Rest

This miracle in the passage from Luke chapter 13, verses 10-17, is quite understated when compared to some of the other miracle accounts. We are told that the woman suffered for 18 years, Jesus lay hands on her, pronounced her free from her ailment and she was set free.

The synagogue leader then points out what many of the Rabbis and Jews may have been thinking – that healing was work and so should have been done on one of the 6 days of labour and not on the Sabbath.

Jesus’s response was that of the lesser to the greater. He points out that any of those gathered there would still take care of an animal if it needed help on the Sabbath so how much more should they respond to a human being in need. 

But the conversation is actually deeper than this. 

In the original Greek the synagogue leader’s words use the word ‘dei’ to make his claim about the ought of work but it also describes what is necessary for Jesus to do as God’s Son and representative; which is why Jesus’s response picks up on the synagogue leader’s claim. It is not about a divine necessity to work on the other 6 days but on the divine necessity to free the woman from what binds her on the Sabbath. And, of course, for added emphasis Jesus calls her what she is – a daughter of Abraham – magnifying the need to heal, liberate and unbind.

And the people praise God. They recognise Jesus as the one who brings in healing power to those who need it most.

Jesus is God’s repairman for the world.

God made the world and He made it good. He also made it holy. When Jesus acts in His Father’s name it is right and natural that people give Him glory. God in Jesus entered the world so it and everything in it could rest, be saved, be restored and perfected. 

Returning to ourselves, do we stand in need of a special Sabbath rest day?

A setting aside that day of rest is something we have lost sight of. We work all hours, shop all hours – assisted by worldly pressures, stores staying open and online shopping. There is the expectation that phone lines will be open 24/7. Society seems to forget the welfare and wellbeing of both the workers and themselves.

The reasons God gave us the Sabbath are overlooked and forgotten.

Nothing must get in the way of instant gratification, of getting what we want instantly, of consumerism.

The pressure this puts on us all leaves us crooked and burdened like the woman in the passage. We need Jesus to repair and heal us just like she did. 

We need to put Sabbath time aside to rest from the worldly pressures and to spend time with God.