At that time Jesus went on the sabbath through the cornfields; and his disciples were hungry, and began to pluck the ears and to eat.
The chapter opens in the grainfields, where the King of Israel's followers are so hungry that they eat raw grain. That raises two questions: why were His people so poor, and why did the Pharisees call it a crime?
The phrase joining this scene to what came before is not a stopwatch. One writer shows that Matthew arranges the material by theme, not by date:
We should not think that "at that time" means "at that exact moment." It is a general term. It covers connected events, though there might be months between them. It is not like "at once," or "straight away," or "the week after." We must gather what happened in between from the other Gospels. In Mark we find that the scene in the grainfields took place early in our Lord's ministry... Mark keeps to the order of events. Matthew leaves that order to show the great change that followed Israel's rejection of the Messiah.
Read that way, the placement is itself the message. The same writer sets this chapter at a turning point:
Matthew 12 completes the picture of the change that started in chapter 11. It shows that, before God, the crisis had come. The Lord might yet meet still deeper rejection. But the spirit that crucified Him had already shown itself.
The hunger is not accidental. It shows how far His people had pushed their King away:
His people rejected the King. If they had received Him, those who formed His court would not have been in this hard place — hungry and glad to eat the ears uncooked. In the past as now, God's anointed had been rejected!
David's day was the same story. One writer asks what had put David in that position:
What was the state of things when David had to use the showbread? Was it not because the true king was a despised, persecuted man — because the king of their own hearts' choice was there? It was the same thing now. The sin of Israel profaned the holy bread. God would not accept anything as holy from people who were living in sin. No ceremony is worth a straw if the heart does not honour Christ.
Plucking grain by hand in someone else's field was not theft:
As the disciples walked along, they began to pluck some of the ears of grain. They rubbed them in their hands and ate the early ripened grain. No one saw this act as breaking the law of private property. On the contrary, the law of Moses plainly allowed it: "If you go into your neighbor's standing grain, you may pluck the ears with your hand, but you shall not put a sickle to your neighbor's standing grain" (Deut. 23:25).
The timing cleared them too. Israel's rule about the firstfruits of the harvest set when the people could eat new grain:
Until the firstfruits were offered to God, no one could eat the new grain, though it was ripe. Afterwards they were free to eat. There was therefore no reason why the disciples could not eat of the new grain at this time.
The objection had no verse behind it:
Now, it is clear that there was no law of God against this case. Their criticism was a law of their own. It was a notion of men that looks at an outward fact and makes a system of it — man's constant danger. It is quite true that God had ordained rest on the Sabbath Day for man and beast. But nothing in the law of God forbade a hungry man to pluck the ears of grain to satisfy his need as he passed through a field.
This one meal points to a much larger change:
The old order could allow the One in whom goodness and grace were being shown, and His disciples, to be poor and hungry. Their hunger drove them to do (Matt. 12:1) what the law allowed (Deut. 23:25) once the wave-sheaf had been offered (Lev. 23:14). A new piece could not be put on the old garment, and so the old must give place to the new. So He asserts His title as Son of Man over the sabbath.
- Timing. "At that time" groups events by meaning, not by calendar. Mark keeps the order; Matthew arranges events to show the great change.
- Hunger. The King's own people leave His followers starving — the plainest sign that they had refused Him.
- Precedent. David ate the holy bread while the nation despised him. Where God's anointed is despised, ceremony has already lost its value.
- Lawful. Both the act (Deut. 23:25) and the moment (after the wave-sheaf, Lev. 23:14) left the disciples guiltless; the offence existed only in a rule men had added.
- Lordship. The old order gives way, not to lawlessness, but to the Son of Man, who asserts His title over the sabbath.
But the Pharisees, seeing [it], said to him, Behold, thy disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on sabbath.
Jesus and His disciples walk through the grainfields on the Sabbath. The hungry men pluck heads of grain, and the Pharisees object at once — not to the eating, but to the day.
Nothing the disciples did touched anyone's property rights. The law of Moses made room for this need. The field's owner raised no complaint — only the onlookers did.
