Sunday, August 25, 2019 | 4:00 p.m.

Sabbath Healing and Liberation

Nanette Sawyer
Associate Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church

Psalm 71:1–16
Luke 13:10–17

Jesus was a rabbi. He was a Jewish teacher, teaching often in the synagogues. And one of the things that rabbis do, like pastors, is discuss and even sometimes debate about the meaning of the holy scriptures. For Jesus, this meant the Hebrew scriptures, what we call the Old Testament or the First Testament. In our scripture today in Luke, Jesus debates with the leader of the synagogue about the meaning of the sabbath as taught in scripture and through tradition.

In Hebrew scripture there are several explanations of the meaning and importance of sabbath. One scripture says that the sabbath is for resting because God rested on the seventh day after creating the world and everything in it. In this scripture the sabbath is a recognition of rest, and it celebrates all the work that God has done.

Another scripture says that people should honor sabbath rest as a reminder that God freed the Israelite people from slavery in Egypt. Now that they are free and no longer slaves, they shouldn’t work like slaves, filling every minute with work. In this scripture, the sabbath is a recognition of freedom, and it celebrates the Exodus journey out of Egypt and out of bondage. Jesus’s debate with the leader of the synagogue revolves around these two biblical ways of understanding what the sabbath is and why it is important. Jesus is not criticizing Judaism or Jewishness here—he is being very Jewish!

The way Jesus makes his argument is also a classic method in rabbinic discussion of scripture. He makes an argument from the lesser to the greater. If this one smaller thing is true, then how much more true is this bigger, more important thing. It’s a classic method of biblical debate and study.

If you set your animals free, he says, if you untie them on the sabbath day so they can drink, how much more appropriate and important it is to set this woman free from her bondage. That Jesus uses this language about being set free from bondage also reminds the people listening to him that the sabbath celebrates the liberation of their ancestors from bondage in ancient Egypt.

The synagogue leader who says one should not work on the sabbath is not wrong. He’s just emphasizing something different than what Jesus emphasizes.

We are in the Gospel according to Luke here, and remember that way back in chapter 4 of Luke’s Gospel, Jesus proclaims that his mission, his purpose, is to bring liberation. While teaching in the synagogue then, he reads from the prophecy of Isaiah,

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
   because he has anointed me
      to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
    and recovery of sight to the blind,
       to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. (Luke 4:18–19)

So it is not surprising that when Jesus teaches about the sabbath, he lifts up the importance of liberation.

Jesus also uses scripture to interpret scripture, another classic and accepted method of Bible interpretation. While there are verses in Deuteronomy (Deuteronomy 5:13) and Exodus (Exodus 20:9–10) that prohibit working on the sabbath, there is also a commandment that one must help their neighbor’s ox or donkey: “You shall not see your neighbor’s donkey or ox fallen on the road and ignore it; you shall help to lift it up” (Deuteronomy 22:4).

So what happens if you see your neighbor’s donkey or ox fallen on the road and it’s the Sabbath? Do you help lift them up? Or is that work?

What do you do when there are commandments that seem to contradict each other? You look for the underlying values and consider why something is important. You weigh priorities, and you look for the things that honor life, that bring life, that honor God, and that honor God’s creation. You look for things that bring justice and foster healing. You work to bring liberation and to build peace.

The synagogue leader in today’s story was in a tough spot. It was his job to interpret scripture and the many commandments, to protect the traditions, to provide structure for the religious community. Jesus’ contemporaries debated which work was prohibited on the sabbath and which work was actually required. For example, there is a rabbinic interpretation that says it’s not only OK but it’s required to work on the sabbath if it will save a life. You must save a life if you can.

But the woman with the bent-over back, her life was not in danger. She had been suffering for eighteen years. What was one more day? Could she not come back the next day to be healed?

The leader of the synagogue was addressing the worshipers, not Jesus, when he said, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.”

He was saying, this is how we do it here. Observe protocol. Don’t forget what we’re about. Don’t forget what we believe. Practice in the way we practice. Observe the norms. This situation did not fit the paradigm of saving a life.

But Jesus shifted the conversation to be about liberation. When someone is living in bondage, oppressed, then isn’t liberating them from bondage also saving their life? Isn’t it bringing them an abundant life?

This kind of liberation breaks boundaries. God’s grace and healing power can’t be controlled and contained.

Immediately after today’s story Jesus asks the question “What is the kingdom of God like?” The kingdom of God, Jesus says, is like a mustard seed that someone took and planted and it grew into a tree where birds could build nests and have shelter and home.

Mustard plants are really bushes, although they grow pretty tall. They can grow to be six feet tall. They grow fast and spread fast, and some types are even called invasive species in some areas. They never get a trunk, so they’re not trees as we think of trees.

The kingdom of God is like a tree that’s not a tree, that grows fast and spreads, that provides shelter and nourishment. The kingdom of God can’t be controlled or contained. It spreads.

The kingdom of God is also like yeast, Jesus says right after that, yeast that gets mixed with flour and spreads until all the dough is leavened. The kingdom of God can’t be controlled or contained. It spreads. The yeast spreads through all the dough and leavens everything.

