There was a TV show on several years ago that I have not seen, but it's piqued my interest as I've read about it called The Good Place. And in this show, it was kind of a humorous fantasy about a place that's in the mind of the author, the mind of the writer and producer, a place similar to heaven. You will see very quickly it's not similar to heaven, but that's the model that this idea is based on. And the creator said, it's the idea of an omniscient point system. Like we're all playing a video game that we don't know that we're playing. And someone's keeping score, and the 10 highest scores out of every 10,000 people get rewarded. How would you like that to be the standard by which your eternal destiny is figured out? Well, in this fantasy that they have created here, there's a woman, and actually a man as well, but there's a woman that's let in and she knows that she was an immoral person. Something happened in the calculations and she's there and she knows she shouldn't be, and she tries to live a moral life to prove that she should be there even though she knows she shouldn't be. And the keeper of the gate, whose name is Michael, writes down a quiz for her so that she can answer these questions, and that would start the conversation about whether she should be there or not. The questions are these. Did you commit murder? Did you commit arson? Did you take off your shoes and socks on an airplane? Did you ever have a vanity license plate? Did you ever reheat fish in an office microwave? Have you ever cared about The Bachelor and any of its attendant spinoffs? Now that sounds like a righteous evaluation, doesn't it? So Michael lets Eleanor, the lady who is in view here, lets her know that they're gonna watch some highlights of her life. And she says, well, I'll just warn you up front, it's not gonna make me look very good. And Michael says, my dear, that's the whole purpose of the exercise. When Jesus shows up, we don't look very good. And my dears, that's the whole point of the exercise. We're not. Jesus shows up in his perfection And when he shows up as the God-man, as we see in the New Testament, as we're traveling with him in Luke, and as he shows up in our life when we're lost people, and as we're saved, and he's in us living through us every day, it's him that shines forth. And us in comparison, we don't stack up to be much without him. Now, as Jesus is moving through, as Luke is moving us through Jesus's life in his gospel, he is revealing some things in some very systematic ways and approaches, isn't he? He's revealing that Jesus comes and he comes as one, according to the Old Testament prophecies, he's coming to one who is the Messiah, but he's also coming as one who is the son of Adam and the son of God. so that he's coming as both God and man, fully God and fully man as the incarnate one. And as he opens his ministry in the synagogue in Nazareth, he reveals himself to be the messianic prophecy, the fulfillment of the messianic prophecies in Isaiah 61, and therefore all of the suffering servant prophecies. He's saying, this is filled within your hearing today, within your ears, today, he says. And then he goes on to prove that. He begins to set the captives free, doesn't he? He sets the leper free by cleansing him and making sure that now he, Jesus, doesn't become unclean, but the leper becomes clean, and now the leper is ready to do what's required under Old Testament law. to go visit God, to be in God's presence. And that sets us up for the healing of the paralytic when Jesus forgives these sins and then heals him to show that he's the one who has the power and the authority to forgive sins. And it's starting to crank up these controversies. And you remember that last week we learned that Jesus is bringing something new. It is something that the Old Testament has forwarded, looked forward to. He is the fulfillment of all of the Old Testament, but it is something new. It's like new wine that doesn't fit into old wine skins, because when it ferments, it will burst those skins. New wine requires new wine skins. A patch, you wouldn't cut a patch out of a new coat to fix an old coat. You just leave the new coat intact. They're not to mix in that way. So we continue to see this develop in front of us. And today, we're going to be challenged ourselves even closer. We think, oh, this is just the Pharisees and Jesus as Lord of the Sabbath. But when's the last time you acted like a Pharisee? When's the last time that in the face of Jesus revealed in his word, you acted like a Pharisee? Like your standards of righteousness trumped his standard of righteousness. Like your view of his law, his word, trumps his view of his word. When was the last time that happened? When did you make judgments of someone else based on your own understanding and not the word or God's understanding? Or maybe you just didn't even have all the facts. And you say, oh, wow, this is gonna turn into one of those sermons. No, it's one of those texts. We see Jesus in all his glory, and we're not gonna skip over that. But if we see Jesus in all of his glory, and it doesn't remind us that we're not like him, we're different, we need him. We need to be bowing before him as he reveals himself, not standing in our own understanding and our own righteousness. The Pharisees were the epitome of being self-righteous. And it's being revealed right before us in this text. And it stirs them to anger because they have every opportunity to bow before Jesus and they dig their hole even deeper. So we wanna see Jesus clearly. We wanna see the Pharisees clearly. And we wanna make sure that we're not the Pharisees. Not by lifting ourself up on a point system, but by trusting and bowing before Jesus and his work and not holding onto our own. Let's stand as I read our text in Luke chapter six. We have two Sabbath controversies that we are going to look at both