When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him,
"See, your disciples are doing what is unlawful to do on the sabbath."
Jesus did not engage in argument about the technicalities of whether picking grain in a field really counted as the sort of harvesting prohibited on the sabbath. But neither did he minimize the importance of keeping the sabbath. What he did instead was to show that there was a more important priority in play, one which was in fact in keeping with the spirit of the sabbath.
Have you not read what David did
when he and his companions were hungry,
David was the prototype of the Messiah. Saul was trying to put him to death in order to prevent him from asserting his rightful claim of kingship. The mission of David and his companions was a sort of messianic mission that took precedence over the ordinary demands of the law. Thus Jesus was saying that the urgency of the proclamation of the good news of the Kingdom must also take precedent over such ordinary demands when necessary.
how he went into the house of God and ate the bread of offering,
which neither he nor his companions
but only the priests could lawfully eat?
David and his companions were permitted to share in the priestly privilege of eating bread of offering, a privilege granted to priests because of the importance that service in the temple continue even on the sabbath. David, though not a Levite, nevertheless had a priestly role, because his authority was meant to assure that Israel was established in the right praise of God. He thus prefigured Jesus who was priest, prophet, and King, in the order, not of the Levites, but of Melchizedek.
Or have you not read in the law that on the sabbath
the priests serving in the temple violate the sabbath
and are innocent?
I say to you, something greater than the temple is here.
The work performed in the temple was justified by the importance of continuing the function of the temple, even on the sabbath. But Jesus suggested that the importance of the work his disciples performed in picking grain on the sabbath was in service of something greater than the temple. The temple signified the presence of God but it was well established that it could not truly contain the almighty. The sacrifices offered there provided some benefit but could not truly set the people free. But Jesus contained in himself the fullness of the presence of God. And his sacrifice, in which he was both the one offering and the one offered truly had the power to set his people free. Jesus was the one who was finally and truly able to establish the new Israel in the chorus of right praise, that which had always been God's deepest desire for his people.
If you knew what this meant, I desire mercy, not sacrifice,
you would not have condemned these innocent men.
The Pharisees seemed to not regard the intended end of sacrifice, seemed to desire sacrifice for the sake of sacrifice, for the sake of the destruction entailed. Thus they had the priorities all eschew such that they got caught up in what the small apparent transgressions they perceived and failed to realize and celebrate Jesus' mission of bringing mercy to the world.
For the Son of Man is Lord of the sabbath.
That the Son of Man was Lord of the sabbath was a clear claim of his divinity and of his equality with the Father. For who but God could claim to be Lord of the sabbath? God established the sabbath and himself defined the law that required its observance. He himself brought blessing on those who celebrated it and allowed evil to befall those who presumed to have better things to do. But God's own purpose for the sabbath was to ensure that his relationship to mankind and ours to him would always take priority over merely worldly work. Hence the work of Jesus on the sabbath to reunited man and God was not a violation but a celebration of his own purpose in creating the sabbath in the beginning.
This day shall be a memorial feast for you,
which all your generations shall celebrate
with pilgrimage to the LORD, as a perpetual institution.
The priesthood of Jesus established a new and definitive passover sacrifice that truly set humanity back in right relation to God, a sacrifice that was in itself the right praise God desired. The modern day companions of Jesus still offer this sacrifice on the Lord's day and every day, from the rising of the sun to its setting. We too, in some way, are granted a priestly privilege in offering ourselves along with this sacrifice and in receiving the priestly bread. Let us grow in our appreciation for all the blessings bestowed on us by the Lord of the sabbath and let us enter more deeply into the relationship with him that has always been his purpose for us.
No comments:
Post a Comment