesus’ disciples of breaking the commandment by doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath. Religious pride moved these Pharisees to think they knew better than Jesus as to what God intended when he first created this commandment. What they didn’t know is that as TRUE GOD, Jesus authored the Ten Commandments.
Does anyone here know what the phrase “Keeping the Sabbath Day Holy” means? Many folks have difficulty understanding its true meaning. Those that are unfamiliar with the Sabbath might wonder what it means and how it is kept. So I came up with a more modern way to ask the question and it goes something like this: “When and why do I make time for God and His Word in my life”? That is really what the Sabbath is all about. It is about making time for God and His Word.
You know the original day of the Sabbath took place on a Saturday not on Sunday. This has confused some Christians as they wonder if we are even being faithful to the commandment the way we should. Such a question leads to creating laws that just do not belong in the Christian’s life.
The truth of the matter is that it does not matter on what day we honor the Sabbath. In fact we should never be concerned about such things because no matter how hard we try we cannot keep this or any other commandment the way God has intended. The entire reason why Jesus came into this world was for him to keep this and every other commandment perfectly in our place. Then Jesus transferred his perfect response to keeping God’s laws upon us. The result of this free gift is that now God sees you and me as Holy in His sight as if we kept every commandment perfectly. So I ask again, why would any of us want to cast that gift aside and try keeping God’s law perfectly on our own?
I do understand that there is often some confusion as to just what we are supposed to do with God’s laws. Some say that because we are under His Grace we really do not have to honor any of them. After all, as I just said, Jesus took care of keeping the commandments perfectly for us. However, the commandments still have their role in the Christian life.
The way we are called to honor the commandments is to see them for what they are; they are here for our guidance. The ceremonial aspects of the commandments such as having to observe the Sabbath on a Saturday, those things have been done away with since Christ came, so we really do not have to focus on that aspect of God’s law. This is why none of us bother to sacrifice a pig in our backyard, unless we are planning on having a BBQ.
Jesus the Christ has set us free from those laws and rigid regulations leaving behind the laws of God that are here for our guidance. There is spiritual wisdom in these commandments and we can see that clearly after hearing Jesus’ response to the Pharisee’s accusation of failing to keep the third commandment. As you know, the third commandment calls us to remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. Jesus’ spiritual wisdom was teaching us that “God made the Sabbath for man, not man for the Sabbath.”
Since we can worship God on any day, in Christian freedom Christians chose Sunday to honor God in Worship because it was on a Sunday that our Lord rose from the dead. But let us go back further than that; to the original purpose for the Sabbath day. God called his people to rest from their labors. God rested on the seventh day after he created all things.
That sounds sort of odd that God rested. God certainly has no limit nor does He have any need to rest so it must have a deeper meaning. What the word “rest” means (in this context) is that God stopped all his creative activity, then he stood back and he admired the beauty and goodness of everything that he had created. So the seventh day was originally intended to rest and reflect on all God has created and all that He has done to bless us.
In addition to reflecting upon God’s Blessings, the Sabbath provides us with a time to heal and a time to recover from the strain of hard physical labor, but that alone is not the purpose of why most of us have Sunday’s off from work. The far greater purpose of the Sabbath is that God wanted to provide you with spiritual rest and holy refreshment that would be gained by regular and frequent use of God’s Word in your life.
Sometimes we limit God’s Word to our own understanding, which is why so many Christians think that they are honoring the Sabbath day by staying in bed on Sunday morning instead of coming to church. “Once I called upon a member who was not coming to church and he said to me, “HEY PASTOR AT LEAST I AM HONORING THE SABBATH DAY BY RESTING!” So, please don’t use that one if you find me calling you.
Ok, we are all guilty of staying at home TO REST instead of going to church and even when we do go to church, we have been guilty of thinking about how we would rather be sleeping or doing something else other than attending worship. So, I would like to provide US with a way to re-train our brain about honoring the Sabbath. (so here we go)
What makes the Sabbath so much more restful than sleep or any recreational activity is that it reflects on God’s unconditional love for you in Christ. That is what true REST is. True rest is to know that you and I have Peace with God, through faith in our Lord Jesus. In the broader sense this commandment encompasses more that just our giving God, one hour; one day out of the week. Keeping the Sabbath in its truest sense would require that we would make time for God every day and every hour, every minute and every second that our heart beats. Doesn’t God who created all things, who sent His Only Son to take our place upon the cross in order to earn us Eternal Life; shouldn’t He deserve our ultimate attention? Why would we not expect that GOD WOULD WANT US TO MAKE TIME FOR HIM? However, guilt should never be our true motivator for worshiping our Lord.