today. They're two separate events, but they're very much tied in our text. And you can see that in the opening line of verse one and the opening line of verse six, and the themes that are tied together and the way the Pharisees are revealed even more as they progress. Luke 6, beginning in verse 1. Now it happened that on a Sabbath, he was passing through some grain fields, and his disciples were picking and eating the heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands. But some of the Pharisees said, why do you do what is not lawful on the Sabbath? And Jesus answered and said to them, have you never read what David did when he was hungry? He and those who were with him, how he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is not lawful for any to eat except the priest alone, and gave it to his companions. And he was saying to them, the son of man is Lord of the Sabbath. Now it happened that on another Sabbath, he entered the synagogue and was teaching. And there was a man there whose right hand was withered. And the scribes and the Pharisees were watching him closely to see if he heals on the Sabbath so that they might find reason to accuse him. But he knew what they were thinking. And he said to the man with the withered hand, get up and come forward. And he stood up and came forward. And Jesus said to them, I ask you, is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save a life or to destroy it? And after looking around at them, he said to him, that is the man, stretch out your hand. And he did so, and his hand was restored. But they themselves were filled with rage. and we're discussing together what they might do to Jesus. The grass withers and the flower falls. You may be seated. In these verses, Jesus demonstrates his authority as Lord of the Sabbath by engaging the scribes and Pharisees in two Sabbath controversies. He demonstrates his authority as Lord of the Sabbath by engaging the scribes and the Pharisees in two Sabbath controversies. And just to make it clear, the first controversy, Jesus claims his authority as Lord of the Sabbath. He does that verbally. He's demonstrating, but he's claiming it. And in the second controversy, Jesus demonstrates his authority as Lord of the Sabbath. So he claims it and sort of demonstrates it. And in the second one, he clearly demonstrates it. So that's where we're heading. And I want you to see that at the very beginning, now it happened on a Sabbath. Now, both of these are Sabbath day controversies, and you know that the Sabbath was an important day for the Jews, commanded by God, and I want you to turn to one passage. We could turn to many passages this morning. I'm only gonna have you turn to one or two. I want you to keep your finger here before we even get started, and I want you to turn to Exodus, back into Exodus. Go ahead and turn there. You need to see what we're looking at here. Exodus chapter 31, beginning in verse 12. Exodus 31 verse 12. Yahweh spoke to Moses saying, but as for you, speak to the sons of Israel saying, you shall surely keep my sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you throughout your generation, note this, that you may know that I am Yahweh who makes you holy. So there it is, it's a sign between God and the Old Testament people, Israel, so that they may know that it is Yahweh, it is God who makes them holy. Verse 14, therefore you shall keep the Sabbath for it is holy to you. Everyone who profanes it shall surely be put to death, for whoever does any work on it, that person shall be cut off from among his people. Six days work may be done, but on the seventh day there is a Sabbath of complete rest. Holy to Yahweh, whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall surely be put to death. So the sons of Israel shall keep the Sabbath to celebrate the Sabbath throughout their generations as an everlasting covenant. It is a sign between me and the sons of Israel forever. For in six days Yahweh made heaven and earth, but on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed." Important day for the nation of Israel. Important to remember who God is and that it's God who makes them holy. And they are to set aside work on that day and trust Yahweh for everything that they need. Now, the scriptures give other regulations of how this looks like. The Old Testament scripture prohibits working on the Sabbath. It prohibits gathering manna on the Sabbath, plowing and harvesting on the Sabbath, lighting a fire or gathering wood on the Sabbath, buying and selling merchandise on the Sabbath. But there were also things that were allowed on the Sabbath. that military exercises could take place on the Sabbath, temple-related actions such as changing the temple guard, tending to the showbread, offering sacrifices, opening the east gate, and circumcision. Those were things that were allowed on the Sabbath. Remember, God is the one who set up those rules and what could and could not happen, and it had a purpose. for his people to trust him and rest in the same way that he rested and they were not to work on the Sabbath. And some of those categories of work were delineated. The Pharisees, however, in the Mishnah, which is a written record of the oral law available to Jesus and the others during Jesus' time, still available to us as well, but it's a collection of that oral tradition, and Jesus and his disciples in this setting that we just read about are guilty of at least four of the Pharisees' categories. There are 39 categories of work described in the Mishnah. And it includes things such as you can't intertwine two pieces of thread. and you can't untwine two pieces of thread. But one rabbi says, well, if you could untangle those pieces of thread with one hand and not two, then you can do that. So think of your shoes being tied, two pieces of thread tied together. If it's in a knot, you gotta work a little harder. It takes