September 14 Grace is Challenged

Luke 6:1-5 One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and his disciples began to pick some heads of grain, rub them in their hands and eat the kernels. 2 Some of the Pharisees asked, “Why are you doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” 3 Jesus answered them, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? 4 He entered the house of God, and taking the consecrated bread, he ate what is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions.”  5 Then Jesus said to them, “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
 
HAVE you ever considered that God’s law as recorded in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy contains much understanding of God’s grace – his unmerited favor in our lives? This passage refers to two grace elements in God’s law. First, God graciously commanded a Sabbath to be remembered each week (Exodus 20:8 and many other passages). This is God’s favor to give us a day to rest, worship and consider God’s blessing of life to the earth and to the Jews. Consider the impact of this rest day as the Jews in Egypt’s slavery had worked seven days each week. What a gift!
    Second, God’s law also graciously permitted hungry travelers to pluck grain to eat from the fields along a road. Deuteronomy 23:25 If you enter your neighbor's grainfield, you may pick kernels with your hands, but you must not put a sickle to his standing grain. The understanding is, “Take eat as needed but no more.” Graciously, God permitted rest for weary workers and food for hungry travelers. These are the physical ways of salvation. Our Lord always cares for us physically to prepare us to enter into his spiritual resting and feasting.
    But this grace wasn’t enough for the over-zealous Pharisees. They had added 39 rules to God’s Sabbath law! God’s straightforward commands became an impossible pathway in the Pharisees’ man-formed, legalized system.
    As Jesu responds, “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” he affirms the Lord’s way needs no additions. Long before the Pharisees’ rules, Jesus, the Living Word, had spoken to establish his gracious care over the Jews on their desert journey from Egypt and into the Promised Land. He spoke again that day to affirm he is the Lord. He has made the law. He requires no instruction from us. We are to listen, learn and live into his gracious, righteous truth. 
 
Prayer: Thank you, Father, for your gracious words throughout Scripture. You love me in so many ways. I praise you for your favor of salvation in my physical body and eternal soul. Amen.