02.02.25, Slaves to the Sabbath, Luke 6:1-11
Pre/Post Worship Music – Spotify – Open and Close,
Rick lights Christ candle/Billy softly plays first song
Songs 10,000 Reasons (Bless The Lord) 6016351 Billy/Linda
Sanctuary 24140
Passage/Prayer Luke 6:1-11 Musgrove
Song Faith 5469291 Billy/Linda
Message Slaves to the Sabbath Rick
Song It Is Well With My Soul 25376 Billy/Linda
Community/Closing Peace Rick
Closing Music Faith 5469291 Billy/Linda
- Record message on memory card –
- Leave space above Speaker’s head
Music (Slides) Billy/Linda
10,000 Reasons (Bless Lord) 6016351
Chorus
Bless the Lord O my soul O my soul
Worship His holy name
Sing like never before O my soul
I’ll worship Your holy name
Verse 1
The sun comes up it’s a new day dawning
It’s time to sing Your song again
Whatever may pass and whatever lies before me
Let me be singing when the evening comes
Verse 2
You’re rich in love and You’re slow to anger
Your name is great and Your heart is kind
For all Your goodness I will keep on singing
Ten thousand reasons for my heart to find
Verse 3
And on that day when my strength is failing
The end draws near and my time has come
Still my soul will sing Your praise unending
Ten thousand years and then forevermore
I’ll worship Your holy name
Ending
Sing like never before O my soul
I’ll worship Your holy name
Worship Your holy name
Worship Your holy name
Sanctuary 24140
Lord prepare me
To be a sanctuary
Pure and holy
Tried and true
With thanksgiving
I’ll be a living
Sanctuary for You
Passage (Slides) Luke 6:1-11 Musgroves
On a sabbath day, Jesus walked through a field. His disciples were rubbing heads of grain in their hands to get rid of the chaff, and eating them.
Some Pharisees said to Jesus, “They are breaking a Sabbath rule!”
Jesus said. “Have you not read what David and those with him did when they, and their companions, were hungry? How they entered the sanctuary and ate fresh bread that was designated for the priests only?”
Jesus said, “The Son of Man is no slave to the Sabbath; he is in charge.”
On another Sabbath Jesus went to the meeting place and taught. There was a man there with a crippled right hand.
The religious scholars and Pharisees were watching Jesus to see if he would heal the man, hoping to catch him in another Sabbath violation.
Jesus knew what they were up to but he spoke to the man with a crippled hand anyway. “Get up and stand.” The man stood.
Jesus said to the religious leaders, “Let me ask you: What action best suits the Sabbath? Doing good or doing evil? Helping people or leaving them helpless?”
Jesus looked at each of them in the eye and said to the man, “Hold out your hand.” The man’s hand was as good as new! The leaders were angry, and started plotting how they might get rid of Jesus.
Join me in the prayer of Jesus,
Our Father who art in Heaven hallowed be your name./Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven./ Give us this day our daily bread./ Forgive us our trespasses, while we forgive those who trespass against us./And, lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil./For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.
Music (Slides) Billy/Linda
By Faith 5469291
Verse 1
By faith we see the hand of God
In the light of creation’s grand design
In the lives of those who prove His faithfulness
Who walk by faith and not by sight
Verse 2
By faith our fathers roamed the earth
With the pow’r of His promise in their hearts
Of a holy city built by God’s own hand
A place where peace and justice reign
Chorus
We will stand as children of the promise
We will fix our eyes on Him our soul’s reward
Till the race is finished and the work is done
We’ll walk by faith and not by sight
Verse 3
By faith the prophets saw a day
When the longed-for Messiah would appear
With the pow’r to break the chains of sin and death
And rise triumphant from the grave
Verse 4
By faith the church was called to go
In the pow’r of the Spirit to the lost
To deliver captives and to preach good news
In ev’ry corner of the earth
Verse 5
By faith the mountain shall be moved
And the pow’r of the gospel shall prevail
For we know in Christ all things are possible
For all who call upon His name
Message Rick [Screen Share until close]
[Series Title Slide – Screen share entire message until prayer]
Challenge
This week week we had 3 great questions upon which our sermon was built.
- Why did Jesus heal the man with the crippled hand while knowing that he was being watched ?
- Why did Jesus heal the man in the open and not take him somewhere private?
- Why did the Pharisees care?
Context
Today we watch the journey as Jesus, with his disciples, are literally following Jesus, and are very hungry. As they walk through a field, they pluck the heads off the grain, rub them with their hands to remove the chaff, and then eat.
