Following a Road Map of Bad Assumptions ...

Back in my day, traveling across the country, required a road map, a physical one printed on paper.  I realize that today this practice has been completely outmoded by Siri and the GPS in general.  But not so long ago, paper road maps were a thing.  In fact, one of the key benefit services AAA provided for you was a spiral bound vacation map that started at your house, and ended wherever you told them was your final destination.  As you progressed across the countryside you simply flipped the pages of your map moving from one page to the next.  And the maps told you not only distance, but what cities were on the horizon and their relative size and perhaps key points of interest.  A significant undertaking for a personalized map of your particular journey.  The other approach to maps was a Rand McNally map book, which was quite large and resembled more of a magazine you would put on your coffee table than perhaps what you envisioned a map to look like.  Rand however included the entire 50 states in a single map collection, one on each page, and was updated each year to include new road changes.  Also included in the map magazine were breakout pages with large cities to give you better details should you require them.  The final map option was a simple large map you bought at a gas station or picked up in a hotel, that showed where you were and the surrounding areas.  It folded itself up nicely into about a 5x8 pamphlet for easy storage or portability.

The key thing about paper maps, is that you needed the right ones, covering the right areas you were interested in, and of course, that they were correct (at least as good as the last couple years).  Today, we trust the automated lady’s voice on our phones, or in our cars, that tells us to turn left in 500 ft, or to take a particular exit on the freeway and then bear right.  GPS and the automation that goes with it, requires more faith on our part, than traveling with old paper maps did, because we are completely unable to see the entire journey should it fail.  At that point, it is back to paper maps again, if they still exist.  But GPS rarely fails, so most younger folks have no idea what it is like to ever have need of a paper map.  And outside of the few oddities, everyone is comfortable trusting the GPS when it says to turn left, it has at least some idea of what it is doing.  But if ever there were an A.I. based GPS, that developed a “sense of humor” along the way, watching the humans do stupid things just because they told us to, might prove frustrating for the humans in the story, even if funny to the A.I..  It would be the same way for me in the back of the car, when my mother backtracked 100 miles on vacation, having misinterpreted North and South on her AAA vacation map.  Talked about wasted time, and a frustrated kid, who now spent 200 miles extra in his car just to get back to even from where the mistake occurred.  Somehow, I can envision an A.I. based GPS who will one day run me amok, just for the fun of it.

Another way to surely mess up your destinations is to make bad assumptions about what path or which road you intend to follow to get there.  Take for example, getting maps of Texas for your journey, when Texas is nowhere near where you intend to go, Montana is.  Or say, planning to depend on GPS to route you through a National park on foot only to discover your carrier has excellent city coverage, and nearly NONE when you get 20 miles off road.  Either way, you’re in a pickle.  It is not much different when we make assumptions first about what scripture should say, and then set about attempting to prove it by finding and googling the specific texts that “might” prove out what we believed before we opened the book (or the online page) to begin reading.  And sometimes bad assumptions are not just made by us.  Sometimes they are made by many of the readers of the age, or perhaps even a writer or too.  Take Luke as a case in point.  The gospel of Luke (a letter to his Greek friend), ends chapter 3 with a snippet about Jesus being baptized, and then an entire section on the “as was supposed” genealogy of Jesus.  The road map to His ancestry.

Let’s take a second look at these passages and see what else they might reveal, particularly about bad assumptions on our part.  Luke picks up in verse 21 saying … “Now when all the people were baptized, it came to pass, that Jesus also being baptized, and praying, the heaven was opened, [verse 22] And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased.”  Luke presents only 2 verses to cover a much larger event with a lot more dialog than is presented here.  First Luke omits how John the Baptist did not feel he was fit to baptize Jesus (perhaps He knew Jesus did not need baptism to begin with, as there was nothing to repent for).  Luke also omits how the first two disciples of Jesus were previously disciples of John, who John tasked to follow Jesus instead of himself.  When Jesus gets back from the wilderness it these two who go to find their brothers and bring them to Christ as well.  But enough about what Luke omits, what Luke does present is a simple clear picture of one thing – that the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon Jesus as He came up from the waters of the Jordon.  And a voice from heaven itself thundered saying – Thou art my beloved Son; in Thee I am well pleased.

