How to Misunderstand God’s Law

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And I read a story within the last few weeks about a man during the height of the Cold War who decided with the threat from the Soviets and the threat from the nuclear bombs and such that maybe it would be a good idea if he had a nuclear bomb shelter, a fallout shelter. And so he started researching plans for them and talked with architects and engineers and he had paid them and he had gotten the plans and he had ordered all the supplies and having stuff delivered. But the last thing that he had to do was to get his permit from the city, whatever city he lived in.

I don’t know. I don’t recall what it said in this story. But he had to get a permit from the city.

So he had to take all the plans and everything to the city inspector. Had to have it okayed before he could proceed. So the city inspector looks it over, says, I’ll get back with you.

He gets notified a little while later that his plans for a fallout shelter have been denied. His permit has been denied because it’s not up to city codes. So he looks it over.

And finally, he contacts the city inspector and says, what is it that’s not up to code about this? And the city code said that in all new construction, you had to have windows. So they turned down his permit for his nuclear bomb shelter because there were no windows.

Let that sink in for a minute. They kind of missed the point, didn’t they? Now, if you’re not familiar with the concept of a nuclear bomb, massive bomb, have you seen on TV the mushroom cloud where everything comes?

It’ll destroy everything for 10 or 20 miles and send radiation particles in there. So you want to be behind several feet of concrete. So the idea that you would want to put windows in this bomb shelter is, you know, government for you.

But they miss the point of a bomb shelter if they want you to put windows in it. And it’s easy to miss the point of things sometimes. It’s easy to get so wrapped up in our little details that we miss the overall point of important things like that.

And that’s what the Pharisees did with God’s law and His commands. Sometimes they got so wrapped up in the little details of their traditions, the little details that they had appended to the law, that they missed the whole point of the reason why God gave the command in the first place. And one of the instances where they did this, where they wanted to put the windows in the bomb shelter, one of the places where they missed the point was with the Sabbath.

And that’s what we’re going to look at tonight. There’s a few stories, actually, from the book of Mark, where Jesus has run-ins with the Pharisees over the Sabbath. And His interactions with the Pharisees give us some insight on how to miss the point of God’s law, if we were trying to do that.

Now, what we can take from it and learn is don’t do what they did in order to miss the point of God’s law, in order to understand what He intended with these things. So we’re going to be in Mark chapter 3, I’m sorry, Mark chapter 2, and then we’re going to go into chapter 3. We’re going to look at a few stories here.

Mark chapter 2, starting in verse 23, if you would turn there with me. If you’re using your phone, there’s a link in our bulletin to the scriptures we’re going to use. And you really don’t even need me to ask you anymore to stand, do you?

If you’re able to stand without too much difficulty, we’ll read from God’s Word together. Mark chapter 2, starting in verse 23, says, Now it happened that he, that’s Jesus, went through the grain fields on the Sabbath. And as they went, his disciples began to pluck the heads of grain.

And the Pharisees said to him, Look, why do they do what is not lawful on the Sabbath? But he said to them, Have you never read what David did when he was in need and hungry, he and those with him? How he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar, the high priest, and ate the showbread, which is not lawful to eat except for the priests, and also gave some to those who were with him.

And he said to them, The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. Therefore the Son of Man is also the Lord of the Sabbath. Now we go on to chapter 3, and we’re going to read through verse 6.

And it says, And he entered the synagogue again, and a man was there who had a withered hand. So they watched him closely, whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse him. And he said to the man who had the withered hand, Step forward.

Then he said to them, Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill? But they kept silent. And when he had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts, he said to the man, Stretch out your hand.

And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored as whole as the other. Then the Pharisees went out and immediately plotted with the Herodians against him, how they might destroy him. And you may be seated.

So it’s important to note here, first, right off the bat, that Jesus never violated God’s law. He had these run-ins with the Pharisees all the time. We’ve looked at several of them just on our journey through the book of Mark already.

