Keep the Main Thing, the Main Thing

I once had a secretary who kept a little saying taped to the phone on her desk. It said, "Keep the main thing, the main thing." I loved it. Today's blog is about "the main thing."

This coming Sunday, the Gospel reading from Luke is a story about Jesus and a woman in need.  Jesus is in a synagogue, teaching on Sabbath day. As he taught, a severly crippled woman, bent over, likely with some spinal disease or deformity, is sighted by Jesus. There’s no indication she approached him and asked for help. She knew her place. She was almost certainly in the balcony, the area reserved for women. Perhaps Jesus saw her as she ascended the steps toward that gallery, or perhaps he saw her once she was in place. We don’t know.

What we do know is that when he saw her, he called her over to him, and healed her. She immediately was able to stand up straight for the first time in eighteen years. What do you think the reaction would be next Sunday at your church if someone were healed of a long time infirmity? I suspect even in the more staid of our parishes, there would be some gasps, maybe even a few “Oh, my God!” prayers of astonishment. 

Maybe that happened back then too. We don’t know, because the very next verse tells us that the synagoge leader or president, was horrified. Maybe he was happy that the woman had been released from her burden of pain somewhere deep inside. But his immediate reaction was to, in modern language, freak out. Not because she was healed, but because she was healed on the Sabbath.

The Jewish Law forbade any work on the Sabbath and since healing was the work of a physican, as far as the leader was concerned, Jesus had violated a major tenet of Judaism regarding keeping the Sabbath. Jesus was not pleased with the synagogue leader’s reaction which was, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; the Sabbath isn’t one of them.” So displeased was Jesus, he called the leader--and others present--hypocrites. “You water your cattle on the Sabbath. That’s work is it not? Why would you forbid this woman to be set free on the Sabbath?”

Well, that’s the story, but is there more to it than appears? What’s the motivation of the synagogue leader to focus on Sabbath keeping rather than on this act of power and grace? To vastly over simplify the concept of Jewish Law, it was understood to be a way of life, the path one should follow as a part of the Chosen. As my first Old Testament professor taught, “The Law was not a penal code; it was a means of grace.” It’s purpose wasn’t to restrict activity; it was to assure that one’s life was pleasing to God--a duty owed to God.

With that understanding, the synagogue leader is probably thinking something like this: “Yes, this is an act of kindness and mercy, but it could have been done tomorrow as well as today. If we begin to pick and choose which statute to follow, where will it end?” It’s an example of the “slippery slope” school of thinking, and in some important ways, it’s hard to argue with. 

Jesus isn’t persuaded, however. There are seven separate instances of Sabbath healing by Jesus in the New Testament. Pretty clearly Jesus must believe that, as important as Sabbath keeping is, it’s not the be all and end all. “The Sabbath is made for us, not us for the Sabbath,” he famously said. Jesus clearly believed that the whole of the Law was summed up in what we call the Two Great Commandments--love God, love neighbor. Following that precept, loving this woman called for immediate action, not a delay of even a few hours. 

Perhaps we can call this story to mind when we get bent out of shape over some “violation” of our own religious traditions or rules.

Peace, Jerry+