CLICK TO LISTEN: 060 Defending Rest (Matthew 12 ,1-14)
Defending Rest
Matthew 12:1-14
August 7, 2010
As you will recall, last week we studied one of
The most famous statements off of the mouth of Jesus.
“Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.”
We learned that salvation was both exclusive and a divine privilege.
Jesus won’t lower the Father’s standard to let people in the kingdom.
The Father won’t let anyone apart from Jesus.
Jesus said, “nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.”
Then came the great part.
Jesus said no one can unless “the Son wills”
And then Jesus said, “I will”.
Jesus was offering the salvation rest
That had eluded Israel since the days of Moses.
God continually offered rest and Israel continually failed to receive it.
WHY?
Hebrews 4:1-3 “Therefore, let us fear if, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you may seem to have come short of it. For indeed we have had good news preached to us, just as they also; but the word they heard did not profit them, because it was not united by faith in those who heard. For we who have believed enter that rest, just as He has said, “AS I SWORE IN MY WRATH, THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST,” although His works were finished from the foundation of the world.”
The writer of Hebrews reveals that Israel never received rest
Because she never believed. She never placed saving faith in God.
Jesus reiterated that by revealing that
• They were self-appointed wise men who only want their way.
• He said they were like children who want everyone else to conform to their standards, but are unwilling to conform to anyone else’s.
And because they thought this way, they hated Jesus.
For He refused to play their games.
Jesus knew their rituals and traditions (games)
Were nothing but man-made burdens,
And He sought to give people rest from that.
And so Jesus confronted their sin and offered them rest.
One more time He offered the salvation of God.
It is for all who will “Come to Him” and “Take His yoke upon themselves”.
And so rest was offered.
This morning we move forward and see that rest defended.
At first reading of this text,
It can cause a person to get a bad misconception.
It can almost appear like it is the Pharisees who are concerned about maintaining God’s rest, and that it is Jesus who is attacking it.
But that is not the case at all.
In fact it is the opposite.
Jesus is defending true rest, while the Pharisees
Seek to maintain their burdening grip on the people.
And not only will we see the great defense of rest by Jesus,
But we will also get a glimpse of just how badly the enemy hates it.
5 things
#1 THE ACT
Matthew 12:1
We have talked before about
How the Pharisees had perverted the Law of the Sabbath.
They had “added to” the Scriptures.
The command was this:
Exodus 20:8-11 “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you. “For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.
God simply said, “you shall not do any work”
The Pharisees then took it upon themselves to decide what “work” was.
They came up with some of the craziest regulations you’ve ever heard of.
William Barclay quotes from the Jewish commentary: “The Book of Jubilee”
Chapter 50 states this:
“Whoever lies with his wife, or plans to do anything on the Sabbath, or plans to set out on a journey (even the contemplation of work is forbidden), or plans to buy or sell, or draws water, or lifts a burden is condemned. Any man who does any work on the Sabbath (whether the work is in his house or in any other place), or goes a journey, or tills a farm, any man who lights a fire or rides any beast, or travels by ship at sea, any man who strikes or kills anything, any man who cathes an animal, a bird, or a fish, any man who fasts or who makes war on a Sabbath – the man who does these things shall die.” (Barclay, Matthew commentary volume 2, pg 22-23)
They had regulated every action they could think of.
The True Purpose of the Sabbath was: REST
Mark 2:27 “Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.”
In its truest sense, the Sabbath was a gift from God to man.
What a great day to know you wouldn’t have to labor,
That God would take care of everything for you.
The Israelite didn’t have to worry about crops or enemies or finances. God had given him a mandate and he could rest.
It obviously became a picture of New Testament salvation.
TURN TO: HEBREWS 4:1-11
It is now a picture that we don’t have to work to earn God’s favor,
But thanks to Jesus, we rest in that regard.
He has made us pleasing to God.
The Sabbath was supposed to be anything but a burden.
However, the Pharisees had taken a day that was meant for rest,
And actually turned it into the day of the biggest burden.
And that is what starts our problem here.
(1) “At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath, and His disciples became hungry and began to pick the heads of grain and eat.”
So here on the Sabbath, Jesus and His disciples are having a meal.
DID THEY BREAK THE LAW?
Deuteronomy 23:24-25 “When you enter your neighbor’s vineyard, then you may eat grapes until you are fully satisfied, but you shall not put any in your basket. “When you enter your neighbor’s standing grain, then you may pluck the heads with your hand, but you shall not wield a sickle in your neighbor’s standing grain.”
They weren’t doing anything that was forbidden,
God had said they could eat from their neighbors field.
(I remember studying this passage several years ago in Bible study and Leo asked if that meant it was OK to eat a grape in the grocery store?)
