In the sermon 'The Lord of the Sabbath (And Everything Else)' based on Luke 6:1-11, Jason Dohm explores Jesus' authority over the Sabbath amidst conflicts with the Pharisees and scribes, who challenge Jesus' interpretation of lawful Sabbath observance. The sermon outlines a series of conflicts from Luke 5 to 6, highlighting how the Pharisees and scribes continually questioned Jesus' actions, including the forgiveness of sins and association with sinners. Dohm emphasizes Jesus' declaration that he is 'Lord of the Sabbath,' asserting his authority over its observance. He illustrates this with the story of David eating the showbread, pointing out that acts of necessity are lawful on the Sabbath. The sermon critiques the Pharisees' rigid interpretation of the law, which misses the Sabbath's intent to be a blessing, not a burden. Furthermore, Dohm discusses Jesus' healing on the Sabbath as an act of mercy, underscoring that such acts have always been lawful. The message concludes with a call to understand the Sabbath as a day of delight and abundance, a time for worship and rest, not merely a day of restrictions.

The title of the message today is, The Lord of the Sabbath and Everything Else. Jesus is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. He's Lord of all, He's Lord over everything. But the questions on the table in today's text have to do with the Sabbath and Jesus actually says that day is mine. I own that day.

I'm the one who ought to say what's lawful or what's not lawful on this day. Conflict number one was in chapter 5. Jesus says to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven. The scribes and the Pharisees say, that's blasphemy. No one can forgive sins but God alone.

Jesus essentially says, I'll prove it. And he has the paralytic stand up and take his map and go to his home. Conflict number two, Jesus goes to a feast at Levi the tax collector's house and The scribes and the Pharisees say, why are you eating with tax collectors and sinners? It's not really a question, it's an accusation. Jesus says, I didn't come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

I'm a physician who's come to to heal. Conflict number three, scribes and the Pharisees say to Jesus's disciples, Why do we fast and pray often? John the Baptist disciples fast and pray often, but you don't fast and pray. Jesus says, I'm the bridegroom. Can the friends of the bridegroom fast when the bridegroom is with them.

Now in today's text we have conflicts number four and number five. So what we're seeing, Luke develop a theme. It's the theme of The resistance that he's getting from this small but most influential sect of Judaism, the Pharisees, and they're experts in the law, the scribes. You didn't have to be a Pharisee to be a scribe, but most of the scribes were Pharisees. And so we've had just five in a row conflicts about this and about really whose people the Lord's people are and who ought to have the say.

By the way, Sabbath conflict is all over the Gospels. We're going to hit Sabbath conflict again in chapter 13. We're going to hit Sabbath conflict again in chapter 14. So I hope you like it, because more is coming. Let's pray.

God, thank You for this text. Thank You that Jesus is Lord. And that we don't have to trust our sensibilities about these things. That Jesus has taken authority over them and made so many things so clear. Thank you that we get to live in the light of the New Testament when all these things have been made so clear.

It is a blessing. Thank you for it. I Pray that you would use this text for our encouragement. You would use a day of rest for our good. I pray in Jesus' name.

Amen. Alright, well we're breaking into 1-5, 6-11. Let's read 1-5. Hopefully your Bibles are still open to Luke chapter 6. Follow along as I reread verses 1 through 5.

Now it happened on the second Sabbath after the first that he, Jesus, went through the grain fields, and his disciples plucked the heads of grain and ate them, rubbing them in their hands. 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.

Here in these five verses we are taught that acts of necessity are lawful on the Sabbath. Says who? Says the Lord of the Sabbath. So you can take it on his authority. He owns the day and he gets to say an acts of necessity have always been and always will be lawful on the Sabbath.

What commandment is in view? The Fourth Commandment. I like how Vody frames it. No other gods, no images. Don't mess with my name, don't mess with my day.

That's the first four commandments. So this is a day not to be messed with. It's God's day, the fourth commandment. Remember or observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy, to keep it set apart to God. Work for six days, get all that work done in six days, then rest on the seventh day.

And make sure to secure rest for all under your influence. So in your household, you secure it for your household. If you have a wife, you secure rest for her. If you have a son or a daughter, sons and daughters, you secure rest for them. If you have work animals, you secure rest for them.

Everybody gets to rest on this day. You'll find The Ten Commandments in Exodus 20, that's the first time that they're given right after their liberation from Egypt. You'll find it again after the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. Again, in the second giving of the law, that's what Deuteronomy means, the second law. You'll find it in Deuteronomy chapter 6.

