Sermon -- 2nd Sunday after Pentecost (June 6, 2021)

MARK 2:23-28

THE SABBATH GRANTS NEEDED REST.

In the name + of Jesus.

     Ava, today you are observing the Rite of Confirmation.  While it marks the end of formal study of the Catechism with your pastor, the Rite of Confirmation may give the impression that you are done with your study of Scripture.  You are not.  In fact, the challenges you are going to face in regard to the Christian faith are only going to get more intense and more frequent.  Your studies have prepared you for these attacks.  But just as an army needs a supply line, so you will need to be continually supplied so that you remain faithful to the Lord.  That is one reason you will continually need the church; for we are all fighting together in the Church Militant.  No one is ever done with the challenges and temptations until we die.  Only then will we get eternal rest in the Church Triumphant.  You do, however, get times of rest before entering heavenly glory.  That is what the Sabbath is all about.  The Sabbath grants needed rest.

     Jesus and his disciples were well acquainted with the Sabbath day.  For six days, everyone carried out their various occupations.  Each person did what was necessary to care for his family and to serve his neighbor.  But the seventh day was the Sabbath.  It was not merely a divinely ordained day off.  Rather, it was a day set apart for a sacred purpose.  On the Sabbath, the Lord served them.  They rested to hear God’s word and receive his blessings.  The Sabbath granted needed rest.

     On one particular Sabbath, Jesus and his disciples were walking among grain fields.  As they walked, the disciples helped themselves to some of the heads of grain—rolling them in their hands to release the kernels to eat.  God’s Law had instructed farmers not to harvest the ends of their fields so that the poor and the traveler could eat from them.  There was no problem with that, but the Pharisees found a problem anyway.

     In their obsession for purity in observing the Sabbath, the Pharisees had debated what constitutes work to ensure that no work would be done on the Sabbath.  In doing so, they went beyond what God had said.  It would be like this.  Your parents do not want you to track mud in the house, so they tell you, “You are never allowed to go outside.”  If you don’t go outside, you can’t track mud into the house.  The Pharisees invented such restrictions.  Over time, the tradition became the commandment.  So, the Pharisees found fault with Jesus’ disciples for harvesting—not taking a scythe to gather bales, but rubbing heads of grain in their hands.  Harvesting.

     The Pharisees judged everything by laws and traditions.  But living a life that focuses on endless obedience to laws can get very burdensome.  Somehow, the Pharisees had convinced themselves that they could do it.  And they did have the appearance of being very pious and obedient.  But there is no one who can keep God’s Law perfectly.  The Bible rightly tells us: “Surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins” (Ecclesiastes 7:20). 

     Still, God’s Law is God’s word.  Ava, you memorized the Commandments and Luther’s explanation of them.  Each Commandment directs us, “We should fear and love God that we do not” do something wicked, but we should do what is good.  God sets the standard, and he holds us to it.  We did not spend Catechism Class debating whether it was worth following God’s instruction.  God has filled us with a desire to live according to his Law.  We strive to do God’s will.  We might credit ourselves that we tried or that we meant to do these things, but no one gets to credit himself with perfect obedience.  The Commandments always demand continual obedience, and they always accuse us that we don’t.

     As you continue to grow in God’s word, you make take up the practice of highlighting passages in your Bible.  I know of a man who marked the verses which told him what he was supposed to do for Jesus.  He knew this is what he was supposed to do, and he did want to do it.  He would review his marked verses only to see that he was never living up to the way he was supposed to live.  The Law always accuses, and it was a soul-crushing practice.  He found no rest for his soul.

     But the Sabbath grants needed rest.  Jesus, who is Lord even of the Sabbath, summons us: “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).  Eventually, this man started to pay attention to what Jesus has done for him rather than what he was supposed to do for Jesus.  Finally, the fear and the pressure were replaced by peace and rest.  The Sabbath gives needed rest.

     Sabbath rest does not mean we get to ignore God’s Law.  God’s Law is still God’s word which endures forever.  Jesus did not come to abolish the Law, but he did fulfill it.  He did not do it as your example, but as your substitute.  The very righteousness God demands you to have, Jesus Christ has supplied.  It was put upon you in your baptism.  Now, you are covered in Jesus’ innocence.  No longer do you live under the pressure of being perfect—even though you will still strive for it.  Rather, you have been granted a Sabbath rest.  The work has been done for you.  The Commandments have been fulfilled.  God’s demands have been satisfied by Christ.  And God’s favor rests on you because you are Christ’s.  The Sabbath grants this needed rest.

