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Lord of the Sabbath Matthew: King of Heaven Matthew 12:1-21 Pastor Josh Black June 20, 2021 Please Open Your Bibles to Matthew 12

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Lord of the Sabbath Matthew: King of Heaven Matthew 12:1-21 Pastor Josh Black June 20, 2021 Please Open Your Bibles to Matthew 12 Lord of the Sabbath Matthew: King of Heaven Matthew 12:1-21 Pastor Josh Black June 20, 2021 Please open your Bibles to Matthew 12. Lucas’ passage last week ended with some of the most important words Jesus ever spoke. These are Jesus’ only words which speak explicitly about his heart.1 They not only conclude chapter 11, they introduce the theme of chapter 12. And so, I want to begin by re-reading them. “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. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (11:29-30).2 What did Jesus come to do? You could say, he came to give his people rest for their souls. Rest is a major theme in the Bible. We’re introduced to it in the first two chapters of the Bible. After God creates the heavens and the earth, he rests from his work on the seventh day. God rests from his work, not because he’s tired, but to show his work is perfect. Then he invites Adam and Eve to join him in his perfect, Sabbath rest.3 God places Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, so they can live in perfect peace or shalom. This Sabbath rest is characterized by a right relationship with God—Adam and Eve dwell in God’s presence and live under his authority and blessing. Their rest is also characterized by a right relationship with one another and God’s good creation. When Adam and Eve sinned, this perfect rest was disrupted. One theologian calls the fall the vandalism of shalom.4 They were banished from God’s presence and given a heavy burden of toilsome work and broken relationships. But when God begins his work of redeeming a people for himself, he speaks in terms of rest. God made a way for Israel to come again into his presence and to be restored to a right relationship with him. God’s presence with his people in the land is described as rest from enemies (Deut. 12:9-10). The tabernacle and temple are described as a resting place. They are like a new creation, a new Eden. When God redeemed Israel, he established a covenant with them. And the sign of that covenant was the Sabbath. The Sabbath was meant to point backward to God’s rest in creation and the rest in redemption. And it was meant to point forward to a future rest. Actually, all these pictures of rest were meant to point forward. To a final and full rest where God’s people would live again in perfect peace with God, with others, and with creation. When Jesus shows up, he says, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” He’s saying he’s the one that the land, the temple, and the Sabbath all anticipated. The purposes of redemption are fulfilled in him. 1 Dane Ortlund, Gentle and Lowly 2 Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® unless otherwise noted. 3 Vaughan Roberts, God’s Big Picture 4 Nicholas Wolterstorff, Until Justice and Peace Embrace 2 This is seen in our passage this morning. Right after Jesus says “come to me for rest,” he engages in an argument with the Pharisees about the Sabbath, the day of rest. As they engage in this topic, it becomes clear that Jesus is the fulfillment of the rest theme in the Bible. Jesus wants us to see this and to come to him. He alone offers full forgiveness of our sins. He alone can restore us to a right relationship with God. But the Pharisees didn’t see this. They didn’t come to him and they tried to keep others from coming to him, because they were threatened by him. In Matthew 23, Jesus rebukes the Pharisees for putting heavy yokes on people, for failing to come into the kingdom and from keeping others from coming in. He says, “They tie up heavy burdens hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they aren’t willing to move them with their finger… Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in” (vv. 4, 13) The Pharisees were powerful people and they liked their power. One way they exercised their power was through enforcing the Mosaic Law. But some things in the law were not as clear as they would like, so the Pharisees made up their own rules to help Israel keep God’s law. These were the heavy burdens Jesus speaks of. For example, the Mosaic Law called Israel to keep the Sabbath. There was some guidance in the law for how to keep the Sabbath. The law said you couldn’t work, you couldn’t travel, you couldn’t gather firewood. But it didn’t say much more than that. So, the Pharisees created more rules about the Sabbath. They built a fence around the law with their own rules.5 There were thirty-nine rules about the Sabbath. In our passage this morning, we see Jesus and his disciples aren’t following their man-made rules. This is a threat to their authority. Jesus shows his authority is greater than their authority. But his authority, unlike theirs, isn’t a burden. It’s meant to give rest for our souls. Matthew 11:2-30 1At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry, and they began to pluck heads of grain and to eat. 2But when the Pharisees saw it, they said to him, “Look, your disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath.” 3He said to them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, and those who were with him: 4how he entered the house of God and ate the bread of the Presence, which it was not lawful for him to eat nor for those who were with him, but only for the priests? 5Or have you not read in the Law how on the Sabbath the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath and are guiltless? 6I tell you, something greater than the temple is here. 7And if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. 8For the Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.” 9He went on from there and entered their synagogue. 10And a man was there with a withered hand. And they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”--so that they might accuse him. 11He said to them, “Which one of you who has a sheep, if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will not take hold of it and lift it out? 12Of how much more value is a man than a sheep! So it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.” 13Then he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” And the man stretched it out, and it was restored, healthy like the other. 14But the Pharisees went out and conspired against him, how to destroy him. 5 R.T. France, The Gospel of Matthew, The New International Commentary on the New Testament 3 15Jesus, aware of this, withdrew from there. And many followed him, and he healed them all 16and ordered them not to make him known. 17This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah: 18“Behold, my servant whom I have chosen, my beloved with whom my soul is well pleased. I will put my Spirit upon him, and he will proclaim justice to the Gentiles. 19He will not quarrel or cry aloud, nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets; 20a bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not quench, until he brings justice to victory; 21and in his name the Gentiles will hope.” This is the Word of the Lord. This passage is divided into three sections. The first two are Sabbath controversies. The last is a prophetic postscript. All three sections teach us mainly about who Jesus is and why we should come to him for rest. I’m going to combine the Sabbath controversies into one point. These controversies teach us that Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath. And the quotation teaches us that Jesus is the Servant of the Lord. LORD OF THE SABBATH (1-14) First, Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath. The setting of the passage finds Jesus and his disciples taking a stroll through the grainfields before they make their way to the synagogue (v. 1).6 On the way, his disciples are hungry and pick some wheat for a snack. I don’t believe they were doing anything wrong. They weren’t stealing. The law gave provision for people who were hungry to pick a little grain for food. And there was nothing in God’s law that said picking grain was a violation of the Sabbath. But if you look in the Pharisee’s rulebook about the Sabbath that’s a different story. They considered picking grain harvesting. And then rubbing it out in their hand to eat it was threshing. So, they say to Jesus, “Look, your disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath” (v.
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