So now back to our text. It's a certain Sabbath day. Maybe a couple of weeks since the events of last week's text, the second Sabbath after the first. I just think a couple of weeks have passed since last week's text. And Jesus and his disciples are passing through the grain fields, just walking through the grain fields.

And Jesus now have people who are following him. We haven't been introduced to them yet. Mike will introduce us to them by name next week. They're walking through the grain fields and they're hungry so they pluck heads of grain and they separate the grain from the chaff by rubbing it in their hands and then they eat the grain. The Pharisees observed this and they say, why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?

Why are you plucking those heads of grain and separating and eating them? So that's the charge. Plucking heads of grain and then rubbing them in your hands to eat them is unlawful. You broke the law. Now what's the background?

Through the centuries the rabbis had created 39 different categories of activities. Not 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, not 10, not 20, not 30, 39 different categories. So that they could systematically evaluate. This activity is in Quadrant 4. Come over on the x-axis, go down on the y-axis.

It's in this, carry the one. Not lawful. So they could systematically evaluate and say, you can do this on the Sabbath, but you can't do that on the Sabbath. This, yes, that, no. This, yes, that, no.

And in that framework, a framework found nowhere in Scripture, plucking was essentially equated with harvesting. Okay, so now this is what the Pharisees are seeing. They're harvesting. What? No, they just picked a head of grain.

That's harvesting? Yes, because we went over on the X axis and we went down on the Y axis in the 39 categories outlined by the rabbis and we carried the one and now that is unlawful. And now that is unlawful. And rubbing it together to separate the wheat from the chaff in your hands is now threshing. So you're harvesting and you're threshing.

Jesus responds, have you never even read the scriptures? Oh, now think of who he's saying this to, the scribes, experts in the law, and the Pharisees, the ones who are actually serious about the faith, serious about law keeping. Have you never even read the scriptures? So blood pressure goes up to 200 over 150. Pharisees, let me introduce you to a wonderful book known as the scriptures.

Stop and think about that for a minute and the impact of that on the scribes and the Pharisees. There is no backpedal in Jesus. No backpedaling Jesus. It is head on. He's not avoiding conflict over interpretation of what's lawful and not lawful.

He's running headlong into conflict. He's actually initiating and escalating the conflict over the interpretation of what's lawful, not lawful on the Sabbath. Gentlemen, you obviously haven't considered 1 Samuel 21 and the implications. What's in 1 Samuel 21? In 1 Samuel 21, David, having been anointed by God's prophet Samuel to be king in 1 Samuel 16, so chapters earlier.

He's already been anointed as king, but he's not king yet. Saul knows, has been told by Samuel, that the kingdom has been ripped from him, but you're gonna have to pry it out of his cold dead hands. So he's been trying to kill David and he's redoubling his efforts to kill David. In fact, he's just at the end of 1st Samuel chapter 20, he's just thrown a spear at his own son for being David's friend. So David, with no time for preparations, flees for his life, and he and his men don't have food with them, so they stop and ask the priest for food.

And the priest has nothing to give them. There's only the consecrated bread. That's all that they have. It's the day when you put out fresh bread, so there's actually fresh consecrated bread that he doesn't offer to them, but the bread that that's replaced, which should be eaten by the priests and only by the priests, he gives to David and his men for food. In the parallel text to this in Mark chapter 2, so same circumstances but just related by a different gospel writer.

Mark records that Jesus said this, have you never read what David did when he was in need and hungry? So Luke records that Jesus said haven't you read what David and his men did when they were hungry? Mark adds in, in need and hungry to drive home the point, this is not in any way convenience. This is true actual necessity. Why were David and his men in need and hungry?

Because they thought it would be great to eat consecrated bread. No, They didn't even ask for consecrated bread. They just said, we need food. Can you give us food? Do you have anything to give us?

And the only thing that was available that the priest was offering to them was the consecrated bread from last week. There was fresh bread left. No, because David was fleeing for his life. It was a true, unqualified act of necessity, and That law was never designed to keep people from food in a circumstance like that. That's not what that law was for.

To keep people hungry if they found themselves in that circumstance. It was not unlawful for David and his men to eat that bread in those circumstances. In most circumstances it would be unlawful for you to eat that bread. In that circumstance it was not unlawful for them to eat that bread. So let me get this straight.

