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Sermon for 2nd Sunday after Pentecost 2024

First Reading: Deuteronomy 5:12-15

 12{Moses said to the Israelites,} “‘Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. 13Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant, or your ox or your donkey or any of your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. 15You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.’”

 

Psalm 81:1-10

 1Sing with joy to God our strength and raise a loud shout to the God of Jacob. 2Raise a song and sound the timbrel, the merry harp, and the lyre. 3Blow the ram’s horn at the new moon, and at the full moon, the day of our feast. 4For this is a statute for Israel, a law of the God of Jacob. 5He laid it as a solemn charge upon Joseph, when he came out of the land of Egypt. 6I heard an unfamiliar voice saying, “I eased his shoulder from the burden; his hands were set free from bearing the load.” 7You called on me in trouble, and I saved you; I answered you from the secret place of thunder and tested you at the waters of Meribah. 8Hear, O my people, and I will admonish you: O Israel, if you would but listen to me! 9There shall be no strange god among you; you shall not worship a foreign god. 10I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and said, “Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.”

 

Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 4:5-12

 5For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. 6For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. 7But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. 8We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; 9persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; 10always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. 11For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. 12So death is at work in us, but life in you.

 

Gospel: Mark 2:23-28, 3:1-6

 23One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. 24And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” 25And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: 26how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?” 27And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.”

1Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand. 2And they watched Jesus, to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse him. 3And he said to the man with the withered hand, “Come here.” 4And he said to them, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. 5And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. 6The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him.”

 

 Keeping the Sabbath Holy

Based on our First and Gospel readings for today, it’s difficult to gloss over the fact that these readings are about the Third Commandment.  Listen carefully to what God commanded through Moses at Mount Sinai, after freeing the Israelites from slavery and oppression in Egypt.  God said, “Observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy.  Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God.  On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns.  For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day.  Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Deuteronomy 5:12-15).  For Christians today, this is probably the most misunderstood commandment and at the same time the most abused.

To begin to fully appreciate this command, we must first go all the way back to origin of the Sabbath.  In Genesis chapter 2 verses 2 and 3 we read, “By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work.  Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.”  God in these two verses set the example for us: He set aside one day, “made it holy” and rested.  From the beginning of the world, God established a cycle of work and rest, knowing that His creation would need time for rest and refreshment.  And since we were created both body and soul, we need rest for our bodies, and we need refreshment, a time for our souls to be in communion with God.

Now before someone starts to argue that this is an Old Testament, Old Covenant, Commandment that doesn’t apply to us today, consider what the writer of Hebrews says: “There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his” (Hebrews 4:9–10).  And in Matthew 11:28-30 Jesus said, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”  We need a time of physical rest, and a time of spiritual refreshment.  God set aside one day per week for both these needs to be met.  The problem is, our sinful nature compels us to focus our minds and energies on ourselves and ignore anything that conflicts with the gratification of our desires.  Satan wants us to focus only on ourselves and take our focus away from God and meeting our spiritual needs.

So instead of repeating all the old, tired arguments of “I can worship anywhere”, or “I can rest doing this activity or that”, or “Sunday is the only time I have to do this or that”, the first question we must ask ourselves is, are my actions concerning the Sabbath an issue of idolatry?  Remember the First Commandment, “you shall have no other gods before me.”  Anytime we place anything between us and our devotion and obedience to God it is idolatry, even if that idol is our own self-focused wants and desires.

Repeatedly in the Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, God reminded the Israelites about the importance of keeping the Sabbath and of the consequences of not observing the Sabbath.  Furthermore, throughout the gospels, we read of Jesus not only honoring the Sabbath, but also of finding time for rest.  Jesus knew the importance of keeping the Third Commandment; of our need for rest and refreshment and we need to follow His example.  So, the question is, what is it about taking a break from our everyday lives, and resting as God commands, that we find so hard?

For many, one of the biggest difficulties in keeping the Sabbath holy is the basic understanding of what the Sabbath is for.  God set the Sabbath aside for us, for our rest and for our spiritual refreshment.  Consider Jesus’ words in our reading from St. Mark’s gospel: Jesus said, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.  So the Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath” (2:27-28).  There are two things we need to note in these two verses, God gave us the Sabbath, for our benefit, and second, Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath.  As Lord of the Sabbath, He is to be the focus of the day.  When God is the focus of our day of rest, we not only honor the day and obey God’s command, but we also keep the day holy or set apart.

To set something apart, or to keep it holy, is to treat it differently than we do the other six days of the week.  Think about that.  How do we currently treat the Sabbath differently than the other six days?  First, recall Jesus words, “the Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath”, therefore we’re to honor God, thank God, and worship God differently than we do Monday through Saturday.  On the Sabbath we come to church, we learn God’s commands and statutes, sing hymns of praise and thanksgiving, we receive God’s forgiveness and strength in the Sacraments, and we fellowship with our fellow Christians.  By the way, fellowship with other believers encourages us, emboldens us in witness and meets our social needs.