He had these run-ins with the Pharisees where they often accused him of violating the law, him and his followers. They often accused him of doing things that were not lawful. But really, Jesus never violated the law.

Jesus is the law giver. Jesus never violated the law. He merely violated their interpretation of the law.

If I came and told you, what is the speed limit on cash road? Like 100? It’s something like that.

45? Okay. 95, okay.

Let’s just say it is 45, okay. And I came and told you, And you’re driving 40, Don Cash, number one, you’ll get killed. But if the speed limit is 45 and you’re driving 40 and I came to you and said, why would you violate the speed limit?

Well, what speed limit? Well, it’s my tradition that we only go 35. Have you violated the law or have you just violated something I made up about the law?

Just something I’ve made up about the law. They had their interpretations that were not exactly what God put in place and then they would get on to Jesus and his followers for not doing the things that they thought. Because they had equated their traditions with God’s law.

So I just want to be very clear right off the bat that when we have this back and forth, sometimes you’ll hear today when people don’t particularly want to be obedient to what God’s Word says, they will make it out, well, the religious leaders thought in their day that Jesus was wrong for this and that. There’s a difference. They were not going according to what God said.

They were going according to their interpretation. their misinterpretation. They were going along with their traditions and blaming Jesus for not following those things.

So Jesus never violated God’s law. He couldn’t. But by the way, the Pharisees reacted to what Jesus did here.

And look at what he did. He allowed his disciples to eat. That’s pretty important, right?

Does anybody else like to eat in here? Okay, that’s a good thing. and we need to eat to live, right?

They were hungry and so He allowed them to eat. Oh no, it’s on the Sabbath. He allowed them to pluck heads of grain, which by the way was allowed.

Now God’s law didn’t allow you to go out there with a sickle and start harvesting your fields on the Sabbath because that was considered work. God’s law did allow you to go pick some heads of grain if you were hungry. It did allow you to go pick an apple out of the tree if you were hungry.

That’s not harvesting, that’s eating. God’s law allowed that. But they, in their tradition, I think the Pharisees had started out hundreds of years earlier with good intentions, maybe.

Started out saying, we don’t want to risk violating God’s law. So if God’s law says, don’t go past this line, let’s put a line back here and not go past it. Probably with good intentions until you start making that the law.

Until you start equating your guardrails with God’s law. They got mad at Jesus for allowing his disciples to eat, to pluck the heads of grain by hand and eat them. And they got angry with Jesus for healing a man.

Now, they had an agenda here. They were after Jesus. They already didn’t like Jesus.

They already wanted to destroy Jesus. Can you imagine being so consumed by hate and honestly just being so downright petty that you’re looking at a man with a lifelong problem he’s had that disrupts his life. and you’re looking at this and thinking, oh, I just hope He heals that man so we can get Him.

You don’t even care about the person anymore that Jesus is dealing with. You don’t care about the need that this person has. You don’t care about the fact that God loves this person.

You are just hoping that Jesus does one thing or the other and using this man as a pawn in your political agenda to get Jesus. So they’re sitting there watching, hoping, oh, is He going to heal Him on the Sabbath? because if he is, we’re going to get him.

That was their attitude toward Jesus. The way they dealt with Jesus, the way they reacted to these things, it reveals some mistakes they made in the way that they viewed God’s law. And I want to talk about those tonight.

They made at least four mistakes in the way that they viewed God’s law. First of all, the Pharisees saw God’s commands as burdens to bear, rather than blessings that are there for our good. And we still can do this today.

We still do this today. We treat God’s law as though it’s something there to keep us from having fun, something there to to rain on our parade instead of recognizing that God puts guardrails and safety nets around us for our good, for our protection. This is what they did.

They complained that the disciples were doing farm work on the Sabbath by plucking and eating the heads of grain. They said, look, why do they do what is not lawful on the Sabbath in verse 24? Now, as I told you, it was lawful on the Sabbath.

It was something they were allowed to do. It was not farm work and therefore it wasn’t a violation. But Jesus went a step further.

