Have You not Read?

Luke 6:1-5

          As we continue our study of St. Luke’s gospel, we once again find our Lord at odds with the biggest hypocrites of His day, the Pharisees. I don’t believe that Jesus ever had anything good to say about these guys and this day was no exception. Our lesson today will be from the sixth chapter of Luke verses 1-5.

            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."

            The setting today is on a path going through a field of grain. It is a Sabbath day and on this path Jesus is walking with a number of disciples. He has not yet chosen who His apostles will be so there were at least twelve men with Him and probably many more. They are plucking heads of grain of the stocks as they walk, rubbing it in their hands, blowing away the chaff and eating the grain.

            We do not know whose field they were in but we do know that what they were doing was perfectly acceptable, based on the teachings of the torah. In Deuteronomy 23:25 we read, “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.” In other words a person could eat his neighbor’s grain or corn but he could not harvest it.

          By the way, that does not mean that it is ok to eat candy in the store without paying for it. I won’t back you up in court if you get caught on that one. You’re on your own!

          Anyway, these guys are walking through the field and out of nowhere some Pharisees show up. The question is “where did they come from?” Now I’m no Sherlock Holms, but there seems to be only one answer to this question. The Pharisees had to be spying on Jesus and his entourage. They were either following them from a distance or hiding from their view along the path. You’d think they would have better things to do on a Sabbath but apparently not.

I can hear it now;

“Hey Pete, what are you doing after temple services today?”

“Well, I should be fixing my roof but I can’t do any work today. What did you have in mind George?”

“Well I heard that that Jesus character was going to be up near old McDonald’s farm this afternoon. Let’s go see if we can catch him in the act. You know how he loves to break the Sabbath laws that we have established.”

“Sure, why not!  I can’t eat till after sunset anyway. Let’s go.”

          Now that may not be exactly how it went down but then again, who knows? One thing we do know is that they hit the jackpot that day, or so they thought.

          The Mishnah had 39 categories for things you could not do on the Sabbath with 6 sub categories under each of them. Even the writers of the Mishnah had there reservations about the Sabbath laws; “The rules about the Sabbath….are as mountains hanging by a hair, for scripture is scanty and the rules many.” Mishnah

            Can you picture Pete and George hiding and watching in the wings; “Look George, they are plucking the heads from the stock, that’s reaping. They are rubbing them in their hands, that’s threshing. They are getting rid of the chaff, that’s winnowing and they are eating the grain, that means they are preparing food. A quadruple violation, we’ve got them now!

          Ah ha, caught you red handed, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on a Sabbath?

          The text doesn’t say who Pete and George, I mean the Pharisees were addressing the question to, but Jesus is the one who answers them, and he starts with a question of his own "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?"

            Now the question is obviously a rhetorical one, of course they had read 1 Samuel. The problem is, how did they interpret it and what did they learn from it?

                Since Jesus used the example of David to straiten out the Pharisees it is only right that we understand the passage. Within the temple or in David’s case, the tabernacle, there was a gold table that sat very close to the Holy of Holies. The table was made of gold and on the table sat twelve loaves of bread which represented the twelve tribes of Israel.  Every Sabbath the twelve loaves were replace by twelve new loaves and the sons of Aaron were the only ones allowed to eat the old bread.

             "You shall take fine flour and bake twelve loaves from it; two tenths of an ephah shall be in each loaf. And you shall set them in two piles, six in a pile, on the table of pure gold before the LORD. And you shall put pure frankincense on each pile, that it may go with the bread as a memorial portion as a food offering to the LORD. Every Sabbath day Aaron shall arrange it before the LORD regularly; it is from the people of Israel as a covenant forever. And it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place, since it is for him a most holy portion out of the LORD's food offerings, a perpetual due."     Leviticus 24:5-9

          One day when David was on a mission for King Saul, he went to the tabernacle in Nob and met with Ahimelech the priest.  David wanted five loaves of bread for him and his followers. The only bread available was the shewbread or the bread of the presence, as it was called. After inquiring about the sexual purity of David and his men, Ahimelech gave him the bread and sent him on his way.

