THE LORD OVER THE LAW

Posted by Pastor Greg Allen on February 5, 2020 under AM Bible Study |

AM Bible Study Group: February 5, 2020 from Luke 6:1-5

Theme: If we walk in union with Jesus, we walk with the Lord over God’s law.

(All Scripture is taken from The New King James Version, unless otherwise indicated).

I had an interesting conversation the other day. I was talking with a Christian friend about ‘abiding in Christ’. I asked her what she thought it meant to abide in Christ; and her answer surprised me. “I abide in Christ by being very careful to take a sabbath rest.”

I was impressed with that answer; because it seemed to me to reflect the reason that God gave the Sabbath commandment. He gave this commandment as a gracious blessing and a benefit to humankind—a command to rest from labor, just as the Creator Himself rested from His work on the seventh day. In Mark 2:27, the Lord Jesus told the Pharisees, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27).

But in Luke 6:1-5, we’re told of how the Pharisees of Jesus’ time confronted Jesus and His disciples having taken grain in their hand and eating it on the Sabbath.

Now it happened on the second Sabbath after the first that He went through the grainfields. And His disciples plucked the heads of grain and ate them, rubbing them in their hands. And some of the Pharisees said to them, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?” But Jesus answering them said, “Have you not even read this, what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he went into the house of God, took and ate the showbread, and also gave some to those with him, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat?” And He said to them, “The Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath” (Luke 6:1-5).

Did Jesus actually lead His disciples in an act of breaking the Sabbath commandment?

This story comes as a part of an increasing sense of tension between Jesus and the Pharisees. As we have already seen in Luke’s Gospel, they had objected to how Jesus had told a paralyzed man that his sins were forgiven (5:20-21); presenting Himself as authorized to forgive sins committed against God. They were also uncomfortable with how He would eat and drink with sinners (5:30); showing that He did not keep Himself in strict separation from sinners as they did. And they questioned why it was that He didn’t teach His disciples to fast like they did theirs (5:33); allowing His followers to celebrate rather than teaching them to refrain—as they taught their disciples. And now, they confronted Him on what they considered to be another matter of tension—a very serious one in fact—an act of open violation of God’s law.

But our Lord demonstrated from the Scriptures that He was not violating His Father’s will at all. And more; Jesus even demonstrated that the only way to keep the true spirit of God’s law—as the Father Himself intended it to be kept—was by being in a close relationship with Himself and by following where He leads.

This passage, then, shows us the wonderful truth that, so long as we walk in faithful fellowship with Jesus, we will walk in full conformity to the true spirit of the holy standards of His Father. This is because if we are walking in union and fellowship with Jesus, then we are in union with the one who is Lord over the God’s law.

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Let’s begin by considering …

1. WHAT THE DISCIPLES WERE DOING (v. 1).

Luke tells us, “Now it happened on the second Sabbath after the first that He went through the grainfields. And His disciples plucked the heads of grain and ate them, rubbing them in their hands” (v. 1). Was there any actual wrong in what the disciples were doing? Not at all. They certainly weren’t doing wrong in plucking the grain out of the field of someone else. This was not stealing; because the Old Testament law, in fact, commanded that ‘gleaning’ was to be allowed in farm-fields of the Jewish people. God’s law said;

“When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not wholly reap the corners of your field, nor shall you gather the gleanings of your harvest. And you shall not glean your vineyard, nor shall you gather every grape of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the stranger: I am the Lord your God” (Leviticus 19:9-10).

This provision in Leviticus was an act of mercy on God’s part. God allowed it for the benefit of the hungry and needy traveler; so that as they journeyed along, they were free to go into the corners of the farm field and eat of the produce that the farmer was to leave for them. And that’s what the disciples of Jesus were doing. They were following behind Him and plucking the kernels from off of ripe stalks of grain; rubbing the kernels in their hand, blowing away the chaff, and eating the fruit of the field that was freely left for them to enjoy.

But that’s when the religious leaders made their appearance. It may be that they only casually saw what the disciples were doing. Or, because of the growing tensions, it may be that they were carefully watching them. In any case, they were upset over the fact that the disciples of our Lord were eating grain on the Sabbath—and that Jesus was not prohibiting them from doing so.

This leads us to consider …

2. HOW THE PHARISEES SAW THE MATTER (v. 2).

Luke says, “And some of the Pharisees said to them, ‘Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?’” (v. 2). What exactly did they see as sinful in all this? In the original commandment regarding the Sabbath, God had said;

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it, you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it” (Exodus 20:8-11).

What the disciples were doing couldn’t really be considered “work”—not in the normal sense of what ‘work’ would mean. They were not bringing in harvesting equipment, or hauling grain in large containers. They were simply plucking the grain, rubbing it in their hands, blowing away the chaff, and eating the kernels. There was nothing in the commandment that prohibited simply plucking up grain and eating it.

But the religious leaders had sought to protect people from violating that law by surrounding it with additional laws that dealt with how the Sabbath was to be kept. These were all spelled out in what is called the Talmud—or “the Instruction”. It’s a collection of instructions—originally oral, but eventually written down—that explained in detail how the law of God was to be kept in specific situations of life. The Talmud had several specific categories of activities that were prohibited on the Sabbath; and many of those prohibitions had to do with work in the field. There were prohibitions created by the rabbis against plowing, sowing, reaping, gathering, threshing, or winnowing; and all of them were meant to keep people from drawing too close to the moral ‘danger line’ and breaking the Sabbath.

When the Pharisees saw what the disciples of Jesus were doing, they felt that many of those Talmudic prohibitions were being violated. In their mind, they were breaking the Sabbath law prohibitions against “reaping” and “gathering” in that they were pulling the heads off of grain, and taking them up, and storing them in their hands or garments. And they thought the disciples were breaking the prohibitions against “threshing” and “winnowing” in that they were grinding the grain in their hands and blowing the chaff away. These Pharisees were doing doing what God warned about in Isaiah 29:13; and were “teaching as doctrines the commandments of men” (see Matthew 15:9).