If that's the last food on earth, and you're not a priest, you can't eat it. You just starve. No, There is nothing inherently immoral about eating bread, thankfully, because that is a basic necessity for all of us every day. There's nothing inherently immoral about eating bread. We eat bread every day.

We need food every day. But that bread should only be eaten by priests under an overwhelmingly large percentage of circumstances. But in a case of true unqualified necessity, it was not unlawful for David and his men to eat that bread. Jesus is essentially saying if you had read 1st Samuel 21, and they had read 1 Samuel 21 many times, and if you had really thought it through and understood it, you would not call what my disciples were doing unlawful on the Sabbath. If you understood that text, you would not call what they were doing unlawful on the Sabbath.

The Sabbath was intended to give human beings rest and to give them a day to worship. They didn't have to work at the other normal occupations. They were afforded a day to worship and to rest. In the parallel text in Mark chapter 2. I've already referenced it.

I'll reference it again here. Mark records that Jesus also said this. Luke doesn't capture it, but Mark says it right here, right in this section, The Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath. What does that mean? It means that God made the Sabbath to be a blessing to mankind.

But you can turn it into a curse by acting like you exist for it, like God made man to exist for the Sabbath instead of it existing as a blessing from God for your good. You can turn things exactly around and take what God made to be a blessing for mankind and make it into a curse by feeling like you have to slavishly serve it like you were created to serve it, not that it was created to be a blessing for your own good. You can turn the Sabbath into a cheerless drudgery by slavishly serving it when it was created to serve you. Now, how in the world can you possibly turn something that was intended to be a blessing from God for your good into a cheerless drudgery? How could you even do that?

Well, for instance, by saying things like acts of necessity are lawful. Unlawful. Excuse me. By saying that normal acts of necessity are unlawful. By saying that picking a head of grain is harvesting.

By saying that rubbing it in your hands is threshing. The Expositors Bible commentary says this, the disciples were not farmers trying to do some illicit work, But they were itinerant preachers casually picking some heads of grain. They weren't farmers trying to get away with working on the Sabbath. They were hungry and needing to eat. Finally, Jesus says to the Pharisees, the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath.

At some point we'll take more time to talk about Jesus' favorite self-designation. He likes to call himself this better than he likes to call himself anything else. When he puts a label on himself, most likely that label says the Son of Man. For now, Suffice it to say that this title marks Jesus, this amazing miracle worker who can do divine things, like proving that he can forgive sins. Only God can do that.

Yes, that is correct. Let me heal this man to prove I can do that. This title plants him firmly as part of humanity. Is that important? If we need to substitute, it's important.

So Jesus, by this title, is absolutely planting himself firmly in humanity. Good, now he can go to the cross for me. But also, He's laying claim to being the exalted figure of Daniel 7. In Daniel 7, one like the Son of Man comes before the Ancient of Days and receives glory in an everlasting kingdom where all peoples, nations, and languages serve Him forever. You could just fast forward right to Revelation chapter 4 and chapter 5 where every tongue, tribe, people, and nation are before the Lamb.

That's Daniel 7. That's the one like a son of man coming and receiving this kingdom that probably was not lost on the scribes and the Pharisees. Jesus said, had you never read the scriptures, but he knows they've read the scriptures over and over and over again. The Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath. So I looked up when I preached on Matthew 12, which is the parallel text in Matthew to this, so same circumstances, just Matthew's gospel.

It was December 11th, 2011. So 14 years ago I preached on essentially this text. I said this, When Jesus says the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath, He's not claiming executive privilege. What is executive privilege? Because I'm the executive, The laws that apply to you do not apply to me.

He's not claiming executive privilege here. No way. In Galatians 4 verses 4 and 5, Paul states so clearly that Jesus was born under the law to redeem those who are under the law. So Jesus is subjecting himself to the law and never claiming executive privilege in the incarnation and obeying every law in the incarnation in order to redeem those who are under the law is absolutely essential and stays intact in this text. So this is not executive privilege, where the executive doesn't have to obey the laws that everybody else needs to obey.

This is Jesus claiming the supreme authority to rule on what is lawful and what is not lawful on the Sabbath. I'm the supreme authority who rules on this. I'm the Supreme Court. Because the Sabbath belongs to him. It's his.

Because the Sabbath is his own institution and the fourth commandment came from him. When you need a just ruling and you go to the Supreme Court for a just ruling, you hope you have originalists. What are originalists? They're the ones who are trying to get at, what did the givers of the law have in mind when they gave this law? We want to give a ruling that's consistent with what was in the mind of the law givers.

