The Greatest Legal Minds ...

In our day “the law” is a written aspiration of seeking justice.  We use the law as a tool to attempt to insure fairness and equality.  But even the greatest legal scholars among us will recognize that our entire body of laws are simply, not perfect.  This would make sense.  Since man is not perfect, the devices of his imagination are likely not to be perfect either.  In the field of art, we glory in these imperfections and unusual perspectives.  But in the field of law, we attempt to fix the imperfections as we stumble across them, or suffer from their application.  But no matter how much we continue to revise our laws, to attempt to find a better justice than the one we had before, our work on them is never quite finished.  One could find it interesting that while our laws can trace their roots all the way back to the tablets of stone Moses first carried down the mountain – our “evolution” of them has resulted in only more opportunities for improvement over time, not less.

In the days of Moses, “the law”, was the first revelation given to the people of earth, of what it means to love.  For a people fresh from slavery, who never had the freedom to think and act as they chose, God tried to reveal to them in the tablets of stone (and in His very tangible presence, with daily miracles of His care), what the base definition of love is.  That Ten Commandment law then, was the first guide rails, in answer to the question – what does it mean to love God, and to love each other.  But herein is where most of us jump the rails; the law, was NOT a definitive list, it was merely a beginning.  If the legal code of the United States is written across volumes of books today, imagine how much bigger it would be, if we were to attempt to define what it means to love on top of all the other statutes.  The Ten Commandments were a start, a beginning, NOT a comprehensive definition of how to love.  Common sense would build on this law, and provide a next step, in how to make love deeper, richer, and better.  For instance, if I love you, I would not think to steal from you.  Common sense would tell me, that as I get to know you, I will find out what you like, and try to share those interests with you, simply because it makes you happy.  Theft is the farthest thing from my mind.  Giving and trying to improve your life (because that makes me happy too) is at the top of it.

When you think in those terms, when you feel passionately in those terms, other crimes drop from you like scales off of a snake.  When I love you, I do not think to enslave you, I do not think to rape or abuse you, all of the evil that can be done to you, is NOT what I would see happen to you, not by the world, and especially not by me.  The Ten Commandments enumerate a starting point, but when love is my way, my list gets substantially longer.  This does not represent a flaw in God’s law, it represents true obedience to it, and the genius of it.  We were never meant to be satisfied with how great we can love.  We were always meant to discover an even greater love for others, every single day of our lives, not just in this life, but in the eternal one to come.  That thought should overwhelm you.  It is meant to.  To know that your ultimate state of bliss can only be measured today, for tomorrow it will become greater, is beyond the limits of our imagination.  Yet our reality to come.

Which takes us to the purpose of the law in heaven.  The “law” of God, that is to say the “love” of God, will never disappear throughout all of eternity.  We will not lie to each other throughout infinity.  We will speak only truth forevermore.  The reason – because truth is what love speaks – and lies only damage what we say we love.  We will not steal anymore, because stealing hurts others, and our internal passions will never be to hurt, but to uplift.  And here is another mind blower.  There is NOTHING in the law about how “much” you can give to somebody else.  There are no caps on giving.  The sky is the limit.  And giving will be natural, theft unthinkable.  When this is true, the law, or His love, is the core of who you are.  And while the law never disappears, we will need it no longer, because we would not think to transgress it.  For us the need of the law itself is gone, because the focus of our minds and hearts is on how to love others greater, not how to love less.

Here on earth, where God’s love looks restrictive, meaning it points out something I want to do, but am not supposed to do – this is where even the term “law” comes from.  The law here on earth only restricts my evil.  In that sense, the law is truly the beginning definition of what it means to love.  All our laws are designed to keep my selfishness from invading and harming your life.  For it is self-love that creates the need for any law in the first place.  Take away all self-love, and you can take away the need for any law forevermore.  But when you do love self, and not so many others, the law acts as a mirror to show you, how actions you take reflect a lack of love for others in your life.  It is evil that sees God’s law as restrictive.  And for evil, it is.  Evil, that is self-love, wants to do whatever it wants, regardless of who else might suffer because of it.  That is the nature of all evil in the first place.  The two ways of thinking could not be any more diametrically opposed.  God’s love that loves only others, and Evil’s ideas of love that focuses only on self regardless of others.  When those two ideologies exist, there is need for a law.  Once evil is gone forever, the need for the law will go, as the thinking behind it will obliterate the need for it.

