Luke 6:1-5 - Going Against the Grain
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Introduction:
I am by no means a master woodsman. Our very own Jonathan Bowling has some impressive skills in this area. But I do know one thing from experience. Cutting along the grain is much easier than cutting against the grain.
When chopping a piece of wood into two pieces, you can chop across the grain or you can chop with the grain.
This first picture is chopping with grain. Note how smoothly the wood split. There is a natural grain that splits nicely.
Note in this second picture of a man trying to chop a tree down across or against the grain. It takes many more strikes before getting through. This is because each of the wood grains must be split this way.
Jesus came to earth as Truly God and Truly man into a world that had become so legalistic that the actual Laws of God were increasingly misunderstood because of the addition of man’s ideas and rules.
And Jesus, knowing the difficulty ahead, continued chopping against the grain with the axe of truth. He continued fighting against legalism and self-righteousness.
And the account we have today is all about grain. No, its not about the grain of wood. But it is about grain nonetheless!
Join me as we read our account for today:
Read Full Scripture:
On a Sabbath, while he was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked and ate some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands.
But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?”
And Jesus answered them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him:
how he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?”
And he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.”
Prayer
Today we will see three aspects of Christ’s Lordship. The first is…
I. Jesus Is Lord Over the Law (1-2)
I. Jesus Is Lord Over the Law (1-2)
On a Sabbath, while he was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked and ate some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands. But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?”
Some may read this and take issue with what the disciples are doing. And this issue isn’t actually what the Pharisees mentioned. Instead, people today read this and think - aren’t they stealing grain? Come on, Pharisees - you all are missing the ‘captain obvious’ issue here!
Yet, the Pharisees realize that the disciples of Jesus are in fact not stealing. The Jewish Law allowed them to partake as they walked through the field of another.
“If you go into your neighbor’s vineyard, you may eat your fill of grapes, as many as you wish, but you shall not put any in your bag. If you go into your neighbor’s standing grain, you may pluck the ears with your hand, but you shall not put a sickle to your neighbor’s standing grain.
Hospitality of this sort was understood in Israel and was even the Law in Israel. There wasn’t a gas station on every corner or a fast food restaurant to stop by on long journeys like there are today! So the Pharisees aren’t knocking Jesus on this particular issue.
What they mention is that the disciples are plucking grain and eating it on the Sabbath. And they claim that what is occuring is not lawful. The Pharisees are claiming that Jesus’ disciples are lawbreakers and that He needs to intervene.
But whose law is being broken here?
They are going to quickly find out that:
Jesus is Lord over the Law and He is the only Law giver.
You see, the Mosaic Law did not forbid what the disciples were doing. It was entirely lawful for them to eat when hungry. And it was entirely lawful for them to glean in this field - as long as they didn’t use tools in order to do so.
The ‘laws’ that they breaking were none other than the legalistic additions of the Pharisees. The Pharisees had determined that picking the grain was the equivalent of reaping, rubbing the husks together to separate out the edible portion was threshing, and throwing the husks away was winnowing. They had determined that this was nothing short of harvesting which was against the Mosaic Law.
And because they exalted their own opinions and regulations over the actual Law of God, they were infuriated at what Jesus’ disciples were doing by disregarding their rules and regulations.
You cannot help but think about how the Pharisees continue badgering Jesus. Here Jesus and His disciples are - out in a field - and they still cannot seem to avoid the Pharisees. They are like little evil detectives following every move Jesus makes. We must take a step back and worship Christ for His great patience here for not calling down fire to destroy them at this very moment!
To help put into perspective the legalism of the Pharisees, it is important to note some of their laws. These laws are found in the Talmud and Mishnah. And many of these laws are centered around the Sabbath. The religious elites had successfully turned the Sabbath from a gift from God giving rest to the people into the most burdensome and dreadful day of the week.
