“Sabbath Rest”
Original sermon given June 2, 2024, written and delivered by Pastor Jeffrey Leininger at First Saint Paul’s Lutheran Church.
Watch the sermon live.
“Sabbath Rest”
Mark 2.23-3.6
Mark 2.23-3.6
In the name of the living God and the risen Christ. Amen.
Two Sabbath Scenes in a larger drama of opposition to Jesus.
Scene 1: Jesus and his disciples are making a beeline through a grainfield on the Sabbath, and because they’re hungry they pluck some of the heads of grain for nourishment.
Now although I’m not a farmer, I come from deep farming roots, and I remember as a little boy my grandfather in Bay City, MI showing me how to do this. Take the grain head, rub it in your hands, blow away the chaff, and there’s something good for you to eat. Instant snack for a hungry kid!
Something like this is happening with the disciples near Capernaum, only it’s happening on the Sabbath, and it’s technically “work.” The Jews had many hundreds of rules governing what it means to keep the one commandment, “remember the Sabbath Day to keep it holy.” The Talmud, for example, lists 39 different categories of work to discuss, which extends to some 24 chapters of commentary: carrying, burning, extinguishing, writing, erasing, cooking, washing, sewing, tearing, knotting, untying (shall I go on?). One particularly over-achieving Rabbi spent 2½ years studying but one of these chapters—a remarkable testament to his love of the law and his scholarship and his perseverance!
So in one sense it might be a legitimate question for the Pharisees to ask, “Why are Jesus’ disciples ‘working’ on the Sabbath?” But in reality, we’re told what’s really behind their hypocrisy: not a love for the law but opposition to Jesus.
The Lord’s response is to take them back to the book of Samuel, to a parallel situation where the spirit of the Law was more important than the letter of the law. King David—before he was king—he and his warriors are in an emergency battle situation. They go to the high priest for help, but the priest has no extra bread for their nourishment and sustenance. So David asks for the sacred Showbread, the Bread of the Presence placed in the tabernacle every day as a reminder of God’s provision to the children of Israel. The letter of the law was clear: this sacred bread was reserved only for the priests. No one else could take it. But in this case, the spirit of the law would win out. The priest gives David and his men the sacred bread. Thus, God provides again to David and his men to sustain them for the battle.
Jesus’ memorable line (in the traditional translation), “The sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath,” is a reminder of the purpose behind all God’s law: it is for us. Jesus’ disciples were equally on God’s emergency mission and equally needed that nourishment and sustenance to do God’s work—whether on the sabbath or not; whether technically “work” or not. No rule or law could trump the urgency of Christ’s mission in that moment.
Scene 2: A synagogue on the Sabbath. A man with a withered hand. Whether by birth or by accident we’re not told. Early church tradition has it that he worked as a mason and that an injury meant he could no longer earn his bread through his work. In any case, we can picture the dramatic scene: the shame of a shriveled hand; the pharisees waiting to entrap Jesus; Jesus calling him forward to stand right there in the middle, all eyes on him… and his disability… and his shame.
This time the Lord first questions the Pharisees: “Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath or to do harm; life to preserve or life to kill?” Their silence angers him because it exposes their hypocrisy and hardness of heart: they’re more concerned about checking off the right boxes than saving lives. They’ll even use the healing of this poor man as an excuse to destroy Jesus, the son of God.
There are two things for us to learn about the Sabbath from these two Sabbath scenes: 1) the purpose of the Sabbath and the 2) person of the Sabbath. The purpose of the Sabbath is for our restoration and healing. Like Jesus’ disciples we’re in an emergency situation, in a spiritual battle, in a land of opposition. We need strength for the journey and provisions for the battle. We receive here the bread of life, which nourishes and restores us and strengthens us. No religious rule can be more important than this.
We also need healing, like the man with the withered hand. Jesus gives this to us through his word and sacrament. He restores us, gives us rest, takes our shame away, forgives our sins, sends us out to proclaim his word. In Martin Luther’s words from his Small Catechism, that’s why we don’t “despise preaching or God’s word but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it”—because it’s our only true source of healing.
Second, the Person of the Sabbath. Jesus refers to himself when he says, “The son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath.” True God and True man, Jesus here makes the audacious claim that he’s the one who made the Sabbath in the first place and is ultimately revealed through it. He made it, he rules it, he is revealed through it.
The point for us is that only in the presence of the “person of the sabbath”—this Jesus—can we really be nourished, sustained, fed, filled, healed, and made whole. Only Jesus, his word, his bread of life, can fully give us rest.
That’s the whole point of the Sabbath—whether it’s observed on a Saturday, or a Sunday, or whenever God’s word is read. The point is we need restoration and healing, and only Jesus, the Lord of the Sabbath can give it to us.
So don’t seek it in other places. Any place else you’ll only find more burdens, more work, more unsettledness of soul. Only in Christ is our true rest and restoration found. Only in him is there true healing.
You can be at rest in Christ, here, now, this morning; but also finally, ultimately, eternally, when our Sabbath rest will reach its ultimate fulfillment with him in heaven.
Come soon Lord Jesus. Amen.