Pentecost 14C
Luke 13:10-17
Who
does Jesus think he is, anyway? You know, this is just one more reason to
believe that he does not come from
God – working on the Sabbath! We have laws for a reason, after all – we can’t
have people breaking them willy-nilly. Where does it stop? Today we’re breaking
the Sabbath, and tomorrow, what? Do we start taking the Lord’s name in vain?
Dishonoring our parents? These are God’s laws, we’re talking about here. This
is a really big deal.
I
mean, why would God give us a law that was meant to be broken? Laws are meant
to guide our way, to show us how God wants us to live, a sort of curb to keep
us on the right road. They are meant to protect and preserve us. But you start
breaking one law, and then all laws become less like law, and more like
suggestions, and they lose their power to protect and preserve. And if they
indeed show us how God wants us to live, then how could we even think of
hopping the curb and going our own way, rather than God’s way?
On
the other hand…
Can
you imagine viewing the world – for eighteen years – from the waist down? To be
so bent over that you can’t see anyone’s face? She tried to make the best of
her life. She maintained her faith, kept the law, and always went to the
synagogue on the Sabbath, as the law told her to do. She knew that her God was
full of mercy and compassion, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.
Perhaps if she could just continue to have faith in that, God would, someday,
show her that mercy and compassion, that abounding and steadfast love, and free
her from this crippling spirit.
As the years went on, it was hard to maintain that
hope, but hope was all she had. And so she continued to go to synagogue, and
continued to sing praises to God, even as she felt continually trapped by this
ailment that kept her quite unable to stand up straight.
What
a surprise it was that day in the synagogue. For her, it was a normal day, a
normal Sabbath, the day specifically set aside for holiness and rest. The woman
knew her Scriptures – she knew that keeping the Sabbath was linked to two
significant stories in her people’s history. It was because of creation,
because God rested on the seventh day, and we should too, but it was also
because of the exodus. Many years before, her people had been slaves in Egypt,
cruelly treated by the Pharaoh, made to work without proper rest, bound in
slavery. And God had sent Moses to free them. They followed Moses, out of Egypt
and across the Red Sea, leaving their bindings behind. And so God told them, in
the book called Deuteronomy, to remember on the Sabbath that while once they
were bound as slaves, now they are free.
The
woman secretly clung to that second meaning, the one about freedom. Oh, to be free from this ailment! To be free from whatever this
thing was that kept her hunched over, unable to see and appreciate the fullness
of the world!
Imagine
how she felt, then, when she encountered Jesus that day, when he said to her,
“Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” A part of her was scared – she
completely understood the synagogue leader’s indignation. She took the law
seriously, too. Had this man Jesus, this man claiming to be from God, just
broken the Sabbath? She did want to be healed, don’t get her wrong, but was the
Sabbath the right time to do it? But she also knew that this was exactly right:
the Sabbath was about freedom, after all! Her people had been bound as slaves
in Egypt, and then they were free, and so we should honor the Sabbath to keep
it holy. She had been bound as a slave to this crippling spirit, and now she
was free – so what a way to honor the Sabbath, to keep it holy! She even heard
this in Jesus’ next words, “…ought not this woman, a
daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from
this bondage on the Sabbath day?” Yes, Lord, free from bondage!
Even
as she was unsure about whether this was the right time and place, she also
felt that she had that day become a living example of the spirit of the Sabbath
– a spirit of freedom from bondage, freedom from slavery. And as she stood up
straight and saw the world around her for the first time in eighteen years, all
she could do was begin praising God – who indeed is full of mercy and
compassion, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.
Today’s
Gospel reading gives us two powerful perspectives on law: the indignant
synagogue leader who is wary of breaking one law lest we take it as leeway to
break all the rest, and the bent over woman, whose healing can be seen as the
embodiment of the spirit of freedom that the Sabbath intends. Whose is right?
To
be fair, there is validity in both perspectives. The synagogue leader is right:
these laws are in place for a reason, and we would do well to remember that.
They are there to protect and preserve us, to keep us on the right path, and
therefore, to lead us toward life. And I think Sabbath is one law in particular
that we could take a lot more seriously. For most people, I think when we hear
“Sabbath,” we think, “Go to church.” Going to church is one thing you can do on
the Sabbath to keep it holy, and I certainly don’t want to discourage that. But
Sabbath is so much more than that. In today’s story, Sabbath is about release
from bondage, about overcoming that which bends us over and makes us unable to
see, about freedom to praise God. Some of us may have been physically bent over
at some point or even currently, but my guess is that all of us have been
spiritually or emotionally bent over at some point in our lives. We have too
much on our plate. We have too many demands on our backs. We have impossible
expectations put upon us by friends, family, co-workers, or even ourselves. We
are weary, and don’t allow ourselves the rest we need, indeed the rest that God
commands.
Sabbath,
then, becomes a life-giving mandate for us, a chance to find release from all
these binding and crippling demands of life. Maybe you have the luxury of a
whole day of rest – that would be best, but realistically in today’s world this
is hard to come by, especially if you have people in your life, like children
or elderly parents, who cannot care for themselves. So maybe you need to take
Sabbath where you can find it: at a red light, perhaps, when you can just take
a deep breath and say a prayer for freedom from the weight of the world. Or in
those few moments after you wake but before you are out of bed, when you can
pray for peace throughout your day.
Sabbath is something we need, and the synagogue leader
is right to stand by that need. Where the synagogue leader’s view falls short,
however, is that his upholding of the law is only for the letter of the law,
and not for the spirit of the law. This is where we can learn something from
the woman’s story as well. Our Psalm today says that God is full of mercy and
compassion and abounding in steadfast love, and we would do well to remember
that these characteristics of God overarch all laws. In other words, God gives
us these laws because God is
merciful, compassionate, and loving. And if those laws contradict those values
in any way, then the spirit of the law is not being fulfilled.
What,
then, is the spirit of the law?
With Jesus, grace trumps law. That’s not to say we
disregard the law – by no means. Law has its place, to show us the way God
wants us to live, to get us outside ourselves and facing God and the needs of
our neighbor. But the law always bows to mercy, grace, love, and life. Law
helps us know how to live better lives, but grace creates and enables life. Law
pushes us to care for each other, but grace catches us when we fall short of
that. Sometimes the law is suspended in order to let grace abound, and today’s
Gospel is just such a time. In this story, when Jesus breaks the Sabbath law,
healing happens, a sinner gives thanks and praise, and a crowd rejoices –
because that is what happens when grace invites us to both value the law and
also suspend it in the name of mercy, compassion, and love.
Let
us pray. God, you are full of compassion and mercy, and abounding in
steadfast love. Help us to value your commandments and live them to the
fullest, but help us also to know when we must tend toward grace in order to
let your mercy, love and compassion abound in our lives and in the lives of
everyone we meet. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
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