The Pharisees thought themselves masters of the law.  Not because it had penetrated their hearts so that they only loved others.  But because they knew every word that was written, and every habit of action, that might prove they kept the law.  Sound familiar?  In the modern Christian churches which still teach the applicability of His laws (rightly so), His laws are more often taught with accompanying lists of do’s and don’ts.  Further actions defined in order to offer proof, that you are in fact, obeying His laws.  Any descension from the lists, and you are doomed to hell (usually forever).  This application of the law focuses on punishment and the fear of punishment, as your motivation to curb your behavior (if not your enthusiasm).  This is because love itself, is just not understood.  And love for others is not something that has ever been a natural part of how you think.  But without this kind of love, true obedience is just not possible.  It takes reformation of our thinking, of how we love, of what we want, before true obedience is possible.  That comes only from surrender to Jesus of our will, of our thinking, of how we love, and who we love.  Total surrender brings total reformation and re-creation, and then love brings a natural state of obedience, a harmony with His laws of love.  The Pharisees had no personal experience with this, nor did they want one.

If Jesus could not be trapped in matters of popularity (taxes), or in matters of doctrines (resurrection, and how women are to be treated), then perhaps they could trip Him up in a matter of law.  For let’s face it, everyone of us has broken His law at some point in our lives.  Most of us breaking it every day.  They reasoned the human part of Jesus had to be subject to this.  But they forgot His humanity only cloaked His divinity and Jesus had lived a spotless life, though tempted perhaps worse than we are, yet without a single transgression.  The love in Jesus, was not a love for Himself.  It was a love for us.  And a burning passionate love for us, could just not be compromised by an action that might hurt us.  So Jesus remained pure, and their attempts at trapping Him were going to leave them disappointed.  Never the less, they assembled the greatest legal minds of their day, and began to devise a strategy to trip Jesus up in His own law.  Silly when you think about it.  But evil often starts with a silly or ridiculous premise, and degenerates from there.

Matthew picks up the last trap for Jesus in chapter twenty-two of his gospel to the Hebrews in verse 34 saying … “But when the Pharisees had heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they were gathered together. [verse 35] Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying, [verse 36] Master, which is the great commandment in the law?”  This was a well-conceived trap.  Which law would you pick as the greatest idea defining love.  If you say do not kill, you leave the body of your neighbor alive, but steal his wife, lie to him about it, and injure him greatly anyway.  If you pick a different law, you can simply kill your neighbor to end any disputes about the damage you do to him.  It devolves down to one of those worst of two evils scenarios.  In that case we would likely pick the do not kill him commandment, reasoning that if he lives, at least he is alive.  But this focus comes from a punishment perspective, not from a true love of others one.

Jesus answers them in verse 37 saying … “Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. [verse 38] This is the first and great commandment.”  Why is this the first one?  Think about that for a moment.  If the goal of harmony with the law of God is to love others completely, and love myself not at all.  Then why be taught to love God first?  Could it be that God is love?  And love comes “from” Him, and only “through” you.  Perhaps you are a conduit of His love, not the originator of your own.  Could it be, that for humans steeped in the evil of self-love, the only cure for it, is to come to God first?  Without experiencing the liberation of re-creation, the work of Jesus in us and for us, we are powerless to love anything other than ourselves.  Sin is an addiction that makes no logical sense, yet we find ourselves bound in chains to it anyway.  Only Jesus can break our chains for us, through our surrender to Him.  We cannot free ourselves, we must be made free.  Coming to God first, directing our love to Him first, can allow Him to do the work we need to be saved from ourselves, FIRST.  Only afterwards, is love for anyone other than me, even a real possibility.  Trying to love others first, is nothing more than hidden motives, buried in selfishness that I probably don’t even see.  My love for you, will be a result of my love for Him.  I cannot truly love you, unless I love Him first.

