Rev. Will Rice
Grace United Methodist Church
Corpus Christi, TX
pastorwillrice@gmail.com
Luke 6:1-11
“Jesus the Rule Breaker”
Before I start into this text, let me ask you a few questions. You won’t have to answer aloud, just sort of let the answers float around in your head. All the questions start with, “Can you still be a good Christian if…”
you don’t go to church every Sunday?
you don’t go to church at all?
you don’t pray?
you don’t give money to the church?
you don’t observe the sabbath?
you don’t read the Bible?
you are divorced?
you steal?
you drink beer?
you drink lots of beer?
you’re pro-choice?
you’re gay?
In case you are waiting for the answers, keep waiting. This is a fun exercise to do without anyone talking. If I let you answer out loud, this would take the rest of our time together. I think it is likely that many of you have an opinion or two on these two topics.
Let’s look at today’s text. As always, when trying to understand Jesus, it really helps us to know what is going on in the background.
1One sabbath while Jesus was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked some heads of grain, rubbed them in their hands, and ate them. 2But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?”
There is a whole Bible study right here. Let’s look at their question, “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” I grew up in a farm town. When I worked on a farm and my boss, Bill Henry caught someone is his fields, helping themselves to corn, tomatoes, green peppers or melons, Bill called that stealing. But that is not what is going on here. The law of Moses, the book of Deuteronomy, to be specific, said that it was quite ok to do this: Chapter 23:
25If you go into your neighbor’s standing grain, you may pluck the ears with your hand, but you shall not put a sickle to your neighbor’s standing grain.
So what Jesus’ disciples are doing is perfectly legal. As long as they weren’t using a sickle, they could pluck all the wanted to eat. The Law of Moses was very clear about the fact that everything was a gift from God. Ownership was only a limited concept. If people were hungry, they could eat some of your crops.
So their question, “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” is not about stealing. It is not about what they are doing, it is about when they are doing it. Sabbath, the fourth and longest of the Ten Commandments.
8Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. 9Six days you shall labor and do all your work. 10But the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. 11For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and consecrated it.
There is a reference within a reference here, we are looking back to Genesis 2:
2And on the seventh day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done. 3So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.
This is my favorite commandment. It is my favorite because it is the one that many Christians flagrantly break while looking down their noses at others for not keeping the other nine. Whenever I point out this fact, people tend to either ignore me or get into their own sort of legalism, asking me for help defining what is or isn’t allowed on the Sabbath.
“Who decides what work is?” “Is it ok to go shopping?” “What about gardening? Is it ok if I really like gardening?” “What about fishing?” “What if my job required me to work?”
Now the original Law of Moses was quite clear on this. Numbers 15:
32When the Israelites were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the sabbath day. 33Those who found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses, Aaron, and to the whole congregation. 34They put him in custody, because it was not clear what should be done to him. 35Then the LORD said to Moses, "The man shall be put to death; all the congregation shall stone him outside the camp."
But we are not the first ones to come up with questions about the sabbath. There were a lot of different religious people running around in Jesus’ day. The Pharisees, for reasons that are sort of beyond the scope of this sermon, seem to get picked on an awful lot. The gospels often make them out to be almost laughable in their legalism. But I contend that they were just doing their best to be faithful to God, to follow God in the best way they knew how and to lead others in following God.
The Pharisees were trying to clearly define Judaism against other competing faiths and ideologies. They, like Jesus, believed that God’s promise was spelled out in the Torah or Law of Moses. However, the Pharisees became legalists, wanting everyone to follow the letter of the law. Therefore, they had to take the ancient laws of Moses and apply them to modern situations. They were doing the ancient equivalent of case law.
The example for today is the Sabbath. The law is clear, no work on the Sabbath. But the interpretation is not so clear. What is work? When exactly does the Sabbath start? Can you work if it is an emergency? What if it is kind of an emergency, like you are out of milk?
Modern Rabbis are still thinking about this stuff. Let me give you a modern example. Would it be ok for an orthodox Jew to go running on the Sabbath?
One Rabbi writes that one can not run to exercise, but could run if that was part of one’s normal travel. Another Rabbi says that it is actually an issue of whether or not you sweat. Another says that light exercise in general is ok unless it makes you sweat but heavy exercise of any kind if forbidden even if you don’t sweat. Another Rabbi says that it is “why” you are running or exercising in general. If you enjoy it you are ok but if you are doing it because your doctor told you to or to lose weight then it is work so it would be breaking the sabbath.[1]
Part of the reason I point this all out is to say that Jesus, as a good Jew, and perhaps a Rabbi, was arguing this out in the same terms that the question was asked. “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” Jesus is saying, “let me explain.” And he explains use their common book.
3Jesus answered, “Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? 4He entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and gave some to his companions?”
Jesus knew his scripture pretty well, as did the Pharisees, but not all of us do, so let’s review. He is talking about a passage from 1 Samuel 21. David, who we know as King David, the second King of Israel, is on the run from Saul, the somewhat crazy first King of Israel, who is trying to kill him. On the run, David stops in to see the priest Ahimelech and asks him for some food for the road. The priest tells him that the only bread he has is the bread of the Presence, the Holy Bread that had been offered to the Lord. This bread could be eaten by the priests, but the priest offers an exception in this case.