Well, Jesus is a pretty good place to go for those things. He is the Word. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. So don't think for a minute that Jesus is saying, there's a new sheriff in town, me, and I'm changing how we're going to handle the Sabbath.

No, Jesus is the old sheriff. Jesus is the eternal sheriff. There's not going to be a new sheriff in town. There's only Jesus starting an eternity past, and He is saying what the Sabbath has always been. However, it might have been misrepresented and abused by the Jewish leaders.

By the way, as we work through the Gospels, we're going to see there's a lot of Old Testament law that was misinterpreted and abused. Jesus goes one by one correcting. Nope, it always meant this. Nope, it always meant this. Nope, it always meant this.

Eternally it's meant that. It's not new law. It's not a new sheriff in town. It's the eternal sheriff with this supreme authority to rule on these things. In last week's text, Jesus laid claim to being the bridegroom.

Meaning the bride belongs to Him. Bride is his. He came to give himself to and for the true people of God. So we're his. You're part of the people of God, but you belong to Jesus.

Because he came to give himself to you and for you. So Jesus will not be conforming to expectations. Jesus, why don't you fast and pray often like we do? He will not be conforming to our expectations about what is lawful and what is not lawful on the Sabbath day. We don't know.

He knows. So that is verse 1 through 5. Acts of necessity are lawful on the Sabbath, so says the Lord of the Sabbath. And they always have been, acts of necessity have always been lawful on the Sabbath, and they will always be lawful on the Sabbath. This helps us think through what we should do on the Lord's Day.

Verses 6 through 11. Now it happened on another Sabbath also that he entered the synagogue and taught. And a man was there whose right hand was withered. So the scribes and Pharisees watched him closely whether he would heal on the Sabbath and they might find an accusation against him. But he knew their thoughts and said to the man who had the withered hand, Arise and stand here.

And he arose and stood. And Jesus said to them, I will ask you one thing, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil? To save life or to destroy? And when he looked around at them all, he said to the man, stretch out your hand. And he did so, and his hand was restored as whole as the other.

But they were filled with rage and disgust with one another, what they might do to Jesus. These verses we're taught that acts of mercy are lawful on the Sabbath, so says the Lord of the Sabbath. Another Sabbath comes, Sabbath sometime in the future, we don't know the time gap in between, it doesn't matter. Jesus is in a synagogue teaching. A man is there, his right hand is withered.

His right hand is unusable. He does not have the use of that hand. And there are scribes and Pharisees there too, and they're watching Jesus closely to see if He'll heal this man on the Sabbath. Why are they watching him to see if he'll heal him on the Sabbath because they're hoping to have something to accuse him of. He's actually a very blameless man, the most blameless man who's ever lived, the only blameless man who's ever lived, and they're looking for something to grasp on to to accuse him.

They are hoping he will heal this man on the Sabbath so that they can accuse him. Oh please heal him so that we can accuse you. Do you see how sick that is? Look, he violated the Sabbath. Did you see him working on the Sabbath?

Jesus knows exactly what's going on. The text says, he knew their thoughts. So again, He didn't hear them whispering. He doesn't need to hear whispering. He has full access to all of their unspoken thoughts.

So he knows what's happening in their minds. So knowing exactly what they're up to, what does Jesus do? He keeps a low profile so as not to give any ammunition to His enemies. No! Actually, he does the exact opposite of that.

That's what I would have done. I would have kept a low profile so as not to give ammunition to my enemies. But again, Jesus does not backpedal from confrontation. He actually initiates the confrontation and escalates the confrontation. Jesus picks a fight.

Most of us should avoid picking fights, but Jesus knows just the fights to pick. He does it right. He knows sometimes, he knows that sometimes you should pick a fight. He tells the man with the withered hand. He's teaching in the synagogue.

He tells the man with a withered hand, come stand right here. Come out from the rest. Everybody's sitting. Come out from the rest. Come here to me, the teacher.

Here in front of everyone. Arise and stand here. That's what he says, arise and stand here. Now Jesus, with the man with the withered hand, out in front of everyone. So you can see, he has picked the fight.

Come stand right here. What if I did that right now? JZ, come stand right here. He's right out in front of everyone and all eyes are on what's happening. Jesus addresses the scribes and Pharisees.

I will ask you one thing, one question. Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to destroy? And then he just looks around. He looks around at them all. I don't know whether he made eye contact with every single person in the room, but I'm not betting against it.

