We're in the conflict portion of Mark, in which the things that happen regarding Jesus and his disciples create a conflict, and that conflict is mainly with the religious leaders, and in this case tonight, it's with the Pharisees. We're going to look at two examples that have to do with the Sabbath. The first is entitled in the ESV, Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath. The second one is the man with the withered hand. I want to inform you a little bit about the Sabbath. It was very, very important in the life of an Orthodox Jew of this time. If you look at the bulletin, Our bulletin does not say the Sabbath at the top with the date after. It says the Lord's Day and the date. That's correct for us to think in terms. But in terms of the Old Covenant or the Old Testament, the Sabbath was the day of worship. It was on Saturday. and it was instituted by God. To abandon the Sabbath day, in essence, was to turn one's back on the God of the Sabbath. When the theologians of the Pharisees, and that would have been the scribes, read concerning the Sabbath day, and that is found in Exodus 28 through 11, they immediately noticed that it talked about work. And so, they wanted the question answered, what is exactly involved when it talks about working? And how can we make sure that we don't break the Sabbath laws that speak of working? So what they did, they made a long list of regulations involved in that because they wanted to cover, as it were, all the bases so that they could never be accused of breaking the Sabbath law. And working was a key aspect of that. But there was a problem. Because those man-made regulations were looked upon as actual truth concerning the law. But they were man-made. They were the traditions of the Pharisees and scribes. And so what the Pharisees did, they took every opportunity to scrutinize what Jesus and his disciples did in all kinds of ways, but they really focused on the Sabbath. And this is what we're going to look at tonight. This is the Lord's day. We have gathered together on the Lord's day. Listen, on the Lord's day, it's not business as usual. It's the one day in seven that God has ordained to be set aside for worshiping and gathering together of his people. So what, I'm going to be emphasizing that with a question at the very end. There's going to be two questions, one for the first one that we look at and then the second one that we look at. By the fact that you are here tonight, speaks this, the Lord's day is important, to be very honest with you. This crowd is smaller than this morning. And I really wished I could preach this message in the morning service, to be very honest with you. Because maybe I'm preaching to the choir But again, maybe I'm not. So I'm going to read to you Mark 2.23-3.6 and then we're going to pray. He was going through the grain fields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. And the Pharisees were saying to him, look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath? And he said to them, Have you not read what David did when he was in need and was hungry? He and those who were with him, how he entered the house of God in the time of Abiathar, the high priest, and ate the bread of presents, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him. And he said to them, listen to this, the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. Listen, Jesus is laying down a principle here, a huge principle that applied then, but it also really applies today too. So the son of man, is Lord even of the Sabbath. Again, he entered the synagogue and a man was there with a withered hand and they watched Jesus to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath so that they might accuse him. And he said to the man with the withered hand, come here. And 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. And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their heaviness of heart, hardness of heart. And he said to them, said to the man, stretch out your hand. and he stretched it out and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately held council with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him. Let's pray. Our great God, we are here together tonight as your people, those you have redeemed, through your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Father, we thank you so, so much for the great salvation that is ours. We thank you, Father, that we have the opportunity and the privilege to be here tonight. And I pray, Father, that as I open up these two passages of scripture, that you would give me clarity and understanding, and above all, the unction and power of the Holy Spirit. God, we are weak and we are frail. We need your strength. We need your guidance. We need your hope. We need your care. Father, provide that for us, your people. Help us, Father, tonight to block out everything that would cause us or our minds to wander, that we might focus on the truth of your word, for we ask it in Jesus' name, amen. If you look at verse 23, of what the first one that I read to you. It says, one Sabbath he was going through the grain fields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. Now, why in the world would they be plucking heads of grain? The answer is very simple, they were hungry. The text does not describe how long they had eaten, But we know they were hungry because that's the only reason they would do that. In Camino, we have orchards. And Bonnie's a walker. And at times, she would walk through orchards. What do you find in orchards? Apples. And from time to time, She would find an apple on the ground or wherever, and she would eat it. Now there's only one reason she did that. Well, maybe a couple. She loves apples, but she was hungry. That's why she did it. So the setting here is Jesus and disciples, we don't know where they've been or what they've done, but we do know this, they're hungry. Look at verse 24, and the Pharisees were saying to him, they observed this, look, why are they, meaning his