Sermon Notes

12 At that time Jesus went through the grain fields on the Sabbath; his disciples were hungry, and they began to pluck heads of grain and to eat. 2 When the Pharisees saw it, they said to him, “Look, your disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath.” 3 He said to them, “Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? 4 How he entered the house of God, and they ate the bread of the Presence, which it was not lawful for him or his companions to eat, but only for the priests? 5 Or have you not read in the law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple break the Sabbath and yet are guiltless? 6 I tell you, something greater than the temple is here. 7 But if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. 8 For the Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.”
(New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition, NRSVue)
12 1-2 One Sabbath, Jesus was strolling with his disciples through a field of ripe grain. Hungry, the disciples were pulling off the heads of grain and munching on them. Some Pharisees reported them to Jesus: “Your disciples are breaking the Sabbath rules!”3-5 Jesus said, “Really? Didn’t you ever read what David and his companions did when they were hungry, how they entered the sanctuary and ate fresh bread off the altar, bread that no one but priests were allowed to eat? And didn’t you ever read in God’s Law that priests carrying out their Temple duties break Sabbath rules all the time and it’s not held against them?6-8 “There is far more at stake here than religion. If you had any idea what this Scripture meant—‘I prefer a flexible heart to an inflexible ritual’—you wouldn’t be nitpicking like this. The Son of Man is no yes-man to the Sabbath; he’s in charge.” (The Message, MSG)

Any close reading of Jesus’ ministry in the Gospel of Matthew reveals that he was regularly in conflict with Jewish orthodoxy because of their insistence that people must strictly observe religious tradition and its customs as proof of one’s devotion to God. While Jesus did teach that the Torah—or Hebrew law code—was worthy of observance, he also taught that love took precedence over all other religious law observances, including Sabbath.
In Matthew 22:36-40, Jesus quotes Deuteronomy and Leviticus as he sums up the whole of the Hebrew Bible’s (Old Testament’s) teaching on love:
“Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
Writing to a late 1st century community of Jesus followers, the Matthean writer underscores justice, mercy, and love—not religious rules and customs—as the primary activity of those who are called the Church. Can we say the same of the 21st century followers of Jesus who call themselves the Church?

Matthew’s Gospel consists of six major parts, and our lesson text for this week emerges from the third portion which spans from 11:2-16:20. In these chapters, Matthew describes differing responses to Jesus’ identity, Jesus’ teaching on God’s kingdom, and growing opposition to Jesus’ ministry by the Pharisees and scribes. Case in point: this portion of Matthew is framed by two scenes that pose questions about Jesus’ identity (11:3 and 16:13). The first question is posed by John the Baptist to Jesus through his disciples, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” The second question is asked by Jesus to his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”
While many accept Jesus’ identity as the one God sent to inaugurate God’s “empire” or “kingdom,” the Jewish religious leaders—the Pharisees, Sadducees, and the leaders of synagogues—do not accept Jesus as Messiah. Therefore, they rejected his identity as God’s anointed one. Matthew’s gospel reflects intense conflict between Jesus and those religious leaders who reject his call and ministry. Because Jesus envisions a new reign of God where his followers—called the Church (ekklesia in Greek)—reshape society by radical community and care for the “least of these,” he is consistently at odds with religious leaders who are more concerned with temple rules instead of the people that worship in the temple.
In this week’s lesson, Jesus debates the Pharisees about the Sabbath because they narrowly interpret the Torah/Law to emphasize keeping rules over providing for the needs of people. As post-70CE pastoral theology, Matthew employs the theological concept of Sabbath observance to underscore how Jesus’ ministry and vision of God’s kingdom meant he stayed in conflict with the Roman Empire and the religious leaders who were complicit with imperial rule in 1st Century Palestine.