If you were a bystander on the banks of the river and saw these events you could conclude but one thing; you are watching the Son of God be recognized by the Godhead and affirmed verbally as to who He is.  Jesus is the beloved son of God, the only son as John would write of in his gospel.  Why is that important to Luke (aside from affirming it to his Greek friend)?  I believe it is because of what follows.  Luke continues in verse 23 saying … “And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli,”  Before we enumerate the road map, catch the subtle statement of the bad assumptions of this road map.  Who was Jesus the son of?  In the immediately preceding verses Luke states plainly that Jesus has been claimed by the Holy Spirit and by God the Father as His Son in whom He is well pleased.  So Luke states plainly the genealogy of Joseph, the road map tracing back the lines of “His” fatherhood are only a supposition.  If you really wanted to be accurate you would need to trace back the lineage of His mother Mary who was indeed human.  The Father of Jesus was God the Father.  The road map then that Luke lays out is about nothing more than the adopted father of Jesus, the man charged with raising Him, not with siring Him.

As for raising Jesus, the genealogy traces back as …

“[verse 23] the son of Joseph,                (Joseph is 41 generations from David)
which was the son of Heli,
[verse 24] Which was the son of Matthat,
which was the son of Levi,
which was the son of Melchi,
which was the son of Janna,
which was the son of Joseph,
[verse 25] Which was the son of Mattathias,
which was the son of Amos,
which was the son of Naum,
which was the son of Esli,
which was the son of Nagge,
[verse 26] Which was the son of Maath,
which was the son of Mattathias,
which was the son of Semei,
which was the son of Joseph,
which was the son of Juda,
[verse 27] Which was the son of Joanna,
which was the son of Rhesa,
which was the son of Zorobabel,
which was the son of Salathiel,
which was the son of Neri,
[verse 28] Which was the son of Melchi,
which was the son of Addi,
which was the son of Cosam,
which was the son of Elmodam,
which was the son of Er,
[verse 29] Which was the son of Jose,
which was the son of Eliezer,
which was the son of Jorim,
which was the son of Matthat,
which was the son of Levi,
[verse 30] Which was the son of Simeon,
which was the son of Juda,
which was the son of Joseph,
which was the son of Jonan,
which was the son of Eliakim,
[verse 31] Which was the son of Melea,
which was the son of Menan,
which was the son of Mattatha,
which was the son of Nathan,
which was the son of David,                  (David is thirteen generations from Abraham)
[verse 32] Which was the son of Jesse,
which was the son of Obed,
which was the son of Booz,
which was the son of Salmon,
which was the son of Naasson,
[verse 33] Which was the son of Aminadab,
which was the son of Aram,
which was the son of Esrom,
which was the son of Phares,
which was the son of Juda,
[verse 34] Which was the son of Jacob,
which was the son of Isaac,
which was the son of Abraham,             (Abraham is eleven generations from Noah)
which was the son of Thara,
which was the son of Nachor,
[verse 35] Which was the son of Saruch,
which was the son of Ragau,
which was the son of Phalec,
which was the son of Heber,
which was the son of Sala,
[verse 36] Which was the son of Cainan,
which was the son of Arphaxad,
which was the son of Sem,
which was the son of Noe,                    (Noah is ten generations from Adam)
which was the son of Lamech,
[verse 37] Which was the son of Mathusala,
which was the son of Enoch,
which was the son of Jared,
which was the son of Maleleel,
which was the son of Cainan,
[verse 38] Which was the son of Enos,
which was the son of Seth,
which was the son of Adam,                  (Jesus will be 74 generations from Adam)
which was the son of God.”

You will notice how often the names repeat the in genealogies, as tradition dictates.  You will also notice Nathan is the son of David where they trace Jesus from instead of Solomon in this map.  You will notice there is no mention of Ruth (married to Boaz) in the lineage of David.  Nor is there mention of Rahab from the wall of Jericho mentioned either.  In fact the entire road map is devoid of women entirely – and traces the wrong parentage in the first place as Luke eludes to in the “as was supposed” comment he makes before He dictates it.  How this lines up against Mary’s ancestry might be nicer to know.  And the first clue we are using the wrong road map to trace back to God is in two easy to see places – it begins with God the Father claiming Jesus at His baptism.  And it is devoid of women entirely throughout the entire map.  Jewish traditions at the time, assuming males to be the only thing that counts, results in a wrong road map that only gives us an inkling of a bloodline that is shared through adoption.

