I have posted yesterday’s sermon on my sermon blog here.

This was a big day for me.  It was the first full-on no-notes sermon at the principle worship service.  And I didn’t mess up (which is pretty big, too)!

What I posted on the sermon page is a recreation from my notes, not a transcription.  It is as close to how I would have tried to script what I was saying.

Here is my nutshell argument:

The crux of what we have to work with isn’t simply that Jesus is attacking someone for misunderstanding the rules or that Jesus is this awesome healer, so we should all be happy: it is both, of course: but that what Jesus offers is much more than that: to see GOD’s message as truly being for all of us.  That we don’t support restrictions on the powerless while benefiting from the arrangement ourselves.

In the end, we are called to make sure that everyone gets rest and redemption.  Sabbath is about making your own rest and redemption a priority; and an opportunity to recognize those that have neither.  As Jesus demonstrates, therefore, the Biblical imperitive is, despite our own call for rest and redemption, to bring rest and redemption to those that don’t have it.  That we are to sacrifice our own Sabbath, to bring Sabbath to one who does not have it.

In our emerging culture, I can’t see a greater imperative to us than to help get the people that already have their Sabbath to give a little bit of it so that someone else can have it.  Older generations need to see the importance of sacrificing some comfort to provide for the needs of the younger, for example.

What other ways might the faith benefit from expanding our Sabbath?