Sermon 02.02.2025: Is it Lawful to do Good or Harm?

Rest and sabbath are necessary. As such, work was prohibited on the sabbath in observance of God's example in creation and commandment in Exodus. But when do our rules hinder rather than promote healing, wholeness, and shalom in our lives? Are Sabbath Day sins allowable in certain circumstances?



Scripture

Luke 6:1-16 

One sabbath while Jesus was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked some heads of grain, rubbed them in their hands, and ate them. But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” Jesus answered, “Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and gave some to his companions?” Then he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the sabbath.” On another sabbath he entered the synagogue and taught, and there was a man there whose right hand was withered. The scribes and the Pharisees watched him to see whether he would cure on the sabbath, so that they might find an accusation against him. Even though he knew what they were thinking, he said to the man who had the withered hand, “Come and stand here.” He got up and stood there. Then Jesus said to them, “I ask you, is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to destroy it?” After looking around at all of them, he said to him, “Stretch out your hand.” He did so, and his hand was restored. But they were filled with fury and discussed with one another what they might do to Jesus.

Now during those days he went out to the mountain to pray; and he spent the night in prayer to God. And when day came, he called his disciples and chose twelve of them, whom he also named apostles: Simon, whom he named Peter, and his brother Andrew, and James, and John, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James son of Alphaeus, and Simon, who was called the Zealot, and Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor. 

Sermon

My 5th grader is naturally inclined to be a rule-follower. Some of us are just born that way. So, a few weeks ago, on his overnight fieldtrip with his school, he insisted that he could not take his watch because no electronics were allowed. 

Now, granted, it is a Fitbit watch, so it’s more advanced than just your average analog timepiece, but still; compare that to two of his friends who brought smartphones on the trip, and you can see that his adherence to the rules is a lot more strict than most of his peers. Generally, this is a good thing, especially for parenting. 

According to the Judicial Learning Center, laws exist to, “protect our general safety, and ensure our rights as citizens against abuses by other people, by organizations, and by the government itself.” [1] 

So laws and rules exist for a reason. Namely, we want our society and communities to be safe. We also want them to be fair and provide some stability by setting the expectations that we have for one another. And we want to prevent chaos and conflict when possible, and provide ways to non-violently resolve disputes as needed. 

As human beings, even as early as our hunter-gathering days, there were rules and norms that we chose to abide by. It makes sense for a group of people, trying to do life together, to be guided by something bigger than ourselves. 

For the ancient Israelites, that something bigger was not just a code of ethics or best practices, but God. And the rules and laws set up by their society was so that they could be good citizens of God’s household. 

As such, they had all these rules in place that set them apart from the nation-states around them, and that, hopefully, embodied what God longed for in humanity – particularly for the flourishing of all humankind. For example, “thou shalt not kill” was actually a more radical law than you would think.

Child and human sacrifice was common in ancient civilizations, so to have a law that said, “no, don’t do that” actually set the Israelites apart from their neighbors. 

Now, the word “holy,” simply means “set apart,” so when you read all the holiness laws laid out in Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and throughout scripture, they were trying to find ways to set themselves apart from the societies around them. 

Now, some of these laws may strike us as kind of strange or TMI (too much information) in this day and age. But there are other laws from Ancient Israel that are abundantly just and almost-ridiculously merciful. 

For instance, the gleaning laws – these instructed successful farmers to leave some of their harvest for those who were poor and in need. Sure, legally, that was your land to farm, and that was your harvest. But it was part of your duty, as a citizen of God’s household, to make sure that if you had enough, others could share in your bounty and glean the edges of your fields. 

Similarly, every fifty years, there was a year of jubilee. The Ancient Israelites understood that some people would be better at farming than others, that some families would become wealthier than others and acquire more land and status as a result. 

But every fifty years, the slate would be wiped clean. Any Israelites who were sold into servanthood due to poverty were freed; all debts owed to one another were forgiven; and land that had been bought or taken would be given back to its original owners. 

Everyone had a chance for a new beginning, the opportunity to start over. Jubilee was the great equalizer. And it ensured two things: (1) that nobody could become a billionaire and (2) that generational poverty would not exist. 

These laws were codified into the life of our ancestors of faith. Friends, laws should be for the flourishing of all people. 

But we know that not all laws promote healing and human flourishing. In fact, some laws, court decisions, and executive orders, do the absolute opposite. This is because what is legal is too often a matter of power and who’s got that power, rather than a matter of justice. 

We all know that slavery was legal, and freeing slaves was criminalized. The Holocaust was legal, and hiding Jews was criminalized. Apartheid was legal, and protesting the system was criminalized. The internment of Japanese descendants was legal, and refusing to go willingly was criminalized. But none of it was moral or right or how God would want us to live. 

In today’s stories from scripture, Jesus, chooses compassion over laws. The Pharisees, a group of religious leaders and scholars, identified 613 commandments regarding the Sabbath. Honoring the sabbath was one of the original 10 commandments, and one that we witness God observing on the seventh day of creation. 

Sabbath was important; sabbath is still necessary. But 613 rules to define what is okay and not okay on the sabbath? That’s a lot. And not always helpful. 

So when asked, “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” Jesus responds to the question with another question: “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to destroy it?” 

And Jesus asks this because Jesus valued people over rules. And he didn’t come to break the law but to fulfill it, for the law of God, ultimately, is and always has been: LOVE. 

As citizens of this country, we are expected to follow the laws of the land. But as citizens of the household of God, we are ultimately expected to follow the laws of love, compassion, and justice. So what do we do when what is legal does not align with what is loving? 