Jesus continues in verse 39 saying … “And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. [verse 40] On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”  Hear closely His own words, that the second commandment is “like unto it”.  Meaning the distinction between the first and second is very subtle.  We must love God first in order to build our own connection to the source of love itself.  But that connection to love was not meant to be turned inwards to ourselves.  It was meant to be turned outwards to the entire world.  Loving our neighbors when we once thought only to love ourselves.  If you were to make a priorities graphic to illustrate this.  You would place a drawing of God at the far left and call that priority one.  Then draw an infinity symbol on its side (it looks like a figure eight).  Under that infinity symbol would be labeled everyone else.  Then at the far right a stick man drawing of you.  You would be priority last.  And that is how it should work, and will work, when Jesus re-creates in you, what it means to truly love.  Jesus restates here for us, that all of the law, and all of the prophets were trying to get this simple message across.  Love God first, love everyone else next.  Self-love is the thing we are trying to rid ourselves of, as every evil can be traced back to it.  And the only freedom from self-love is a surrender to Jesus.

But Jesus had a question for the “masters of the word” before they scurried away.  The story continues in verse 41 saying … “While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, [verse 42] Saying, What think ye of Christ? whose son is he? They say unto him, The Son of David.”  Jesus was not referring to Himself here, He was simply asking the Pharisees a generic question about “the Christ” they believed would be coming to deliver Israel from the Romans.  The Pharisees responded rightly that the Messiah would be from the lineage of David.  Jesus continues in verse 43 saying … “He saith unto them, How then doth David in spirit call him Lord, saying, [verse 44] The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool? [verse 45] If David then call him Lord, how is he his son? [verse 46] And no man was able to answer him a word, neither durst any man from that day forth ask him any more questions.” 

First of all this stumper left the Pharisees, the lawyers, and the Sadducees speechless.  It was tradition in that day to refer to the King as “Lord”.  And this term only worked upwards in the genealogy.  Solomon would have referred to David as “his Lord”.  David would only have referred to Solomon as his son, or his prince, or the anointed and chosen of God etc.  So if the Messiah as the Son of David, yet referred to by David while under the influence of inspiration (so no doubting he misspoke or something) as His Lord, that would imply the Messiah existed before David, and then again after Him, or as an eternal being, the Son of God.  This was yet another attempt at Jesus trying to use the things the Pharisees loved, namely scripture, to invite them back to Him for reconciliation.  He was revealing who He really was to them, in a way they could understand.  But none were ready to accept.  At least not yet.

The traps all in the past now, I wonder if we understand our own relationships with His law.  We are bound to it forever.  But is the law part of the core of who we are, or do we see it as a restrictive set of conditions we have no idea how to live up to?  That difference is night and day.  It is the difference between walking in darkness, and having experienced the salvation of Jesus in you.  Jesus is NOT saving you from hell.  Jesus is saving you from yourself, and your self love.  He is teaching you how to really live.  How to live in harmony with His laws, making them only a beginning for you to explore what it means to love others.  That journey of exploration is meant for the here and the now, not just for the afterlife.  To be free to love others brings such a state of bliss and happiness it has no words to describe.  Even in a world of sin, you can still be made free from the slavery of self.  That is the Kingdom of heaven Jesus told us was here already.  Become the 2-year-old that runs to the arms of Jesus your Father, trusting in Him to save you, and making you free to love for real.  There is nothing better than this, and it can begin this moment as you surrender this work to Him and watch what He does in you.

 

Vain Obedience ...

How can you obey a command you do not understand?  Your boss hands you a stack of papers 18 inches thick, the type font is small, they are single spaced and double-sided type, and they are written in a combination of Cyrillic, Kanji, and ancient Babylonian.  He says simply to you, do what this says and walks away.  You stare blankly at the papers, not even knowing where to begin.  The task is overwhelming.  But it is not just the magnitude of a challenge that can make it difficult.  Different scenario.  Your boss walks up to you and says … be ready for this afternoon’s meeting.  The command is simple.  The expectation at least superficially understood.  But then, what all might that simple command imply?  Is there some material you are supposed to memorize?  Are you supposed to be ready to present?  Are you just supposed to be ready to get there on time, maybe 15 minutes early?  While the command is very simple in language, duration, and seemingly in intent.  It could mean a hundred different things.  How could you possibly be “ready” for every scenario this might imply?  How could anyone?

