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Nov 14, 2021

Following is Regularly “Standing Still”

Following is Regularly “Standing Still”

Passage: Mark 2:23-3:6

Speaker: Patrick Lafferty

Series: Follow: Learning from Mark about Jesus’ Most Misunderstood Command

Keywords: mercy, david, rest, sabbath, lord, restore, bread, presence, feed, lawful

To our modern ears there may be fewer issues more confusing and less relevant than Jesus’s frequent dustups with the religious elites over proper observance of the Sabbath. But perhaps that’s because we can’t appreciate what’s really behind its observance, or what its purposes are. Maybe if we did we’d see not just why they scrummed but why it may have more significance to us than we imagined.

Readings & Scripture

PREPARATION: Matthew 11:28-30
LEADER: Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

ALL: For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

CENTRAL TEXT: Mark 2:23-3:6
23 One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. 24 And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” 25 And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: 26 how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?” 27 And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.”

3:1 Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand. 2 And they watched Jesus, to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse him. 3 And he said to the man with the withered hand, “Come here.” 4 And he said to them, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. 5 And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. 6 The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him.

BENEDICTION: Adapted from Colossians 3:17
LEADER: When you work, work as though you have worked for the Lord.
When you rest, rest in the sovereign grace of God. And when you celebrate,
celebrate as a people with the greatest reason for love, joy, and celebration.
Go now in the grace and forgiveness of our Savior, and in the name of the Father,
the Son, and the Holy Spirit. May the peace of our triune God be with you all.

ALL: And also with you.

Related SCRIPTURES:

Exodus 16:23-25; 20:8-11; 25:30
Leviticus 19:30
Leviticus 25-26
Deuteronomy 5:12-15
1 Samuel 21:1-6
Psalm 23
Isaiah 28:11,12; 30:15
Matthew 11:28-30
Hebrews 4:8-10

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

  1. What brings you rest? What activities do you partake in, or refrain from, in order to become, however you might define, “rested”?
  2. What does “spiritual rest” look and feel like? (maybe we need to attempt to define that rest, first?) How would keeping a Sabbath serve that end?
  3. Jesus gets into two scrums with the Pharisees over the Sabbath in this passage. Before you dunk on the Pharisees, “steel-man” their point of view–that is, what are their best arguments for why they take issue with how Jesus lives out the Sabbath in this passage? Be fair! Be kind!
  4. In being designated “lord of the sabbath,” are we to think of Jesus as changing the sabbath laws, or clarifying their intent? Why?
  5. It’s not often we hear a gospel writer document the emotional moment of Jesus. What all accounts for his anger toward the Pharisees there in chapter 3? What is the greater concern of the Sabbath Jesus thinks they’ve missed?
  6. Having seen the nature and importance of the sabbath through this passage, how might your preparation for it and participation in it need to change? How can you let the sabbath work for you as God intends?

QUOTES:

  • Soviet citizens longed for ritual. Ritual was originally dismissed by Marxism as a superstitious relic of the past, but researchers found that rituals were difficult to eradicate. Rituals were concrete and multisensory; they brought together families and communities in shared celebration and mourning. Rituals entered ordinary lives and struggles, while always pointing to the higher purpose toward which lives should be lived. Christianity continued to provide this sense of ordered time and human telos.
  • The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill , the with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs. - George Eliot
  • Absolutely religion is a crutch, and it’s not only useful for the weak of mind but for anyone dealing with severe weakness. You had better believe that I leaned on my belief in a silent, invisible God more in those miserable months, that miserable summer, than on any hope or notion or idea in any prior portion of my life. - Ross Douthat, The Deep Places
  • It's trying to fill the hole, and it's fear. You're going, 'What am I doing in my career?' You bottom out.... People say, 'You have an Academy Award.' The Academy Award lasted about a week, and then one week later people are going, 'Hey, Mork!  - Robin Williams
  • No Christian deserves his dogmas who does not pray them. - Austin Farrer
  • If Christ is risen, nothing else matters. And if Christ is not risen–nothing else matters. - Jaroslav Pelikan

BOOKS / DOCS

SERMONS / TALKS: