Matthew 12:1-8
One day, Jesus and the disciples were walking the wheat
fields on a Saturday—Sabbath-day in the Jewish world. You probably know the
story. They’re hungry so they grab a few grains to eat, infamously breaking
that commandment of honoring the Sabbath day by keeping it free from work. The
eating is not the problem; the plucking, however, is strictly forbidden. They
also might be breaking the stealing commandment as well, since we have no
reason to believe this was a field any of them farmed, but putting that aside
let’s focus on the Sabbath-violation because that’s what the Pharisees are most
concerned about anyway.
They have Jesus dead to rights. This is a clear violation
of the law. More to the point, no holy person—if that’s what Jesus really
is—would allow this kind of sacrilege under his sight. It’s an affront to their
religion; they might as well be Roman pagans.
This sets the stage for a conversation that we are still
having today. You might not realize it, but this debate between the Pharisees
and Jesus is happening in Christianity in the modern world every single day. It
is scripture like this around which many of the biggest disagreements between
Christians are staged, because it is scripture like this that calls into
question the law and the law is a big deal for Christians.
Here’s what I mean: Imagine a scenario where Jesus agrees
with the Pharisees. He says, “Yep. No plucking grain on the Sabbath. You are no
longer my disciples. You can’t be disciples because my disciples are perfect
followers of the law.”
Imagine what that would mean. It would mean that
we—today—would have no choice but to be orthodox followers of the law if we
were to call ourselves Christian. It would mean that the Christian faith was only
about making good choices, being good people, following the prescriptions set forth
by the law—found in our Bible—and that would be it. End of story. Honor the
Sabbath. Period. No excuses. No lake homes. No sports. Nothing. No doing
homework. No turning on the TV to watch football. To do any of that would be
anti-Christian.
Imagine a world where Jesus took the law to its fullest
conclusion, as he does with the rich man who comes to him and tells him how
holy he is—to whom Jesus says, “Give it all away”—and imagine that world
without the follow-up, “For mortals it is impossible but for God all things are
possible.” This would be an easier faith. It would be about absolute devotion.
Christianity would be like Hassidic Judaism or Orthodox Islam. For some, Christianity
is exactly like this, even if the devotees of this kind of Christianity often
seem to be the biggest hypocrites.
But for most of us we have, whether we realize it or not,
sat with scripture like the one today and begun to ask the question, “What is
the purpose of the law?” Is it to make us holy? There are a lot of people who
would say “Yes” to that question. They are Christians, Jews, Muslims—some
people of all faiths believe this. For them it is about devotion, submission,
complete observance. Others have taken scripture like this and said, “It’s a free-for-all! Look, Jesus says there
are no rules!” So we have relativists who use the parts of the Bible they
find palatable, but as with so many things if you go around the circle of
belief far enough you end up in the same place. Relativists, too, tend to judge
their worthiness based on how faithful they are to a cause, whatever that cause
may be, and so whether you are a right-wing fundamentalist, who claims the
ultimate authority of the law, or a left-wing fundamentalist, who claims there
is no law, you tend to find yourself in the same place: Justifying yourself by
your observance of principles.
So many people find themselves on one side of the coin or
the other, but Jesus—like Jesus always seems to do—straddles that tiny grooved
notch between the sides of the coin. Jesus seems to be the only one not at all
interested in the things we are doing in and of themselves but instead he turns around and asks the
Pharisees (and us along with them), “Why are you doing what you are doing?”
Plucking grains on the Sabbath in itself could be good or
bad. If it’s about your own selfish hungers, if it’s because you planned poorly
or because you don’t care about stupid traditions, then it’s a real problem;
but if it’s because you’re feeding somebody in need, if it’s because your love
of God and the people around you trumps your love of yourself then by all means
break the stinking law because the law exists for God, not God for the law.
This is a radical statement. Have you thought about this? The law exists for
God, not God for the law, which means in every point of the law we are to ask
ourselves “Am I observing this law for God or to feel better about myself?” And
if it’s the latter then we are condemned even by following the law!