The Bible and the Gospels are full of the stories of the impacts of women.  Indeed the story of Mary and of Elizabeth begin this gospel itself.  I believe Luke knows the importance of women to the gospel story.  And perhaps has placed this genealogy here to satisfy the legalistic requirements of the Israelites of his day, who want to see a bloodline traced back to the beginning to know “where” Jesus comes from.  But Luke preceded all this by offering a direct commentary on where Jesus comes from.  For those that prefer to see a bloodline, they miss the point.  Jesus is the Son of God.  It is this position that makes Him the Messiah, it is not the road map based on bad assumptions.  Jesus is at the heart of any map of salvation.  We are not saved because of what Adam and Eve did, nor of Abraham, nor of David.  We are saved because of what God did for us.  To send us His only begotten Son, that whoever of us should believe upon Him would be saved.  That is the gospel.  That is the road map.  We do not need to believe in David, but we do need to believe in the promise of God to send us Jesus.  It is the life of Jesus that matters.  Not that failings of Abraham, Adam, or David – the perfection of Jesus is the road map we should follow.

Given this, if we could allow ourselves the freedom of abandoning preconceived ideas and assumptions, and make Jesus the heart of our Bible study – what scripture reveals could be so much more than it does today.  We have the advantage of knowing the gospel story from end-to-end.  We have the life of Jesus fully documented.  We have His words directly.  We know His admonitions, His promises, and His deeds.  We have His example of His own full submission of His will to the will of His Father.  If He needed to do that, how could we ever deny our own need to do the same exact thing.  Where we allow doctrine to separate us from our common sense, and from the example of Jesus, we allow it a disservice which makes the work of God for us ten times harder.  Where we are able to submit, to follow, and to be humble, we make it ten times easier.  Let us follow the road map of peace.  It begins with the recognition of the Father God Himself, as He tells us, “This” is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.

 

Fields of Perfection [part three] ...

A journey can sometimes be an arduous thing.  The voyage from point A to point B is not always painless.  But that pain is nearly a guarantee when an enemy works to insure it.  I always find it remarkable that folks who ascribe to atheism do so while blaming God for everything bad that happens in the world (if there was one); but fail to ever attribute any of the pain and suffering to the devil, His enemy.  It is as if there is only one responsible party for anything bad, but the other guy just continues to not exist.  Even in atheism, the devil continues to pull off the great deception of just never being there for anything bad.  But in Christianity, this deception takes the form of “forgetfulness”?  Somehow Christians think there are bad people in the world, but seem to forget they face the chief of all evil in their journey away from self.  On occasion we remember there is a devil, but in general seem to think he couldn’t possibly affect “our” lives (perhaps with disease, temptation that leads to failure, or even death itself).  But he does, and he remains very active as Jesus reminds us so long ago.

Imagine planning a vacation to Disney World (home of the 6ft rat 😊).  But then everything that could go wrong, does go wrong.  Some call that Murphy’s Law (perhaps the devil’s middle name is Murphy?).  Bad coincidence is survivable, though not enjoyable.  It would however not make for a great vacation to say the least.  We think of our vacations as an escape from stress, not a deepening of it.  But now imagine that same vacation plan you create and begin to set in motion.  This time, the circumstances beyond your control are cooperating fully, but your wife is not.  This time, your wife not only resents going, she is determined to make your vacation as miserable as possible.  You do not just lose your wallet, she steals and hides it.  You did not just forget your reservations number at the hotel, she not only stole your paperwork, she secretly cancelled the reservations without anyone knowing.  This behavior is not designed to keep you from going, perhaps she is unable to do that, but it is designed to make every inch of going as hard as possible, and as miserable as possible.  That, is the role the devil plays in your spiritual journey.  He is unable to stop you from movement, but he is unwilling to concede a single inch without inflicting as much distraction, failure, pain, and misery as it is possible to inflict upon you along the way.  And it is not the will of God, it is the will of His enemy.

So the argument emerges, why not just prevent him (Satan) from doing it – perhaps kill him to keep him from this?  But then, without any kind of test, would you ever know what you “truly” believed, and how much you truly believed it?  Without test, would you really know how much you trust God to save you, or would you believe you did it all yourself?  And when the devil uses human agents to accomplish his goal of making your journey miserable, can you possibly consider killing the messenger who needs redemption and reconciliation as much as you do?  Bad children are still children.  You do not execute your two-year-old because she intentionally throws milk at you.  You do not kill her because she hits her sister.  These behaviors are what need to go.  But your daughter remains your daughter even when her actions cause pain to others, and ultimately to you, and God.  In the eye of God, “bad” people, are children He is still trying hard to redeem.  And sometimes your spiritual journey is made more difficult by people who act as agents of the enemy whether they know it or not.  Something that again, is not new.