     The Pharisees, however, measured everything by laws.  As a result, they found fault with everyone.  That is not hard to do.  Everyone has faults.  Some are more obvious than others.  They even tried to pin fault on Jesus.  If his disciples were breaking the Sabbath and if Jesus were not putting a stop to it, then surely Jesus was not good.  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: how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him” (Mark 2:24-26)?    

     Jesus first had the Pharisees reflect on the purpose of God’s Law.  It is not a club to bludgeon people into obedience.  The Law of God begins with the word “Love.”  Love the Lord your God.  Love your neighbor as yourself.  While God had commanded that the holy loaves were to be consumed by the priests, the high priest had compassion on the needs of David and his army.  Was it lawful?  By the letter of the Law, No.  Was it loving?  The high priest determined that it was not loving to send away starving the army who fought God’s battles.

     Now the incident with David was certainly an exception, and exceptions do not make good laws.  We have a defibrillator on the wall in the church hallway.  If we should ever have to use it (may God spare us!), we would have to rip open the shirt or blouse of the person in order to properly apply the paddles to one’s chest.  That’s the only way to restart someone’s heart.  In this case, modesty takes a back seat to saving one’s life.  But immodest dress would not become the new rule.  Exceptions do not make good laws.  The high priest did not make it a new practice to hand out the expired loaves to just anyone.  But he did it for David and his men because they had need.

     But there was something more.  David was the Lord’s anointed.  He had been commissioned by God to fight for his people and to deliver them from their enemies.  Just as the Bread of the Presence had been set apart for God’s sacred purpose, so was David.  The holy things were given to the holy one.  This is all the more true in regard to Jesus Christ.  Jesus was not merely set apart for God’s sacred purpose.  He is God who came for his own holy purpose.  Jesus’s purpose is to set you free from the condemnation of the Law.  His holy purpose is to lift off of you the burden of guilt.  To do that, Jesus picked up the burden of your guilt and made it his own.  He delivered you from condemnation by taking your judgment for you.  No matter how much you tried or how often you meant to better, you and I have not measured up to the standard the Law demands.  The Bible uses the word “iniquity” for that.  But listen: “The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:6).  This is what the Lord has done for you to alleviate you of the burden of perfection.  Now you live under the grace of being pardoned.  This is the rest Jesus gives.  The Sabbath grants needed rest.

     The Sabbath is for rest and for receiving God’s gifts.  This is done mainly in our services.  We do not come to do something for God, as if he needs our service.  We come because God does things for us.  He serves us.  He consoles us with words of mercy.  He strengthens us with words of encouragement.  He gives us his Law to provide direction.  He feeds us with the bread from heaven—holy loaves for the holy ones.  He puts his blessing upon us and sends us home in peace.  Then, just as gladly as we sang his praises here, we gladly serve him in the world as his word directs us—not under the threat of punishment, but under the loving care of a forgiving God.  And then, to find relief in a world that mocks God’s word and his people, we come back again to God’s house.  The Sabbath again grants us needed rest.  This is the life of God’s people.

     There is still a word of warning for us here.  We see the Pharisees as villains, but we are in constant danger of becoming like them.  The Pharisees judged everyone by the Law.  The Law always accuses, and so that is what the Pharisees did.  Now, you could argue that the Pharisees were usually right.  The people they condemned were sinners.  You and I could do the same and insist the Law backs us up.  You know people ought to behave better because you have been taught by God.  Can you really expect better of people who have not?  We know better and we still sin!  Even if the Law always accuses, it does not command us to do that.  

     The Law tells us to love.  Our job is to love and to show mercy.  We don’t know what burdens other people are carrying.  God’s Law will only make those burdens weigh more.  But the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ give hope.  The Law shows us how love is practiced, but it does not produce love; only the grace of Jesus Christ does that.  Only the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ can remove burdens, melt icy hearts, change stubborn minds, and redirect steps to a godly path.  And the only way others can see and hear and know the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ is from you and me who bear his name and confess his word.  All people need the Sabbath rest we have, and the Sabbath grants the rest we all need. 

In the name of the Father and of the Son + and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.