Mark 2: 23-28- Freed by the LORD Of The Sabbath Part 1

I would like to read Luke 5:36-39 which says, “No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment. If he does, he will tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins and it will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine desires new, for he says, “The old is good.”

Luke’s passage is a parallel passage to what we studied last week in Mark 2:18-22 in which Jesus was asked a question about fasting. These two parallel texts are very similar, however, Luke’s account gives us a couple interesting facts that Mark’s Gospel does not highlight. These facts will help us as we move forward and consider Mark 2:23-3:6.

First, in Mark’s Gospel he says, “No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment.” (2:21) (Notice that it speaks of a piece of cloth and a garment.) When I read these words I imagine a person who goes to the fabric store and purchases a specific piece of material that can be used to fix an older garment that has a tear in it.

However, Luke account brings something different into my mind, saying, “No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment.” When I read this I imagine a person who goes out and finds a new and identical garment, but instead of this one replacing the old one, he cuts up the new one and uses a patch from it to fix and wear the old garment. This seems like a ridiculous thing to do!

Second, both Mark and Luke refer to the two illustrations that Jesus. However, Luke adds something at the very end in verse 39 which is not in Mark’s text. Luke adds these important words, “And no one after drinking old wine desires new, for he says, “The old is good.” (39)

• We have all drank the old wine of idolatry and sinful and worldly things.

• We have all cultivated a desire for these things and become more enslaved to them.

• This enslavement makes a moral judgment saying, ‘The old is good’ and I reject Christ and His goodness.

• God must give us a new heart with new affections and desires that see Christ as the ultimate good. (2 Cor. 4:6; John 6:44; Ezekiel 36:26)

With these words, Jesus addresses the reason why He can minister so authoritatively about the Good News of His coming and of His Kingdom but people are not responding well to it. Jesus came preaching a New Covenant with better promises, but so many people who experienced these things were rejecting Christ and His teaching. The words in verse 39 tells us why this is,

• The moralist perfers self-righteousness to grace.

• The ritualist prefers tradition to Christ.

• The worldly person prefers present pleasures to eternal life.

• The carnal man prefers the lies of Satan to the truth proclaimed by Jesus.

The ‘old garment’ and the ‘old wine’ represents the familiar system that the people had grown accustomed to: the Mosaic covenant, the Pharisaic traditions and religious customs, and the established patterns of worship. In contrast to this, the ‘new wine’ and the ‘new garment’ that Jesus is speaking about represents: Christ’s Kingdom, the Gospel, the New Covenant which is inaugurated and administrated by Jesus Christ. What Christ offers is far better, but unbelievers love their old sins more than the gospel. The legalist prefer the law and their traditions more than Christ’s gospel.

With these things in mind let’s read Mark 2:23-28, “One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. And the Pharisees were saying to him, ‘Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?’ And he said to them, ‘Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?’And he said to them, ‘The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.’”

We have seen in our study of Mark’s Gospel that the religious leaders have taken every opportunity to accuse Jesus of either violating God’s Law or violating their own religious rules. Jesus says that they did this because they did not read and understand God’s Word rightly. (2:25) They did not have eyes to see, ears to hear, or minds that could understand spiritual truth. Let me make two brief observations about this.

First, to confront this problem Jesus used the scriptures. In fact, one of the things that is so amazing about our text is that Jesus only uses one text from 1 Samuel 21 to confront this serious misunderstanding of spiritual truths by these religious leaders. When I have done a position paper regarding certain doctrines I used lots of passages, but Jesus uses just one text with power.

Application: This is a reminder to us that we should appreciate what the LBC says in 1.9, “The infallible rule for interpreting Scripture is the Scripture itself. Therefore, when there is a question about the true and full meaning of any part of Scripture (and each passage has only one meaning, not many), it must be understood in light of other passages that speak more clearly.” Let us acknowledge that when we look at 1 Samuel 21 we will have to conclude that Jesus uses a very clear and powerful passage to confront these religious leaders.

Second, we will also see that in this text Jesus will uphold the sufficiency of God’s Word against being burdened and weighed down by the laws of men that can so easily entangle us. Application: Once again, the LBC 16.1 reminds us of the importance of these things when it says, “Good works are only those works that God has commanded in His holy Word. Works that do not have this warrant are invented by people out of blind zeal or on a pretense of good intentions and are not truly good.”

In Mark 2:24 Jesus’ disciples are accused by these religious leaders of having done something that was unlawful, saying, “And the Pharisees were saying to Jesus, ‘Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?’”

We might wonder, “What had the disciples done that was unlawful?” Verse 23 says, “One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grain fields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain.” (23) The religious leaders have been watching Jesus and His disciples very closely and now they have found a reason to accuse Jesus’ disciples of doing something unlawful. Notice two things about this verse. First, we are told that Jesus’ disciples ‘began to pluck heads of grain’. Second, notice that the word ‘disciples’ is plural, saying, “...they made their way, His disciples began to pluck heads of grain.”

Illustration: Some years ago we had a bunch of families with their kids visit our home. The kids loved to go by the pond to see the goldfish, but at some point one of the kids took a rock and threw it in the water. Immediately all the other kids began to do the same. There were so many rocks being thrown in the pond that I feared that all the decorative rocks would soon fill up our pond; therefore, I quickly told the kids to stop throwing the rocks.