both hands. But if you could reach down and do that with one, that's permissible. It was these kinds of things. Remember now, we look at that and we kind of snarl and laugh at that, but the purpose is to make sure that they obeyed the law. The Pharisees were incredibly driven by obeying the law of God. That's what they wanted to do, and they wanted other people to do it too. So they set what they called the fence that we talked about before around the law, full of other laws that if we didn't violate those, we surely wouldn't violate the law of God, and then we would be holy. And they would be holy according to their standards, not God's. God said, celebrate the Sabbath so you will know that I am the one who makes you holy. That's what God says. So the four areas in the Mishnah, they're violating here. Reaping, threshing, winnowing, and preparing food. Those are all things that in the Pharisees' minds, the disciples are doing. So we're setting up this situation here so we understand what the Pharisees are trying to do. They're looking for ways. Look back at your text. As we see Jesus claiming his authority as Lord of the Sabbath. The disciples pick, prepare, and eat grain on the Sabbath. We see this in verse one. Now, it happened that on a Sabbath, he was passing through some of the grain fields, and his disciples were picking and eating the heads of grain, rubbing them together in their hands. Notice the placement of that last phrase. It's emphatic in the Greek text. It's kind of out of place, rubbing the heads of grain the grains together in their hands. Now, Deuteronomy 23 allows for this. Deuteronomy says in the gleaning laws, you remember those laws where God set up this merciful interaction. If you owned a field, you had to leave the edges of it so the pork could come in and glean in those fields. This was part of the gleaning law. That you could go in and you could not raise a sickle up and cut anything down if you were gleaning, but you could pick with your hands and you could rub the grain in your hand. So the exact wordage is permitted in Deuteronomy, but the Pharisees are looking at that and by that, now we're clear that in Deuteronomy 23, it doesn't mention the Sabbath or not, it just says that's permissible activity. So there is a little bit of a conflict here already. The Pharisees are looking at this as working on the Sabbath. Now we just read, what's supposed to happen if you work on the Sabbath? Put to death. So we're talking about a serious offense here in the mind of the Pharisees. So this is the setting. They're in the fields, but the second thing we see is the Pharisees charge Jesus, and this should say Jesus and his disciples. When I wrote the outline, I left that out. This should say Jesus and his disciples. The Pharisees charge Jesus and his disciples with unlawful activity. Verse two, but some of the Pharisees said, why do you do what is not lawful, so unlawful on the Sabbath? So we have to think about this. What in the world are the Pharisees doing in the field with Jesus and his disciples on the Sabbath? Well, they're there because they are already looking to blame Him, right? They've already, they're seeing what He's done. He's healed. He is healing people everywhere He goes. He's teaching like no one else has taught. The crowds are following Him. He is a threat to their existence, and they're seeing Him as that threat instead of seeing Him as the threat to them. Now, notice the difference. They're seeing them as a threat to the Pharisees and their status, not a threat to them and their lack of holiness. Jesus is in front of them doing things that are miraculous and acting in a way that reveals he is God, and they are rising up against him to protect their own status. They are the ones who know what keeps men holy. They are the ones that do that. So they're looking for ways to trap him. out with them in the fields on a Sabbath when they're eating breakfast or lunch, and they accuse them, and they're accusing all of them, not just the disciples, but that's why Jesus is mentioned being with them and his disciples, and it's Jesus who responds. So they're trying to set him up. They ask this question, why do you do what is lawful, what is not lawful on the Sabbath? Do you see, how do you think they might have asked that question differently if they didn't have bad motives? Couldn't it be, can you help us here? We've been taught that you're not supposed to work on the Sabbath. You're not supposed to thresh and you're not supposed to do these things on the Sabbath, but you guys are doing it. Now, you just told us, you just told us about the peril about the old wine and new wine and the old material and the new material. We don't really understand that, but we think this might have something to do with it. Can you help us? That'd be a heart-seeking truth. What they're establishing is that they have a heart who's after Jesus. They want him stopped. And that's why they ask, they think they've got him trapped. Aha! He knows the law. We'll just ask him this question. We'll just see what he says. Well, Jesus proves the Pharisees wrong, beginning in verse three. And Jesus answered and said to them, Jesus is responsible for his disciples, right? They're doing the work, but he's not rebuking them. So he's responsible for what's going on. So he answers. And Jesus answered and said to them, have you never read? Now, if we just stop right there, that is already an indictment for the Pharisees, right? The Pharisees would have said they know everything, and you've combined the scribes and Pharisees together, which will be in the next section. Of course they've read it. We don't even know what you're gonna ask, but I'm gonna tell you we've already read it. But Jesus puts it, and his answer, the way the grammar is written, the answer is expected to be, of course. And so it's, have you guys not even read? It's that