disciples, doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath? You see, the disciples would say, your disciples are reaping. Reaping is work, therefore, They are breaking the Sabbath law. Now, Jesus responds to that. He responds by asking a question, and it's a rather lengthy question. It goes from verse 25 through 26. He reminds them of an incident that happened to David and his men that's recorded in 1 Samuel 21, one through six. And in essence, here's what he's saying to these disciples. Hey guys, have you read your Bible? The Pharisees had a translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint. It was a Greek translation and Jesus even quotes from it. That's what he's saying to them. Have you not read your Bibles? You're the men that claim to be the theologians. And they were supposed to be the experts in the Hebrew Bible. Now, here's the question, and it is a lengthy one. Have you never read what David did when he was in need and was hungry? he and those who were with him, how he entered the house of God in the time of Abiathar the high priest and ate the bread of presents, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him. And then right after asking that question, he gives the principle. The key principle, the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. Let me read you a statement here. It was given to man to meet his needs, to bring him a special blessing spiritually and physically. not to restrict his life and reduce him to a rule keeper. And that's exactly what the Pharisees did. They reduced people to checking it off. I didn't do this. I didn't do that. I didn't do this. And then thinking all was well. And what Jesus is saying, all is not well at all. Legalism, and this is the height of legalism, is absolute absurdity. Absurdity. And this is where these Pharisees were. And then Jesus goes on. He goes on and he talks about his authority in verse 28. He says this. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath. Now you notice he said Son of Man. He didn't say Son of God. We know he's the Son of God. Mark tells us at the very beginning. He refers to himself as the Son of Man. And what he is saying is, so the son of man is Lord of the Sabbath. What does it mean for Jesus to be the Lord of the Sabbath? He ordained the Sabbath, therefore he is sovereign over the Sabbath. And what he's saying to them, you need to apply the principle. You need to apply the principle that I've just given to you. Now, I wanna talk just a little bit at this point. about how we can go askew. This is the Lord's Day, and I mention to you, it's not business as usual. But there are some who restrict the Lord's Day, and they start going like this. And I'll be very honest with you, I don't see that in Scripture. What are we to do? It's the Lord's day, so we gather together every Lord's day to worship God. Now, there's nothing in the Bible that talks about Sunday school. Sunday school came way later in church history. But the Bible talks very early about God's people gathering together. And this is what they did on the Sabbath. God's people gathered together. It doesn't say anything about a morning and evening service. But here's the way it is. Gold Country Baptist Church has a morning service and there are some fellowships that end it right there. They don't have an evening service. Gold Country Baptist Church does. Here's the way I look on it. It's another opportunity for Dean Orr to hear the word of God preached and to gather together with God's people to worship him. That's how I look at it. And I personally believe that you need to be here unless you're providentially detained. It has nothing to do whether you feel like it. Listen, do you know what is happening right now? March madness. I love basketball. I love college basketball. This is when the teams are getting down to the sweet 16. There's one team that I'm really looking at, it's Virginia. And that's because of the coach of Virginia. His name is Tony Bennett. And when my son Andy was going to get his master's degree at Washington State University, Tony Bennett was the coach of the men's team. And Tony Bennett turned that team around. And usually when you turn a team around, a school that is really known for basketball wants you to come coach their team. That's what's happened to him. They're the number one seed in the Eastern Division. They're going to play Memphis. Okay, here it is. Sports Center. It's a click away. It's a click away. If I were not up here preaching, I would be so tempted. Nobody would know the difference. Well, if Bonnie were here, I wouldn't be doing it, okay? I might be back in the corner though somewhere. You know what? I can watch it some other time. Really, really, huh? I need to be here. I need to. You know why? Because you never know when God the Holy Spirit is gonna wrap himself around your heart and he's gonna open you up a little bit because you and I need to change and become more Christ-like. And it has nothing to do with who stands up here preaching, nothing. It has everything to do with how God the Holy Spirit works. And God the Holy Spirit loves to surprise us. The second one is about a man with a withered hand. This takes place in the synagogue where Jesus happens to be preaching on that particular day. And there in that synagogue on this particular Sabbath was a man with a withered hand. He is there because God providentially put him there. But you know who else is there? The Pharisees. They're there. They're there to see what Jesus is gonna do. Verse two says this, and they, meaning the Pharisees, watched Jesus to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath so that they might accuse him. And listen, that's what they wanna do. They wanna catch him. They never do. They're slow learners. They never catch him. He always foils them. Now, in full view of everyone, meaning hearing and seeing, Jesus says this to the man with the withered hand, come here. And what did he say to the Pharisees right after that? Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save or to kill? The point is really clear if you think of what he's just said prior to this about the principle. Jesus is arguing that God has given man the Sabbath for his blessing. What could be a greater blessing for a man with a withered hand that Jesus would heal him on the spot? What could be greater than that? Last summer, Bonnie and I, during the summer, take a trip. This year, we're going to the New England states. We're gonna get in that travel van, I think the 12th of May, maybe, gonna be gone for about a month, and we're gonna take off Highway 80, just go straight through. When we get to where we can go to Niagara Falls, we're gonna go up to Niagara Falls, And then we're going to make this little circle, so to speak, through the New England states. There's a couple that goes to this church and she was born up there. She's given us the name of a restaurant that we're going to go to. We can hardly wait to do this. When we were last year on a trip, we were staying in the parking lot at Walmart. That's an RV place, Walmart. I noticed the guy over here who had a big pickup truck and a long trailer. He had one arm and he was lifting up the hood and doing things and working. I thought, wow, man, that's something that guy can do it with one arm. I don't know if I'd like to try that. Well, here's a man with a withered hand, he can't use it. You know, you just take for granted you use your hand, right? However, the Pharisees taught that you could only heal somebody like this man with a withered hand only if his life was in danger. Was his life in danger? Absolutely not. So therefore, Jesus is not supposed to heal this man. What's the response of the Pharisees? Mark tells us, but they were silent. Listen, what is missing? The Pharisees had zero compassion. That's what's missing. No compassion. It didn't matter to them that this man had a withered hand and Jesus could heal him. What mattered is, check it off. You don't heal a man unless he's in serious life-threatening situation. That's what's important. No compassion. What was more important to them was their tradition, their tradition, their list of regulation, do's and don'ts, infinitum. What did Jesus do? Jesus said to the man, stretch out your hand. He stretched it out. and his hand was restored. I'd like to have seen that. I'd like to have seen the look on his face. One minute that hand is withered, the next minute, it's just like his other hand. It's like nothing was ever wrong. How does this section end? The Pharisees went out and immediately held council with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him. Who were the Herodians? They were part of a political group that supported the dynasty of Herod the Great and his sons. And by joining together with the Herodians, they were seeking to kill Jesus. That's where they are. They want to eliminate Jesus's life because Jesus doesn't check off their boxes. Okay, now we're at the point to where I want to ask some questions. But before I do, I want to give you an important principle that crosses everything in our life. Here's the principle. Right thinking leads to right doing. Right thinking leads to right doing. And where it starts is right thinking about God. That's where it starts. If you are thinking wrongly about God, you're in deep trouble from the get-go. Now, from time to times, I recommend books, and I do that specifically, and I have a book here that I want you to buy. I want you to get post haste. That means you might want to work a little bit tonight by going to amazon.com and ordering it. Or if you don't do it tonight, do it tomorrow morning. This is it. I first of all got it on my Kindle digital. Oh man, I get very frustrated with a Kindle though sometimes. I'm coming to the conclusion that Kindle reading is just for certain types of books. You see, this doesn't need to be charged, right? And I can actually find a page number on here, okay? I happen to be on page 77. Now, let me tell you why you need to get this book. The author of the book, David Wells, wants to focus you on the center of everything in a Christian's life. Here's the title of it, God in the Whirlwind. What's the whirlwind? The Whirlwind is life in 2014, because the book has come out in 2014. You know how he starts out? He starts out, he's written five other books on a grant from the Pew Foundation to explain how evangelicalism has gone wrong. And I have all the hard copies in a place and this is after I finish it, it's gonna go right in there, right there. His other books are unbelievable. He's a master at analyzing culture and what culture does and how it affects Christians. So in the beginning part of the book, he leads you into culture because whether you realize it or not, this thing can control you. Okay, I get iMessages. You can't text me because it's blocked. But I, not too long ago, I found out I could get an iMessage if somebody else has an iPhone or an iMini or an iPad. I didn't know that. It might have been a good idea if that person hadn't told me about this. But it's great. But it can control your life. You know what happens when you get an iMessage? Ding. Ding. Now it's silenced. Okay, it's silenced. But I'll be very honest with you, I don't get many iMessages. I don't. I have about three names on that category. But listen, do you know what he talks about in this book? He talks about distractions and how we as modern people, because of things like this, can get thoroughly distracted. Let me tell you, if you hear a ding, can you actually leave that for a half an hour before you look? Can you actually wait two hours? Unheard of. But what he talks about, we can get so distracted by things like that. You can, okay, I'm not a Facebook fan. I'll tell you right up front. I don't like it. I think it's a waste of time to be very honest with you. If you're on Facebook, sometime you clock how much time you check it out. You know what Facebook, okay, you know what a selfie is? I just learned this. I didn't know this. A selfie takes a picture like this. And then they have the audacity to send it to you as if you really cared. Who cares? I know what you look like. Listen, that's where we are as a culture. You can laugh, but that's where you are. That's where we are as a culture. We can't wait. You know how it affected me today? I sat down to go over my notes. I have a room where there's a little TV. March Madness is on, right? I didn't turn on the TV, but you know what I did? I stopped right in the middle of studying and checked out SportsCenter. and found out the latest scores. After I did that, I thought, what are you doing, Dinor? You can't wait, can you, Buckle? You just have to do it. So I'm right there with you. I want to tell you that. I'm right there with you. I'm not praising myself. at all. We need to learn to wait. We need to learn that there's a time and a place. The subtitle of this book is, God and the Whirlwind, How the Holy Love of God Reorients Our World. Kevin DeYoung says this, Kevin DeYoung went to Gordon Cromwell Seminary because David Wells was there and he wanted to sit underneath his teaching. He teaches systematic theology there. Here's what he says, partly because it's a small quote. Part biblical theology, part systematic theology, and part cultural reconnaissance. This is a powerful work that my generation, really any generation, cannot afford to ignore. After years of pointing out the shallowness of evangelicalism, this is Wells' masterful summary of what should be our depth, our ballast, our center. What needs to be a center? Holy love. That's how he describes God. God is a God of holy love. That's the umbrella. That's how we think of him. That's why I'm so gung-ho on this book. I'm on page 77. He's just starting about God is love. And then the next chapter, he's gonna talk about God is holy. And then he goes on from there, talking about theological issues like justification. Get the book, read the book. Now let me ask two questions. One question I asked prior to this, but it's a question I needed to ask myself, and I need to re-ask it to you. Are you a compassionate person? In Sunday school this morning, we're in chapter 10, verses 1 through 12, and Jesus talks about divorce. And guess who's there? The Pharisees. My sister, okay, I moved my watch. Okay, 702. My sister was divorced. It tore our family apart. My dad had already died. And my mom said to me one time, I am so glad that God took your father. I don't know if he could have taken this. My sister never got over this. Never. Young people, marriage is serious business. Don't marry a fool. You may be thinking, oh man, if I could only, where am I gonna get married? Don't think that way. There are people in this church who've gone through it. You ask them about it. And there was a person there this morning in that class who's there. That person knows what it's all about. Listen, we ought to be so compassionate to people who have gone through situations, not of their own choosing. And that's one of them. Oh, be compassionate. Be compassionate. Secondly, are you committed to gathering together on the Lord's day? Now, I do want to challenge you here. I'm gonna speak to the young people. Tonight is varsity night. If it were not varsity night, would you be here? that the rubber hits the road right there, boom, would you be here? For some of you adults, maybe for some that work in varsity tonight, if varsity wouldn't happen tonight, would you be here? You see how this works? You see how important it is? It's so easy, it's so easy to look and see some, oh, he's preaching tonight. Oh no, don't ever, ever, ever think that way, ever. That could be the night where God is going to speak to you, to you, to you. Phil Reichen has written a commentary on Galatians, and Bonnie was teaching through Galatians recently in a ladies' Bible study. He quoted J.I. Packer, and he quoted J.I. Packer, and Packer says, we need to develop godly habit patterns, and that's how God works in our life, godly habit patterns. You need to put off ungodly habit patterns and reestablish or establish godly habit patterns. This is what I'm talking about. Be here, unless providentially detained. Now, as I said, you're here already. But I know what can happen. What an unbelievable privilege it is to be together with God's people. And you know, when you miss it, when you can't, when you are providentially detained, I have had two surgeries where I had to miss not coming to church. I miss that deeply. I sat next to a couple I had never met this morning. They'd been going here for three years. So I introduced myself and then asked them, how long have you gone here? Three years and wow. It was so great just getting to know them. I love this church. I love it. Pray for the elders and deacons. They have the awesome responsibility of guiding us. Pray for them. Pray for them. Don't miss a day. Don't miss a day. where you don't lift them up. Let's pray. Before I pray, I'm gonna give you time to reflect and search your heart about what the word of God has said to all of us tonight. Our Lord God, I wanna thank you so much for these two events that you placed in your word that speak very pointedly to us, your people. God, I pray that you would be the center of our life. The center of our life. God, work in our hearts through your word, through whatever means you choose, through your preached word, through your taught word, as we read your word, so that, Father, you would be there. You would be our ballast. You would be our center. And your holy love would be that umbrella that we would sit under Thank you for resources that you give in your providence to us that we can learn from, and that minister not only to their local church, but to the church much, much bigger. Thank you for that. And thank you, Father, that you are so, so patient with us, so patient with me. And I pray that in the week that lies before us, that we would be salt and we would be light wherever we would find ourselves. And we ask this in Jesus name. Amen.