God, in His infinite wisdom, set aside the Sabbath to slow us down, to allow our bodies time to rejuvenate, to meet our physical, spiritual, and social needs and to give us time to reflect on all God has done and is doing in our lives.  The Sabbath is about rest, and the worship of God, of remembering all God has done and gives us an opportunity to bring our burdens to Jesus; it’s in Him we find our rest.  The Sabbath is a gift of God, given for our own good.  And we’re to observe the Sabbath as a way of giving thanks to God for His goodness.  However, we must also be careful not to turn the Sabbath into a religious work, thinking of it as a way of earning God’s favor.  Honoring the Sabbath isn’t about working our way into heaven.

Honoring the Sabbath isn’t about us obtaining God’s mercy and blessing.  We honor the Sabbath in response to all God has done and continues to do in our lives.  The Sabbath gives us an opportunity to reflect and give thanks to the One who gives us our daily bread.  Therefore, when we honor the Sabbath, we need to remember it has to do with our focus and attitude.  We always need to ask ourselves, “why am I doing what I’m doing?”  Jesus didn’t get angry with the religious leaders for their actions, He was angry with them because of their focus and attitude.  Instead of being focused on obedience because of love of God and neighbor, it became about them, and their adherence to a set of rules they had created.  The rules they instituted had become their idol and the worship of their idol was more important than God and neighbor.  Again, the problem was in their focus and attitude.

Down the street from the seminary I attended, was a Jewish synagogue.  As such, we had a good bit of exposure to the Jewish people and their beliefs.  This synagogue was served by a rabbi who typically walked or rode a bicycle to the synagogue on the Sabbath, even though he lived some distance away.  It wasn’t that he didn’t have a car, for him, driving constituted work.  In one of the conversations we had with this rabbi, someone suggested that it seemed like more work to walk or ride a bicycle to worship rather than simply turning on the ignition in an automobile.  His response was interesting.

He said that when a person walks or rides a bicycle on the Sabbath, that person isn’t tempted to go out to eat, to go shopping, or run errands, or to pick up something at the cleaners.  However, when one is driving a car, it’s much easier to do many more things than one intended to do, and thus, the special nature of the day is lost.  Moreover, anytime we do any of those things we encourage others to work, a violation of God’s command.  He was, of course, attempting to live up to the requirements of the Third Commandment.  Some people would honor his attempt to live by the requirements of this commandment.  Others would see it as an unnecessary concern for an outdated concept.

During Jesus’ ministry, He was repeatedly running into the requirements generated by this commandment.  While He was often at odds with the religious authorities over how this commandment was to be observed, He didn’t discount its intended value.  In our gospel passage, Jesus attempts to balance the validity of sacred scripture with human necessity.  It’s in this balance that we see the lessons.

The first thing this passage says is that religious people tend to get focused solely on regulations.  Consider the Jewish people of Jesus’ day.  The Sabbath was seen as special to them.  Outwardly, they treated it differently.  On the surface they honored the Sabbath.  However, remember why Jesus got angry with the religious leaders?  Their focus and attitude were about following the rules rather than serving God and what was best for their neighbor.  God, from the beginning knew that because of our sinful tendency that we will attempt to make things about ourselves.

Consider the Third Commandment in light of the Fifth, “Thou shalt not commit murder.”  It’s interesting that the prohibition against murder takes just five words, but the commandment about the Sabbath takes 94 words.  This shows us that the requirement to observe the Sabbath is so contrary to human activity that it required an extensive explanation.  As I mentioned earlier, God established the idea of rest on the seventh day of creation, therefore, a Sabbath rest is built into the very structure of the universe; there is a basic rhythm of activity and rest in all of life.  André Gide tells about an incident that took place years ago when he took a trip into the interior of the Belgian Congo.

Gide’s party had been pushing ahead at a fast pace for several days, and one morning when the Europeans were ready to set out, their native bearers, who carried the food and equipment, were found sitting around, making no preparation for the new day’s trek.  Upon being questioned, they said that they had been traveling so fast in the last few days that they had gotten ahead of their souls and were going to stay quietly in camp for the day in order that their souls could catch up with them.  In their primitive way they were describing the need for a rhythm in life between activity and rest.