kind of a question. Have you never read what David did when he was hungry? He and those who were with him, so David and his men, how he entered, so it's comparable, right? Jesus and his disciples, David and his men, how he entered the house of God and took and ate the consecrated bread, which is not lawful for any to eat except the priest alone, and gave it to his companions. Now we find this story in 1 Samuel 21, David is fleeing from Saul. God has anointed him king, but the people have not yet. Saul's still trying to persecute David. And he shows up at the house of God, and he asked the priest, give us some food, we're hungry. We're on a mission. And he makes up a story about him being sent by the king, and really he's running from the king, but he's actually been sent by the king, hasn't he? By God himself. God has already anointed him as king. So here's David, the king of Israel coming in and he's coming in and asking for food. And the priest says, we don't have any food except the show bread, the bread of the presence. Now that was a bread that was to be made in a certain way by the priest, changed in the temple every single Sabbath day, 12 loaves, one for each tribe of Israel. And they would remove the loaves after a week and replace new ones every Sabbath day. So we don't know whether that incident with King David happened on a Sabbath or not. It could have because in the text, the priest says something about the only thing we have are the loaves just removed from the temple. So it could be this is a Sabbath and they've already changed them out on the Sabbath as they were supposed to. But what the priest knew is only the priests were supposed to eat that bread. This would be a violation of law. And so you know what he does? He asked about the holiness of the men. He asks if they have abstained from women. And David says, of course they have. We're on a mission, we're out in battle. That's part of what we do. They were holy when we started. How much holier are they are now? And the priest, realizing this was an okay thing to do, his measure was holiness, because all of those temple sacrifices were driven by the holiness of God. The Sabbath day, so that you will keep it holy, so that you know that I am responsible for your holiness. So this is tied together with that idea here, and all of that is what Jesus is referring to. He doesn't even deal with the actual issue at hand. He's dealing with another issue in front of him, isn't he? How do you place yourselves as the ruler and interpreter of the Sabbath? That's his point in asking. So he asked the question, And then he makes a claim. Jesus, the Son of Man, proclaims his lordship over the Sabbath. So he asks the question, he asks it in a way that assumes a positive answer, and he's saying, if you know that text, then you need to know this. The Son of Man, he's referring to himself, is Lord of the Sabbath. So we've talked about the son of man language before, Luke is going to use this a lot, and most of the time it's referring to Jesus, the name he uses for himself most often, and it's referring to him as the one from Daniel chapter 7. The one who comes riding on the clouds and to face the the Ancient of Days, he comes to do that and he's granted a kingdom with eternal authority and a people to have dominion over and that will not pass away. Jesus is claiming he is the Son of Man, this is him. He is the one who comes, promised in Daniel 7, he's the king over the kingdom with the authority that will never pass away, it's eternal. So he's arguing from lesser to greater, isn't he? If David can go into the holy place and make a case to eat what was only for the priest, the king, the earthly king, surely the king of all the universe can go in and tell you what the Sabbath is actually supposed to be. That the Sabbath is for, it's for man, it's not for you just to hold up these laws and then bind people to these extra biblical things, these things that are just the traditions and standards of men. He says, to the people in the field, the Pharisees in the field, I am the Son of Man and I am Lord of the Sabbath. Now, let's not diminish this, right? He's not saying, I'm the Son of Man and I'm Lord of the Sabbath and that's it. He's saying, I'm the Son of Man, which means I have a kingdom with an eternal reign, so what does that make me? Lord over the Sabbath that you are trying to Lord over. So he puts them in their place. Now he's bringing to them that the law of God, including the Sabbath, is intended to reflect the character of God. Yes, he's holy, but he's also merciful. And you should show mercy, Jesus is saying, to my disciples. You should realize that it's merciful for them to pinch this grain in their fingers on the Sabbath day. And he says, the reason I know that is because I'm Lord over it. I interpret it. I know what it has always meant. He's not reinterpreting the Sabbath here. He is interpreting it for the Pharisees who have fenced it with all the other laws, and he's revealing their heart that all they want to do is trap him. And you say, well, it really doesn't say that there, but Luke wants to make sure that we do see that, right? Because Luke is going to move right into another Sabbath controversy. So this is the hearts of men here. If you've read Animal Farm by George Orwell, you know there's some really eerie and creepy parallels to our own world, but there's also some really eerie and creepy parallels to our own heart. If you know the story of this, where the animals are on a farm, and they can all speak, and the farmer treats them mean, so they get rid of the farmer, they set up their own government, and it gets worse. It doesn't get any better at all. And the pigs take over. Two pigs try to take over and they're combating for control of the barnyard, Napoleon and Snowball. And they're trying to combat for control of the, to be the one who is in