Matthew documented a parable of Jesus in a continuing line of parables that addressed this in chapter thirteen of his gospel.  He picks up with the words of Christ beginning in verse 24 saying … “Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: [verse 25] But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.”  Before we decipher the meaning of this parable which Jesus explains in further texts we will read before proceeding, there are a few other items of notice.  First, this is the second parable in a line of them that uses farming as the analogy.  As stated before farming is not an instant process, it is a growth process.  It takes a farmer’s care if a harvest is to be gained.  The seeds respond to the work of the farmer, they do not work for themselves.  They will need planting, fertilizing, water, sunshine, and earth before what God intended them to become happens.  This is in a perfect world.  This story begins with introducing intentional means of destruction.  Here we learn, that the farmer has an enemy, and the enemy has done something to intentionally hurt the farmer, the seeds are only a mechanism to hurt the farmer, that was the enemy’s only goal, the seeds mean nothing to him.

Jesus decodes this parable beginning in verse 36 saying … “Then Jesus sent the multitude away, and went into the house: and his disciples came unto him, saying, Declare unto us the parable of the tares of the field. [verse 37] He answered and said unto them, He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; [verse 38] The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one;”  Duh!  The explanation of this is kind of exactly what you might expect, but the disciples asked for one anyway.  It is good being stupid.  Think about it, you could have made assumptions about this story, and hardened those assumptions until no other truth gets in.  That is what we do all the time, and we call those assumptions and interpretations – doctrine.  Once hardened in tradition we call it core beliefs and we would rather die than open our minds to some other interpretation of the same set of facts.  The disciples were smart enough, or rather stupid enough, not to make assumptions of their own, but instead TO ASK TO BE LED by Jesus before putting “anything” in their minds.  And this approach works, even today.

As it turns out, the farmer is Jesus the Son of Man.  The field is the world.  That sentence is sometimes one Christians like to forget.  We associate “the world” as being the mission fields, someplace primitive and far away.  But the world includes Hollywood, and New York City.  It includes gay bars, and for that matter, bars of every kind.  It includes places like Kansas, Alabama, and Arkansas.  It includes the families within our own churches, and the people within our own families.  The world is not exclusive, it is inclusive of everyone, everywhere – in places that are primitive, and in places where sins are committed on purpose by people who should know better, like us.  The good seed are the children of the kingdom.  We like to think that is us.  But we forget that word “children”.  We gloss over it like a phrase so often repeated it loses meaning.  There are only “children” in this explanation.  No adults identified and everyone in the world is included in the meaning.  That means you are either following God, or His enemy, and you are not old enough to even think there is a third option.  Folks convinced they are adults, are actually children following the enemy who tells them they are adults and in control, they are deceived and they do not know it, because they do not want to admit the truth, told by The Truth.

These weeds however are not wicked supernatural agents, they are just humans, doing the bidding of who they follow.  And your spiritual journey can be impeded by them.  It is like having your husband hide your purse everyday before you leave the house, or your wife hide your wallet.  People clinging to false ideas, they are certain are correct, and wanting to share them with you whether you want to hear them or not.  Better to both come in surrender and humility before Jesus and ask Him, what does The Truth say in this matter or that one.  That act of following, combined with that acknowledge in humility that we need His wisdom, is becoming children of the kingdom.  It is attempting to become perpetual students at the feet of Jesus to learn, ignoring all other distractions and purported “wisdom” of men.

So let’s go back to the parable in verse 26 as Jesus continues saying … “But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. [verse 27] So the servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares? [verse 28] He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up?”  Before we get the explanation a couple things to notice here.  Notice that question of the “servants” to the farmer – didn’t you sow good seed, why does it have weeds?  Nearly everyone blames the farmer, or God, for the weeds.  We do something bad, we blame God for it.  We suffer from the bad actions of someone else, we blame God for it.  But God says … “an enemy has done this”.  There is more than one supernatural actor in this story, and in our world.  Satan tempted Adam and Eve, God did not.  God warned them how to avoid temptation (stay together, and stay away from it).  But we treat the warnings of God lightly believing in strength we do not have, and stumble right into failure without even a second thought, until the guilt of our failure sets in again, or the consequences have immediate effect.