For Israel, the Sabbath was a sign of their unique relationship with God.  The Sabbath became a weekly reminder of the Passover, the time when God had delivered the Israelites from slavery in Egypt and made them His people.  In his book, East River, Sholem Asch quotes the words of an old Jew, Moshe Wolf, about observing the Sabbath.  Wolf says, “When people labor, not for a livelihood, but to accumulate wealth, they become slaves.  For this reason, God granted the Sabbath.  For it is by the Sabbath that we are taught that we are not working animals, born to eat and to labor.  We are humans.  It is the Sabbath which is our goal, not labor….”  Unfortunately, as with everything in which people are involved, the Sabbath had the possibility of excess within it.  Initially the desire of the religious leaders was to keep from profaning the Sabbath.  However, instead of letting God’s command speak for itself, they instituted all kinds of petty regulations to safeguard the Sabbath.  Ultimately, adherence to the rules became more important than the people and reason for which it was created.

By the time of Jesus, the Sabbath had become a burden, not a blessing.  Strict rabbis had drawn up lots of rules over the years, regulating everything.  Some were ridiculous.  For example, it was taught that there could be no work on the Sabbath, so a person must be still; he must not shave or ride horseback; if his ox fell in a ditch, he could pull the ox out; however, if he fell in a ditch, he had to stay there.

Eggs laid on the Sabbath couldn’t be eaten; the hens had been working.  If a flea bit a person on the Sabbath, he must not scratch it, but let it bite in peace, for to try to catch the flea would be hunting on the Sabbath.  Once fire broke out in Jerusalem on the Sabbath.  The Jews, afraid to work on that day, let it burn, and three people were killed.  The day became more important than the reason and people it was designed to serve.  But when Jesus came, He reversed the idea, reminding people that rest, honoring God and taking care of the neighbor was more important than rules or regulations or days.  And for this, they sought His life.  Christians, too, have been tempted to focus on regulations.

Requirements about the observation of the Sabbath were eventually attached to Sunday.  The early Christians were responsible for some of the changes.  They had no special day of worship at first; so they observed the Sabbath along with the Jews.  But as the resurrection of Jesus assumed increasing significance among them, it seemed appropriate to have a day to remember that distinctly Christian event.  Therefore, the disciples chose the first day of the week rather than the seventh day, so that they might have a weekly reminder of Easter.

In 321 A.D., Constantine made Sunday an official day of rest for the Empire, and with that there began to develop an increasing series of rules to regulate that rest.  Subsequently, Sunday observance followed the pattern of the Jewish Sabbath before it.  Strict laws were set up for its observance.  In England, in 1653, a law was passed saying that any person above the age of seven caught walking in the streets on Sunday would be whipped and fined.  In one of our American colonies, a law said that a woman couldn’t wear a red dress on Sunday.  A sea captain returned to his home in Massachusetts after many months at sea.  His wife met him at the gate, and he kissed her.  But it was Sunday, and it was illegal to kiss one’s wife on Sunday, so the captain was jailed.

The second thing this passage says is that human beings are more important than regulations.  Jesus asked the question, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save a life, or to kill?”  We cannot allow ourselves to create rules that take our focus away from the basic reason God set aside the Sabbath in the first place.  We’re to rest and honor God.  Remember Jesus summed up all the Commandments into just two, love God and love your neighbor.

Many of you know a colleague of mine, Pastor Hefner.  When it comes to honoring the Sabbath, he is a stickler.  Some of what he suggests is a bit strict, but overall, he’s got an amazing grasp on what it means to observe the Sabbath.  At pastor’s breakfast the other day he challenged us with two scenarios.  It’s Sunday and after attending worship two men engage in two different activities.  The first, after a bad windstorm, sees that a large limb has broken off one of the oak trees at the church.  He goes and gets his chain saw and cuts up the limb so it can be more easily cleaned up later in the week.  The second man decides to take a walk after lunch and comes across a man with a flat tire.  Seeing the driver is having trouble loosening the lug nuts on the wheel, he stops and helps the man change his tire.  Which one of these gentlemen violated the Sabbath?

On the one hand both did something that constituted work.  The first cut up the tree limb, but let it lay.  The other helped a man change his tire.  The answer is found in their focus and attitude.  The first wanted to save time later and make it easier for him to cleanup during the week.  The second wanted to help another person.

When it comes to observing the Sabbath, what is our focus and attitude?  Are we more concerned about the rules than we are about honoring God and loving our neighbor?  Is the focus on ourselves, and are our decisions encouraging other people to work to serve us?  Are we doing things on Sunday because we’re so busy during the week that we’ve left no time for rest and spiritual refreshment?  God knew from the beginning that we need both in order to have balance in our lives.

Jesus got right to the point with the religious leaders: “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.  So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”  The Third Commandment is simple.   How, or even if, we observe it correctly, is about our focus and attitude.  Is the day about us, or is the day about rest and honoring God?

Amen

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