charge. Well, Napoleon actually wins and he gets Snowball banished. But then it's revealed that he's the only one responsible now. And so nothing gets better. So whose fault is it? It's Napoleon's. Well, what does Napoleon do? Everything is Snowball's fault. Sound familiar? Everything is Snowball's fault. It doesn't matter whether it's a key that's lost to go into a gate. It's Snowball's fault. He probably stole it. And it doesn't matter if they found it two days later stuck under a bag, a bushel of feed. It's still Snowball's fault. Everything is Snowball's fault. Everything is Snowball's fault. That's the way we live. It's known sometimes as the snowball syndrome. You and I can live this way. Do you feel it in your own hearts? Justice for thee, but mercy for me. And we live this way. We live as if we see everything perfectly, omnisciently like God does. And that we see everything that happens and we can judge everybody else's motive. We can judge God's motive. Well, I know what he said, but he really means As if we can just set ourselves in the place of God and make these decisions when we're reading the Word of God for ourselves. It's very easy for us to sit on the throne and then blame everybody else when we fail. And guess what we do often? We fail. We sin. Now the blood of Christ, the righteousness of Christ is applied to us and it's eternal. Remember, his kingdom is eternal. He doesn't just get defeated one day and everything he promises, well, that's out the window because the other pig took over now. It doesn't happen that way. His promises are eternal as well. And yet that's what the Pharisees are setting themselves up to do. The Pharisees and the scribes are looking at Jesus and they're looking for ways to condemn him. They're not looking at their own hearts. They're not looking at what they should be doing in light of Jesus and his actions. They're not looking at what they should be doing in light of Jesus and his words. They're just pointing the other way toward the wrongness of Jesus. That's what happens as we move into the second controversy. Jesus demonstrates his authority now as Lord of the Sabbath. First, we see Jesus teaches in the synagogues in which there is a man with a withered right hand, verse six. Now it happened, there's our time marker in Luke, it's regular occurrence for Luke to advance what's going on. Now it happened that on another Sabbath, so we're in a different place or maybe a different day, we don't know if he's in the same place. But a different day, a different Sabbath though. We have another Sabbath controversy. He entered the synagogue and was teaching. And again, we have Jesus doing what he always does. He teaches in the synagogue. We don't know a lot about what he's taught outside of the first sermon in Nazareth, but he's teaching constantly. And that is continuing to draw people in, not just his healing, but his teaching as well. So Jesus is continuing on doing what he came to do. He entered the synagogue and was teaching. And there was a man there whose right hand was withered. So palsy or something had caused his right hand to dry up and he couldn't use it. Now in biblical times, this could have been a curse from God. If you remember Jeroboam, Jeroboam and Rehoboam, when the kingdom after Solomon dies and his sons have that battle and the kingdom divides, and Rehoboam, he's trying to get wisdom, but he's not really getting wisdom. He talks to all the people and he talks to his father's advisors and they say, loosen, just loosen the burden that your father placed on our people. But the people he grew up with, the young men, young is emphasized there, the young men, they say, no, no, no, make it worse. If your father had a thigh of power, your pinky has more power than your father's thigh, make the burden worse. And he chooses to do that. Jeroboam leaves and comes back and the people want Jeroboam to be their king. And Jeroboam starts to fear that because he's in the Northern kingdom, that he needs to control how things happen because if the people go and give their offerings in Jerusalem, their hearts will be turned back to Jerusalem and to Yahweh. So he sets up this has to be the greatest lack of wisdom, one of the greatest lack of wisdom anywhere, two golden calves. And he sets them up in two places, one in the north in Dan, one in the south, and he sets it up and he said, behold, your gods who led you out of Egypt. You ever heard that before? And that's what he says because he's fearful that he has to control all the people. Now, God had already intervened at this point, and he had already told the people, you're not gonna fight against each other, and they stood down. Northern kingdom and southern kingdom, you're not gonna fight against each other, and they stood down, but he did not trust God. So he sets up these altars, and he burns offerings in the high places. He does everything that he is controlling how the worship is done, even to burn the incense on the altar himself. And God's not gonna have anything of that. So he sends a man of God who challenges him and said, listen, you're not gonna have any throne. You're gonna have somebody come up behind you and take this throne. And for a miraculous sign to you, that altar that you built, it's gonna be blown apart and the ashes scattered everywhere. Jeroboam comes against the man of God and challenges him on that. And what does God do? Causes his right hand to wither. The punishment of God for standing against him. That miraculous sign actually happens. Jeroboam says, please ask your God to undo this, and God mercifully undoes the punishment. In the minds of all the people there with the man with the withered hand, that's a very important event in the life of Israel, the division of the kingdom. There are other passages in the Old Testament that would lead us to that. In Zechariah chapter 11, there are curses on bad false