2Th 2:13-17; God’s Love Gives You a Life of Sabbath Comfort.Thursday October 5, 2023
C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity writes: “Do not waste time bothering whether you “love” your neighbor; act as if you did. As soon as we do this we find on the of the great secrets. When you are behaving as if you loved someone, you will presently come to love him. If you injure someone you dislike, you will find yourself disliking him more. If you do him a good turn, you will find yourself disliking him less.”
Theme: God’s love gave mankind the Sabbath – heaven in His presence.
Example of loving representative principles more than people. Jesus breaking Sabbath traditions.
Mar 2:23-28 And it happened that He was passing through the grainfields on the Sabbath, and His disciples began to make their way along while picking the heads of grain. 24 The Pharisees were saying to Him, "Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?" 25 And He said to them, "Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions became hungry; 26 how he entered the house of God in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the consecrated bread, which is not lawful for anyone to eat except the priests, and he also gave it to those who were with him?" 27 Jesus said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. 28 "So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
The point of using David’s eating of the bread was not about the validity of rituals, but about love being the fulfillment of the Law.
Sabbath – the privilege of enjoying the presence of God in the world of His making. Click in (Not doing nothing)
Gen 2:3 Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.
The end goal for man is to enjoy God’s presence in God’s righteous world. Heavenly sabbath.
This is the Sabbath. God gave it. We threw it away. And then God did something in love that not a soul would have imagined that He would do, nor did the greatest archangel fail to be absolutely astounded by it.
God gave His Son that His enemies might live through Him and with Him.
Through love God gave us His Son.
When we love others, this Sabbath is what we must ultimately want for them, and there is no limit to what we will reasonably do to help them to get it (enemies included) heavenly sabbath.
The point of David eating the consecrated bread is not how cool it is to be a rebel, but that sometimes the personal needs of others take precedent over procedure and tradition. God’s love will show us when that is true and what to do. Love gives itself for the benefit of another.
Jesus then states why the Sabbath was made.
Mar 2:27 Jesus said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
The Sabbath was made for man. The door to God’s presence was made for man. (Not man for the door)
We don’t serve the door, as if we were door keepers or had to work to keep it open, etc. We are given the door so that we can live in the peace, rest, and incredible joy of our Lord.
Then the Lord says something astounding.
Mar 2:28 "So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
ὥστε κύριός ἐστιν ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου καὶ τοῦ σαββάτου.
He is the creator and the giver of the Sabbath. That makes Him the Creator in the six days and Sabbath giver of the seventh.
The Lord Jesus made the Sabbath and He, as its Lord, gave it to mankind for him to enjoy.
Are you enjoying the life He gave you? Do you see and feel His love? Do you know His comfort? Are you a person of hope? Do you desire all others to enjoy God’s Sabbath?
On another occasion a man has a diseased arm. What about him?
Mar 3:1-6 He entered again into a synagogue; and a man was there whose hand was withered. 2 They were watching Him to see if He would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him. 3 He said to the man with the withered hand, "Get up and come forward!" 4 And He said to them, "Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save a life or to kill?" But they kept silent. 5 After looking around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, He said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored. 6 The Pharisees went out and immediately began conspiring with the Herodians against Him, as to how they might destroy Him.
Christ addresses the question of what work is permitted on the Sabbath, but in a very strange fashion. “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm (evil) … to save a life or to kill?”
We might see the crux of Jesus’ question. “Is it lawful to do evil and to kill on the Sabbath?” Apparently, for the Pharisees the answer is yes, for they immediately went out and conspired to kill Jesus (on the Sabbath).
The Pharisees work on the Sabbath – to kill the Lord. The Lord of the Sabbath seeks to save life.
Without love man will eventually preserve himself at the expense of others.
The Pharisees care more for their traditions than they do people.
If you fail to possess (within yourself) the fabric of the Sabbath, you will violate it in the worst way.
Sabbath – enjoying God’s presence in His righteous world.
In doing good to protect our traditions or principles we may become violators of goodness.
Do not keep a false love in your heart and convince yourself it is God’s love. We must be honest and confess it when we lack God’s love.
When David ate the consecrated bread, Saul had the priest who gave it to him killed. He had all the priests in that town killed. A shepherd named Doeg was his executor.
David wrote a song about him. Notice the mention of love in the song.
Psa 52 For the choir director. A Maskil of David, when Doeg the Edomite came and told Saul and said to him, "David has come to the house of Ahimelech."
Why do you boast in evil, O mighty man? The lovingkindness of God endures all day long. 2 Your tongue devises destruction, Like a sharp razor, O worker of deceit. 3 You love evil more than good, Falsehood more than speaking what is right. Selah. 4 You love all words that devour, O deceitful tongue.
5 But God will break you down forever; He will snatch you up and tear you away from your tent, And uproot you from the land of the living. Selah. 6 The righteous will see and fear, And will laugh at him, saying, 7 "Behold, the man who would not make God his refuge, But trusted in the abundance of his riches And was strong in his evil desire."
8 But as for me, I am like a green olive tree in the house of God; I trust in the lovingkindness of God forever and ever. 9 I will give You thanks forever, because You have done it, And I will wait on Your name, for it is good, in the presence of Your godly ones.
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