Exodus 34:21 “You shall work six days, but on the seventh day you shall rest; even during plowing time and harvest you shall rest.”
There God simply said you still had to rest during harvest,
But He didn’t say you couldn’t eat.
You could satisfy your hunger in your neighbor’s field
As long as you didn’t harvest it.
The disciples were not in violation of the Law.
They were however in violation of the Pharisee’s traditions.
They had said that picking wheat was HARVESTING,
Rubbing it in your hands was a form of THRESHING,
and blowing away the chaff was a form of WINNOWING.
They had turned the gift of God into a burden for the people.
And so you can see we are set up for a confrontation.
First the act.
#2 THE ATTACK
Matthew 12:2
“But when the Pharisees saw this…”
One has to wonder why the Pharisees were even in the field.
They were spying on Jesus and His disciples.
Psalms 56:1-7 “Be gracious to me, O God, for man has trampled upon me; Fighting all day long he oppresses me. My foes have trampled upon me all day long, For they are many who fight proudly against me. When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You. In God, whose word I praise, In God I have put my trust; I shall not be afraid. What can mere man do to me? All day long they distort my words; All their thoughts are against me for evil. They attack, they lurk, They watch my steps, As they have waited to take my life. Because of wickedness, cast them forth, In anger put down the peoples, O God!”
That sounds just like the Pharisees doesn’t it?
They were hiding out just waiting for Jesus to mess up so they could jump out and say, “AHA!”
This is yet another proof of what kind of men they actually are.
They were not seeking redemption, they were seeking condemnation.
It was not their goal to unite men with God,
But to separate men from God.
And yet at times we can act the same way in Church.
If the Pharisees were truly concerned about the person.
They would have warned them before the sin.
Instead they waited until they had good evidence, and then condemned.
How many times are we like that in church?
The Bible says if your brother sins, to confront him…
The purpose of that is redemptive.
The aim is to save his soul.
However, we seldom do that in church today.
We see a brother sinning, but don’t confront him.
Instead we get on the telephone and spread it.
That is just like the Pharisees.
They weren’t redemptive, they were destructive.
First the act, second the attack.
#3 THE ARGUMENT
Matthew 12:3-5
You have to love what Jesus does here.
He gives them an argument that they cannot handle.
I love what He says first, “Have you not read…”
What a great question. I can imagine they all clutched their chests,
And took big whiffs of air, and acted astonished.
Sure they had read, but that didn’t make them wise.
Remember, “wisdom is vindicated by her deeds”
These men had read the Law, but they did not understand it.
Two important truths they failed to understand.
1) The Sabbath does not restrict Deeds of Necessity (3-4)
“But He said to them, “Have you not read what David did when he became hungry, he and his companions, how he entered the house of God, and they ate the consecrated bread, which was not lawful for him to eat nor for those with him, but for the priests alone?”
David proved that the Sabbath didn’t restrict human necessit.
They weren’t working, they weren’t harvesting grain,
They weren’t doing any sort of labor,
They were merely satisfying their physical need.
It is lawful to eat on the Sabbath.
God never intended to make the Sabbath so burdensome
That man couldn’t even meet his basic physical needs.
Jesus points out the foolishness of the Pharisees
Because they had elevated their traditions over the needs of humanity.
That is a tragedy we see in many religions.
Buddhists are taught not to help a man in poverty,
Because you would be hurting his eternal reward for living in poverty.
Hindus will starve to death rather than eat a cow,
Which is a very sacred supposed reincarnated animal.
The Pharisees had elevated their traditions above the needs of humanity,
And God never intended that.
2) The Sabbath doesn’t restrict Service to God (5)
“Or have you not read in the Law, that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple break the Sabbath and are innocent?”
Certainly they lifted more weight than was allowed by the Pharisees,
But yet they accepted it because it was service to God.
The Pharisees had gotten their traditions out of wack.
Their traditions had become more important
Than ministering to people, or worshiping God.
How easy it is to get our focus off.
When we are more concerned with doing things our way
(i.e. playing our flute or playing our dirge)
Than we are about the needs of others, or about worship to God.
Then we have a problem.
We have slipped into the ritualism of the Pharisees.
That is what the Pharisees had done,
And Jesus reveals they are foolish because of it.
The Act, The Attack, The Argument.
#4 THE ANNOUNCEMENT
Matthew 12:6-8
And this is vitally important.
It is yet another announcement by Jesus about Himself as to who He was.
Some today have made the assertion that Jesus never claimed to be God.
That is foolish, for that is precisely what He is doing here.
Notice the statement, “But I say to you that something greater than the temple is here.”
That is a claim to deity.
And if that didn’t do it, then notice the second claim.