He could have said, this is not what that’s talking about. This isn’t farm work. But Jesus realized that behind that objection, there was a deeper heart issue that he needed to deal with.

And so he goes in verse 27 and says to them, the Sabbath was made for man and not the man for the Sabbath. They had a fundamental misunderstanding of what God’s law was about. God didn’t create, hear me on this tonight, God did not create man so that there would be somebody to follow the rules.

That’s not our purpose for being here on this earth. God created the rules and put them in place for our protection. I don’t know if you’ve ever realized that before, but that’ll change the course of your life if you get that in here.

God did not create me for the purpose of there being somebody to follow the rules. God created the rules for my benefit. That was true of the Old Testament law.

That’s true of the things that he tells us to do in the New Testament. They are there for our benefit and ultimately for his glory. But we are not there so that there’s somebody to follow the rules.

In verses 25 and 26, Jesus used an example from 1 Samuel chapter 21. I’d encourage you to go back and read it sometime. But in this story, David’s troops, David and his troops were out in the wilderness.

They were out fighting. They hadn’t had any food in days. They were starving.

And David’s troops were allowed to come into the tabernacle and they were allowed to eat this consecrated showbread that was used in the tabernacle. And it was only supposed to be eaten by the priests. It’s right there in the Old Testament law that that’s what was supposed to be done.

And it’s not that David and his men went in there and disrespectfully ransacked the tabernacle or anything. He went in the day before the Sabbath when they replaced, they’d bake the bread on the day before the Sabbath, and they would replace it, and they would take the old bread, and they would give it to the priests to distribute once they’ve put the new bread out there on the table. So this old bread, and when I say old, I don’t mean that it was bad, it was just done being used in the tabernacle.

That bread was supposed to be distributed to the priests, and because it was consecrated and holy and used in the tabernacle, it was only to be eaten by the priest. That was the law. And yet David comes in and there is a legitimate emergency need and the high priest allows David and his men to eat the bread. And God seems to be okay with it.

When you read 1 Samuel 21, God doesn’t say, oh, he shouldn’t have done that. And if we’ve learned anything together in our study on Wednesday nights going story by story through the Old Testament and we’re now dealing with just the immediate aftermath of the law and then receiving the law right now. If we’ve learned anything in that study up to this point, it’s that if God has a problem with something, He was going to let Israel know.

Nadab and Abihu brought fire from the wrong place to use in the tabernacle and God incinerated them. God doesn’t say a word about David and his men eating the showbread. And if there’s any doubt in our minds that God is okay with it, now I can’t explain to you why God is okay with it.

if maybe God had said something to David, if God had said something to the high priest, I don’t know. But if there’s any doubt that God is okay with it, just look at the fact that God the Son affirms that behavior right here in Mark 2. He used this example.

They ate the holy, the consecrated showbread that was under normal circumstances, according to the law, only there for the priests, and yet they, because of their dire need, were allowed by God to eat it. And Jesus said it’s the same thing here. Yes, there is a rule, But it’s there for God’s people, not God’s people for it.

God gave them the Sabbath to make their lives better. But the Pharisees were using the Sabbath to make life harder. The idea of a Sabbath day was supposed to make their lives easier.

That they were supposed to work for six days, but then take a day of rest. God wanted them to rest. We need that rest. And yet, are you like me? Were you ever find yourself feeling guilty for taking time off and resting? And I don’t mean just time off from work.

But at the end of the day, when we get all the children to bed, if we’re not zombies at that point ourselves, my wife and I will sit down and have a few minutes of conversation before one of us passes out. We might have snacks and watch a little television. Half the time I sit there and feel guilty thinking there’s something I should be updoing.

There’s something in us that we’re workaholics. Not always, hence the labor shortage in our country right now. But there’s something in a lot of us that we are just wired that way to go and do and not to take a break and rest. And God says you need it.

And so he required it. But it was there to enhance the quality of life. It was there to refresh God’s people so that they could go back and work and they could go back and serve and do better at it.