Jesus is saying, “I know the law and I know there are exceptions.” You see Jesus is not just purposefully breaking the rules, he is arguing about them from scripture[2] So Jesus is doing this really normal Rabbi thing, arguing the finer points of the law and then he completely shifts gears in way that still throws me.
5Then he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath”
He is arguing about the law and then says something akin to “I am the law!” People often read this as Jesus first move in tossing out the law completely. But is that were the case he would have just said that and not bothered with that whole scripture lesson about King David.
In case you haven’t heard me make my case, I am in favor of people taking Sabbath seriously. In most courses I teach, at some point you can count on me veering off to a place where I will talk about our need for disciplined and holy rest, our need to take time, to stop and be in God’s presence and rest and be re-created. And I am not talking about for an hour on Sunday. Whenever I talk about that, I often have this line thrown back at me:
“The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath”
Or even the more provocative line from Mark’s gospel that is part of this same exchange:
27Then he said to them, "The sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the sabbath; 28so the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath."
Somehow, this line is handed back to me as proof that Jesus abolished the sabbath, and in some people’s opinions the rest of the law with it, but that is just not what is going on here. Jesus is not throwing out the law, he is just helping them and us to refocus, to see what is actually important. He is helping them and us to remember that the laws of Moses were meant as a gift for humanity not as an onerous duty.[3]
We have to consider what he says in Matthew chapter 5:
17“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. 18For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. 19Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
Before I start to sound like a Rabbi, arguing the finer points of the law, I think all of this has a lot to say to us all today. As Christians, we have this really strange relationship with religious law. We sort of pick and choose which parts of the law are important or let religious leaders or radio talk show hosts decide for us. We might decide that we think it is not ok to be gay, (forbidden in Leviticus 20:13 - If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall be put to death; their blood is upon them.) but ok to eat lobster (clearly forbidden in Leviticus 10:10 ), We may think that adultery is bad (Exodus 20:14 - You shall not commit adultery), but the Sabbath is not important (Exodus 20:8-11 - Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy). Stealing is considered clearly bad (Exodus 20:15 - You shall not steal), well unless you are stealing music off the internet, while really our whole consumer economy is based on coveting (Exodus 20:17 - You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor) (i.e., I know you have a nice pickup truck in your driveway, but don’t you really need this brand new four wheel drive with the biggest engine ever?) Bearing false witness is out (Exodus 20:16 - You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor), except little while lies, while honoring your mother and father (Exodus 20:12 - Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you) is a day by day thing.
We have this weird relationship with rules and laws, because sometimes we just use them to decide how others should live while missing the gift that they are and totally missing the point that none of us are saved or made righteous and brought closer to God by keeping them.
Even though we stand in this place called Grace, even though we are good, protestant, United Methodists, when we talk about the law, we forget what puts us right with God. Romans 3:
22bFor there is no distinction, 23since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; 24they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
The question I started the sermon with, “Can you be a Christian if?” is really an invalid question because our redemption, or salvation, our relationship with God, our very Christianity is not based in rules but in Grace. You may ask me, “Wouldn’t someone who really has faith and has accepted the Grace of Christ do things like go to church, pray, read the Bible, refrain from stealing etc?” Maybe, but that is not the point.
Galatians 2:16:
we know that a person is justified not by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. And we have come to believe in Christ Jesus, so that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by doing the works of the law, because no one will be justified by the works of the law.
Let me be as clear as Jesus was when he said:
17“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.
I am not suggesting that the commandments, the laws of God, be thrown out, but we need to be continually reminded of our relationship to them, that we never, ever, let our selective enforcement of the rules get in the way of God’s amazing Grace.
Think about this passage as a whole. Those Pharisees, in their effort to keep the law intact, would rather those disciples go hungry than violate the law.
6On another sabbath he entered the synagogue and taught, and there was a man there whose right hand was withered. 7The scribes and the Pharisees watched him to see whether he would cure on the sabbath, so that they might find an accusation against him.
They would rather that man suffer than the law be violated. The law had become the most important thing, to the point that
11But they were filled with fury and discussed with one another what they might do to Jesus.
And in case you think they were thinking they might just get him in trouble or steal his sandals, remember what happened last time the people got all mad at Jesus, from the text I preached on just a couple of weeks ago: Luke 4:
28When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. 29They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff.
Jesus was a rule breaker. And the punishment was pretty severe. But Jesus was pretty clear in his message, the rules and ordinances of God are not God, they are not what saves us and they should never, every get in the way of the amazing Grace of God. Now saying that too loud led Jesus to an ugly death. But Jesus is the rule breaker and he broke even that rule about death being permanent. He was resurrected to make perfectly clear, that nothing, nothing we do, nothing we fail to do, nothing any one else does or fails to do to or for us can ever separate us from the love of God. Amen.
[1] This summary of the argument is taken from “Working Out on Shabbos” a weblog article on Israel Forum’s Blog Central, available at http://www.israelforum.com/blog_article.php?aid=510198, accessed 3 February 2007; internet
[2] R. Alan Culpepper, “Luke” in Leander Keck, et. al, eds., The New Interpreter’s Bible (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995) 133
[3] ibid. 134