I have included only a small sampling of Sabbath ordinances and rules from Edersheim’s book called The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah (p777). This book gleans these regulations from the Talmud and Mishnah which are rabbinic documents that describe ordinances in detail. Here are a few rules that might make you chuckle:
Traveling more than 3,000 feet from home was forbidden…unless you had placed food at the 3,000 foot point before the Sabbath, which would consider this spot a home and then you could travel another 3,000 feet. One could place a rope across a narrow alley and consider it a doorway which would now make this an entrance of one’s house and the 3,000 feet could actually start there.
No fire could be lit or put out.
Warm water could be poured into cold but not visa versa.
Bathing was forbidden.
You could only carry enough ink in order to write two letters of the Hebrew alphabet.
Clothes could not be examined or shaken out lest an insect be killed in the process which would be considered work.
If you tossed an object up with one hand - it would have to be caught by the same hand. If you caught it with the other hand - it was a Sabbath violation.
I cannot help but see the Pharisees walking around with a whistle and calling violations like an NBA referee! When it gets complex though, they have to meet together to try to figure out what the actual rule even means!
Have you ever played a game with someone who changed the rules and also knew rules that you didn’t? You don’t have to audibly let us know who it was though. That might get a bit awkward.
But they always stayed a step or two ahead and there was no way to win.
Maybe like playing UNO with one of the fill-in-the-blank UNO cards seen here!
That was what the Pharisees had done to the Sabbath. They had created so many rules that the Sabbath had become a burden instead of a blessing. What was given as a gift from God to be a time of rest had become a complex web of legalistic rules and laws only known by the religious elites.
You see, the Pharisees knew all of the tricks to win these games. But the common people didn’t. And so most Jews suffered under the burden and weight of the Sabbath regulations while the Pharisees were able to keep their rules and still move about.
But as I have already alluded to, Jesus is Lord over the Law - and to illustrate this, He shows that He is…
Scripture References: Deuteronomy 23:24-25
II. Jesus is Lord Over the Loaves (3-4)
II. Jesus is Lord Over the Loaves (3-4)
For those who might not be as quick at picking up on metaphors, the title of the sermon is “Going Against the Grain”… and we discussed picking grain in our first point and now we are discussing loaves of bread (also grain). Just wanted to make sure you were with me still!
Now that we are all back on track let’s read verses 3-4 again:
And Jesus answered them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?”
To understand Jesus’ reference regarding the bread of the Presence, we need to reflect back on Exodus 25:23-30 and Leviticus 24:5-9. These two Scriptures mention 12 loaves that are placed in two rows of six each. Each was made with 2/10 of an ephah of flour which functioned as a grain offering. The offering was sprinkled with frankincense which was a special fragrance commanded by God for this offering (we can note why frankincense was so special as it was offered to Jesus by the Magi).
These loaves were replaced by Aaron weekly and were placed in the sanctuary just in front of the holy of holies. The bread would be removed and eaten within the confines of the sanctuary. The passage in Leviticus chapter 24 clearly lays out that the Bread of the Presence was to be prepared by and eaten by the priests alone.
These loaves were to symbolize the covenantal Presence of God with Israel. It showed that God was their sustenance and that they were entirely dependent on Him alone.
Now that we understand what the bread of the Presence was we can look at the account regarding David and this bread in 1 Samuel 21:1-6.
David has just been warned by Jonathan of Saul’s plan to kill David. David and his men are fleeing Saul and arrive at Nob. The men are very hungry - likely to the point of fainting from starvation and so David asks the priests for bread.
Now then, what do you have on hand? Give me five loaves of bread, or whatever is here.” And the priest answered David, “I have no common bread on hand, but there is holy bread—if the young men have kept themselves from women.”
The only bread available here is the bread of the Presence. And we discussed above, this bread was only to be eaten in the sanctuary by the priests. Yet, see what happens:
So the priest gave him the holy bread, for there was no bread there but the bread of the Presence, which is removed from before the Lord, to be replaced by hot bread on the day it is taken away.
For those of us who are rule followers, this account just got very uncomfortable - didn’t it? Weren’t the priests of Nob sinning by giving David and his men the bread of the Presence? Wasn’t this a terrible thing to do?
This is a difficult passage to understand and follow. And Jesus is the one bringing it up to the ultimate rule followers - the Pharisees.