Now, I am hesitant to advocate that any one of us go and break the law. I spent a semester in law school before quitting; I understand laws are important. And like my fifth grader, I am wired to be a rule-follower. 

But I do think as followers of Jesus, we are required to critically engage with the law and to examine how and where it might be causing harm, especially to those who are the most vulnerable among us. So if that means denying entrance to ICE, or protecting the rights of transgender youth, if that means going with the “DEI” hire, (which, by the way, have you seen me?) then so be it. 

Just twelve days ago, we marched for the legacy of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. And in “A Letter from a Birmingham Jail” he wrote: “… there are two types of laws: There are just laws and there are unjust laws.” He says, “I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.” 

Dr. King used non-violent, direct action, that sometimes broke laws in order to change a system that was designed to oppress and dehumanize people. He did so because his allegiance wasn’t to the American flag or the United States government, but to the realm of God. 

And friends, the truth of the matter is, we are, first and foremost, members of the kingdom of God, so we get our marching orders from God, not from any government or human ruler, not from any president or supreme court. And when the government fails to uphold human flourishing, compassion, and justice, perhaps it is time to resist. 

Pop culture knows this! We watched Star Wars and sided with the Resistance. We watched Harry Potter and sided with the resistance. We watched The Hunger Games and The Matrix and sided with the resistance. 

And history tells a similar story. We learned about the Nazis and well, hopefully, we side with the resistance. We learned about apartheid, the civil rights movement and slavery and side with the resistance, the likes of Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass, Dr. King and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Nelson Mandela and Sophie Scholl. They were the resistance. 

And, finally, we learned about the Roman occupation of first century Palestine and sided with the resistance in the form of Jesus Christ. That’s why Jesus was crucified after all, not just for blasphemy, which means speaking against God, but for sedition which means speaking against the state or ruler. Jesus was a threat because he was willing to break unjust laws for the sake of healing people and feeding people and making people whole. 

We who have gathered here today are called to be followers of Jesus. Being a follower of Jesus doesn’t necessarily make our lives easier; I’m sorry to break it to you. In fact, it often complicates things. 

But it also fills our lives with love, an outpouring of love, given to us and given to the world, so that our sense of what is right is not determined by human laws but by a deep love for God and a deep love for humanity. 

And for many of us gathered here today, to resist what is unjust doesn’t mean we need to add a million things to our to-do list, it just means that we will do all that we’ve been doing with more intention and more awareness. For example, Calvary will continue to walk with immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers, but we will do so with more compassion and intention knowing that fear is more prevalent than ever as hostility, hate, and policies stoke that fear. 

Calvary will still feed those who are hungry, seek housing for those who are unhoused, and we will speak out and speak up, so that everyone knows that the loudest Christian voices do not speak for all people of faith. 

Maybe you’ll join a march or an action that is new to you. Maybe you’ll give more financially in support of the mission of those who are doing on-the-ground work. 

Maybe you’ll call your congresspeople more, or call your family members more. Some of you may feel an urgency that brings you to a whole new line of work and vocation. But for many of us, resistance is in the small acts of kindness and compassion that fight back against the rhetoric of hate and chaos. 

The good news is this: We do not do the work of resistance on our own. God leads us and beckons us to follow. And God places us in community, so that we have others with whom to resist. 

And friends, this Jesus, whom we follow, he does not let the resistance go hungry. We are invited to the table of grace again and again. We are fed, by the bread of life and cup of salvation, again and again. 

And at this table, we are given the sustenance we need for the long journey ahead. And we are given the great cloud of witnesses and amazing colleagues, friends, and community whom we need for the long journey ahead. 

So let us eat, and let us partake often. Let us be filled, for the work ahead is arduous and exhausting but made easier by the company and the food we feed one another. 

And now, as the people of God, let us rise and say together a portion of what we believe using the words from the Belhar Confession. Church, what do we believe? 

We believe 

• that God has revealed Godself as the one who wishes to bring about justice and true peace among people; 

• that God, in a world full of injustice and enmity, is in a special way the God of the destitute, the poor and the wronged 

• that God calls the church to follow God in this; for God brings justice to the oppressed and gives bread to the hungry; 

• that God frees the prisoner and restores sight to the blind; 

• that God supports the downtrodden, protects the stranger, helps orphans and widows and blocks the path of the ungodly; 

• that for God pure and undefiled religion is to visit the orphans and the widows in their suffering; 

• that God wishes to teach the church to do what is good and to seek the right; 

• that the church must therefore stand by people in any form of suffering and need, which implies, among other things, that the church must witness 

against and strive against any form of injustice, so that justice may roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream; 

• that the church as the possession of God must stand where the Lord stands, namely against injustice and with the wronged; that in following Christ the 

church must witness against all the powerful and privileged who selfishly seek their own interests and thus control and harm others. 

Therefore, we reject any ideology 

• which would legitimate forms of injustice and any doctrine which is unwilling to resist such an ideology in the name of the gospel. 

We believe that, in obedience to Jesus Christ, its only head, the church is called to confess and to do all these things, even though the authorities and human laws might forbid them and punishment and suffering be the consequence. 

Jesus is Lord. 

To the one and only God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, be the honor and the glory for ever and ever. 

Amen. 

[1] https://judiciallearningcenter.org/law-and-the-rule-of law/#:~:text=Laws%20protect%20our%20general%20safety,provide%20for%20our%20general%20safety.