But the Pharisees had taken what was supposed to be a day of rest and made it into a day of rules where you practically needed a flow chart to figure out what was allowed on the Sabbath. I’ve heard some accounts of some of the rules. You could carry this much ink and you could carry the equivalent of ink.

Even today, I understand that because of the restrictions on what can be carried and how far under the Sabbath, that some Jewish communities will string up wires around groups of houses and consider it one dwelling place so that they’re not in violation of carrying things from one dwelling to another. With all due respect to my Jewish friends, I cannot imagine that being restful. And that’s what the Pharisees had taken God’s gift of rest and turned it into.

We see here in the Sabbath that God’s commands are meant to improve our lives. And I know the world looks at that and says, that’s crazy. God’s commands improve our lives.

Who wants to live in a lawless society? Everybody thinks it sounds fun until the cities go up in flames. who wants to live in a society where there’s no rules against murder who wants to live in a society where there are no rules about rape who wants to live in a society where there are no rules about robbery we could go down the list all these heinous things that are condemned by god’s word and I submit to you that he as they are outlawed by the secular rulers it’s because god has engraved the law on our hearts, as the Bible says.

And so there are some things that we just automatically know are wrong and some things that are right. Nobody really wants to live in a lawless society. As I said, it sounds great until the lawlessness happens to you.

God’s commands are meant to improve our lives and help us grow closer to Him, but we make a mistake when we forget that’s the purpose. God’s purpose is people and not simply the rules. So the next time you look at something in Scripture and say, I really don’t want to do that.

And we think to ourselves, God’s just a spoil sport to make me do that. We need to consider how it protects us, how it protects our families, how it protects our heart, how it guards our fellowship with Him. These things are put there for our protection.

Our kids may not believe it, but the rules we give them are not there to spoil their fun. We give you rules because we love you. You know that, right?

do you do you always feel that way does it feel like we sometimes just want to spoil your day probably lying in church but we give the rules because we love and that’s what god’s done to us now second of all the pharisees saw god’s command as an excuse to neglect others part of what they’re doing here is using god’s law and god’s commands as an excuse to neglect others when jesus stood there in the synagogue preparing to heal a man, rather than rejoicing over the fact that he was healed, they were outraged at the idea that he would do this on the Sabbath. Can you imagine? They came and told us that the doctor was available to do Jojo’s second heart surgery, and he was going to do it such and such day.

And we were ready. She was ready. She was ready to get out of there because we knew the need of this pacemaker after the first surgery, it’s the only thing keeping her in here.

It’s the only thing holding her back. We just need to get this done. I wish they’d have done it a week earlier.

But they came and said, he’s ready to do it. It’ll be tomorrow. Can you imagine if I’d looked at them and said, you can’t do that on a Friday.

We have plans. They were upset that Jesus wanting to heal him and do this incredible thing for him didn’t happen according to their timetable. They were outraged at the idea that he would heal on the Sabbath.

And so Jesus asked them, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to evil? To do evil, to save life or to kill? Because see, there was this rule in Judaism that if you had the ability to help and didn’t, it was the same as doing evil to the person.

So the Pharisees, for all their trying to trap Jesus and stuff, he’s got them over a barrel here. He says, is it lawful to do good or evil? If they say, well, it’s lawful to do good.

Well, I did. If they say it’s not, you shouldn’t be doing what you’re doing. So you’re saying it’s okay to do evil on the Sabbath.

Cool. Got it. Either way, there’s not an answer here they can give.

What would the law have me do? Do good and preserve life or do evil and take life? And that was really the choice.

God’s commands were designed to lead us to do good to others and to save life. But they were using it as an excuse not to bother with people. And honestly, sometimes people are difficult, right?

As a species, we tend to be a little bit of a handful, right? It can be that way in ministry too. People can be difficult.

Don’t feel bad that I’m saying that. I can be difficult too. It’s just who we are.

