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Commentary on "Lord of the Sabbath"
Day 5: Wednesday, February 15, 2012 - Jesus and His Sabbath: Part 1
Overview
It is interesting that the truth of the Sabbath rest found in Christ has made enough in-roads into Seventh-day Adventism that they are finally having to address the issue head-on instead of their usual focus on people changing Sabbath to Sunday. However, the accusation that this is based on the need to justify rejecting the 7th day Sabbath is baseless. The only issue is what does Scripture teach. We have already seen that SDAism twists the accounts of Scripture to insist that the Sabbath was given to man in the Garden of Eden when there the Biblical evidence refutes this. Next we will examine the ways in which the New Testament accounts are similarly twisted.
Observations
The passage being studied:
At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath, and His disciples became hungry and began to pick the heads of grain and eat. 2 But when the Pharisees saw this, they said to Him, “Look, Your disciples do what is not lawful to do on a Sabbath.” 3 But He said to them, “Have you not read what David did when he became hungry, he and his companions, 4 how he entered the house of God, and they ate the consecrated bread, which was not lawful for him to eat nor for those with him, but for the priests alone? 5 Or have you not read in the Law, that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple break the Sabbath and are innocent? 6 But I say to you that something greater than the temple is here. 7 But if you had known what this means, ‘I DESIRE COMPASSION, AND NOT A SACRIFICE,’ you would not have condemned the innocent. 8 For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” 9 Departing from there, He went into their synagogue. 10 And a man was there whose hand was withered. And they questioned Jesus, asking, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”—so that they might accuse Him. 11 And He said to them, “What man is there among you who has a sheep, and if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will he not take hold of it and lift it out? 12 How much more valuable then is a man than a sheep! So then, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath” (Matt 12:1).
It is interesting that the lesson would tell people to focus specifically on the Sabbath healing. The majority of this passage is not about healing and by skipping over this part of the passage the authors can lead people to their conclusions. I have found that we often learn more about the biases of the author by looking at what was skipped over.
Jesus disciple's were hungry and they gathered food on the Sabbath. The first time that the Sabbath was introduced to man, the lesson involved gathering of food (manna) on the Sabbath.
It came about on the seventh day that some of the people went out to gather, but they found none. 28 Then the LORD said to Moses, “How long do you refuse to keep My commandments and My instructions? 29 See, the LORD has given you the sabbath; therefore He gives you bread for two days on the sixth day. Remain every man in his place; let no man go out of his place on the seventh day.” 30 So the people rested on the seventh day (Ex 16: 27).
Clearly gathering of food on the Sabbath was never included in God's plan for the Sabbath. The disciples were not breaking man made rules about the Sabbath, they were doing the exact opposite of what God laid down as the example in Ex 16. Notice also that Jesus doesn't defend the disciples by saying that it was a man made law; He defends it by comparing the Sabbath to a ceremonial commandment.
3 But He said to them, “Have you not read what David did when he became hungry, he and his companions, 4 how he entered the house of God, and they ate the consecrated bread, which was not lawful for him to eat nor for those with him, but for the priests alone?
Jesus compares the Sabbath to a ceremonial law because the Sabbath is a similar type of law. We can never find examples where it would be acceptable to worship other gods or to murder because we were hungry, or even because it was necessary to heal someone. A "moral" law cannot be set aside for our needs. The Sabbath command is different from the other commands in the Decalogue for this reason.
The rules and regulations about the Sabbath were not man-made requirements making the law harsher than it was given. God gave specific rules and regulations related to the Sabbath (see the discussion in Tuesday's lesson for a review of these God-given rules. Suggesting that Jesus was fighting against the Law that He gave seems silly.
Copyright 2012 BibleStudiesForAdventists.com. All rights reserved. Revised February 10, 2012. This website is published by Life Assurance Ministries, Glendale, Arizona, USA, the publisher of Proclamation! Magazine. Contact email: BibleStudiesForAdventists@gmail.com.
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