Jesus deciphers more in verse 39 saying … “The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels.”  In case there was any debate about how weeds get there, they get there because the devil sows them.  The devil tempts people into failure after failure until they no longer believe anything but failure is possible.  In truth it is less the sin he wins them over by, but instead the notion that “they” could control the sin if they just wanted to try hard enough.  Instead of looking to Christ where victory over sin is guaranteed (we do nothing, and Jesus beats it for us).  The devil gets people to try to fight him one-on-one, over and over again.  He tells Christians you must do your best first before God can help you, or will help you.  Christians believe the lie, and so are doomed to a life of failure after failure.  If the world would look to Jesus to save them, truly let Jesus do the work for them, salvation would be assured.  The kind of salvation that changes what you do, because it changes how you think and how you love.  The only thing you “do”, is keep surrendering to Jesus and stay out of the fight.

We return to the parable with Jesus answering the servant’s question about getting rid of the weeds early, picking up in verse 29 saying … “But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. [verse 30] Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn.”  More here than first meets the eye.  The argument about “soon” should have faded a bit.  The servants ask the farmer if He wants to move early to get rid of the weeds, and the farmer does not.  The farmer wants to wait, give it time.  He wants to save everyone, and everyone has that chance.  Only this farmer could turn weeds into wheat, and that is what He longs to do.  God would prefer to return to a world entirely occupied by wheat, where every weed gave themselves to Him to be transformed.  But alas, too many weeds, choose to be weeds, and do NOT want transformation of any kind, even Christians sitting in pews, singing hymns since they were children.  A hardened heart, is a hardened heart – where it is sitting, and what it is singing – are not important.

Jesus interprets picking up in verse 40 saying … “As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. [verse 41] The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; [verse 42] And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. [verse 43] Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.”  Here is where the rubber meets the road.  The criteria for the angels as they sort weed from wheat is perfection.  Things that offend, and they that do iniquity – are the weeds that are cast out and burned at the end of all things.  Notice it does not read, well Christians that only do iniquity or sin on occasion should be spared.  This is not a partial-pass method here.  Those that still sin, that still offend, will be cast out.  It means that our journey does reach an end, a maturity in Jesus where we will stop sinning, and stop offending.  Stop sinning that is our actions and motives coming in harmony with God and the Law.  Stop offending, that is we stop teaching others incorrect methods of salvation, stop teaching them to rely upon self, and rely ONLY upon Jesus, to TRUST Jesus to save them, for only He can.

This is the end of our journey, and there is an end to it.  Those who remain alive at the second coming of Christ will have already reached the end of our spiritual journey’s.  Those who died in that quest, will have the remainder fixed in the twinkling of an eye at the resurrection of the righteous.  But the wheat will be perfect at the end of all things, sinning and offending no more.  He who has ears, let him hear, are the words of Jesus, The Truth.  The criteria of perfection is not a threat, or a death sentence.  It is a promise.  It is hope.  It is a description of what the end of your journey looks like within who you are.  It is the gift of Jesus Christ to you, and will happen within you individually.  The church does not bring it.  Your wife or husband does not bring it.  It happens because you submit and surrender to Jesus one-on-one, and only Jesus brings it about within you.  Your failures do not prevent it, they are but guiderails to point you back to Jesus, to surrender more, and trust more, to let Jesus bring it about in you.  Do not focus on failure, focus on Jesus.  Stay your eyes upon Jesus and He will do everything that must be done to save you.

What these stories teach us, is that there is no quick fix, no instant, no one-and-done.  But what they also teach us, is that the Farmer will see the harvest complete within each of us His seeds, if we but let Him.  The farmer does the work, we become the benefit, and perhaps feed the world, or at least our corner of it, turning every eye back to the farmer Jesus Christ.  The seed is not the hero of this story, the farmer is.  The harvest itself is not the event of this story, the transformation of the seed is, that transformation happens before the harvest can begin.  We must be transformed by Jesus, before our actions matter.  We must love before showing kindness has the full effect it could have.  Our motives behind what we do matter.  And the perfecting of our souls, minds, and hearts IS possible through Jesus Christ as we submit ourselves to Him, and trust Him to do the work.

And there would be more parables in this line before it was over yet …

 

Sabbath Wars [part one] ...

How hard will you fight, in order to rest?  Most of us have jobs that pay us money we use to survive, to keep food on the table, a roof over our heads, cars running on the road.  The “bosses” we report to set priorities they believe are extremely important, can impact the company’s success, and “need” to be done on time … or else.  So many Americans are reluctant, at best, to take the full vacation time they are allotted any given year.  We fear that our absence from work might remind them that they can get along without us.  We fear that should we take time away, another co-worker who chooses not to, will get that promotion because of their “dedication” and our “carefree” attitude towards the priorities of our jobs.  We fear the results of our decision to take time away and rest.  And if that fear exists for vacations which only happen seldom in a given year, it can apply to weekends, nights, and pretty much every other day of the year as well.