It says he looked around at them all. Isn't it lawful to do good on the Sabbath or evil? To save life or destroy? Anyone? Anyone?

In the parallel account in Mark 3, the beginning of Mark chapter 3, Mark says, But they kept silent. So there are no takers. And when Jesus had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts, he said to the man, Stretch out your hands." So Mark gives us some more information, some more words that Jesus said. Or some more descriptions about what's actually happening with Jesus. He was angry!

This is righteous anger. We know very little of righteous anger, but there is such a thing and he knows how to do it. Paul says in Ephesians 4.26, be angry and sin not. That's what Jesus is doing. Why was he angry?

He was grieved by the hardness of their hearts. Here's a man who hasn't had the use of one of his hands, has lived as a man who can only use one hand for who knows how long. He has faith to be saved, and Jesus is willing to save him, but they're using it as an opportunity to accuse him and it grieves him how hard-hearted they are and it makes him angry. The man does in fact stretch out his right hand. Jesus was not mocking him.

If you or I told a man with a withered hand to stretch out his hand. It would be so cruel. Stretch out the hand that you can't stretch out. It would be a mockery, but Jesus is not mocking him. Of course, he was healing him.

And the man does stretch out his hand. And now his right hand is every bit as good as his normal left hand. Everything works great. Back to Jesus' question. What's the answer?

It is lawful to do good on the Sabbath. It always has been, it always will be. It is lawful to save life on the Sabbath. It always has been. It always will be.

By the way, what are the scribes and Pharisees doing on the Sabbath? Evil. Is it lawful to do what I'm doing on the Sabbath or to do what you're doing on the Sabbath? What you're doing is what's unlawful. Acts of mercy are lawful on the Sabbath.

They always have them. They always will be. And This was certainly a wonderful act of mercy. This is a man who has been going through life with one usable hand. We're not told anything about what happened before or what happened after, but here's what you know.

That was a hard life. Jesus had mercy on him. His life got a lot easier in that moment. In fact, in many ways, the Sabbath is the best day of the week for acts of mercy. I don't think we should save them for the Sabbath, but this is the day where we honor God who saves sinners.

You can argue it's the best day of the week for an act of mercy. That so far from Holding back from mercy on this day, we should be more forward to be merciful on this day, having received mercy. Now, in chapter 5, when Jesus healed a paralytic, proving that he had power to forgive sins. He connected it to the authority to forgive sins. The scribes and Pharisees should have thought and said, this is a mark of the Messiah from the prophets.

This is the Savior God has been promising. And here, when Jesus heals this man who had a withered hand, the scribes and Pharisees should have thought and said, we should be getting our understanding of what is lawful on the Sabbath from this man. None of us can heal. We should be taking our cues from this man, but it's the exact opposite. They're filled with rage.

This makes them filled with rage that this man now has the use of both of his hands because of the day on which he was healed. They start to talk among themselves about what they might do to him. How can this be? We marvel at this. We think, it's so obvious, and of all people, these should have been the people to recognize the signs.

If anyone could recognize the signs, surely it's the experts in the law. The explanation is actually very simple. They aren't born again. And when you're not born again, you have the nature of all of Adam's offspring, and our natures have become terribly twisted and corrupted. Look at this text.

Look how twisted and corrupted you can become. You're filled with rage that someone who started the day with one working hand ends the day with two working hands. They don't have eyes to see or ears to hear. Apostle Paul says this in Titus 1 verse 15. To the pure, all things are pure.

But to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure. Not even the healing of a man is pure, if you're defiled and unbelieving. The end of that verse, but even their mind and conscience are defiled. It's what you're seeing. So that is verses 6 through 11.

Acts of mercy are lawful on the Sabbath. So says the Lord of the Sabbath. They've always been lawful on the Sabbath. Acts of mercy will always be lawful on the Sabbath. Let me take you to one place before we consider some applications.

It's Isaiah 58. Turn to Isaiah 58. Isaiah 58 is actually my favorite Sabbath text because It goes right to the blessings of the Sabbath. Isaiah 58 verses 13 and 14 is right at the end of the chapter. If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath, I read and understand that as stop stepping on the Sabbath.

If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy day of the Lord honorable, and shall honor Him, not doing your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words, Then you shall delight yourself in the Lord And I will cause you to ride on the high hills of the earth and feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father. The mouth of the Lord has spoken. So we lay aside, gives you a list there, your own pleasures, your own ways, your own words, in order to give God the place of honor. It's really the whole point. It's to give God a day where He, above all other days, has the place of honor.

