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Lord of the Sabbath
Mark 2:23-28 (ESV) 23 One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. 24 And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” 25 And 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: 26 how 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?” 27 And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.”
Jesus’ title as Lord of the Sabbath only appears three times in the Bible, all occurrences are in the New Testament, only in the synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), and only at one common event: the disciples picking heads of grain on the Sabbath.
The Complete Word Study Dictionary: New Testament tells us what the Greek word here for Lord means: “kurios: As the main possessor, owner, master, e.g., of property.” So, as Lord of the Sabbath , the Sabbath was Jesus’ to do with as He wished, to define as it was originally written by Him.
Mark is telling us as Lord of the Sabbath Jesus has total control over how the Sabbath is to be observed and interpreted, yet the Pharisees accused Him and His disciples of working on the Sabbath.
They were taking grain from a field, though. Isn’t that work? About Matt. 12:8, where the same occurrence is recorded, Albert Barnes says the following in his Barnes’ Notes on the Old and New Testaments: “To crown all, Christ says that he was Lord of the Sabbath. He had a right to direct the manner of its observance—undoubted proof that he is divine.”
How is Barnes jumping to the conclusion that Jesus is claiming to be God here? It was God who gave us the Sabbath, and the Sabbath Law predates the very Ten Commandments of Exodus chapter 20. Right after escaping Egypt, when Moses spoke to the Israelites concerning collection of the Manna, the Sabbath Law was to be observed: Ex. 16:29 (ESV) See! The Lord has given you the Sabbath. And breaking the Sabbath was punishable by death: Ex. 35:2 (ESV) Six days work shall be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on it shall be put to death.
Did Jesus and His disciples really break the Sabbath Law God Himself gave to Moses? Deut. 5:12-14 “ ‘Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14 but 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.
It all seems pretty plain, the disciples were not to “work” on the Sabbath, and Deut. 5 says they must not do any work. So, maybe this was enough to get into trouble, but the supreme authority on the Sabbath, the Lord of the Sabbath, interpreted it just as plainly.
Maybe the Apostle John had this event in mind when He wrote John 5:18, This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
Why is this important?
So much of Scripture either points to the deity of Jesus or implies it. This passage in Mark and the parallel passages in both Matthew and Luke support His deity. Jesus is Lord not just of the Sabbath but all including the Sabbath: “even of the Sabbath,” as Mark tells us.
In our world, there are many who would deny Jesus is God and tell us He was just a great moral teacher. I don’t think that option is open to us as C. S. Lewis says in his book, Mere Christianity:
“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him [that is, Christ]: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic–on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg–or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse…. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come up with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”
*** Just a personal note: Monday, July 1, 2024 will mark seven years this blog has been online and has offered 368 posts. God is good!