A New Devotion - Rethinking the Rules

Here's a new devotion that I wrote. You can find a recording of this devotion at the bottom of the page.

Luke 6:1-11

One sabbath while Jesus was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked some heads of grain, rubbed them in their hands, and ate them. But some of the Pharisees said, "Why are you doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?" Jesus answered, "Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and gave some to his companions?" Then he said to them, "The Son of Man is lord of the sabbath."

On another sabbath he entered the synagogue and taught, and there was a man there whose right hand was withered. The scribes and the Pharisees watched him to see whether he would cure on the sabbath, so that they might find an accusation against him. Even though he knew what they were thinking, he said to the man who had the withered hand, "Come and stand here." He got up and stood there. Then Jesus said to them, "I ask you, is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to destroy it?" After looking around at all of them, he said to him, "Stretch out your hand." He did so, and his hand was restored. But they were filled with fury and discussed with one another what they might do to Jesus.

Rethinking the Rules

According to the Evangelist Luke, the scribes and the Pharisees completely missed the boat. In both cases, they were so bound to their interpretation of the law that they missed the big picture. You see, they were totally focused on the sabbath rules, you know, on how many heads of grain a guy should pluck and eat or whether a person with a disability should be healed immediately or told to wait another day. In fact, their focus was so complete, that they actually lost the plot, that the Son of Man was the Lord of the sabbath and that the rules were suppose to guide them to do good and not harm. Of course, this was exactly what Jesus had in mind when he said a little bit later in the story that the entire law could be summarized by two commands: love God and love neighbor. And if a person was applying the law in such a way that it didn’t reflect love, that person was simply misinterpreting the law. But the Pharisees and scribes in the story we just read didn’t understand that. And so, when they saw that Jesus had broken the rules by doing something good, they became so angry that they decided that he had to go.

And I’ll tell you, if we’re not careful, we can fall into this pharisaic trap ourselves, focusing on the letter while missing the intent. And for the reason, it just makes sense to reevaluate those laws that we’ve developed and adopted as Christians, rules that we apply to ourselves and others. You see, periodically, maybe we should look at those things that we believe all Christians should follow, with both honesty and faith, ask ourselves and God if our application reflects kindness and compassion. And if it does, then our interpretation is solid, but if it doesn’t, maybe we should rethink the rules.