1-2 One Sabbath, Jesus was strolling with his disciples through a field of ripe grain. Hungry, the disciples were pulling off the heads of grain and munching on them. Some Pharisees reported them to Jesus: “Your disciples are breaking the Sabbath rules!”
Jesus and His disciples were passing through some grain fields on the Sabbath, followed by a delegation of Pharisees. The Pharisees—strict Mosaic code legalists—stayed close to Jesus, hoping for something bad to happen. They knew that Jesus’ popularity was growing steadily and they were eager to catch Jesus in some transgression of their rules, so that they could publicly denigrate him and dismiss his ministry.
On this particular Sabbath, we can imagine some of the Pharisees badgering Jesus with questions, hoping to trap him. Another group may have been counting the steps our Lord was taking, since they would only allow a limited amount of travel on the Sabbath. To their delight, some of the disciples began to strip heads of grain from the field, rub them in their hands to separate the grain from the sheaf, and pop it into their mouths because they were hungry. This, to the Pharisee, was harvesting and threshing grain, something which one could not do on the Sabbath. Rabbinic law expressly forbade thirty-nine types of work on the Sabbath. Plucking grain was considered to be reaping, which was work. Therefore, the Pharisees eagerly challenged Jesus on his disciples’ behavior.
3-5 Jesus said, “Really? Didn’t you ever read what David and his companions did when they were hungry, how they entered the sanctuary and ate fresh bread off the altar, bread that no one but priests were allowed to eat? And didn’t you ever read in God’s Law that priests carrying out their Temple duties break Sabbath rules all the time and it’s not held against them?
Jesus responds to the Pharisees challenging them on their interpretation of the Sabbath based the notion of his identity. Jesus’ argument was, “If David broke the law, then I, all the more, can do so.” David’s actions could be justified by arguing that he was hungry, as were his men. Jesus wants His critics to admit that they don’t condemn David’s actions because David did them. David’s identity as one whom the Pharisees revered meant they dared not condemn his actions, even though they technically violated Torah. If David could break the law (prohibiting any but the priests from eating the sacred bread) because of who he was, Jesus could also break the law, for his identity as the one that God sent (11:3 and 16:13) is even greater than David.
As Jesus discussed David, he invokes 1 Samuel 21:1–6. He debates the Pharisees from a biblical precedent, citing hunger as a common reason for eating. Yet the situations are different: David’s men are in a dangerous situation, while Jesus’ disciples are not; they are violating the Sabbath. However, in the eyes of Matthean writer, the central issue is not whether or not Jesus and his disciples broke the Sabbath, but rather who Jesus was that he could break the Sabbath. Jesus has the authority to break the Sabbath because of his identity and his presence grants his disciples authority to define, or redefine, Sabbath practices.
6-8 “There is far more at stake here than religion. If you had any idea what this Scripture meant—‘I prefer a flexible heart to an inflexible ritual’—you wouldn’t be nitpicking like this. The Son of Man is no yes-man to the Sabbath; he’s in charge.”
Jesus response in verses 6-8 also challenge the Pharisee’s interpretation of Sabbath based on identity. He says, “There is something greater than the temple here…for Son of Man is the Lord of the Sabbath… He’s in charge.” This can be taken two ways. First, Jesus may be claiming here to be the Sabbath’s Lord in the sense that he is the fulfillment of all that the Sabbath was to foreshadow. In that Jesus fulfills the Sabbath by achieving a greater rest, then the commandment to keep the Sabbath can be set aside. In Matthew 11:28–30 Jesus promises rest to all people who come to him:
“Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, 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.” (NRSVue)
Jesus alone promises what no one else can deliver: a richer experience with God, and rest from the cares of this world.
Second, Jesus is “Lord of the Sabbath” in the sense that he is greater than the Sabbath as a religious ritual, and therefore able to set it aside. To be “Lord of the Sabbath” is to be the lord over the Sabbath. When Jesus claimed to be in charge of the Sabbath, he claimed to be greater than the Sabbath and, thus, far more qualified than David with regard to observing Sabbath law. Further, because the Gospel of Matthew is the only passage within the gospels that specifically speaks of comfort for the weary as the rest of God (11:28-30), Mathew invites hearers/readers to interpret Jesus’ title as the Lord of the Sabbath as a radical revisioning of the notion of biblical rest. According to Matthew, rest is the transcendent presence of God in a new “kingdom” where God is in charge—not the Roman Empire or its designees.
In verse 7, when Jesus says, “I desire mercy and not sacrifice,” (NRSVue), he is quoting Hosea 6:6. For both Hosea and Jesus, mercy takes precedence over temple rituals and religious regulations. In his statements about the Sabbath, Jesus is saying mercy and love are the practices that Christians should be concerned with doing. Relentlessly following rules without respect for human relationship—or the systems, powers, and structures that violate human relationship—is not what God desires or rewards.
We should observe Sabbath because we understand that our life, productivity, and calendars should be ordered by a commitment to God. Sabbath rest is resisting the systems that promote work over worship and capitalism over spiritual contemplation. In fact, Rev. Tricia Hersey says, “Rest is a form of resistance because it disrupts and pushes back against capitalism and white supremacy. Both these toxic systems refuse to see the inherent divinity in human beings and have used bodies as a tool for production, evil, and destruction for centuries…the Rest Is Resistance movement is a connection and a path back to our true nature. We are stripped down to who we really were before the terror of capitalism and white supremacy. We are enough. We are divine. However, keeping Sabbath rest does not preclude also keeping proper relationship with people though agape love.

i. M. Eugene Boring, “The Gospel of Matthew: Introduction, Commentary and Reflections,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary, Volume VII (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2015) 37-58 and 188-195.
ii. Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto (Kindle Edition) p.7-8.