February 8th Mark 3:1-6: Jesus Shakes Things Up

Jesus liked to shake things up a little. We already saw this when he ate with the tax collector and when he allowed his disciples to gather a little food on the Sabbath. He did this because people have a tendency to be self righteous and hypocritical. The Jewish leaders thought of themselves as righteous because they kept specific tenets, that they made up concerning specific laws though their heart was not in it. They did these things so that other people would see them as righteous rather than in true obedience. So here we have Jesus healing a person on the Sabbath. The Pharisees said this was wrong. Jesus asks a very pointed question in verse 4 “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?” The point was that it is not wrong to help people on the Sabbath. Jesus was showing them that their self righteousness was of no value, they cared more about their man made law than they did about the fact that Jesus was going to heal this mans hand. Do we ever get caught up in things like this? Do we ever find ourselves trusting in our righteousness instead of Gods?