To begin to know what to do, could start with a knowledge of your boss.  If your boss is a mystery to you, and does things nearly always in a random manner, you are up a creek.  But if your boss is fairly consistent, and has given you similar guidance in the past, with perhaps more context in those times.  Maybe you could extrapolate your history of life with your boss, to this particular event.  At least your odds of pleasing your boss go up, based on following the pattern your boss may have laid out up to now.  Even then, sometimes it is not just the “what” that we do, it is the “how” that we do it.  When my boss gives me a command it is “understood” by him (and should be by me), that whatever he asks me to do, he intends for me to accomplish it in an ethical and legal manner.  Meeting a sales quota by sniping customers from a team mate is unacceptable.  Goal achieved, but method of achievement negates the accomplishment.  It gets even worse if you resort to fraud, or theft, or some other nefarious means to attempt to meet the assigned objective.

So when God tells us to do something, do we find ourselves in the same boat as when the boss gives us a simple edict without nearly enough context to know what we are supposed to do?  Take the Sabbath as an example.  We are supposed to “remember it”.  Easy enough.  We are not likely to “forget” a day of the week.  But then the remembering was in the context of “to keep it Holy”.  Ut-oh.  Here is where we rapidly go downhill.  Humans are really bad at understanding anything about Holiness.  We are sort of the living embodiment of the opposite of Holiness.  So how do we keep something Holy when we do not understand almost anything about Holy in the first place?  More context is offered.  We are advised not to work on this day.  But not just us.  Not our servants either.  In fact, no one who is within our gates, will be required to work on this day.  This is great context.  It helps us get a better idea of what is being requested here.  But is that it?  Then comes the inevitable question, how exactly do you define “work”? 

Is work something I do for money, perhaps only what I do for money?  Then the husband puts his feet up, and the wife continues to “work” all throughout the day?  That does not seem like the ask.  So then the definition of work must extend past just activities I do for money.  How do I know?  Well, the example of manna that fell in the wilderness over 40 years to feed the Israelites gives us a good indication.  Manna was only good for a single day, until Friday when a double portion fell, and it did not spoil over Sabbath.  That meant on Sabbath no gathering, and no prep.  You could simply enjoy the food made the day before.  Presumably this means mom gets a break too.  Presumably this means the servants can take the day off.  Presumably God wants to relate to everyone on Sabbath, not just those of advantage.  And it would appear God defines work with a broader brush than just what I do for money.  And of course, God defined His own rest, as being a rest from the work of creation He had done the previous six days.  His creation looks more like art to me, though perhaps it is science, or perhaps just genius – but He rested from it and the universe kept spinning.

Enter the Pharisees and Sadducees, both had a keen interest in “keeping” the law.  Israel had suffered war, famine, and slavery for ignoring the law over their history.  Though a closer examination of God’s patience running out usually corresponded to Israel worshipping other gods that required them to throw babies (mostly male) into the fires, while preserving female babies to become temple prostitutes.  The ruining of young lives just seemed to be the straw that broke the back of God’s patience with the people who claim His name.  Consider that as you examine the state of how we treat young lives in our own country and churches.  So the modern church leadership in the days of Christ, had a very keen intent to keep the law so as never to see the wars and slavery they had experienced in the past.  They developed then, an extensive additional set of context around what it means to “keep” the Sabbath.  Their list of rules, eventually devolved into walking only a certain number of steps.  Food preparation must be done the day before, or you went hungry.  And yet despite all these precautions, Rome was still in power, and Jews were still slaves.  However since the Sanhedrin still existed, they reasoned, they had to be doing something right.

Then along comes Jesus.  Matthew begins chapter twelve of his gospel touching on the most important commandment, the primary one that sets the people of God apart from every other religion on planet earth.  Outside of circumcision, and kosher diets, what makes a Jew a Jew is the keeping of the Sabbath.  The Sanhedrin had become confident in “how” they did what they did.  They became confident that they were “obeying” the law, to the extent that the law required, and a good measure further just in case.  So does the modern Christian.  While not obsessed with the law, we are equally as certain, that we obey our Lord, to the extent that He has asked, and a little extra just in case.  But perhaps in our certainty of obedience is nothing more than vanity.

