Mark 2: 23 - 3:6
Marginally Mark…Pentecost+2…2018
Resting on the seventh day is part of the rhythm of Creation in that fabulous story in GEN 1 & 2. And still applies no matter how Creation took place or how it’s still ongoing. Failing to make space for God, our world, & our own true self to grow in God, disrupts those in-built rhythms God has always intended. When we fail, we pay a cost in the disintegration going on in so many societies. Respecting & restoring good Law & its good intentions towards us, including keeping a Sabbath, is Gospel.
Whether or not today’s passage, or at least some of it, is an add-on from a later time as some scholars think, v. 27 sounds as genuine as anything else Jesus ever says: the Sabbath, &, surely, it follows, the other Commandments, too, are not just for God’s benefit, but for ours, too. We’re fashioned after God’s likeness, including the need to ‘rest’, because it’s in our interests! In our family’s interests! In society’s interests! In the world’s interests, as well as in God’s interests!
Let’s explore those benefits that come to us, our families, our communities, & of course, to God, too, from a positive angle. Preaching about the way the Law is being interpreted by hard-liners in Jesus’ day, or our own, may not be a fruitful harvest field today. Neither would dissecting His healing of a man’s ‘withered’ hand be likely to be a healing experience unless we explore it to open up the whole question of how God heals now. The positives Jesus emphasises here are clearly to do what’s good & right & needed as & when that need arises; not according to which day of the week it happens, or is allowable!
Do the Commandments sometimes seem more a threat looming over us, rather than the promise God intends them to be? Let’s practise & preach them as promises for all who discern God’s will. Letting Holy Spirit transfer the God-energy we see in Jesus into Jesus- like interpretations of Law, will produce more positive results than any amount of legalistic drum beating!
The Hebrews of old lived & travelled among peoples who’d not moved on to mono-theism; away from attitudes & practices inimical to the way YHWH the One God looks at things. One can understand a strict interpretation being promoted as necessary to ‘protect God’s interests’ among the multiplicity of gods on offer back then. But Jesus, as Son of Humanity, knows through experience to practise a far more embracing approach. Including rather than excluding, loving rather than hating, & respecting rather than ignoring or avoiding others different from us. Jesus teaches us Ten Commandments are really Two.
Such an approach, preached & practised, galvanised into action by the Holy Spirit of Jesus, would show how we all fit into YHWH’s plan for His world. Whether we know Him by that Name, any other name, or none, at this point in time. God’s Law of Love embraces us all.