shepherds, and one of them is that their right hand would dry up. So not only is this a sign of mercy, this is a challenge of whether he has the right to do this, because most of the people there would remember that the withered right hand was a punishment from God. How dare he do anything with this? But I want you to look back at your text. That's our setting. He's teaching in the synagogue. The man is there with the withered right hand. The scribes and Pharisees desire to accuse Jesus of working on the Sabbath. Look at verse 7. And the scribes and the Pharisees, remember the first controversy was only the Pharisees. This is the scribes and the Pharisees. So are they gathering momentum here? Are they bringing more witnesses together? They were watching Him, that is Jesus, closely to see if He heals on the Sabbath so that they might find reason to accuse Him. So they're watching, and one of the commentators said this word, I didn't find this in very many places, but one of the commentators said this word, and has the idea of kind of looking sideways, trying to hide what they're doing, but just kind of the side eye, look at watching Jesus, they have a purpose. Is he gonna heal or is he not? Is he gonna heal? We know this guy's here. This is what he's doing everywhere, he's healing. If he heals here, on the Sabbath, in something that's unnecessary, because they would have seen this as unnecessary. Now the Pharisees had, they had a category to do merciful things in the case someone's life was in danger. They would allow for that, but they wouldn't see this as someone's life in danger. He's been like this for a while, he can be like this until Monday. or Sunday, he can do like this until Sunday, and they wouldn't have a category for him healing. So they're looking, they're just watching, they're waiting, they're lying in wait, just like they did in the field, now they're in the synagogue, and they're looking to see what will happen. Jesus, knowing their thoughts, asks, is it lawful to do good or harm on the Sabbath? So they're desiring to accuse him. They're watching, they're expecting this. This is what he's been doing. And now they think they'll corner him. But then we have verse eight. But he knew what they were thinking. Now this little word for thinking, you remember the reasoning that was so prominent in one of the other healings with the cleansing of the leper? They were reasoning and Jesus knew what they were reasoning in their hearts. This is the same word. It has that negative impact, that he knew what they were thinking, and these are not good thoughts, and he knows it. So they're not speaking, but he knows. He's omniscient, he knows what they're thinking, and he's about to call that out. But he knew what they were thinking, and he said to the man with the withered hand, get up and come forward, and he stood up and came forward. Now don't read over that. Why would Jesus do that? Jesus is saying, you don't want me to heal? Well, come up in the center. That's what the word means. Come to the center. Come up into the center of everybody and stand there. Now, what if you were the man with the withered hand? Would you be so hopeful that you would be healed and this was the one to do it, that you have no problems coming in and standing in the center? Or would you kind of like weasel out the back door so you're not put on display? This man is already starting to reveal faith, and Jesus is going to reveal the hearts of the Pharisees in front of everyone. They may not be saying anything, but he is going to bring it out and prove to everyone that he is the Lord of the Sabbath. So he brings the man out, he's setting the stage to do what he wants to do, but he's still showing mercy to the Pharisees. Look at verse nine. And Jesus said to them, I ask you, Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath? And then to describe it further, to save a life or destroy it? Now, the Pharisees would have to say, well, of course it's lawful to save a life on the Sabbath. Of course it is, but that's not what's going on here. There are already an internal turmoil over this, but Jesus is proving he's about to do this and it's merciful to the Pharisees, because this is the time the Pharisees should have said, Yes, Lord, it is lawful. It is lawful to do this. But they don't say anything. And Jesus is proving that they don't even follow their own rules. So he knows their thoughts and he asked them, he sets up. Now he's setting up more than just healing or not healing this man, isn't he? It's the Pharisees who are about to do what is harmful on the Sabbath. and he's lining them all up to be guilty of their own charges. So Jesus does good by healing the man's withered right hand. Look at verse 10. And after looking around at them, at all of them, after looking around at them all, he said to them, to him, stretch out your hand, and he did so, and his hand was restored. Now, what would you do? Imagine, let me just change this. All of us said, of course we'd stretch out our hand, but he can't stretch out his hand, can he? That's the problem. Jesus is asking him to do something that he cannot do, and yet he does it anyway. Now, if the man had the same heart as the Pharisees, what would he have done? What do you mean stretch out my hand, you idiot? Can't you see? I can't stretch out my hand. That would have been a response lacking faith. That's the response the Pharisees would have because they don't have faith in Jesus. And what they're being challenged that even if they think Jesus is going to do it, they don't think he has the right to do it. And they're gonna prove this in front of everyone. But the man responds in faith. He stretches out his hand. Now by definition, what has happened when he stretches out his hand? He's been healed. Now, how do the Pharisees charge him of working on the Sabbath for what he's done? What has he done? Has he