Preaching Sister: The Spirit of the Law

Sermon Notes

teaching on the sabbath in the synagogue
woman who has been ailing 18 years (much like the bleeding woman who suffered for 12 years)

She didn’t do anything more than “appear” and Jesus told her should would be healed

too often we get hung up thinking we have to do so much in order to earn Jesus’ healing, but instead he simply offers it….it is a gift of grace. It’s free. It’s unmerited. Unearned. And his gift comes before any action on her part.
He heals her, touches her, and she is able to stand up and the only thing that came to mind for her to do was to praise God and worship. 18 years of staring at the floor and dirty feet and finally she can stand up and move….of course she praised God. And there in the middle of her worship, interrupts the synagogue leader

Hey, wait a minute, you can’t heal on the sabbath, that’s work! you’re breaking the law!

Exodus 20: 8 Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work. 10 But the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. 11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and consecrated it.

this is a big deal and by all accounts Jesus did work and thus broke the law…but he clarifies something…which for me sheds light on sabbath law as a whole.

He pushes back on the synagogue leader and says don’t you take your animals to get water…you do the work of untying and retying them? So, you work, in order to preserve life?
So, when I “worked” to preserve this woman’s life, I wasn’t really breaking the sabbath law…I was fulfilling it…I was giving life, restoring life to someone…which is the whole intent of sabbath law in the first place. Right?
and the leaders while maybe humbled a little, were not willing to admit they were wrong. Instead they turned to the people…the other sick people who were ready to be blessed, touched, and restored to health by Jesus and he says, “all of you, get out of here. there are 6 other days of the week that you can be healed and fixed…pick one of those!”
Clearly this guy has missed Jesus’ point. He’s so hung up on what’s “right” on what’s “lawful” that he misses the opportunity to see God at work in Jesus, redeeming, healing and restoring.

UNFORTUNATELY, he’s not the only one who gets hung up on such things. in the midst of witnessing grace, we often like to argue too.

not when it’s for us of course, but when it’s for others and it breaks our rules or challenges our beliefs

Grace interrupts the norms, it breaks the rules. We like to think of it as sweet and beautiful and something we would all accept willingly. But the reality is, grace is something given freely to those who don’t deserve it. a gift given freely to those who don’t deserve it.

we tend to be ok with good things coming to good people, but what about when good things happen to “bad” people? to people we think don’t deserve it? or worse yet, to people we KNOW don’t deserve it?
when blessings fall on the mean-spirited and the unkind, what do we say?

you’re likely sitting there wondering, “does she think good things should happen to bad people?” Are you saying we supposed to go out of our way for people who don’t deserve it?

well, yes and no. It’s not exactly me speaking…but that is Jesus’ way. He is regularly looking for the outsiders…the “bad” ones, the rule breakers and doing good things for them…even though they don’t deserve it. And if we’re supposed to be imitators of Christ, then logic would follow that we are supposed to do that same thing.
It’s counter intuitive, I know. And it doesn’t mean we don’t do good things for those who do deserve it. But the call to offer grace isn’t about simple and sweet for the people we love, it’s about stepping out to bless someone who is an outsider (to us or to others).

in practical terms it can mean stopping on the side of the road when we’re on our way to our thing to help someone in need
it can be helping to cover the groceries in the check out line
it can be inviting the co-worker who’s always a pain to the bbq at our house
it can mean offering shelter to a refuge
it can mean sharing a meal with a hard-hearted family member
it can mean giving up our special coffee to buy someone a meal
—> sometimes we’ll know how deserving (or not) the person is, and sometimes it’s all left in God’s hands. But it’s not about us knowing “hey, you’re not worthy, I’ll pick you to bless”. But it is about being open and receptive to the movement of the Spirit so we can be about God’s kingdom creating work of offering grace—even when it’s inconvenient, even when it breaks our rules, even when the person doesn’t deserve it…probably most especially when they don’t deserve it.

Preaching Sister