Now, we might be able to understand the concern of the Pharisees—given their perspective. Favor with God, in their view, came through a careful adherence to the law given through Moses. But Jesus was not disrespecting the Sabbath. The commandment had come from His Father’s commandment; and He honored it and obeyed it with all His heart. But unlike the Pharisees, Jesus was respecting and observing the Sabbath according to the Father’s will—and not as the rules and regulations and prohibitions of man demanded that it be observed.

This leads us to …

3. WHAT THE SCRIPTURES SAID (vv. 3-4).

Look at how Jesus responded to their accusation: “But Jesus answering them said, ‘Have you not even read this, what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him …’?” (v. 3). What an interesting thing for Jesus to say to—of all people—Pharisees! Of course they had read it. But clearly, they had not really paid attention to it. They had become so focused upon the religious rules and regulations that they had made, that they had lost sight of what the Scriptures actually taught. He was calling their attention back to the word of God. (It always clears things up when we go back to what God’s word actually says.)

Now; the story that Jesus was making reference to is found in 1 Samuel 21. It tells of what happened when David came to the priest who served in the tabernacle of God in the days of King Saul. David had gotten word of Saul’s murderous plot against him; and so, he gathered some men and fled for his life. That passage tells us;

Now David came to Nob, to Ahimelech the priest. And Ahimelech was afraid when he met David, and said to him, “Why are you alone, and no one is with you?” So David said to Ahimelech the priest, “The king has ordered me on some business, and said to me, ‘Do not let anyone know anything about the business on which I send you, or what I have commanded you.’ And I have directed my young men to such and such a place. Now therefore, what have you on hand? Give me five loaves of bread in my hand, or whatever can be found.” And the priest answered David and said, “There is no common bread on hand; but there is holy bread, if the young men have at least kept themselves from women” (1 Samuel 21:1-4).

This “holy bread” was ‘the shewbread’ that God had commanded the priests to prepare and place before Him in the holy place of the tabernacle every Sabbath. Apparently, the old bread had been removed, and fresh, new shewbread had been put in its place. Only the priests were permitted to eat it. But here, the priest was looking at David and his soldiers—a group of very hungry men in need.

David assured the priest that the men were morally pure. So the priest gave him holy bread; for there was no other bread available but the showbread (vv. 5-6). This could have been seen as being in violation of the strict letter of the law. But we’re not told anywhere in Scripture that David, or his men, or even Ahimelech the priest, had done wrong in all of this. It was a necessary act of mercy; and in this case, the requirements of true mercy were more important than the strict letter of the law. To have sent David and his men away famished, when bread was there and available, would have been unmerciful. Jesus—the Son of God—approved of this act of mercy shown to David; and went on to ask the Pharisees if they had read that story; “how he went into the house of God, took and ate the showbread, and also gave some to those with him, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat?’” (v. 4).

Jesus was pointing to this story to show that, to make the disciples go hungry on the Sabbath—out of a strict demand that they keep the regulations that people created in order to protect the Sabbath—would be to place the rules and regulations above people. But that’s not what God intended by His law. In Matthew’s Gospel, we’re told that the Lord Jesus quoted Hosea 6:6; and told the Pharisees, “But if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless” (Matthew 12:7).

Now; that alone is a very liberating lesson. The Sabbath was made for man; and not man for the Sabbath. God’s good rules are given to serve our needs; rather than we being created to serve the needs of the rules. We must not focus so much on the strict letter of the rules and regulations that we lose our sense of the true spirit of God’s law.

But as great a lesson as that is, it’s not really the point of the story. We go on to read …

4. WHO JESUS DECLARED HIMSELF TO BE (v. 5).

Luke goes on to tell us, “And He said to them, ‘The Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath’” (v. 5). In saying this, He was saying that not only is the Sabbath meant to serve man; but that He Himself was Lord and Master of the Sabbath itself!

Notice first that Jesus said that He is “the Son of Man”. The Pharisees would have recognized that as a name for the Messiah—taken from right out of the Old Testament; in Daniel 7;

“I was watching in the night visions,
And behold, One like the Son of Man,
Coming with the clouds of heaven!
He came to the Ancient of Days,
And they brought Him near before Him.
Then to Him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom,
That all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him.
His dominion is an everlasting dominion,
Which shall not pass away,
And His kingdom the one
Which shall not be destroyed” (Daniel 7:13-14).

For Jesus to have declared Himself to be the Son of Man was the same thing as declaring Himself to be the Messiah—the Son of God in human flesh. He was saying that He was the Master of all humanity with all authority over God’s rules for humankind.

As the Son of Man, He is Lord of all the commandments of God—including the Sabbath.

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In the New Testament book of Galatians, the apostle Paul wrote to a group of Christians who were being persuaded that righteousness with God came as a result of carefully following the rules and regulations of the law. He wrote to them to teach them instead that if we are led by the Holy Spirit, we are not under the law.

The Holy Spirit empowers us to walk in close relationship with Jesus; and Paul explained that the Spirit produces the life of Jesus in us by faith. If we try to walk through life in the power of our own fleshly abilities in conformity with the letter of the law, we would only produce sin.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control … (Galatians 5:22-23a).

And Paul adds this: “Against such there is no law” (v. 23b).

To walk in fellowship with Jesus is to walk in fellowship with the One who is Lord over the law of God. He will never lead us in any other way than in complete conformity to the will of the Father. So; if we follow the disciples’ example of walking with Jesus—rather than in the example of the Pharisees—we’ll never go astray from the holiness that God intended in the law.

EA