So Jesus heals and liberates a woman, then tells parables of how God’s kingdom spreads. It makes me wonder, how will God’s healing and liberation spread?

Jesus, in his lifetime spread God’s healing, God’s forgiveness, God’s compassion, and God’s transformation wherever he went. He was a servant-leader who led his followers by serving them, by helping them become whole and then helping them to become servant-leaders too.

“Just as I have washed your feet,” he said on the night of his arrest, “now you should wash each other’s feet.” He taught them and trained them. He modeled what it would look like, and then he encouraged and even commanded them to become servant-leaders.

There is a contemporary movement that teaches servant-leadership based on the teachings of Robert Greenleaf, who wrote a classic book about this in 1977. He talks about the word religion as being based on the root religio, which means “to rebind.”

Greenleaf says that the purpose of religion is “to bridge the separation between persons and the cosmos, to heal the widespread alienation, and to reestablish men and women in the role of servants—healers—of society.” He goes on to say, “Servant-leaders are healers in the sense of making whole by helping others to a larger and nobler vision and purpose than they would be likely to attain for themselves.”

Servant-leaders lead in such a way that they help others become servant-leaders and healers of the world. Christian servant-leaders lead in such a way that they, and those they lead, grow closer to God through Christ, experience God’s grace and presence, share that grace with others, and help others become servant-leaders, too.

In the late 1990s a couple of universities set up residence halls for students that were called servant-leadership houses, so that students could learn by experience what it means to be a servant-leader. Robert Greenleaf described the learnings like this:

Each of us is intimately connected to the other, and in recognizing that connection, we are moved to greater service; to a more profound understanding, appreciation, and tolerance of one another; to an honest self-examination of our own attitudes and behavior; and to the building of community. What is most important in life are the relationships we establish and maintain with other people. (Robert K. Greenleaf, The Servant-Leader Within: A Transformative Path, pp. 5–8)

Through our relationships we can help people heal, including ourselves, by strengthening the bonds of understanding, compassion, forgiveness, and hope. One student who lived in one of the houses observed,

The house mirrors life—complex, rewarding, disappointing, frustrating. People fail to fulfill their promises, forget, procrastinate, try to avoid responsibility some days just as they embrace it others. Some shy away from participation while others want it. It’s all about the difficulty of understanding and accepting others—and coming to see them as less-than-perfect-but-good-enough, as human beings who are flawed and talented at the same time. People who are different from me, but just like me. (The Servant-Leader Within, pp.5–8)

I think about the bent-over woman in today’s Gospel story, how Jesus called her over to him, how he accepted her and helped her. She didn’t heal herself. Our translation says “she stood up” after Jesus touched her, but the original Greek says “she was straightened up.” This was something that happened to her by the power of God.

God’s power was there in the form of a human, Jesus. Yes, he fully embodied the power and presence of God in a way that we are not able to do. He was fully divine, as we say in our creeds and confessions.

But Jesus was also fully human, and in his humanity he taught us how to be fully human, too. He taught us how to be servant-leaders, which also means being healers. He taught us how to look people in the eye with love and how to forgive ourselves so we can forgive others.

I can identify with the leader of the synagogue who wanted things to stay the same. Structure and norms and expectations, even commandments, can help us all to thrive, to live well together, to know what to do next. But life is complicated and challenges us to resolve contradictions and rehash our interpretations and expectations.

Another student living in the servant-leadership house spoke about losing the structure and expectations they were used to. They said,

We are so used to succeeding, to following instructions, to figuring out the path to success and walking it that [the student-leadership house] came as a surprise. There was no formula, and that changed everything. We had to begin to act and lead through understanding rather than by technique or trick. For those of us who are accomplished leaders, who understand the system and how to milk it, this experience was something entirely new. It was frightening at first and later thrilling. (The Servant-Leader Within, pp. 5–8)

Sometimes healing society, and leading transformation, means breaking out of the box, letting go of the way things have always been done, spreading love and hope and mercy like mustard seeds, which are so tiny but grow so quickly and robustly into 6-foot tall bushes and fields of yellow flowers. The kingdom of God is like that.

Healing by listening and seeing what’s needed, responding to people’s need for liberation addressing people’s quality of life, trying new things—these are all aspects of the servant-leadership that Jesus taught.

In the servant-leadership house, another student learned that “real servant-leadership is in the small acts of kindness that we do rather than necessarily the big charity event or service project. Service assumes a larger role in our whole lives, in everything we do, and we understand that even small things can be important. Just because things don’t seem important doesn’t mean they aren’t. Little things can make a difference” (The Servant-Leader Within, pp. 5–8).

The servant-leadership movement is bigger than any one religion, but with Jesus as the pioneer and perfector of our faith, it’s an understanding of leadership and healing that is well-supported and well-rooted in our Christian faith.

And when we think about how to honor the Sabbath, we can think about it in more than one way. It’s a rest from work, yes, and it’s also a liberation from slavery. And in our liberation, it’s OK to rest, to receive the grace, love, and healing of God.

May we receive that grace, as well as share it. Amen.