           What is the point? First of all, the bread was baked and placed on the table on the Sabbath. The Pharisees own interpretation of the law went against what the bible taught. Secondly, David broke the law but was never punished for it. In fact it is not even mentioned again until Jesus brings it up. Why is that?

          Could it be that Jesus is arguing “that the law was never intended to be interpreted so literally that compassion was excluded in a situation of basic need like David’s?” Bock In other words, Jesus is suggesting that sometimes the rules can be bent or even broken to accommodate human needs.

          I had the opportunity to spend some time in the last couple of days with a very good friend of ours from Minnesota. I met Craig and Linda in 1990 at the Sturgis bike rally. I had been out riding all day and a storm had hit the campground where we were staying. My tent got blown over and everything in it soaked. Craig and Linda took everything out of my tent and hung it up to dry. We have been friends ever since.

          The other night Craig told me about the last time he went to church. I am guessing that it was at least 35 years ago. Craig grew up in the Lutheran church and one day was sitting in the back row when a young mother came in with her two children. The service had just started and no one knew she had even arrived except Craig and the minister. The children had their Sunday best on but mom still had her hair in curlers and was wearing shorts. When they were leaving after the service, Craig was right behind the lady and the minister leaned over and told her to be on time from now on and to dress appropriately. Craig never went back to church after that. If that was what church was all about, he wanted nothing to do with it.

          When legalism becomes more important than the needs of the individual, something has gone terribly wrong in the church.

          If anyone could interpret the intent of the law it was Christ. And what he was saying is this, if you condemn me and my disciples for what we have done, then you must also condemn what David and his men did. No Pharisee would ever do that.

          What do we learn from this teaching? If Jesus said to you, “Have you not read”, what would you say? “Yes I have read” But if he said, “Do you understand”, how would you respond?

          Over the past 3 years we have looked at different tools you can use when doing your own bible study. Little sayings like, “scripture interprets scripture” and, “context is king” come to mind, but how do we really approach scripture? Do we do it with an open mind or do we inject our own theology into the text before we even start? I’ve said this many times, everyone has a theology, but not everyone has the right theology.

          When you open up your bible you have a responsibility to read it in context. To find out who the audience was and why they needed to hear what was being written. Don’t read anything into the bible that is not there and don’t ignore things because you don’t like that they are there.

          Remember St. Paul’s words to Timothy, “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.”2Tim.3:16,17 

          We are to approach scripture not only with an open mind but with a needy heart. If we do not go to Gods word with a sense of need, how can we expect to receive anything from it?

          When Bishop Butler was on his death bed he was very distressed. His chaplain said to him one day, “‘Have you forgotten,’ my lord, ‘that Jesus Christ is a Saviour?’  ‘But’, said the dying bishop, ‘how can I know that he is a saviour for me?’ ‘It is written,’ said the chaplain, ‘him that cometh unto me I will nowise cast out.’  And Butler answered, ‘I have read these words a thousand times and I never saw there meaning until now. Now I die in peace.’” Barclay

          When you study the scriptures with an open mind and a needy heart, the greatest treasure in the world will be yours for the taking, the perfect will of God in your life.

          That is not what was happening with the Pharisees. They were as closed minded as could be when it came to the scriptures and Jesus had only one more thing to say to them before they slithered away, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.” The parallel passage in Mark reads, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.”

          The Pharisees thought they had the market cornered when it came to the Sabbath, but Jesus knew otherwise. He had authority over the Sabbath and wanted to make sure these guys knew it.  But what did he mean by, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath” and, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath”?

          There are all kinds’ of theological teachings that can be drawn from this verse but the bottom line is this, Jesus Christ, as the Son of Man, has been given all authority by the Father, the father sent Him and is well pleased with him. As the Messiah, Jesus is indeed the Lord of the Sabbath and has the authority to lay down any principles that he sees fit to govern that day.

          Our response to that is to honor his authority by setting aside one day each week to rest in Him and worship Him; to receive His word and sacrament and above all, to place the needs of others above our own. 

           When Jesus asks the question, “Have you not read”, I pray your answer will be, “yes Lord, I have read and I understand.”