Matthew begins in verse 1 saying … “At that time Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn; and his disciples were an hungred, and began to pluck the ears of corn, and to eat. [verse 2] But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the sabbath day.”  A lot to unpack here.  First, Jesus and crew were walking through a corn field, this act by itself would negate the idea of how many steps one could take before it crossed the line into work which was precluded to do on the Sabbath.  Strike One.  Then, his disciples get hungry, likely from seeing and smelling all the ripe corn right in front of their faces.  It is kind of like sitting in front of the TV watching your favorite show, and after a few advertisements for pizza, you begin to crave pizza.  But no matter, the disciples begin to pick and shuck the corn in preparation of eating it.  This was food preparation, for which there were specific examples in earlier scripture of why this should be prohibited.  Also note, Jesus Himself, was not actually doing this, He elected to go hungry.  But for His disciples, Strike Two.  Then the disciples proceeded to eat the corn (apparently none of them offered ears to Jesus, their Master, clearly an oversight driven by bodily needs).  But legally, eating fruit of the poisoned preparation tree results in, you guessed it, Strike Three.

The Sanhedrin knew the law on this matter.  So the leadership brings this horrible infraction of the law to Jesus’ attention, giving Jesus no credit for refraining from it Himself.  The disciples (people who they did not appreciate) were breaking it.  The patriarchs of the faith however, were people the leadership venerated.  Long dead, Moses, Joshua, Samson, and David, could do no wrong.  They had become Jewish saints if there could ever be such a thing.  So Jesus chooses to use that in His response to them.  Matthew continues in verse 3 saying … “But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him; [verse 4] How he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them which were with him, but only for the priests?”

In our day we call this “what-about-ism”.  Jesus does not actually say that what the disciples did is OK against the letter of the law.  But He does make a comparison of people the Pharisees besmirch with the honorable can-do-no-wrong, compared-with-the-heart-of-God David and his crew.  The Jewish saint they venerate, and his men (who in actuality, were all incredibly efficient killers on the battlefield, none other of their skills preserved in Jewish scrolls), went into the Temple.  This was a huge no-no, only the priests are even allowed in there.  Then they ate the shewbread, which is an offering to God, that ONLY the priests were allowed to eat under specific conditions.  Another huge no-no.  Those infractions are also clearly a part of the known Jewish law, at the time of David, until this time.  And scripture records no prayer of David begging forgiveness for what he and his men did.  They just did it.  Net result.  How can the leadership there in attendance criticize the disciples of Jesus for doing something far less an infraction, than the historical leader David did (who they publicly venerate as some sort of saint)?  It would be hypocritical, or rather, it would point out the hypocrisy of valuing people in any sort of caste system, putting them on a level playing field with the very men they “knew” they were above.

Next Jesus really twists their thinking as He continues in verse 5 saying … “Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless?”  This one is a true mindbender.  On Sabbath, priests (and in our day preachers) “work”.  They do the “work” of the Lord, but it is still “work”.  Back then, that “work” involved killing innocent lambs as a symbolism foretelling the killing of Jesus Himself.  It was and is shedding innocent blood, for the remission of sins.  Killing too, was prohibited in the law.  The shedding of blood in the Temple was highly controlled, and on Sabbath, would have been considered work.  They “profane” the Temple by continuing a practice driven by the evil in men’s hearts.  But the priests are held blameless.  Working to bring men to God is not considered “work” by the God on the end of that equation.  Even though we pay preachers and priests to do it, and even though “most” of their work is conducted on the very day we are commanded to rest.

Now Jesus has pointed out publicly that the priests who are so critical, have a profession where they work on the Sabbath with regularity despite the incongruence with the law.  The anger brews in the mind of the rebuked Pharisee, for they remain certain in their vain obedience, that correction even from the mouth of God is not met with acceptance, but with hatred.  Jesus continues in verse 6 saying … “But I say unto you, That in this place is one greater than the temple.”  Now Jesus has gone too far, now He has crossed a line He will never be able to uncross.  The Temple was “the” place where God Himself sat upon the Mercy seat.  It was His holy presence behind that curtain that made all of Israel fear and tremble daring not to peek behind it even for a second, lest the contrast between true Holiness and our state, cause us to die.  Only once a year did the High Priest, after much consecration and prayer, dare to go behind the curtain for a prescribed practice.  Even then, he wore bells on the hems of his garment and a rope around his ankle, so that if the bells went silent, the attendants could pull him out knowing he was dead, and being unable to retrieve his body any other way lest they themselves die in the process.