Although it wasn’t listed that David and his men could eat of this bread, God approved of it. God certainly does desire complete obedience, though. So how can we understand what happened in light of God’s commands?
Matthew gives us another detail in understanding Christ’s teaching here.
And if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless.
Quoting from Hosea 6:6, Christ reminds the Pharisees of God’s command for mercy. Yes, we are to obey. We show God that we love Him through our obedience (John 14:15). But we are not being obedient to God by ignoring a fellow human’s need and refraining from mercy. We are obeying God by showing mercy like God shows mercy to us. God does not call us to cold-hearted and calloused observance of rituals and ceremony. He calls us to love our neighbor as one’s self.
I want to give a different spin on this to help us see mercy at work in our own lives.
We aren’t supposed to be able to go to heaven. We aren’t supposed to be able to come into God’s presence through prayer. But because of the great mercy of Jesus Christ who intercedes on our behalf and who paid the penalty for our sin on our behalf we can do both of these through faith, repentance and trust in Christ!
Don’t hear in this passage that Christ is saying that God’s commands are not important. That is assuredly not the point that He is making here as we mentioned what He taught about the connection between loving God and obeying God in John 14:15 above.
John MacArthur summarizes the point Jesus is making well in his commentary:
“The point of the account, which was lost on the Pharisees, was that mercy, compassion, and human need were more important than rigid adherence to even biblical ritual and ceremony.” - John MacArthur
And Jesus answered them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?”
Another understanding that we can glean from Jesus reference to David in verses 3-4 is that Jesus is referred to as the Son of David multiple times in Scripture. Jesus came from the line of David. Yet, Jesus is far greater than David. If David was allowed to eat of the priests bread, how much more should the Great High Priest from heaven be able to eat of this bread!
If David was allowed to eat and violate a part of the actual ceremonial law - how much more can Jesus Christ and His disciples eat in a lawful way on the Sabbath?
Jesus is Lord over the Law and over the loaves… Finally we see that…
Scripture References: Exodus 25:23-30, Leviticus 24:5-9, 1 Samuel 21:1-6, Matthew 12:7, Hosea 6:6, John 14:15
III. Jesus is Lord Over the Last Day (5)
III. Jesus is Lord Over the Last Day (5)
And he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.”
I want us to start with discussing the last word of this verse - Sabbath.
The Sabbath given to Israel was the last day of the week - or Saturday. This was given in 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 to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and 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.
Further understanding of the Sabbath even refers back to creation as we see in Genesis 2:2:
And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done.
And he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.”
The Sabbath was a very special day given to Israel. And Jesus claims in verse 5 here that this day is His to rule over.
And in doing so we see Jesus use a name that we have only seen one other time in this book so far (Luke 5:24) but a name that will continue to come up more and more - namely “The Son of Man.” As we mentioned as we went through chapter 5, this term was a Messianic term that came from Daniel 7:13-14.
The Son of Man is Jesus’ third most popular title in the New Testament. But it is actually number one when considering the names that came out of His own lips. This title is given some 82 times in the Gospels - all but 3 of these are directly from His mouth.
The most common title of Jesus is ‘Christ’ - which means “Anointed One” and is the direct Greek translation of the Hebrew title Messiah. This title occurs some 533 times in the New Testament.
The second most common title is Lord which is a direct parallel of Adonai - the Hebrew word for Lord referring to God as Master. This particular reference is in this verse as well.
I think it is important for us to understand that…
Jesus has just called Himself God twice in one verse!
We mentioned that the Sabbath found its origin in creation earlier in our sermon today.
Yet, Jesus just referred to Himself as Lord of the Sabbath.
Do we understand the magnitude of what Jesus just said?
He just said that He is God and created the Sabbath! In essence, He looks at these religious leaders who have dared to try to make their own rules and regulations incredulously as who do you think you are?
Because Jesus Christ is Lord of Sabbath - we celebrate our Sabbath on Sunday - the first day of the week when Christ was raised from the grave. So the early church started meeting on the Lord’s Day. Because He is Lord of the Sabbath - it is His to rule and reign and direct. The day is to be all about Him.
