Seventeenth Sunday after Trinity

The fulfillment of God’s law is love—love for God and love for your neighbor. Love is the perfect summary of the Ten Commandments. During Jesus’ earthly ministry, the Pharisees had a reputation for being the experts on God’s Law. Nobody was better at keeping the Ten Commandments, or so the Pharisees wanted everyone to believe. But in truth, the Pharisees did not keep God’s Law at all. Their thoughts, words, and deeds were devoid of love. How do we know this? Well, when God came among them as a man, as their neighbor, they killed him. They used the Law of God in the worst possible way. Rather than loving God and neighbor, they used the Law as a weapon against him.

To this day many religious people follow in the footsteps of the Pharisees. In fact, you and I have often been Pharisees, using God’s Law to gain an advantage over our neighbors. Did someone point out that you’ve been behaving badly? Time to give them a dose of the Law: “Judge not!” We’ve known how to do this since preschool. Just like the Pharisees we are experts in interpreting the Law of God—but always in our own favor. “Be kind to others,” means, “You should be kind to me.” “Forgive one another,” means, “You should forgive me.” “Give to those who have need,” means that your friend owes you one of his candy bars.

Jesus pointed out the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, saying, “If your ox or donkey fell into a pit on the Sabbath day, would you pull it out?” (Lk 14:5) Of course, they would. After all, their livelihood depended on having healthy animals. But was Jesus allowed to heal a man on the Sabbath? No. That was against their interpretation of God’s Law. The same rule that allowed them to work on the Sabbath in order to have healthy animals forbade Jesus from working to give their neighbor health.

This hypocrisy is alive and well in the church today. In fact, it lurks within the heart of every Christian. If someone gossips about me, it is sinful slander. But if I gossip about someone else, I am showing Christian concern. If I am angry at my neighbor it is righteous indignation, but if my neighbor is angry at me it is unchristian behavior. Ever since God first gave his Law, sinners have been seeking to use it to their advantage. God’s Law is twisted so that it is not about loving my neighbor. It’s about getting ahead of my neighbor.

The Pharisee within each of us will, as Martin Luther said, “always use the best things in the worst manner.” The Law of God, which is meant to help my neighbor, will instead be used to harm him. As an example, we can look at the Law of the Sabbath Day. God knew that people would work themselves to death. He knew that greedy employers would force their employees to work without ever taking a day off. He knew that people would be too busy to hear his Word. So God gave us the third commandment: “Remember the Sabbath day, by keeping it holy” (Exodus 20:8). God’s purpose was love. We should fear and love God so that we do not despise preaching and his Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear it and learn it. And we should love our neighbor. If you are a boss, give your workers a day off to rest and hear God’s Word. Love fulfills the Third Commandment. Love is what God requires. But the Pharisees misused this in the worst manner and said, “The sabbath Law means that I can work to keep my donkey healthy, but Jesus isn’t allowed to heal my neighbor.” This is the opposite of love.

Jesus, who wrote the Ten Commandments, took one look at the sick man and knew exactly what the Law required: love. He had the power to help his neighbor, and so he did. But it was not just for that man’s benefit that Jesus did it. Jesus was living the life of compassion, love, and mercy that God’s law requires of us all. Every time you see Jesus doing acts of kindness, consider that he is living that life of loving obedience that God requires of us. We haven’t lived it. That’s what the Bible calls sin. This is why our conscience is afraid. This is why we come up with ways to calm our conscience: inventing rules we can obey to replace the law we disobeyed, making excuses for our own behavior, blaming others, denying that sin is actually sin, or just getting angry and changing the subject when sins are bought to our attention. None of this can bring us peace and rest. None of this fulfills the Sabbath.

Christ does. Where we used the Law to make ourselves look better in comparison to others, Jesus fulfilled the Law by loving us, his neighbors, perfectly as he died in our place on the cross. Where we refused to rest on the Sabbath, running here and there in our business to get ahead of our neighbors, Jesus rested in his tomb after accomplishing the work of our salvation.

Keeping the Sabbath is not about obeying a set of rules, and especially not about watching to see who else is obeying them, as the Pharisees were fond of doing. The true Sabbath rest that God requires can only be found in Jesus. That’s why we go to church, whether on a Sunday or any other day of the week that we gather for worship. We go to find our Sabbath rest in Christ, who gives us the forgiveness, the peace, the reconciliation with God that he has won for us all. Every time we come to church, Jesus invites us to cease from our work and lay our burdens on him. Have you failed to love your neighbor as the Law requires? Of course, you have. Lay that burden on Jesus. Receive his forgiveness, and find in him the perfect rest that God wants to give to every one of his children. Humble yourself before Jesus and receive from him the peace of God that passes all understanding. Find in Jesus your true Sabbath rest. Amen.