One Sabbath, Jesus, and his disciples are walking through grain fields and being followed by some religious guys. These religious guys were always around Jesus, just watching for a way to discredit Him. Their jealousy and hatred for Jesus burned in them constantly. The hungry disciples started reaching out and grabbing some of the ripe grain to eat as they were walking along. Or maybe they just had what we call the munchies? Yet, in the opinion of the religious observers, they were “harvesting grain on the Sabbath” meaning they were working on the Sabbath. They were breaking a few of the Sabbath day’s laws. They were big sinners and Jesus should be a better teacher if he’s truly sent from God. After all, it is the Sabbath. But rather than addressing their accusation Jesus reminds them of a starving David and his men eating the special priestly bread. David and his men were running from King Saul who was trying to kill David. They had no food. But Jesus brought to their attention a very important key about the Sabbath – “Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, and not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord, even over the Sabbath!” (Mark 2:27–28 NLT). And to top that off, He called Himself God and supreme ruler over the Law itself.
The vital principle of God designing life routines, ones that were instituted by God, were and are for the benefit of both man and creation; that truth has long been lost because of sin. And so has the recognition of who is Lord. The religious use their obedience to religious rules as a measure to promote their own “goodness” rather than the Good News of rest offered in Jesus. The non-religious have no sense of God’s plan to minister to them through rest although they crave it deeply. The point for your consideration today is that if ministry in our Mon Valley continues to be one of religious competitions and evaluations based on outward activities we’ll miss The Lord of the Sabbath as He walks and ministers in our midst. As God created the Sabbath to meet the needs of the people and not for self-realization, so our ministry to the Valley must be developed and adjusted to meet the needs of the people around us. We must meet them where they are and not be expecting them to fit into our concept of good or they will not hear the Good News from us. The fields are ripe all around us, will we have compassion as Jesus does or will we fall into the comparison trap to justify our rules closing the doors of rest to those who most need it?
The Son of Man is Lord,
Pastor Mark
Col. 2:16-23