Explanation
The Law
The law was God’s gift to humanity telling us how to live with each other, with God, and with God’s creation. It, according to many Jewish teachers, was offered to all nations but only the Israelites accepted the law. It was a gift, a how to, a how to that sometimes said, ‘Do Not,’ and ‘Don’t even think of it,’ which most nations did not want to hear – which is why it was not accepted by most nations. However, it also contained phrases like ‘here comes the promise’, and, ‘this is how to be ready for the promise.’ But, at it’s core, the Law was about God’s love and his desire that we would live out that love.
Humanity primarily only knows the law as the 10 commandments …
- No gods before beside the one true God.
- No worship of idols.
- No taking the Lord’s name in vain.
- Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.
- Honor your father and your mother.
- No murder.
- No adultery.
- No theft.
- No lying about another person.
- No lusting for the things that belong to another person.
But these were just the tip of the iceberg. God and Moses’ time together on the mountain was a 40 day engagement.The two spent 40 days and nights…(times 2 because of the golden calf debacle). The time was spent in deep discussion, much of which was probably details of each of the commandments, how to define human actions in regard to the commandments, and how to treat others in light of these commandments.
These discussions were not documented like the 10 commandments. Instead, they were orally shared by Moses and then, the details, spread to others. Jewish scholars still study those oral details and continue to pass them down through to the generations.
The Sabbath
The boundaries and definitions of the Sabbath would have come from these oral traditions passed down for centuries since Moses. The idea that feeding yourself when you are hungry would have surely been an action discussed many times by Jewish scholars as well as the average person.
This means that, Sabbath laws for instance – interpretations (laws) that set limits on acceptable travel on the Sabbath and defined what acceptable work is on the Sabbath, were all open to continued debate
Jesus pointed this out when he mentioned the time when King David’s men were also hungry on the Sabbath. David, spoke to Ahimelech, the priest, and asked for food, Ahimelech then offered David and his men the bread on the altar for them to eat. Jesus was citing a precedent for what is acceptable on the Sabbath. He was arguing his perspective against bad interpretation of the discussions of God and Moses centuries before.
The Sabbath, quite simply, was one of the 10 commandments because intentional resting was what God did on the seventh day of creation. It was to a people who, during their enslavement in Egypt, had been over worked and permitted no rest. The commandment to rest on the Sabbath was/is a matter of spiritual, physical, and mental health for all of humanity.
The Pharisees
Most scholars agree that the bias of Jesus followers against the Pharisees is an unfounded caricature of a passionate group of men dedicated to preserving Judaism. Of course they were human and could often be guided more by their own defensiveness, and… could, like all of humanity, were sometimes prone to get stuck in flawed and outdated perspectives and traditions.
We non-Jews discount the role and foundational reasoning of the Pharisees. Our tight grip on seeing the Pharisees as enemies, blinds us to deep concerns which often obscure truth.
In the time of Jesus, the Pharisees were burdened by what was going on around them in society, in politics, and in religion. They were oppressed by the Romans as the Roman surrogates had begun to infringe on Jewish religion. This was a huge threat to Judaism leading Jewish leaders to extend their reach to all Jews in all places. Their calling was to remind the followers of the true God of their calling to ‘be a Kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ (see Exodus 19:6)
The pharisees would have probably kept up with the latest rabbis’ debates and updates. They, too, acknowledged the oral tradition and the rabbinical debates about how to set boundaries that keep us within the law. And, since Jesus would have been considered a Rabbi at that time, we see them respectfully ask Jesus ‘Why are your disciples working on the Sabbath?’
In addition to these threats against Judaism, the Pharisee recognized the political trends and the fact that the politicians were attempting to control the church. They were aware there would be false teachers among those claiming to be rabbis under the thumb of the politicians and others determined to undermine the church. The Pharisees, in general, were sincere and passionate about their vocation of protecting Judaism.
Understandably, the leaders had deep concerns which led them to investigate all the teachings within Judaism that were taking place across Israel…including teachers such as Jesus. And, again, the Pharisees were human so when things got a bit too uncomfortable, or, in Jesus’ response they did was humans do, what the religious leaders did in Nazareth, Jesus’ hometown, they went on the defensive and began to plot against Jesus. However, it is doubtful that this was an official stance of Pharisees as a whole.
Remember the passion of the apostle Paul who had been a persecuted of followers of Christ until Jesus, post crucifixion, confronted him. Paul was open minded, he, too, considered the different developing views and, when presented with Truth he accepted it.