That was the definition of Holiness to a Jew, it is irony we have so casual a view of it.  And here stood Jesus, claiming to be One greater than the Temple (upon whose seat it was He who sat).  Jesus was now making a clear statement that the buildings dedicated to His service, are NOT as important as the God they purport to serve.  Jesus was saying He can be found outside of Temple walls.  Jesus was saying that being close to His people was and is the most important thing to Him, even when that is in the middle of a corn field on some random Sabbath.  Proximity to Jesus is not about buildings, it is about a desire to be close.  Here was the God they worshipped standing right in front of them, but they failed to see, all the while believing they were in perfect obedience to the law.  And their certainty resulted in the idea that God Himself did not understand or obey His own law.  Literally the definition of error, or hypocrisy, or vanity, all stemming from the certainty of human “wisdom”.

When met with correction, they responded in hatred, for vanity has no room for correction.  And are we even the slightest tittle different than they?  We create “standards” of Sabbath keeping in our minds, and then judge all others by them, while refusing to see the God who so longs to stand right in front of us.  Because we believe in the sanctity of the law of God, and in the continuing proscriptions of Sabbath keeping that started in the Garden of Eden, was given to Moses in the law, and is prophesied to continue in Heaven after this world has passed – we translate our “belief” into our obedience to keep this day.  Yet we know nothing of “how” to truly obey, we have only lists we construct of do’s and don’ts ignoring the God who could put us in harmony with His law.  We take our eyes off of God and put them on what we do against His request.  And irony of ironies, we are rather loose with His direct context of the cessation of work, either working ourselves “for the benefit of our families”, or causing others to serve us “because they were going to be at work anyway”.

But Jesus then cuts to the heart of the matter as He continues in verse 7 (no pun intended) saying … “But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless. [verse 8] For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day.”  The Sabbath is not about what, it is about Who.  The Sabbath is not even about how, it is about Who.  It was Jesus who “made” a block of time Holy.  Only His proximity to it could accomplish that, the same way His proximity to our earth on Mt. Sinai made a block of ground Holy, that Moses was asked to remove his shoes before he walked on it.  Without Jesus involved, the day is just time, and the earth is just earth.  It was about Jesus who “hallowed” it.  He set aside His time to be with us, in a special way, for an entire day, at the end of every week.  He asked us to put aside our other distractions in order to have time to be with Him.  He asked us to be unselfish and not keep others from having time to be with Him as well.  Being close to Jesus, putting away other priorities is what Sabbath is all about.  Hanging out with Dad.  Playtime with Dad.  That is what the Sabbath is all about.  And because the disciples with Him are doing just that, they were in fact guiltless.  It is up to Jesus to decide what is “keeping” the Sabbath with Him, it is not up to us.  Our ideas do not count, only His.

That is how the incongruent actions of priests back then and preachers in our day on Sabbath still make sense.  They are about bringing people to the Lord of the Sabbath.  That is why the disciples choosing to eat with Jesus on their way to demonstrate the gospel to people in need make sense.  They were already with the Lord of the Sabbath, escorting Him to people in such desperate need of hearing a word from Jesus, the Son of God.  It was more important for them to be with Jesus, than to be in the Temple on this day.  That is why we put away our amusements that take us away from Christ, why we cease working, but also cease thinking about working, it is all to have unrestricted playtime with the same Jesus.  You cannot contain that in a list of do’s and don’ts, no matter how long or how thorough you think it is.  You can only begin to see that in a set of principles.  Where I bring others to God, it is a good thing.  Where I do good unto them, it is a good thing.  Where I ask others to serve me, I cause them to lose time with God on my behalf.  It is mercy, I am to be showing.  It is mercy for others, love for others, that if it was my first motivation, would bring me in better harmony with the entirety of the law, not only the Sabbath, but not forgetting it either.

When Jesus saves us, from us, from our self-love and addiction of the same; He creates in us a love for others, that changes the nature of how we think about Sabbath.  The context changes.  The requirement does not, but the vanity begins to slip away.  A knowledge or belief that we are supposed to keep Sabbath is not the same thing as actually doing it.  Repeating the traditions of our forefathers; going to church, singing, praying and coming home again does not equal Sabbath observance as God defines it in a field of corn on a mission to actually spread His word to those who have never heard it.  The gospel does not only look inward, it looks outward where its mercy is so desperately needed.  

