WEEKLY
SUNDAY SCHOOL LESSON
An
international Sunday school lesson commentary
For
Sunday June 3, 2018
Over
162,000 readers worldwide
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JUSTICE
AND SABBATH LAWS
(Mercy
is more important than human rules)
(Matthew
12:1-14)
Human need must always take precedence over ritual law, and
even the Pharisees, who vehemently opposed JESUS, had always taught that people
should adhere to that principal. Strangely, however, when JESUS applied this
same principal in their presence, over and over again they acted as if HE were
violating GOD’s Will by attending to the needs of the people.
One Sabbath day when JESUS and HIS disciples were walking through some
wheat fields, HIS disciples begin to pick off some of the heads of the
wheat, rub off the husk with their hands, and eat them. A group of Pharisees,
who were spying on them, begin to rebuke them for their actions. “Your disciples shouldn’t be doing that! It’s
against the law to work by harvesting grain on the Sabbath” they cried.
Here in this passage the disciples were being scrutinized and rebuked by
Israel’s religious hierarchy for several actions that they deemed to be
contrary to the Word of GOD, and as forbidden work on the Sabbath. Here they
actually cite these four, rather ridiculous, violations against JESUS’
disciples;
·
Reaping
(by picking the wheat),
·
Threshing
(by rubbing the husk from the wheat in their hands),
·
Winnowing
(by tossing the husk in the air to let it blow away), and, believe it or not,
·
Preparing
their food on the Sabbath (the very fact that they then ate the wheat that they
picked).
In verses 3-5 JESUS reminds these teachers
of religious law of what King David did when he and his companions were hungry
(1 Samuel 21:1-6), and they went into the House of GOD and ate the special
“showbread” (the Bread of Presence) that was reserved for the priests only. There
they took the twelve loaves of special bread that was placed weekly on the
Sabbath, on a table made of solid gold, three feet long, eighteen inches wide,
and nine inches high, and he ate it, and gave some to his men. In that
particular incident, David’s “human need” took precedence over “their religious
rules and regulations”, HE cited, and then, JESUS exclaimed, “I, the SON OF
MAN, am master even of the Sabbath”.
I’ve often said, that, it is extremely
important that man approach the Scriptures with an open mind, and time and time
again, it was clearly demonstrated by the Pharisees that they did not come to
GOD, with an open mind. Despite all of their deep studies, somehow, they
regularly seemed to miss the moral and spiritual message that is comprised in
GOD’s Word. It is something that has become the absolute downfall of leadership
in the professed Christian Churches, even here in the twenty-first century. So
often, man has come to Scriptures, not to learn of GOD’s Word, but rather, to
find their own theology, within GOD’s Word.
Man
has long sought a god that is made in his own image, instead of desiring to
serve and worship the GOD, WHO made us in HIS. When we come to GOD’s Word with
no sense of need, we always miss the most profound importance of its meaning.
Here in this passage of Scripture, once again, we see these leaders of religion
in Israel, doing just that.
Taking up at verse 9, on yet another Sabbath
day when JESUS was teaching in the synagogue, we see a man with a deformed hand
catch HIS attention. The teachers of religious law closely watched JESUS to see
what HE would do, because they were eager to find some legal charge to bring
against HIM.
JESUS, knowing their thoughts, said to the
man with the deformed hand, “Come and stand here where everyone can see you”.
After the man came up, JESUS said to HIS critics, “I have a question for you.
Is it legal to do good deeds on the Sabbath, or is it a day for doing harm? Is
this a day to save a life, or to destroy it? (Luke 6:8-9)
JESUS intently looked around at each of
them, one by one, and then said to the man with the deformed hand, “Reach out
your hand”. The man reached out his hand and it became normal again. The
religious leaders became very angry, and they began to discuss among each other
what they should do about JESUS.
In these passages of Matthew’s and Luke’s
Gospel accounts, conflict with the religious hierarchy in Israel over
Sabbath-keeping heats to a boil. Their emphasis on ceremonial observances has
clearly distorted what GOD’s intent was on giving man a Sabbath day of rest.
They, perhaps unwittingly, had set aside the more important issue of caring for
the needs of others.
JESUS clearly understood that the man in
question was not in a life-or-death situation, however, what JESUS is
demonstrating and expressing here is that, anything that impairs the quality of
human life, as GOD intended it to be, does, over time, destroy life altogether.
When we fail to set right, those things that impair the quality of life, we, in
effect, show disrespect to GOD’s greatest gift, which is life itself. And besides,
JESUS tells us that, when HE returns, HE is going to judge us according to how
we reacted to “human need”, in our lifetime (Matthew 25:31-46).
A Sunday school lesson by,
Larry D. Alexander
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