The fact that the Pharisees asked Jesus ‘why’ was a sign that they saw an intellectual worth in Jesus. If they had not thought this they would have begun the plotting to get rid of Jesus immediately.
Challenge
With this in mind let’s take a look at our challenge questions;
Why did Jesus heal the man with the crippled hand while knowing that he was being watched?
Healing, like praying, is a personal moment and usually we see Jesus step away from others when he prays, and, in the ministry of the prophets they always go to a private place to heal. Jesus probably was not afforded such a private moment with the crowds when he healed. However, it is possible that Jesus heals the man all the while knowing he is being watched because this was a not about the healing as much as it was a lesson to the crowds, the disciples, and even the Pharisees – a lesson that our faith is not based on the institution of the church, not a person, not on philosophy or agenda, not on preacher, politicians, or any person, it is on God. Remember, the oral traditions of the practice of the law was always up for debate.
Why did Jesus heal the man in the open and not take him somewhere private? See response to question #1.
Why did the Pharisees care?
The Pharisess sincerely were aware of the possibilities that their long held interpretations of ‘WORK’ on the Sabbath were constantly in need of reconsideration and debate. When this group of Pharisees (which may have just been 2 or 3 Pharisees) became angry it is not because of Jesus’ challenge about Sabbath laws but because Jesus stepped on their toes like he had done in Nazareth. The Pharisee, without realizing it, had allowed their sincere passion to protect the faith, become more focused on protecting their institution.
Takeaway
With this under our belt let’s concentrate on Jesus’ statement about the Sabbath.
Jesus said, ‘I am Lord of the Sabbath.’
Jesus’ words probably were not offensive to the Pharisees anymore than Jesus’ similar words to the religious leaders in Nazareth. However, the Pharisees probably did not hear them in the manner we hear them. We hear the word LORD and equate it to Messiah and automatically think that others heard that as a statement of Holiness – that he was/is God. This was probably not how the Pharisees heard the words of Jesus. This was probably not what ruffled the feathers of the leaders.
What they probably heard was similar to Eugene Petterson’s interpretation, ‘I am not a slave to the Sabbath.’ Which, in the Pharisees hearing, was ‘YOU (the Phariseee) are a slave to the Sabbath, YOU have forgotten God, YOU have become false teachers,in YOUR unholy tradition.’
Jesus still says that to us today – confronting us when we become more loyal to a religious institution, or a politician or a political agenda, or a person or religious leader. Jesus reminds us that our calling it to Love God, Love Others, and go out into our world and teach that truth through the entirety of our lives…not through legalism, not through words of persuasion, but through true and sincere love.
Prayer
Music Slides Billy/Linda
It Is Well With My Soul 25376
Verse 1
When peace like a river
Attendeth my way
When sorrows like sea billows roll
Whatever my lot
Thou hast taught me to say
It is well
It is well with my soul
Chorus
It is well with my soul
It is well
It is well with my soul
Verse 2
Tho’ Satan should buffet
Tho’ trials should come
Let this blest assurance control
That Christ hath regarded
My helpless estate
And hath shed His own blood
For my soul
Verse 3
My sin O the bliss
Of this glorious tho’t
My sin not in part but the whole
Is nailed to the cross
And I bear it no more
Praise the Lord
Praise the Lord O my soul
Verse 4
And Lord haste the day
When the faith shall be sight
The clouds be rolled back as a scroll
The trump shall resound
And the Lord shall descend
Even so it is well
With my soul
Chorus
It is well with my soul
It is well
It is well with my soul
Community (Slides) Rick
- 02.09.25, Depth Width Length Height of Love, Luke 7:1-17
- Weekly Bible Challenge
- Weekly Prayer Challenge
Closing Peace (Slides) Rick (Slides)
Leader: May the peace of the Lord go with you.
Response: And also with you.
Closing Music Billy/Linda
By Faith 5469291
Verse 1
By faith we see the hand of God
In the light of creation’s grand design
In the lives of those who prove His faithfulness
Who walk by faith and not by sight
Verse 2
By faith our fathers roamed the earth
With the pow’r of His promise in their hearts
Of a holy city built by God’s own hand
A place where peace and justice reign
Chorus
We will stand as children of the promise
We will fix our eyes on Him our soul’s reward
Till the race is finished and the work is done
We’ll walk by faith and not by sight
Order, Words, & Voices 