Only the unchanged heart is content to experience the praise of God, holding those good feelings inward, and sharing them only with those who also already understand them.  The changed heart is driven to the dirty, to the sick, to the hungry, to the least of these – because they have the greatest need.  Until we are led to discover what keeping anything Holy really means, we do not understand what was asked of us.  And we must be led to discover it, for Holiness does not originate in us.  Following God, leads us there.  Attempting to blaze the trail based on our accumulated wisdom leads to the path of the Pharisee, to the path of vain obedience based upon certainty and trust in “our wisdom”, that when confronted with what God thinks, responds in hatred and desire to kill God and anyone who truly follows His lead …

And the dispute over this was not over yet …

 

Priorities Come Knocking ...

When there is much to do, knowing what should be first, or what is the most important, is the only way to succeed.  You can mistake the order of things to do, but if you mistake the priority or the importance of which things should be done at all, you are doomed to failure.  Imagine transcribing a court case has been assigned to you.  The only way to insure justice is done, is to faithfully transcribe every word, just as it occurred in the court case.  This might take a while, but it insures every question that can be answered will be answered.  The accuracy is the thing that gives the wisdom to anyone who comes looking for what happened.  But what if, after transcribing it all, you were asked to summarize what occurred in only 3 sentences.  This new task changes the equation.  Being accurate and detailed is not possible if constricted to only 3 sentences.  The entire book, the entire volume of what you originally wrote down, must now be summarized in extreme brevity, yet still convey what took place, and really, what is most important.

Court transcriptionists are asked for accuracy in every word, even every gesture.  Inaudible answers must be clarified with precision by the attorneys before the witnesses can continue with their testimony, so that the words can be preserved.  Court reporters on the other hand, have no ability to preserve everything, they must summarize details into a story, then present the story in a way that catches our attention.  Court reporters are used to leaving out things that are uninteresting, or do not follow the narrative they wish to report.  But there is not a profession, where a person who knows all the details, is then asked to summarize for us what happened in only 3 sentences.  That task would be daunting, nearly impossible.  And whatever the summary was, it could always be debated by others who have a different take on the details they are aware of.

But this is what Jesus was asked to do.  And He was asked by no less, than the court transcriptionists of His day.  Scribes were the third leg of the Sanhedrin ruling class.  Their jobs were to transcribe scriptures from older parchments on to newer ones to preserve the text exactly as it was written before.  It was and remains, the accuracy that makes their work important, and what offers wisdom to the seeker.  Scribes could be asked for clarification on scriptural quotes.  It was more likely they would be able to recite the texts word for word.  It was their job to write these texts over and over with precision every day.  If you wanted to debate scriptures, you were highly unlikely to pick a scribe to argue with.  And so, after the Pharisees had failed to entrap Christ on the role of the Messiah to eliminate Roman rule and its taxes; and the Sadducees had failed to entrap Christ about the Resurrection and the impracticalities of our marriage practices in heaven; the Scribes were now set to entrap Christ about the summary of the Law.

This was to be their best efforts.  The audience here still had members who sat listening to a twelve-year-old Jesus teach them all for 3 days many years ago in this same Temple.  Despite His humble parents and upbringing, the carpenter’s son recited scripture and its meaning with the authority of an author of the text.  His memory was absolute.  He did not miss details.  He did not forget sections of the stories, nor what they meant in detail.  The 12-year-old was beyond an apprentice, beyond a savant, He was a miracle in their ears.  So the effort to entrap Him could not be based in memory, or in details.  It had to be based in priorities, and a summation of what is truly important across all scriptures and the Law.  They would ask Jesus to summarize the entire Bible in 2 or 3 sentences.  But make no mistake, this was another trap, no less calculated to destroy the reputation of Jesus in front of the people, exactly like the other two should have done.

Peter recalls its beginning to John Mark in his gospel in chapter 12 picking up in verse 28 saying … “And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all?”  A scribe had seen the failure of the Pharisees, and then of the Sadducees, and now it was his own turn at bat.  But his trap was better.  To ask which commandment was more important than the others, implied there is a pecking order in all 10 commandments in the law.  This further implied that as long as I keep the important ones, the less important ones may not be such a burden to my soul, and my eternal status.  Comparative salvation did not start in our day; it has been a popular fallacy for a long time.  The notion that my sins are not as bad as your sins, and so by comparison, I am holier is an old lie.  No matter which commandment Jesus selected, an argument could be made that a different one was somehow better.