So, this gets really interesting for us today, because
just about every contentious issue we face as Christians exists on this
continuum of law and gospel that comes out of scripture like this. And it’s not
a free-for-all. We can’t do anything we want, but Jesus does change the rules.
The question we face is the same one Jesus implies to the Pharisees: “Why are doing
what you are doing?” That might be the biggest question for any Christian to
answer. “Why are you doing what you are doing?”
But the thing about that question is that it’s a personal
question. It’s for you and God. Too often our debates in Christian circles
become about other people. We like to imagine we have God’s boundaries all
figured out, so other people need to get themselves inside the boundaries, but
more often our desire for others to get into the box of the law has more to do
with us than it has to do with them. How often when somebody talks about sin do
we imagine the way we most often sin
and then apply it to others?
I’ll
give you an example. Some of you may recall the story of the Prodigal Son.
Here’s the Cliff notes version: Father gives Son his share of the property, he
goes away and squanders it, he returns and the father welcomes him home, and
the brother of the Prodigal Son gets his underpants all in a bunch. I want to
call attention to the blunt, stupid response of the elder son who gets stark,
raving mad at his father for throwing his brother a party—that prodigal son who
went away and squandered all his share of the family fortune. The elder son
says, “When this son of yours came
back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you [threw him a party]”
(Luke 15:30). This seems like a valid criticism, except nowhere anywhere in
the story does it say the prodigal son did anything with prostitutes or had any
sexual endeavors whatsoever. The elder son is projecting his own sinful
desires on the brother. He is projecting what he would have done on his brother, because he is assuming his
brother’s sin is the same as his own. His brother did mess up but his vices
were different. When we assume we know how others sin we are usually only
projecting our own sin.
There’s
one more example of this that came to mind for me. There’s a cartoon that goes
around Facebook in pastors’ circles every once in awhile. I assume it’s only in
pastor’s circles because, let’s face it, most of you don’t share pastor-related
memes on Facebook because most of you have a life. Anyway, this cartoon has a
pastor in the pulpit preaching on the woman at the well, who you might recall
is called a “sinful” woman according to scripture, and the pastor says, “And we
all know what her sin was…” And in the pews are several men thinking,
“Adultery… prostitution… sexual indiscretion...” And then there’s a woman in
the back thinking, “Wanting to kill all the men who assume a woman’s sin has to
be something to do with sex.”
It’s
funny but it’s true. We love to assume sin on other people. Instead, we need to
turn again as Jesus would have the Pharisees turn and look inside ourselves and
ask “Why am I doing what I am doing?” Not “Why are they doing what they are
doing?” It starts, and ends, with me. It’s a lot easier to tell other people
about their own shortcomings than it is to deal with your own, and it’s easier
still when you become confident in your own standing before God to tell other
people that they should be practicing their beliefs just like you. God doesn’t
call each of us to be the same. We are called to different things in life and
we are called differently to be followers of Christ. To assume otherwise is
foolish and it leads to thinking that, “Well, probably only a few people like
me will be in heaven.” That, my friends, is blasphemy and its own special kind
of sin.
I
know because Jesus died so we can forget about nonsense like that. Jesus died
so that this law-business is more than wisdom given or taken at a whim, but so
that all it is null and void in the face of the grace of the cross and the
empty tomb.
Because of Jesus’ death we are free to live a life worthy
of the Gospel, not confined to living a life in worry of the law. We are Easter
people; not Pharisees; which means we live on the side of the coin. Not
trumpeting the law because we see the sin in others; not saying “Anything
goes!” and everything is true; but instead clinging to Jesus as the one way,
even as we see Christ in all the unexpected places doing all the unexpected
things, even breaking the law. It’s easier to live on one side of the coin or
the other, but the one nice thing about living in that challenging place
between the law and the gospel is that you have Jesus on your side. And that’s
a pretty good thing to have.