And because this day is so important to Christ, we should hold it in high regard as well.
In writing this sermon, God really convicted me of something. As we enter this difficult part of today’s sermon, I pray that you graciously hear what the Lord has revealed and been teaching me. This is for all of us.
I have always had a very high view of church attendance. Growing up, my family was faithfully regular in attending church. I have continued with that same fervor with my preaching and have quoted Hebrews 10:25 many times which lets us know that we need to not neglect meeting together and stressed the importance of believers regularly attending worship.
But the true conviction that I received from God was that in my attempt to elevate the need for church attendance, I missed the bigger picture.
I have told many people that they need to come to church because:
1) Hearing the Word preached is important
2) Fellowship with other believers is important
3) Singing praises to God is important
4) It is a command of God - which obviously makes it important!
But this past week God revealed to me the main reason why we must attend church regularly. It is not because of how much we need church - although we most certainly do need to regularly be in church for our spiritual growth and the points that I listed a moment ago are definitely correct points…
But the most important reason we need to attend church regularly is because God deserves our faithfulness to His bride.
Jesus Christ loves His bride - namely the Church. And He desires us to faithfully attend Church because He desires our corporate worship of Him.
Brothers and sisters - you may be able to look at me and let me know you are just fine not coming to church regularly. You may be able to let me know that you listen to podcast preachers that are frankly better than me (thanks for not saying that directly to me - appreciate your grace and mercy). You may listen to worship that is better quality than what we sing on Sunday morning. You may be able to tell me that you do church in your car on the way to work.
But my friends - Jesus demands and deserves our regular corporate worship. You need to be at church because Jesus deserves to hear your voice join with others. You need to be at church on Sunday because Jesus deserves your faithfulness to His bride. And despite how messed up and sinful the bride (namely the Church) can be - He desires and requires us us to be an active part of His church.
I pray that if God is speaking to you in this message about your lack of consistency in attending worship on Sunday mornings - that you repent and value Christ more. It isn’t about me being pleased or happy or even you being happy - it isn’t about a certain amount of people sitting in the seats in this room - but it is about Christ being honored and glorified as worthy of all of praise. And He is my friends.
He is Lord of the Sabbath. Let us honor Him as such.
Scripture References: Exodus 20:8-11, Genesis 2:2, Luke 5:24, Daniel 7:13-14, Hebrews 10:25
Conclusion:
I know that this message ended a little more difficult than it began. But we need to honor Christ as Lord. He is Lord of everything - especially our Sundays. I pray that we make every effort to regularly attend services - not because we should - not because of what we get out of it - not for the approval of man - but for the glory of Jesus Christ. He is worthy my friends.
If you don’t see Him as worthy of your obedience in regularly gathering for corporate worship, I pray that test your heart. Is He the Lord over all of your life? I understand that there are times where one may miss. I’m not trying to place a legalistic burden on you Church for perfect attendance. But, truly, when you look at your life - have you given all of your life to Christ? If not, I pray that you repent and fully turn to Him.
True salvation requires true submission. We must not only believe the right stuff - that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who lived a sinless life and died on the cross for our sins - that He rose from the dead three days later and now is at the right hand of the Father. Believing correctly is definitely the foundation - but true salvation requires true repentance - turning away from one’s sin - and true submission - acknowledging Christ as the Lord over one’s entire life.
If you haven’t done that, or you aren’t sure - I would love to chat with you about it further after the service.
Obviously we won’t be perfect on this side of eternity. But if we are truly saved, God will continue to sanctify us by His Holy Spirit. He will continue to discipline us as children that He loves and help us follow Him faithfully. He has already done all of the work for your salvation - you just must believe, repent, and submit. And He will continue doing all of the work in your life through you if you step aside.
Jesus Christ is worthy of our praise and honor. He is worthy of our submission. He is worthy of giving Him our entire life.
Jesus Christ is Lord over the Law, Lord over the Loaves, and yes - He is Lord over the Last Day - the Sabbath.
And above all… Jesus Christ is Lord (period).
Prayer