Mark 3:1-6 - Jesus the the Lord of sabbath

In the day of worship, Jesus heals in Sabbath.

Is a sabbath is a day for healing or a day for worship? 

A vital question Jesus faced in His public ministry is unravelling here. 

As the Pharisees and the scribes had joined together against Jesus, even the synagogue was not safe for him. The elders of the synagogue were keen to observe him and to find fault with him.

1. The enemies of Jesus were convinced of His power to heal the sick. They were concerned whether He will do it on the Sabbath as he had already stated that the son of man is the Lord of Sabbath also. (2:28) 

The authority of Jesus was well expressed wherever he went. It was high time to make a decision about the message and person of Christ. It is a fact that they were experiencing some kind of intellectual and emotional bondage that they could not respond to Him in a redemptive and creative manner.

2. When Jesus entered the synagogue, he gave attention to a person with a withered hand. There was every justification for Jesus not to attend him on a Sabbath day. But Jesus noticed him and asked him to stand up in the middle. 

On a Sabbath, even treatments were given only in life-threatening situations. As far as the Pharisees were concerned, such a situation did not exist there. But to Jesus, everything that affected the wholeness of life was an area where he had to involve. 

Jesus proclaimed that the real mission of the Sabbath itself is to save lives and to do good. To opt for life and goodness is the genuine human response according to the Deuteronomic law (Deut. 30:15) Jesus could have done this healing privately avoiding public controversy. But it seems Jesus wanted to initiate a public debate on that. 

Jesus was pausing the ministry of compassion and justice against the merciless and morbid structure of the scribal and Pharisaical religion. When Jesus 'broke' the law of the Sabbath technically according to the scribes, he was initiating the work of the leaven of the Kingdom to permeate into that morbid religiosity which had no expression of love and concern.

3. The enemies of Jesus were keeping silence to the question raised by him. That silence was the expression of their negativism. Mark uses the hardest words to tell us that Jesus was furious about that. The reason for the wrath of Jesus was their hardness of heart. They could not accept the divine manifestation through Jesus because their sensitivity was lost because of that dullness. That kind of a mental state is condemned throughout the New Testament. (Rom. 11:7,25; 2 Cor. 3:14; Mark. 6:52; 8:17; John 12:40 etc). These kinds of hardnesses lead to deadly human alliances. The Pharisees went out to plot with the Herodians to kill Jesus. Herodians were a group of the highly influential political group who were allied with the Herodian rule that they had access to the Roman rule also. Their intention was to bring their own nominees to the lucrative position of the high priest. In that unholy alliance of the Pharisees and Herodians, we see the cruel efforts to destroy the son of God and His Kingdom.

Point to ponder: Do we understand the chemistry of the many alliances which try to destroy the Kingdom of God initiatives?

Prayer: Pray for someone under trial for doing good.