worked? Has Jesus worked to heal the man? What did he do? He spoke, that's all he did. There's no Pharisee anywhere that would say you can't speak on the Sabbath or they'd all be guilty. So Jesus not only proves them wrong and proves that he is Lord of the Sabbath, he does it in a way that doesn't even make him guilty of their false laws because he's Lord of the Sabbath and he has the power to do this. So when he says, stretch out your hand and he did so and his hand was restored, He speaks the miracle and it comes into existence. But I want you to draw your attention at one other part. The mercy toward the Pharisees is still granted even here. Look at the beginning of verse 10. And after looking at them all. He asked the question, and then he looks around. He's giving them a chance. He's giving them a chance to respond to him in a way that's faithful, and to respond in him in a way to realize he is the new wine, to respond to him in a way that they reveal that he, they realize that he is the Lord of the Sabbath, but no one says anything. They are hardened in their disagreement with the king. The king has the right to do it, and they're proving that they will not bow to the king. Where do you stand today with Jesus? Because Jesus, let me just talk to you here if you are one who doesn't know Jesus or doesn't know if you do. If you're one in that position, Jesus in the scriptures presents himself as the answer to sin, right? He's done that already in Luke. He presents himself as the answer to sin. And it's Jesus plus nothing else. It's just Jesus. So Jesus presents himself to you in the same way he's presenting to the crowd at the synagogue and the Pharisees that he is the one who can forgive sin. He is the Lord of the Sabbath. Where do you stand with him when he offers that? Do you stand back and say, I think I'm good. I think I'll be one of those top 10 scores on judgment day. Been pretty good. Yeah, I've done a few things, but. Is that your response? Or maybe it's even more visceral. Maybe it is, I don't want anything to do. If that's Jesus, and I have to give up my life to follow him, and he's gonna die on a cross, and you want me to follow him? I am not doing that at all. It may be good for you, Bubba, but it's not good for me. Maybe that's your response as well. There will come a day where the mercy that he's extending now will not be extended to you. That day will come when you die, which is also in his control. And or it will come on judgment day when you stand and you do the foolish thing of pleading that you're one of the 10 highest scores. Because on that day, there will be no more mercy. It will just be the righteousness of the King. And you will not be able to stand on that day of judgment. That's before us at all times because Jesus presents himself as the answer to everything that ails us. And everyone who decides they're not going to be saved today is making the arrogant assumption that they're safe on their own merits. And when Jesus shows up, the response of faith is, get away from me, Lord. I am an unrighteous person. Or as Isaiah would say, I am a man of unclean lips from a people of unclean lips. The choice is yours. He's the one who reveals himself in perfection. How will you respond? As a Pharisee or as the man with the weathered hand who stretches out their hand in faith? Well, the scribes and the Pharisees, they've been revealed and now they don't hold anything back. They actually do the harm by plotting against Jesus in their rage. Look at the last verse. But they themselves were filled with rage. Now, this is a strong term. Filled with folly, filled with rage. They're overcome with anger. They don't know what to do with themselves. They're going ballistic here. What Jesus has now done causes them to be filled with rage, and they were discussing together what they might do to Jesus. And that little verse begins to telescope us to the cross, doesn't it? what they began to figure what they were going to do against Jesus. Remember chapter 9 verse 51 is the turning point where Jesus turns his face toward Jerusalem. We're rapidly approaching that and we have the foretaste here. Jesus is coming to forgive sins, to show mercy, that by his life he would show that he is the inauguration of this new covenant, this new kingdom, that is the new wine. This is something different. Don't respond in the same way as the old covenant legalism. Respond in the way the old covenant always intended you to do with a blameless heart before Yahweh to come into his presence. And now Jesus is in front of everyone and it cranks them up in their anger. They have lost their mind in their anger. Now again, there would have still been room here, wouldn't there? Even if they're hardened before the healing, and then they see the man stretch out their right hand, what would be the response of faith? Lord, get away from me. It would be like Peter when the hall of fish came in. You're a holy person and I am unclean. That would have been fine. That would have been great. Jesus was doing all of this to draw men and women under himself so that they would trust in him and not themselves. And that would have been the time for them to do that, to fall on their face. But instead they're enraged at him and the battle is on. Now we know how the battle ends, but they don't at this point, and the battle is on. This is the question that's before us every single day on how we're going to live. Let me just turn to those of you who profess Christ. The battle that's before us every day is are we going to bow to him as our king or to us as our king? Now, you can be redeemed and your eternity is secure, but you're still fighting sin. Amen? And when you quit that fight, then you're saying, I don't need to worry about that. I can handle that on myself, on my own. And that's before us all the time. And as soon as we quit fighting, remember what the goal