Now given the insecurities we all wrestle with, with respect to our own balance of “home” vs. “work” needs; imagine the incongruity of attempting to dictate to someone else, exactly “how” and exactly “when” they must rest.  I am not talking about telling someone they need a break.  I am talking about telling someone exactly when that break should occur, and exactly what they will do on that break, and exactly how they will do it (down to the number of breaths to take during the supposed “break”).  It makes no sense.  If I dictate to you that you “must” rest, how can you rest?  If I dictate to you “how” you should rest, am I not inherently imposing restrictions that will keep you from “resting” whether you are doing something different than you were or not? 

The Pharisees (or church leaders in the days of Christ), have a lot in common with many of my Seventh Day Adventist friends.  Convicted of the “truth” of the Sabbath doctrine, and certain of its prominence within the Law of God, they studied to insure “we” would all understand “how” to keep it holy.  There were already some guidelines within the Law itself, the prohibition of “work” for example.  There also exists in the same passages the prohibition to have others “work” for us.  So the true students of the Law began to examine - what does it mean to “work”.  If I do an activity in exchange for compensation, is that the definition of work?  But what if I am already an unpaid “employee” such as a housewife or househusband, whose work is to cook, clean, and serve the household?  Should I then refrain from any “chores” on Sabbath?  There is the example of daily manna in Israel that allowed for a double portion collection and preservation on Friday’s, in order to not have to do this chore on Sabbath, that would seem to support the idea that God cares about “household” workers on His Sabbath as well.

But if I extend this same thinking about work prohibitions for myself and my family, to all those who might be considered as serving me … what could I do that would not require someone else to do “work”.  Oh sure it’s easy to say that walking into a restaurant, or theme park on Sabbath will surely require someone else do perform services directly for me.  But when I turn on the water, or electricity, in my home, or use the Internet; I am aware that somewhere there are employees in utility companies who monitor the systems of plumbing, pipes, wires, cables, routers, and infrastructure that deliver “services” to my home.  Am I not also requiring them to work for me on Sabbath as well?  If I drive, the police, and city traffic monitors, are also sort of “required” to do their jobs to keep me safe on the road.  Even if all I do is go to church; even in that action, am I not requiring the often paid music team to perform, the paid pastor to preach, and all the household people who perform “services” for me at church to do their respective “chores”?

Depending on how we define the term “work”, and who we apply that definition to, we could easily get as proscriptive as did our spiritual forefathers about the difference between walking 1,000 steps per day (deemed as recreational) and walking 1,001 steps per day (deemed as crossing the line between re-creation and working).  Of course the problem in this entire line of thinking is that inevitably we will be “working” harder to keep Sabbath holy than any other day, and in so doing completely miss the idea of rest in the first place.  When we consider the entire point of Sabbath rest was to be able to spend time with Dad, and “remember” that Dad takes His time off, in order to be with us on this special day in a special way, it might flip our ideas and notions about Sabbath observance on their heads.  The Sabbath was supposed to be a cornerstone of our relationship with God.  It was time set aside for us to literally be with Him.  In the Garden of Eden, that meant God physically coming to our world to “hang out” with Adam and Eve.  Yes, God heard their prayers during the rest of the week, and liked walking through the garden in the evenings with them.  But on Sabbath, it was a full day to hang out with God, a day that “HE” took time off of HIS work, in order to be with us.  Time HE set aside as holy to be with us.  And how do we respond?

When the rules no longer govern the time, but the anticipation to literally be with Dad takes over, the number of steps we take, breaths we take, or venues we find ourselves in matter a whole lot less than the fact that we are literally hanging out with God.  That is what Sabbath was like for Peter and the other disciples.  They were not just “observing” a day of rest with Christ along for the ride, they were literally with GOD and HE was with them on this special day.  This was how Sabbath was intended to be honored and remembered.  Whatever you find yourself doing literally “with Jesus” on Sabbath day is more than just OK, it is awesome!  The same feeling you get when you are eating a romantic dinner with your spouse, away on a vacation from work, away from the stress of the everyday needs, and able to enjoy time alone in a special way.  Whether in Paris, or Rome, or Fiji, that feeling of getting away from your home, away from your routines, and rediscover the intimacy of the person you have loved for so many years … this is what Sabbath was intended to be like between us and our God.  And God gave us this gift of HIS time, in such a special way, but only every seven days. 