And the Pharisees were to the point, they didn’t want to bother with people. If you weren’t part of their little group, they didn’t have time for you. They didn’t want to mess with you.

They certainly didn’t care whether this man was healed or not. They were more concerned about their rules. And so Jesus said, You can’t use this as an excuse to do the wrong thing.

You can’t use the rules. And I’m not talking about following the rules. I’m talking about the way they twisted the rules.

Have you ever seen people that can do this? They can twist the rules. My favorite example of this is years ago, telling Benjamin, no, you cannot have another spoonful of ice cream.

And then later on, I caught him in the kitchen eating out of this years ago. You probably don’t even remember. I caught him eating ice cream at Nana’s house out of the tub with a fork.

well I can’t really whoop him for that some people are good at twisting the rules and they were twisting the rules as an excuse not to bother with people now some people would take this and run with it and say oh there are no rules it’s just about loving people and doing what they want listen there’s a line Jesus was not doing anything that was sinful according to God’s law and he was not encouraging anyone else to do anything sinful. Instead, he was telling the religious leaders not to twist God’s command as an excuse to keep from serving, as an excuse to avoid serving God and serving other people. And we have to be careful of the same thing.

Third of all tonight, the Pharisees saw God’s commands as a cafeteria where they could pick and choose what they wanted. You notice they are very concerned about God’s law. Very, very, very, seriously, deeply concerned about God’s law here.

And yet they showed themselves willing to disobey God whenever it suited them. If you go to the very end of the passage we read, verse 6, the Pharisees went out immediately and plotted with the Herodians against him that they might destroy him. There’s a lot to unpack in this verse, but I’m going to move through it quickly because our time is running short.

They were conspiring with people that they considered to be evil. The Herodians, now we just read right over that, the Herodians were the people who supported King Herod. They were the people who were collaborating with the Romans.

They were the ones that were compromising with the pagan Romans and their pagan gods and their pagan ways. They were the ones that were okay with Israel being under the thumb of the Romans and with the Romans having so much authority and influence because it filled their pockets and gave them more authority and more influence. And the Pharisees, under normal circumstances, would have kept people like the Herodians at arm’s length.

But suddenly they’ve found common cause. And so they start plotting with the Herodians. These people that they consider wicked to be traitors against Israel and traitors against God.

And they started conspiring with them to harm Jesus. So they’re conspiring with the wicked. They’re plotting to harm somebody that they know is innocent.

So think about this. They have set themselves up as though they are so holy and so willing to follow God’s law and God’s commands wherever they lead. But they left out something in Proverbs chapter 6 and a number of other places as well.

But Proverbs chapter 6, starting in verse 16, says, these things the Lord hates. Yes, seven are an abomination to Him. A proud look.

They certainly had a lot of those about them. Jesus could tell just by their proud looks what they were thinking. A proud look, a lying tongue, they would later lie about Jesus.

Hands that shed innocent blood. It’s exactly what they were plotting to do. A heart that devises wicked plans, like teaming up with the Herodians against Jesus.

Feet that are swift in running to evil, they wasted no time to get there and do this. A false witness who speaks lies, this was part of their plan, ultimately. They hired witnesses to fabricate testimony against Jesus, and one who sows discord among brethren.

And I’m sure if I think real hard about it, I can come up with a time they did that too. But they were oh so concerned about what Jesus did on the Sabbath because the law was so important. And yet look at what God, it says God hates.

And they didn’t care. They looked at God’s commands as a cafeteria that they could pick and choose from. Folks, if any of these, this is probably one that is most prevalent in churches today.

We have to be careful about this. And I’m not saying we go back to following the Old Testament law. We’ve talked about that on Wednesday nights.

Jesus Christ fulfilled the Old Testament law. It we read everything through the lens of the New Testament. And so when we say, this is what God says about any subject, and people say, oh, well, do you eat shrimp?

Yes, I do. Because we read the Old Testament through the New. And the New Testament doesn’t say I can’t eat shrimp.