is, when Jesus shows up, we see him and us truly. Yes? We see him in his glory. We see him full of grace. We see him full of forgiveness. We see him without sin. We see the one who is without sin, who knew no sin, become sin for those who would believe. We see him and we are brought to our knees because we see who we are without him. And then once we have him, he's living inside of us. And how many times do we act as if we've just taken Jesus and put him on our shelf of our household gods, and we go and live as if he has no authority over us? Well, I'm saved, everything's cool. And yet he has authority over every thought, every word, every deed. And every time that we decide that we're living without his strength and his power, and we set his word aside, then we are living in our own strength and our own power. And guess what happens? We're caught up in the wisdom from below instead of the wisdom from above. We're caught up in what we think instead of what he thinks. We're caught up in our own limited knowledge of our situation instead of trusting in him who has full knowledge of our situation. And we're prone to that because we have said, I don't need Jesus. Now, we would never say that, would we? But when we start acting like it, we move into the pharisaical categories. Now, let me be honest with you. When we do that, God will discipline those he loves. But oftentimes, if you are not in faith, he lets you just go, just like he lets the Pharisees go here. And it's evidence that you never knew him to begin with. So our life is marked by the pursuit of holiness because we serve a God whose responsibility it is to make us holy. Our life is marked by righteous deeds because we have a Christ who's living in us and we have crucified our own life and it is now Him living His life in us. And we're one step away at all times of thinking we know better than Jesus. So every time we do that, what do we do? We turn back to the Jesus who's revealed himself as the gracious one, as the one who forgives sin, as the one who loves us enough to turn his face to Jerusalem. And according to the will of his father and all the Old Testament scripture passages, he loves us enough to die on a cross, even though he did not have to do that. He did it out of love. That's the Jesus that has called us unto him. That's the Jesus who's promised us his wisdom so we don't have to rely on our own. That's the Jesus who now has the power of the resurrection directed toward us so that we don't have to use our own power. Because all of our own power is weakness in the mind of God compared to God. And what does God say he will do in that? He will make himself strong in our weaknesses. That's the Jesus we follow. The easy part is to say, I'm going to follow Jesus and not myself. The hard part is to crucify the sins so we do that. But guess what? That's a gift from our Savior as well. And so it's keeping Jesus in our mind and in our vision, his word in our mind, his word in our hearts, participating in community with each other so that those who love us can call us out and say, listen, you're starting to look like yourself instead of Jesus. And we go, oh, we're not like the Pharisees who then get angry. We're like the man and we stretch out our withered hand and we say, thank you. Jesus is working in me, not me. This is the picture of the Christian life, and it's impossible without Jesus. Because without Jesus, we're hoping to be one of the top 10 scorers. With Jesus, we only need one scorer, and that's Him. It's His perfect righteousness, not ours. And if it's up to us, we fail before we take the next breath. Well, these Sabbath controversies challenge us, but they also remind us that Jesus is not us. And aren't we thankful that he's different? Listen to what Dorothy Sayers once wrote. The dogma we find so dull, this terrifying drama of which God is the victim and the hero. If this is dull, then what in heaven's name is worthy to be called exciting? The people who hang Jesus, now these are the Pharisees in front of us, at least in their current state. The people who hang Jesus never to do them justice. They never accused him of being a bore. On the contrary, they thought him too dynamic to be safe. That has been left for later generations to muffle up that shattered personality and surround him with an atmosphere of tedium. We have very efficiently paired the claws of the Lion of Judah, certified him meek and mild, and recommended him as a fitting household pet for pale curates and pious old ladies. Those who knew him, however, objected to him as a dangerous firebrand. That's who Jesus is. And that dangerous firebrand condescended to die so that you and I would be his brothers and sisters and children of God. Let's not neuter him in our lives now. Let's keep him powerful. Let's move back and let him move forward so that he's the one that's powerful, that he's the one who gets the glory. Let's live as if Jesus has presented himself as he has in the Bible, not the way that we want him in our minds. That's the key to a joyful, productive, fruitful Christian life that brings honor to God. Let's pray. Father, we are grateful for your word. We are thankful that through the power of your spirit, it transforms us. We are grateful for The fact that you know our hearts and you open us up and you remind us, Lord, of who Jesus is. And we're constantly reminded of his beauty and that everything he's done has caused us to be able to live our life to your glory and not to our own. So we pray, Father, that you would impress upon us even more at every turn that our life is to be lived for your glory and not ours, because you have given your son that we might be holy. and trust and faith in him and dependence upon him and a growing love and affection for him is what brings you honor. So let us not live for our own life and glory, but for yours. We ask this in Jesus' name, amen.