Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath - Matthew 12:9-12
9 Going on from that place, he went into their synagogue, 10 and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to bring charges against Jesus, they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?” 11 He said to them, “If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? 12 How much more valuable is a person than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.” 13 Then he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other. 14 But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus.
Reflection: Despite the negative interaction with the Pharisees out in the field, Jesus goes into their synagogue, their place of worship. Notice the negativity and undermining of the leaders does not keep Jesus from going to His Father's house. Oftentimes division in the church leads people to vote with their feet, and not come to church because they are mad at someone or the pastor. Jesus is not intimidated by their behavior but goes into the heart of the life together, the worship service.
And when he enters he finds a man with a shriveled hand. Other versions of the story in Jewish literature say this man was a brick layer, so obviously his handicap would have grave consequences for his profession. Regardless of the situation, it brings up an opportunity for Jesus to do just what he was just teaching. The Sabbath was made for man and that is why for Jesus healing the man was the right thing to do. The Pharisees saw this as another opportunity to challenge Jesus' authority. Jesus cites their own interpretation of the commandment, which we have said before went far beyond the scope of the simple commandment, where the rabbi's said it was okay to haul a sheep out of a pit on the Sabbath. This was to avoid financial loss.
So Jesus turns it around on them and says, you say it is okay to lift a sheep out of pit but not to heal this man's hand so he can work again. You can see how this might infuriate them, as the finger points right back at the truly guilty ones. And they are so enraged by the this truth telling that they want to kill Jesus. We will see more of this in the coming weeks.
So what does this mean for us? One very practical consideration is in our worship services do we leave room for Jesus to heal the people who come into our assembly with all sorts of wounds. Do we allow Jesus to show up in our synagogues, or are services so controlled that we might not recognize him in the pews? This is a challenge for us in the Lutheran tradition as often our "liturgy", which is meant to be the work of the people in worship of God, can often become so controlled we don't leave room for something supernatural to happen. Sometimes people get edgy when a service gets over an hour. Makes me wonder if Jesus wanted us to stay for two hours what would our response be? Just saying...
Jesus, thank you came to heal and to save. You saw us in our needs and your kingdom broke into our world to give sight to blind and healing the lame in body and spirit. Help us to be open today how your kingdom might coming to us as we recognize you in our midst. Amen.
Reflection: Despite the negative interaction with the Pharisees out in the field, Jesus goes into their synagogue, their place of worship. Notice the negativity and undermining of the leaders does not keep Jesus from going to His Father's house. Oftentimes division in the church leads people to vote with their feet, and not come to church because they are mad at someone or the pastor. Jesus is not intimidated by their behavior but goes into the heart of the life together, the worship service.
And when he enters he finds a man with a shriveled hand. Other versions of the story in Jewish literature say this man was a brick layer, so obviously his handicap would have grave consequences for his profession. Regardless of the situation, it brings up an opportunity for Jesus to do just what he was just teaching. The Sabbath was made for man and that is why for Jesus healing the man was the right thing to do. The Pharisees saw this as another opportunity to challenge Jesus' authority. Jesus cites their own interpretation of the commandment, which we have said before went far beyond the scope of the simple commandment, where the rabbi's said it was okay to haul a sheep out of a pit on the Sabbath. This was to avoid financial loss.
So Jesus turns it around on them and says, you say it is okay to lift a sheep out of pit but not to heal this man's hand so he can work again. You can see how this might infuriate them, as the finger points right back at the truly guilty ones. And they are so enraged by the this truth telling that they want to kill Jesus. We will see more of this in the coming weeks.
So what does this mean for us? One very practical consideration is in our worship services do we leave room for Jesus to heal the people who come into our assembly with all sorts of wounds. Do we allow Jesus to show up in our synagogues, or are services so controlled that we might not recognize him in the pews? This is a challenge for us in the Lutheran tradition as often our "liturgy", which is meant to be the work of the people in worship of God, can often become so controlled we don't leave room for something supernatural to happen. Sometimes people get edgy when a service gets over an hour. Makes me wonder if Jesus wanted us to stay for two hours what would our response be? Just saying...
Jesus, thank you came to heal and to save. You saw us in our needs and your kingdom broke into our world to give sight to blind and healing the lame in body and spirit. Help us to be open today how your kingdom might coming to us as we recognize you in our midst. Amen.
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