Instead of guilt as our motivator it would be better to realize the meaning behind Jesus’ Word’s to the Pharisee’s today. What Jesus was seeking to convey to the Pharisees and also to us is that the Sabbath is really for our benefit, not for Gods. This is the motivator, that when realized, places us at Worship every Sunday of every year.
It really is important that we realize God is not going to become more Holy or more deserving thanks to your attention to Him. His love for you will not increase just because you study God’s Word at home on a daily basis and attend worship even when you would rather be sleeping. God remains God without our help. Despite the fact that we owe it to God to make time for Him in our lives, God really made this time for you.
What do I mean when I say “God made this time for you” In a nutshell it means We need God! If we are going to remain spiritually whole and alive we need God! That is why God provided us with so many blessings when we seek to Worship Him. Think about it! If the Sabbath Day was meant for God, why would he provide us His Holy Living Word and with Holy Communion? Those gifts are meant to feed us and to restore us; to strengthen our faith and communicate all that God has done….for you and for me.
Honoring the Sabbath is not just another obligation. It is not God’s demand on our time for the purpose of placating God and making him happy. When you come to worship, it is far more for your benefit than it is for God. If you think that going to church is something you have to do for God, then you are just like the Pharisees who thought that man was made for the Sabbath. But, if you go to worship because it is something you want to do and something that you need to do, than you truly understand why God made this day.
Sunday after Sunday, we can be refreshed by hearing the good news of the death and resurrection of Jesus. In fact God invented the Word and Sacrament for your sake, not for his. You need the forgiveness that you receive at this Altar on Sunday mornings.
When you seek to honor the third commandment, you are allowing God the opportunity and the occasion to do his sanctifying work that provides forgiveness in our lives.
Now you know there are people out there who think we Lutherans are just to passive during worship. They think we simply do not do enough in the service. We just kind of sit there they say the same words that are found in our liturgy, week in and week out. But there is a good theological reason why we worship as we do. We come here passively and we sit down and we allow God to do His work in our hearts by faith.
Worship is not about how excited we can become, how loud we can sing or even how high we can lift up our hands in praise. Instead it is about what God does and effects through worship. It is about hearing what God has done and is still doing for us in Christ. It is so easy to think a church is dead simply because they are not shouting out their praises to God but I say if you want to show your passion for Jesus, do it out there in the mission field. That is where God wants us to really display our passion for Him anyway.
Now the Pharisees distorted the reasons and purposes of the Sabbath. They began to work at not working on the Sabbath. The result is that they turned the whole concept of rest into just one more work that people must do before God. Basically, they turned a day of grace into a pathetic human attempt to appease God by works without Jesus Christ. As our Scripture reading conveys, these Pharisees follow Jesus around and monitored Jesus and his Disciples behavior on the Sabbath and then they accuse them because the Disciples rolled a few heads of grain around between their fingers, so they could eat a few kernels of wheat. There is a real irony here because it took a lot more effort and to make that accusation than it did for the disciples to eat the wheat.
Jesus of course defended the actions of the disciples with Scripture. He pointed out how David actually entered the most sacred part of the temple and ate the bread that was set aside as an offering for God. They went far beyond picking a few heads of grain in an open field. So Jesus told this story to remind the Pharisees that God was not angry, nor was this a sin unto David. For God is about loving and providing for his people through Christ, not about condemning us. This is when Jesus says, “the Sabbath is made for man, not man for the Sabbath”. In other words, God did not create this day to burden you but to bless you. In fact every commandment has been created to bless you.
What are the spiritual implications for us? By listening to God’s Word today, we have been encouraged and we have been blessed. Jesus has taken yet another burden off our shoulders as he conveys to us the real purpose of the Sabbath Day. How wonderful it is to know that going to church on Sunday is not some sort of spiritual obligation or just one more demand on our limited time. How blessed we are to know that the Sabbath is God’s gift to us.
Today we have been given Godly Wisdom! The Holy Spirit has convinced us that God has made this day for you and for me. He wants to work His faith and forgiveness in our hearts. He wants to restore us! In truth, God wants us to know everything that he has done to restore us into a perfect relationship with Him. As you step back and look upon all that God has done, please be encouraged to share what you have observed this day with your family and friends. Help them to see beyond the eyes of the Pharisees so that they too can rejoice in knowing that the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. Amen!
Pastor Douglas W. Koehler
Faith Lutheran Church
totallysaved@msn.com