So that you pick up the blessing that God has given us. Like you get delight in the Lord. That's the payoff. Okay, You're laying certain things aside and what's the payoff? Delight in God.

Before we were planted, we were still part of Hope Baptist. Those of you who were there, we went through Deuteronomy. I think there were five sermons, five or six sermons on the Fourth Commandment. The series was titled, a day of delight. That's how we should think of this day.

Stop short-cutting to all the things in your brain, all the things that you don't think you can do. Rewire the short-cutting to delight, delight, delight. A day of delight. So are there things we set aside? Yes, of course.

But fundamentally, it isn't a day of self-denial. Fundamentally, it is a day of abundance. It's not a day of fasting, it's a day of feasting. The Puritans called it the market day of the soul. It's where your soul goes to market and gets the stuff that will make it fat.

If your soul is too skinny, here's one way you can make it fatter. Go get what you need for your soul to be fat at the market on the market day of the soul. It's a feast day. We are denying self, but in the good way. The way that draws our affections away from the least important things.

You get off the hamster wheel, always spinning, never going anywhere. And you refix those affections on the most important thing. That's what the day exists for. And none of that makes acts of necessity or acts of mercy unlawful. You can have a day of abundance.

And acts of necessity and acts of mercy are lawful. They've never been unlawful. Never. They never will be unlawful. Okay, applications, let me give you two.

One. Beware of straining out gnats while swallowing camels." This comes from Matthew 23, verses 23 and 24, where Jesus accuses just these people who are encountering our attacks of straining out gnats and swallowing camels. If I had understood that saying before, I knew it meant Don't get caught preoccupied over small things while you ignore big things. But actually, the fuller meaning of that is that both gnats and camels are unclean in the Old Testament. Some bugs you can eat, some bugs you can't eat.

So John the Baptist ate locusts with honey. Anything taste good with honey? And that was lawful. But A lot of bugs you can't eat because they're unclean in the Old Testament. These are symbolic of spiritually clean and unclean things.

A gnat is an unclean thing. The Pharisees were worried that because wine is sweet and sometimes draws gnats that when they're drinking their wine, they might have missed a gnat. Before drinking wine, they would filter it through cloth. Did you know this? They're filtering wine through cloth to make sure that no gnats are in what they drink because gnats are unclean.

Jesus says, yeah, you're filtering the wine, you strain out the gnats, and then the rest of the meal is camel, and you eat it and don't notice. Camel is also unclean. I'm reading Leviticus now in my Bible reading plan. I read about the uncleanness of camels this week. And Jesus says, you're tithing down to the garden spices, And you've forgotten about justice, mercy, and faith.

What kind of a world is it that tithes down to the garden spices? Have you tithed on your garden produce? But forgets about justice, mercy, and faith. Why does this matter? Because while we'd like to be Jesus in the text, we're usually the Pharisee in the text.

There's something in natural human inclination and all our corruptions aren't gone yet. For the born again, if you think you're done with your corruption, so help you. There's something in your heart that will obsess over fine points. Not to say that fine points are illegitimate, but to say, like When you forget about justice and mercy and faith, when you're obsessed about these fine points, that is so messed up. And we have an inclination towards that.

So we should come away from this text seeing a natural human inclination, and we should go on the hunt down. Where am I doing that? Number two. Behold the Lord of the Sabbath. He's a man, he's a son of man, but he has all authority.

The Jesus we see in the Gospels is God and has all authority and the day being spoken of here is His day. It belongs to Him because He claimed it. He claimed it. How that relates to the New Covenant, how we should think about what is called the Lord's Day in Revelation chapter 1 is a subject for another time. I have strong opinions about it, but at the time of this text, the old covenant Sabbath is in force.

And Jesus is obeying it, and Jesus is explaining how it should have always been interpreted. This is not new law, new sheriff in town. The eternal sheriff is just saying how it should have always been. And freeing that commandment from the misinterpretations and abuses that existed then. But it's still very instructive to us.

Let's give thanks. God, thank you for Jesus. So refreshing to have Him as Lord and not fallible leaders who lord it over, like the scribes and Pharisees were. Thank you for the freedom that we have to obey Jesus. Thank you for the wisdom in these texts.

I pray that you would help us to think rightly about the lawfulness of acts of necessity, acts of mercy every day of the week. I pray that you would make us people who are full of mercy and who are careful about the consciences of our brethren. I pray in Jesus' name, amen.