This is what seems to be happening here. Jesus and His disciples are walking in the grainfields and one of them probably began to do this and all the others followed along. And just as quickly as they began to do this the religious leaders objected, saying, “Look (Jesus), why are they (Your disciples) doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?”

This is such a fascinating passage that we will spend all our remaining time on these two verses. I wonder, when you consider what is going on here do you find yourself asking,

• “Why would these Jewish men do such a thing?”

• “Why would they do it in front of Jesus and open Him up to this ridicule?”

• “Why would these Jewish men dare do this in front of these religious leaders?”

In Mark’s Gospel Jesus has choosen 5 disciples. He chose Peter, James, John, Andrew in Mark 1:14-20. Then Jesus just recently chose Matthew in Mark 2:13-14. It is tempting to blame Matthew for this for two reasons. First, Matthew is a new disciple and has not been following Jesus for all that long of a time. This is a rookie mistake and he may be an easy one to point the finger at for this. Second, Matthew appeared to be irreligious and a well known sinner (2:16) when Jesus said to him, “Follow Me.” (14) Let’s be honest, when you pick a guy like Matthew you need to give him a long list of do’s and do-not’s or else something like this is bound to happen.

Yes, we could blame Matthew for this but it still does not explain why the other disciples did something like this. The other four men (Peter, James, John, and Andrew) were common men, but not irreligious men. I say this for several reasons. When Jesus chose Matthew everyone knew he was a sinner and irreligious, but when Jesus chose these men no one thought it strange.

In fact, think back to Mark 2:16 when the religious leaders were incensed that Jesus ate with sinners and tax-collectors they came to these four men and said, “Why does He (Jesus) eat with sinners and tax collectors?” In doing this these religious leaders were implying that there was something different about them. They were implying that these disciples were not like those other sinners and tax collectors.

There is further proof in the New Testament that shows us that Jesus’ disciples were not irreligious men. For example, in the Book of Acts we see that Peter had strong religious convictions that were in line with the Pharisees believed and taught. In Acts 10:14 Peter responds to a vision from the LORD regarding the Gentiles. In this vision the Lord gives Peter some Gospel-centered instructions; and yet, when Peter receives these instructions he objects, saying, “By no means, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.” In fact, Peter was so reluctant to accept the instruction in this vision that the LORD had to show him these things in this vision three times. (15-16)

Another example regarding Peter is in the book of Galatians. At one point Peter was acting in line with the Gospel among the Gentiles, but when certain Jews from James came he acted contrary to the Gospel. Unlike our text today, on this occasion Peter was quickly influenced by these important religious people who had come from the church in Jerusalem.

Question#1: If this happened to Peter after Jesus’ ascension, why aren’t Jesus’ disciples more cautious around these Jewish leaders who are looking for reasons to condemn Jesus and His teaching?

Question#2: If these men were religious, and had always obeyed these Pharisaical commands, why are they breaking these Pharisaical rules now?

These religious leaders do not see this and then point the finger at Matthew. No, when they see this going on they accuse Jesus, saying, “Look (Jesus), why are they (Your disciples) doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?”

Question: What had brought about this transformational change in the disciples?

In response to this question we might respond by saying,

• Maybe they had previously seen Jesus eat like this and they followed His example? (Luke 6:40; John 13:15)

• Perhaps Jesus had already begun to teach His disciples about the true meaning of the Sabbath and how the religious leaders had perverted these things? (Mt. 5:17-20)

• Or maybe in such a short time Jesus had already begun to free their consciences from these man made rules that can so easily enslave God’s people. (John 8:31-32; Mt. 23)

• Perhaps it is a combination of all these things. (Acts 4:13; 2 Cor. 3:18)

Question: If this transformational change can happen in this area of their lives then is there any other area of life where this sort of transformational change should not be expected? The true grace of God influences every area of life and enriches us in every way. (1 Corinthians 1:5)

Encouragement: My friends, isn’t it encouraging to see that Christ will free us from these things which we can so easily entangle and enslave us? Isn’t it encouraging to see that when we draw close to Jesus and submit to His teaching that our consciences can be set free. (Galatians 5:1)

It is important to see this because the New Testament shows us how quickly Christians, churches, and entire denominations can be enslaved to all sorts of things- religious or irreligious sins. This happens when we neglect Christ and His gospel. Galatians 1:6-9 says, “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel- not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.” Because of these things let us always draw near to Christ and remain steadfast upon His Gospel so that we can remain free from all such entanglements.

The disciples did not leave their nets, tax booths, and their former lives because they suddenly developed superior moral strength. They left these things because they encountered Someone greater than everything they left behind. The old wine had once seemed good, but in Christ they tasted something infinitely better. What frees a sinner from the old wine of idolatry is not merely being told that it is bad, but having the Holy Spirit open our eyes to the superior beauty, glory, and worth of Christ.

We will stop here today since we will now turn our attention toward celebrating communion. As we do this we ought to consider how we have seen that Jesus has not come to give us a gospel patch to put on our sinful life. No, Jesus has come to make all things new. He came to liberate us and give us freedom to serve Him through the Spirit. As we take communion we should consider if we are in bondage to any sin, religious or irreligious, and confess it and let Christ set us free.

As we come to communion consider Jesus’ words, “And no one after drinking old wine desires new, for he says, ‘The old is good.’”, and see in what areas of our life Jesus is speaking about our desires. Do we desire the things that pertain to the new life in Christ, or do we desire the things of the flesh and self-righteousness?