Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B 2nd June 2024.
Lectionary Readings:
Deuteronomy 5 v12-15; Psalm 81 v1-10; 2 Corinthians 4 v5-12; Mark 2 v23 – 3 v6.
Radical interpretations.
Mark tells of an encounter between Jesus and a group of Pharisees. The action takes place at a Jewish ‘meeting place’ in the region of Galilee. The implication of verse 6 suggests that the Pharisees had travelled up from Jerusalem.
Mark says, “The Pharisees wanted to accuse Jesus of doing something wrong, and they keep watching to see if Jesus would heal a man with a crippled hand on the Sabbath.” (from Mark 3 v1,2).
The Pharisees believed that God would only favour the Jewish people if they kept strictly to the traditions and customs of the ‘Law of Moses’ (The first five books of what we call the Old Testament). Their interpretation of keeping the Sabbath holy was based on their reading of Deuteronomy 5 v 14. ‘No one is to work on that day’. To them, any act such as healing was classified as work.
Jesus took a very different view. Jesus said, “People were not made for the good of the Sabbath. The Sabbath was made for the good of the people”. (Mark 2 v27).
Jesus was aware of the Pharisees’ motives and in the matter of healing a crippled man’s hand on the Sabbath he challenged them by asking, “On the Sabbath should we do good deeds or evil deeds? Should we save someone’s life or destroy it? But no one said a word. Jesus was angry as he looked around the people. Yet he felt sorry for them because they were stubborn. Then he told the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He did, and his bad hand was healed. The Pharisees left. And straight away they started making plans with Herod’s followers to kill Jesus. (Mark 3 v4-6)
A footnote in my CEV Bible says that ‘Herod’s followers’ were people who were political followers of the family of Herod the Great and his son Herod Antipas’.
Such people were not the natural allies of the Pharisees, but both groups were keen to maintain temple worship in Jerusalem according to their own rules. Jesus was seen as a threat to their comfortable lifestyle, their interpretation of scripture and their collusion with the Roman authorities. As Mark is keen to point out, Jesus is on a collision course with the vested interests and forces of oppression of his day. Jesus was not afraid to speak God’s truth to those in power.
Hymn writers Keith Getty and Stuart Townend offer this verse for us to ponder prayerfully:-
(Singing the Faith No 161 v1.)
Speak, O Lord, as we come to you to receive the food of your Holy Word.
Take your truth, plant it deep in us; shape and fashion us in your likeness,
that the light of Christ might be seen today in our acts of love and our deeds of faith.
Speak, O Lord, and fulfil in us all your purposes, for your glory.
Bible quotations are taken from the Contemporary English Version.