He will be there for us all the time, but on this time, it is going to be AWESOME!  Neither of us are going to allow the routine distractions we “have to do” to get in the way of what both of us know we WANT to do.  We will free our time and our minds up, so we can really get to know each other, and find pleasure in the small things, in the time away, in the intimacy we offer each other.  The reason why vacation recharges and re-energizes us when we get back to work, is the same effect the Sabbath can have on us every week.  When we allow ourselves to put away distractions, and find Christ intimately, learning to love others like He loves others, what we do changes and why we do it changes.  Anything that would get in our way of intimacy with Christ gets put aside, because intimacy with God and the specialness with which He treats this time, is just too important for us to treat it any differently.  And so it was with Peter.

The Pharisees however, did not recognize Christ as God, so the beauty of hanging out with Dad, had never entered their minds.  All they had was the Law.  So the Law governed their thinking.  Peter recalls how the war to restore Sabbath began in the gospel of John Mark in chapter two and verse 23 saying … “And it came to pass, that he went through the corn fields on the sabbath day; and his disciples began, as they went, to pluck the ears of corn. [verse 24] And the Pharisees said unto him, Behold, why do they on the sabbath day that which is not lawful?”  So Peter is hanging out with Christ, walking through a corn field.  In those days (and since Israel emerged as a nation), farmers would reflect the love of God to others in the form of leaving corn on the stalks for the poor to come and glean.  God had instructed the farmers NOT to be so greedy as to harvest every single ear of corn or grain of wheat from the fields they borrowed from Him.  They left some of it, so the poor, and those who did not “own” land could come and “work” to feed themselves due to the mercy of the “landowner”.  How interesting that today we would see this as irresponsible waste, yet God saw this practice for what it was, charity and love for others.

None the less, to “glean” in the fields was still considered “work”, therefore for Peter and the others to be picking corn on Sabbath was decidedly against the Law of God from the perspective of the Pharisees.  And they were quick to point this out to Jesus, a Rabbi who should know better than to allow His followers to do these unlawful acts.  Peter recounts Jesus’ response for John Mark to chronicle in verse 25 … “And he said unto them, Have ye never read what David did, when he had need, and was an hungred, he, and they that were with him? [verse 26] How he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar the high priest, and did eat the shewbread, which is not lawful to eat but for the priests, and gave also to them which were with him?”  If it is a matter of Law alone, Jesus will challenge them on this basis. 

To enter the temple itself, in the holy place was a privilege reserved for the priests alone.  To eat the showbread was a part of sacred ceremonies again reserved for the priests alone.  To defy these rules, and defy God, was to risk sure, certain, and immediate death.  The high priest wore bells on the bottom of his robes and a rope tied to his ankle when entering the most holy place on the Day of Atonement.  For should he be judged unworthy by God, he would be struck dead, and no one could enter to retrieve his body, or they would be struck dead (thus the bells to let folks know he was still moving, the rope to get him back if they ceased ringing).  Messing with the rules of the temple in days past saw an immediate consequence to breaking them, handed out by God Himself.  So Jesus points out to the Pharisees that there is something beyond their understanding of the rules, there is an intimacy with God that David is acquainted with that these rulers are not.

John Mark continues in verse 27 … “And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: [verse 28] Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath.”  The Sabbath was made for Man.  It was a gift to us.  It was our Dad setting aside His time and His work to be with us.  He makes the rules, we don’t.  He alone can make “time” itself holy, we can’t.  It is through His presence that a thing can move from what it was, to being holy.  The ground Moses was walking on near the burning bush was not inherently holy, it was holy ONLY because God was standing on it as well.  Any given day is not holy on its own, it is only made holy because God is doing something on that day, making His presence known in a special way, hanging out with us that makes Saturday into Sabbath.  Otherwise it is just another day at work.  We are NOT holy on our own, but when He dwells within us, His presence can take what was profane and make it Holy when He is in us, when we love like He loves.  It is His presence alone that makes a thing holy.