That was a law for Israel. You see, I’m not picking and choosing what I follow. I’m reading it according to what Jesus said about it and what the Apostle Paul said about it.

When I come across things in the New Testament that were written to apply to me. I don’t get to pick and choose what I follow and what I don’t just because some things are hard or unpleasant. Honestly, there are some things, and don’t gasp when you hear this because we’re all in the same boat, but there are some things in the New Testament that if my flesh had its way, I would rather not do.

But when I find myself not doing what God said, the answer is not for me to say, well, that one’s okay. The answer is for me to say, Father, I’m sorry. I was wrong.

Help me to be more obedient to you. I don’t get to pick and choose. And we have to be careful about not picking and choosing because the world can smell hypocrisy a mile away.

Finally tonight, the Pharisees saw God’s commands as something that were at odds with the character of God. Jesus reminded them in verse 28, the Son of Man is also the Lord of the Sabbath. Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath.

Jesus is the Master of the Sabbath. Jesus is the one who formulated the Sabbath, came up with it, and gave it to mankind. Jesus is God the Son.

I’m not saying the Father didn’t have a part in it. I’m not saying the Spirit didn’t have a part in it. I’m saying Jesus had a part in it.

He makes the rules. He understands the rules. And He applies the rules.

If we want to understand how the rules work, we read them through the lens of Jesus. And so Jesus taught them all through this about what the purpose of the Sabbath is. And for us to understand God’s commands, we have to look at His character.

I’ve told you before, God’s commands, God’s law, are rooted in who God is. The reason I hammer this home all the time, I don’t know if I’ve ever told you this story, but the reason I hammer this point home so often is that this, and some of you may be in college within the next few years, some of you may have kids or grandkids in college in the next few years who may be faced with this, and we need to know what to say to it. When I was in a freshman philosophy class at OU, they presented to us the Euthyphro Dilemma, where Socrates argues back and forth with Euthyphro.

Is what’s pious because the gods love it, or do the gods love it because it is pious? In other words, applied to Christianity instead of the Greek pagan religions, because they used it as a club to try to disprove Christianity. Is right right because God says so, or does God say so because it’s right?

If God says so because it’s right, then there’s a higher law than God. If it’s right because God says so, then God could affirm anything, and it becomes right. It’s completely arbitrary.

So either God’s under something else, or they kick God off of his throne of holiness. And I thought, neither one of those sound right, but I was a freshman in college. What did I know?

I thought I knew everything until I got there. I didn’t have an answer for this, and I wish I had, because how many other people have sat in that class and numerous others and heard that and thought, oh, what I’ve been taught all my life, it doesn’t make sense. And I realized after studying my Bible years later, I’d been in ministry a few years by this point when I finally stumbled across the answer.

There’s a third option. Right is right because it’s tied to the character of God. There’s nothing higher than him outside of him that determines what’s right and wrong.

And it’s not just an arbitrary choice where God can say, no, lying is wrong. Let’s try that. No, right is right because it is reflected and tied to the unchanging nature of who He is.

That’s why I tell you, honesty is right because God is a God of truth. Faithfulness is right because God is faithful. We need to understand this, that the law is not just some arbitrary thing that God’s put out there.

It reflects who He is. It is not just a checklist of rules. We have to understand that His commands reflect who He is, and they are designed with a purpose beyond just following the rules.

His commands are there for us to work those things out for our good and for His glory. That when we follow His commands and we learn to be more faithful, when we learn to be more truthful, when we learn to be more compassionate, when we learn to be more discerning, when we learn to do all the things that He tells us to do, what we’re really doing is learning more about who He is and how to follow in those footsteps. We can’t separate God and His commands because His commands are rooted in who He is.

And I think that’s part of what Jesus meant when He says, The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath. They were trying to pit Jesus against the rules. People still try to do that today.

In progressive churches, they will try to put the Word of God against Jesus and make them butt heads. But you can’t separate the two and understand either because what God said is a reflection of who God is.