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Ex. 31
God declared His Sabbath, “a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you.” (Ex. 31:13b). He also said that anyone who profaned it would surely die. Jesus performed many of His healings on the Sabbath. This angered the Pharisees because they saw His actions as profaning the Sabbath. But Jesus told them, “the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” (Matt. 12:8).
What all of that tells me is that God established the Sabbath as a sign and remembrance for us that the work of salvation is His alone. Jesus then revealed Himself as God’s sanctification work for us by making people physically whole on the Sabbath to demonstrate how He also makes us spiritually whole. This was His to do because, for all practical purposes, He is our Sabbath. That’s why He also said, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matt. 11:28).
Finally, this tells me that anyone who tries to add to the work of Jesus profanes the Sabbath. Paul said as much to the Galatians, who argued over circumcision. He wrote, “You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace.” (Gal. 5:4). There cannot be ‘Jesus and…’. Either we enter into God’s rest, acknowledging that it is God alone who sanctifies us, or we profane His Sabbath with our own work. And if we do that, our result is the same as Adam and Eve’s when they ate from the forbidden tree – we separate ourselves from God.
John 10
You’ve gotta love people.
CROWD: “If You are the Christ, tell us plainly.”
JESUS: “I am the Christ.”
CROWD: “Blasphemy! Stone Him!”
That’s the abbreviated paraphrase of the conversation. Jesus’ answer, of course, was not quite so short and direct. He didn’t simply answer their question, but instead told them why they asked it in the first place. They asked because they didn’t believe what they should have already known by that point. But the people weren’t looking for the truth. They were seeking what they wanted to hear, which had nothing to do with truth. Thus, they didn’t like what Jesus said.
I had to stop and think, though. How often do I ask someone a question already knowing what I want to hear in their answer? And how do I react when I don’t hear what I want to hear? And how often do we do this with God? I think if we ever feel let down or abandoned by God, we are probably expecting a specific answer from Him, rather than truly trying to hear His voice. I want to to do more of the latter, both with God and with the people with whom I interact.
Prov. 7
The first few verses of this chapter talk about keeping a close relationship with the commandments and teachings of wisdom and understanding. We are to look on them as our most precious treasure, keep them close where we will remember them always, and spend time with them as a close friend or relative. I thought how wonderful and amazing it is that we don’t have to do that with something as abstract as words on a page or concepts. No, the commandments and teachings of wisdom and understanding came to life in the person of Jesus Christ, whose Spirit now lives within us. Thus, it is this living, interactive Spirit who becomes our constant, treasured, close companion, keeping us from the path that leads to death.