Whether you pluck corn on Sabbath or not, does nothing to make the Sabbath holy or not.  It is not the activity of plucking corn that is in question here, it is the context of the story.  Peter and the others were “with Jesus” literally.  They found themselves walking through a field with Christ, and they picked corn due to the charity of the landowner to enjoy with their Lord.  The gift of the time of the Sabbath with Christ, in combination with the gift of the charity of the landowner, where love was being shown from everyone to everyone.  Only the Pharisees missed all the love for their focus on the Law.  Only the Pharisees were so obsessed with the accuracy of their scriptural interpretations, that they missed the love of being with God on His holy day.  What a loss!!  They could have spent Sabbath with God on earth, but they were too busy reciting their ideas of the rules to God.  Are we any different?

We rationalize what we do on Sabbath to ourselves.  We make distinctions between turning on a light switch, driving to church, listening to a sermon … and causing someone else to work to feed us afterwards.  We excuse shopping on Sabbath because clerks and cashiers would be there whether we were or not.  The one key theme that emerges in our all focus on the adherence to the law, is a focus on what it means in practical terms to “me”.  I am obsessed with my own convenience and activities on MY day that I call Sabbath.  Sabbath is MY day off.  Sabbath is MINE and therefore what I do on it, is up to me.  But in this thinking I have lost the time and special intimacy that comes with hanging out with Dad, appreciating His gift of His time with me.  I ignore what is possible with Him, and instead focus on what I might do, that might bring joy to me.  Jesus did not say that “we” were the Lord of the Sabbath, He said He was.  The Sabbath is only the Sabbath because He made it that way, blessed it, and gave it to us.  It was supposed to be about spending intimate time with us.  We enjoy Sabbath, when we spend it hanging out with Dad, on vacation from our everyday lives.  If we treat Sabbath like we do every other day of the week, focusing on what makes me happy, or the concerns of my survival, we “lose” the beauty of what it was intended to be.  The punishment for this loss, is the loss of what was possible.

The lesson Christ was trying to teach us was a restoration of how we should “think about” Sabbath.  He was not abandoning the rules, but was trying to put them in context.  Time out with Dad was the most important thing.  Sharing in the joy of loving each other was the most important thing.  We will “guard” the Sabbath properly, when we visualize Sabbath properly in our own minds and priorities.  We will treat the gift of Sabbath like so much used toilet paper when we do not.  Going to church does not make Sabbath holy.  Hanging out with Christ does.  When we so long to be with Him, we would not find ourselves anywhere else but in His presence we will come to know the JOY of being with Christ.  When we treat Sabbath like a vacation from our routines, we will come to experience the joy of loving others, like He experiences that joy.  Shopping and eating out on Sabbath are hardly the point, being distracted by something other than spending real intimate time with Dad is.  I don’t have time to shop on Sabbath, my Dad is making time to be with me, and I don’t want to miss a minute of it, to do something as menial as shopping.  I am not interested in dining out on Sabbath, because I love you enough to not be the reason you are missing your time with our Dad.  If I find myself in church it is my privilege to serve you in any capacity I occupy because in this way I share the joy of loving others with Dad, I cannot consider this privilege a “chore”.  I don’t want to be paid to play music at church, or to speak, or minister … I do not want to come to think of the gift of my service as being a mere “job”. 

A different perspective on Sabbath and the gift it is to us, is what Jesus Christ was beginning to teach us in a simple corn field long ago.  But this challenge to the current ideology, and leadership of the church, could not go unanswered, lest anarchy arise.  So having been put to silence on matters of the Law, the religious leaders of the day (His, and ours) set out to look for the next “signs” that this upstart Rabbi was not “really” a member of this church.  If Jesus dared to challenge conventional ideas about the observance of the Law, then He could not be God (i.e. if Jesus disagrees with us, He is the wrong one).  Has anything changed?  Adventists are so certain that the fourth commandment will become the ultimate test of loyalty to God in the end of days.  We are so certain, we have begun to rationalize how we keep the other nine commandments.  We are so certain, we have lost sight of how to keep a thing holy, but maintain that it must be kept that way lest our salvation be lost.  We espouse the need to keep Sabbath holy, but like our spiritual forefathers, we have no clue what that really means in practical terms.  So like them, we rely on traditions, habits, and our scriptural interpretations of the Law.  We lose sight of the beauty of time out with Dad, we lose sight of what it means to share in the joy of loving others, and instead we focus on the facts, the rules, and our rigid ideas of right and wrong.  We make the papacy the enemy of our delusions.  And in so doing, we find false comfort that our real enemy is not found in the mirror, when in truth, that is only place the real enemy can be found.

To see where this line of thinking will end, we need only continue to look at what happens next …