Tuesday, October 17, 2023

WHY THE LAW IS STILL LAW

The legalists were out to snare Jesus. Among other things his disciples were picking corn to satisfy their hunger on the Sabbath day. Jesus owned the Sabbath; he said to them, “For the Son of man is lord even of the Sabbath day” (Mat 12:8). The Sabbath day is a day of rest. No work was lawful on the Sabbath day, but Jesus Himself did work: 

13 Then saith He to the man (with the withered hand), “Stretch forth your hand.” And he stretched it forth; and it was restored whole, like as the other. 14 Then the Pharisees went out, and held a council against him, how they might destroy him. 15 But when Jesus knew it, He withdrew himself from there: and great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all. (Mat 12:13-15)

 Jesus made several points with that ‘statement.’ The main point is that good things could be done on the Sabbath; not hard work like digging ditches or doing fun things but improving life for those who believe.

When the disciples picked corn, that did not diminish Jesus. It did, however, remove their hunger. If anyone would save the life of even a lamb, that would be the merciful thing to do. Then Jesus had mercy on the man with the withered hand and restored it to be like the other. His final point was made when “the multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all.”

Following Jesus was work. It was against the Law to move about, “The Lord has given you the Sabbath, therefore He giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days; abide you every man in his place, let no man go out of his place on the seventh day” (Exod 16:29). Make your bread on another day and stay put, to make it clearer. However, they were following Jesus on the Sabbath day of rest, which in itself was breaking the Law.

Of course, the Pharisees were right. The disciples should not have picked corn. The Law was that God would give them two days of food on the sixth day. Throughout the gospels, Jesus called those who believed in Him to follow Him. Jesus rested in the tomb on the Sabbath day. He prepared Himself on the sixth day for that time of ‘rest.’ Death for Jesus was merely sleep, albeit dying was agony.

But did Jesus truly rest on the Sabbath? Although His Body was at rest, His Spirit — the Holy Ghost — was quite busy, delivering sin and Satan to Hell! Paul wrote, “Now that He ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the Earth?” (Ephes 4:9).

Even while Jesus rested, He broke the Sabbath for a great cause — the healing of the nations. Jesus revealed to the legalists that good things were still allowable.

The difficult thing for the Pharisees was discerning what was good! They thought that following the Law to a tee was the greater good whereas Jesus made allowances for both essential things and human improvement, as well as following Him.

Because they were following Jesus, the disciples could pick corn to nourish their bodies. Without food, they could not have followed Jesus.

The Lord said to pray a certain way, “Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors” (Mat 6:11-12).

Jesus gave His followers their daily bread, even on the Sabbath day. (He allowed them to pick corn.) If they had prayed, He had already given them permission to gather corn, and even said to ask God to forgive their debts, or ‘trespasses’ as some versions say it.

The Pharisees never were able to add one plus one and get two. It was still unlawful to pick the corn, but Jesus had the power and grace to forgive such simple things. The Law, therefore, had a point; that although people break the Law, the Lord still has the grace to forgive.

Then, Jesus Himself broke the Law when he restored the hand of the man that followed Him. I’ll show them, He may have thought. What if Jesus had done what the doctors do? See you on Monday, friend.

Jesus is not confined by time. God did rest on the seventh day, but to be honest, God does not need rest when it comes to healing. He broke His own Law to heal the man, and then broke it to heal the ailments of the multitude.

When Jesus healed the ‘multitudes’ that means so much! It was not just the Jews that He healed, nor even just the Gentiles, but whosoever believed in Him to the extent that they would even break the Law to follow Him. The Law was not meant to prevent Christians from following Jesus, and therefore, they could both pick the corn and follow Jesus because Jesus, they knew, would forgive their trespasses, or lawbreaking.

Neither was Jesus a respecter of persons. The Pharisees missed the point! They followed Jesus wherever He went to monitor Jesus and His followers breaking the Law, ostensibly to condemn them when the time came to try Jesus. The Pharisees, by following Him, were also breaking the Law, but neither did Jesus condemn them, even at the crucifixion for those who would kill Him, “Know not what they do” (Luke 23-34).

Just as Jesus said to the woman who prostituted herself, “Neither do I condemn thee: go and sin no more” (John 8:11), He did not condemn the disciples, the multitude, nor even the Pharisees. They were all permitted to follow Him and break the Sabbath Law.

The Law was meant for breaking! Mankind was sinful, and genetically, because of original sin, keeping even one Law, let alone all the Law, was never possible. Just following Jesus made them all lawbreakers, and that was not necessarily a bad thing because it revealed that they all needed Jesus to forgive their trespasses.

A debt, or trespass, is essentially violating the Law on God’s ‘Estate.’ The Law of God is doing the Will of God. It is His Will that He be followed, despite breaking another Law.

The legalese in modern times is a ‘priori’ — logically concluding from a general principle to the expected facts or effects.

The general principle is that Jesus is the Authority who decides the motive for lawbreaking, given the facts or effects. A priori was that following Jesus would be a better principle than not breaking the Law. Jesus allowed them to break the Law for the better purpose of trusting Him rather than the Law. In fact, Jesus wrote the Law, and as the Author, or Authority, He could abridge the Law whenever it would be good to do so.

Resolving hunger was more important than resting. The restoration of a withered hand was more substantial than rest, and the healing of the souls of man was tantamount to preserving the Law, not that the Law is not God’s Will, but that He has abundant grace!


Technically, going to church on Sunday (the Christian Sabbath) is breaking the Law, but a priori is to be with the Spirit of Jesus.


Next, the healing of the multitude will be examined more closely.

(picture credit; Art and Faith Matters)



 

 

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