Mark 2:23-28

Lord of the Sabbath

23One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. 24The Pharisees said to him, "Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?"

25He answered, "Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? 26In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions."

27Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."







BACKGROUND READING:


1 Samuel 21:1-9




1 Samuel 22:6-23



Dig Deeper

If someone were to read the New Testament without a decent understanding of the Pharisees, they might get the impression that they were some sort of secret police. It almost seems like they were spying around on Jesus and his followers waiting for them to break the law so that they could drop the hammer. The impression that they were a sort of official secret police force, however, would be a mistaken impression.


The Pharisees were actually an unofficial group. They had no basis in the law itself. They were, in reality, self-appointed guardians of the law. They had been around for almost 200 years by the time of Jesus but they had no official authority. They could not make laws nor did they have the power to enforce the laws. What they did have, though, was the power of public opinion. The Pharisees were extremely influential with the common people of Jesus’ day. These people had a great deal of respect for the expertise that the Pharisees had in regard to Israel’s ancestral laws and traditions.


No, they weren’t a police force, but what were they then? It is important to note that many Pharisees were sincere, devout, holy men. There were others, though, that were more like investigative journalists. They wouldn’t have bothered following around ordinary people, but Jesus and his followers were clearly not ordinary people. The things that Jesus had done and the claims he was making had set them apart as unique. Just as journalists will go after someone running for political office, Jesus had stuck his head up from the crowd, and so the Pharisees were going to check him out.


Keeping the Sabbath was one of the Ten Commandments and was one of the symbols that set apart the Jews as God’s people. They observed the Sabbath to demonstrate that they were God’s people and to set them apart from the rest of the pagan nations around them. For the Pharisees, following the various laws of the Torah were more about the political statement of separation from the pagan nations than the actual purity of keeping the law.


When asked, Jesus doesn’t deny that he and his followers were stepping outside of the boundaries of normal Sabbath observance. He admits that much, but he appeals to special circumstances and implies that these special circumstances should apply to him as well. What Jesus was not doing was providing a legal parallel from history to create a legal loophole. He was giving the Pharisees a kingdom-parallel in what, for him, was a clear kingdom-case.


The circumstances to which he appeals is from the life of King David. The story comes from 1 Samuel 21, a time in David’s life when he had already been anointed as king, but had yet to take the throne. He was on the run from Saul, gathering support, and waiting for his time to come. The point that Jesus is making is not so much about the fact that David went outside of normal Sabbath rules. He is making that point, but he is doing so much more than that. Jesus is clearly identifying himself with King David, implying his kingdom aspirations. He is saying that he is the true King. He has been anointed at his baptism as God’s chosen one, but has yet to be recognized by the people and has not yet been enthroned. He has the right, as did David, to go around the normal Sabbath regulations. Rather than this being an example of Jesus’ lack of respect for the law, we find that it was, in fact, a deliberate sign just like the refusal of Jesus and his disciples to fast. The real King was here. God’s kingdom was coming, but in a different way than anyone expected.


This leads to Jesus’ final statement in this passage: The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath. This is the second time Mark has used the phrase, ‘the son of man’, and the point is clear. Jesus is saying that the Messiah, the one who would represent the people of God, has the authority over institutions that had been turned on their head to repress people. The Sabbath was meant as a sign to point to the Messiah, not to be seen as the point itself. A new day was dawning and even Israel’s God-given laws would be seen in a new light. When the light is present the shadows are no longer needed. The Sabbath rest was no longer needed in the same way now that the Messiah, the true place of rest for God’s people was here. This is yet another example (of which Mark will give us many) of Jesus redefining Israel and what it meant to be Israel through the reality of his ministry and followers.



Devotional Thought

The Commandment concerning the Sabbath called for people to honor it and keep it holy. The point of the New Testament is fairly clear that Jesus Christ is our Sabbath, our rest. To honor the Sabbath for us, then, means to honor Christ, not just one day a week but all the time. Does that sound like your life? Do you honor Jesus in everything you do? What areas of your life would not be honoring to Jesus? In what areas of your life do you seek to find rest in things or people other than Jesus Christ?