(8) “For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath”
This was an absolute claim to deity and authority.
Jesus is letting it be known that their rules meant nothing.
He is Lord of the Sabbath and He can do whatever He wants on it.
Who were they to question what God did on the Sabbath?
Who are we to question what God wants to do either?
If Jesus demanded hard labor, that was fine, because He is Lord.
However Jesus doesn’t want hard labor.
Nor does Jesus want strict burdens.
WHAT DOES THE LORD OF THE SABBATH REQUIRE?
‘I desire compassion and not a sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent.”
The point is that the Pharisees went around promoting their religion
Like they really cared so much about God.
Yet in the exercise of their religion,
They had failed to do what mattered most to God.
WHAT WAS THE GREATEST COMMAND?
WHAT WAS THE SECOND GREATEST?
God desired love.
God desired compassion.
And the Pharisees had neither.
All they cared about was their own tradition.
All they cared about was their rituals.
They just wanted people to dance when they placed the flute
And mourn when they played the dirge.
It wasn’t about setting people free,
It was about keeping the people under their thumb.
That was the problem of the Pharisee,
And Jesus says they are ridiculous.
#5 THE APPLICATION
Matthew 12:9-14
“Departing from there, He went into their Synagogue.”
The harmony of the gospels suggests that this wasn’t as immediate as it seems,
But certainly Matthew places it here to make a point.
We find Jesus in the Synagogue and it is time to present Him with a test.
(10) “A man was there whose hand was withered. And the questioned Jesus, asking, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”
Now stop for a moment and picture this scene.
Ever seen a man with a withered hand?
Well here is a man who has all sorts of hardships in life to endure
And now he gets used as a pawn in their game.
Only the belief is that if Jesus heals Him,
Then they think Jesus is breaking God’s Law.
That means the message they were sending to this man is that
God doesn’t want you to have any relief.
That is just a synagogue filled with love isn’t it.
The Law never said a person couldn’t be helped on the Sabbath,
But their tradition did.
THEIR TRADITION SAID,
“you could give enough medicine to keep a person alive, but you could not cause him to get better.”
(11) “And He said to them, “What man is there among you who has a sheep, and if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will he not take hold of it and lift it out?”
And of course they all would.
(12) “How much more valuable then is a man than a sheep!”
Do you hear what Jesus is saying?
“You value sheep more than man.”
You care more about your animals (because of the money involved)
Than you do about another human being.
Beyond that, if it is ok to help a sheep on the Sabbath,
Then certainly it is ok to help a man.
“It is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”
They wanted to know if it was lawful, Jesus said it is.
Romans 13:8-10 “Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. For this, “YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, YOU SHALL NOT MURDER, YOU SHALL NOT STEAL, YOU SHALL NOT COVET,” and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, “YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.”
Matthew 7:12 “In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”
(13) “Then He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand!” he stretched it out, and it was restored to normal, like the other.”
THAT IS THE SORT OF THING GOD WOULD DO.
THAT IS THE SORT OF THING RELIGION WON’T DO.
Jesus came to offer man rest from his burdens,
It was the religion of the Pharisees that wanted him enslaved.
So Jesus sets him free, even on the Sabbath.
His mission must be our mission as well.
It is too easy to just play church.
NOT FOCUSED ON MINISTERING TO ONE ANOTHER
NOT FOCUSED ON WORSHIPING GOD.
Just going through our little routine.
We have to make sure our focus is on worship, not routine.
The things the Pharisees were doing weren’t wrong.
Its ok not to carry food on the Sabbath. Its ok not to light a candle.
There is nothing wrong with that.
The problem is, that was more important to them than worship.
It leads us to ask a question of ourselves?
Why did I come to church this morning?
Did I come out of habit?
Did I come so other people would see that I was here?
Did I come to make sure everything was done correctly?
Did I come to make sure the preacher didn’t say anything wrong?
Or did I come to worship?
Did I come to lay all on the altar before God?
Did I come to look for a way to minister to my fellow brethren?
In short did I come offering rest
Or did I come increasing other people’s burdens?
See the Pharisees wanted their rituals.
They wanted to keep playing the flute and making people dance.
But Jesus refused.
He came offering rest.
And because of this they hated Him.
(14) “But the Pharisees went out and conspired against Him, as to how they might destroy Him.”
There will always be enemies of true salvation.
There will always be those
Who would rather yoke you to some sort of religious burden.
But Jesus says no.
Jesus offers rest to all who will come to Him
And take His yoke upon themselves and let Him have control.
This morning let me encourage you to embrace His rest.
Find it for yourselves and offer it to others.
Let us make sure that what we are about here
Is true worship saturated with true compassion.
Experience rest and offer it.
Matthew 11:28-30 “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. “For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