So Jesus answered saying in verse 29 … “ And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: [verse 30] And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.”  The answer of Christ, was that our love of the Father was more important than any other law, tradition, doctrine, or religious practice.  Jesus grabs our attention with His declaration to “Hear”.  He then points our attention upwards identifying the real God from all the other claimants.  Loving God is more important than the Sabbath.  Loving God is more important than avoiding murder, or adultery, or lying, or lust.  Loving God was the number one thing to strive for, even if at the exclusion of everything else.  But why?  Why is this the first priority of the entirety of the Bible according to our God?

Consider the mechanics of our salvation.  When we love our God, we trust our God.  It is natural to do so.  When God promises us He will do something for us, we can trust Him, because we love Him, and we know He loves us.  It is love that motivates us to do anything, to change who we are.  So when our God tells us, He will change us, from the inside out, we know He will do it.  Having this love based relationship, becomes the fundamental building block, of changing me from who I am now, to who He wants to be.  I start wanting different things because He changes what I want.  I start loving different ways, more passionately, and for others, instead of myself.  When the new me thinks differently, wants different things, and loves others with a burning passion … I start acting differently, my life begins to reflect the changes His Holy Spirit brings. 

I think about ways to love you more, to find ways to make you happy.  I would not consider stealing from you, I am looking to give you stuff, not take it.  I would not lie to you, because the truth about how much I love you is something you really will want and need to hear.  I do not lust after others because using someone does not lift them up, it degrades them.  And I would not consider hating that which I love, let alone killing it.  All of the sudden, the new me, is in harmony with every other commandment naturally.  It is no longer a struggle.  As for how I behave with God; if God wants to take one day off each week to be with me, sign me up.  I honor His name, and reverence it.  For it is the name that transforms me into His image, saving me from the old me.  There are no other gods, only my God.  So harmony with Gods entire law, begins with choosing to love Him.

Jesus continues in verse 31 saying … “And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.”  Extremely important how the mechanics of your salvation work here.  First we love God, we trust Him, we submit to Him.  Then He changes us into the person that loves our neighbor.  God first, change first, THEN comes obedience.  You CANNOT do this the other way around.  Loving our neighbor can ONLY happen when we love our God with everything that we are.  Otherwise, if we still love ourselves, instead of God, we will treat our neighbor like an opportunity to make us happier.  We will use our neighbor, despise our neighbor, cast aside our neighbor (if he is lucky).  We will go so far as to kill our neighbor if there is something in it for us.  For absent the love of God, there can be no real love for anyone other than me loving me.

The scribe concurred with Jesus, to his own surprise.  He responds in verse 32 saying … “And the scribe said unto him, Well, Master, thou hast said the truth: for there is one God; and there is none other but he: [verse 33] And to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”  The scribe can hardly believe his own mouth, but then the wisdom of Christ is irrefutable.  His voice has dropped its accusatory tone, it has softened.  He is now responding almost like a collaborator in a worship study group; than an arrogant prosecutor in the court of public opinion.  He does not understand what is happening.  His confusion is evident.

Jesus responds in verse 34 saying … “And when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly, he said unto him, Thou art not far from the kingdom of God. And no man after that durst ask him any question.”  The scribe accepted the truth of what Christ had said.  In so doing, He was near to entering the Kingdom of God.  It is only in our humility that we can accept the truth of what Christ says, instead of what we are so certain about.  The Pharisees after their encounter with Christ did not change their views in one iota, they were committed more than ever that Jesus was still wrong.  It was the same for the Sadducees, but for this scribe, there was a glimmer of hope.  The scribe was willing to change.  The scribe was willing to accept truth in humility.  And Jesus looked to claim this scribe for His own kingdom.

The Sanhedrin could not risk the defection of an entire third of its base.  There would be no more tests of Christ in front of any one.  They would close ranks, and spew hatred among themselves, never letting the truth of Christ enter their ears if they could.  We do not know, if this particular scribe defected from his original intentions, and joined the followers of Christ.  It is likely.  The power of the love of Jesus is a lure no evil can withstand.  For those scribes who refused His wisdom Jesus would pose a few questions of His own.  But for this one, for the redemption of this man, who answered Him “discreetly” there was a hope that could not be extinguished.  As it is for us.  When we are ready to love God, and trust God, putting aside the wisdom we think we have and learning to just listen.  We can follow instead of lead.  And in our deference is our elevation.  In our weakness we find His strength.  And in our submission to Him, is our Salvation perfected.