This act broke no law of private property. On the contrary, the law of Moses allowed it: "If you go into your neighbor's standing grain, you may pluck the ears with your hand, but you shall not put a sickle to your neighbor's standing grain" (Deut. 23:25). So the farmer himself raised no protest. But the envious and jealous eyes of the Pharisees were on the little group. The moment they began to pluck the grain in their hunger, the hostile critics spoke up — in indecent haste to find some reason to condemn the Lord.
The charge sounds like it comes from Scripture. It does not.
Now, it is clear that there was no law of God against this case. The censure was a law of their own. It came from a notion of men that looks at an outward fact and makes a system of it — man's constant danger. It is quite true that God had ordained rest on the Sabbath day for man and beast. But nothing in the law of God forbade a hungry man to pluck ears of grain as he passed through a field. In fact, it was fully in keeping with the goodness of God to provide from His people's plenty for such urgent need.
Their own extra rules explain how a handful of grain became an offence.
They had built many extra safeguards around the law — a hedge round it. Under those safeguards, the disciples rubbing the ears of grain between their hands could count as work. The law itself allowed a hungry person to gather for personal use. The Pharisees appeal straight to Him about what His disciples are doing on the Sabbath. The act was not unlawful in itself, or on any other day. They treated it as a violation of the day of rest. The Lord answers and defends them against the charge, but not at all in the way we would expect. He does not attack their human additions to God's Word, or their finely spun readings of it. He takes higher and stronger ground. He exposes the whole condition of the people before God, seen in their unbelief toward Him, who was Lord of the sabbath. Once they rejected Him, the sabbath could no longer stay with them at all.
Notice who they speak to. The disciples act, but the charge falls on the Master. He does not distance Himself from them.
He walked with His disciples through the grainfields, and they rubbed the ears of grain to satisfy their hunger. But watchful and jealous eyes were on them. They looked on with less hatred against the disciples than suspicion against Him. He was the one who bore all reproaches... He was the constant target of every attack. Yet He was the ever-present shield for the faithful in their weakness and exposure. So He pleads for the guiltless. He shows them how little those who twisted their own law against His disciples understood it.
He points back to David eating the holy bread, at a time when the true king was hunted and despised.
What was the state of things when David had to use the holy bread? Was it not because the true king was a despised, persecuted man — because the king of their own hearts' choice was there? It was the same thing now. The sin of Israel profaned the holy bread. God would not accept anything as holy from a people living in sin. No ceremony is worth a straw if the heart does not honour Christ. Why were the disciples reduced to plucking and eating the ears of grain? Why were the followers of the true King reduced to hunger?
A rest that cannot feed the hungry is no longer God's rest.
What an insight we have here into the hollowness and worthlessness of man's sabbath keeping! Those religious guides would sooner let the disciples starve than let anyone disturb their sabbath... It was indeed their sabbath, and not God's. His rest could never fit with hunger and withered hands... They did not understand that legal rules must give way when divine grace meets human need. Grace rises in its magnificence above all legal barriers, and faith rejoices in its brightness. But mere religiousness takes offence at the activities of grace and the boldness of faith.
- Lawful. Deuteronomy 23:25 allowed the plucking. The owner never objected — only the watchers did.
- Added. The prohibition came from a fence built around the commandment, not from God's word — a rule of their own.
- Aimed. The accusation names the disciples but targets the Master, who answers for them as their shield.
- Exposed. Jesus skips their additions and asks the harder question: why are the true King's followers hungry at all?
- Empty. A sabbath that would sooner starve a man is theirs, not God's. Grace rises above such barriers.
But he said to them, Have ye not read what David did when he was hungry, and they that were with him?
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
How he entered into the house of God, and ate the shewbread, which it was not lawful for him to eat, nor for those with him, but for the priests only?
The Pharisees complain about His hungry disciples. Jesus answers by sending them back to a strange moment in Israel's history: David, on the run, ate bread that the law kept for priests alone. Why does the Lord defend an act He admits was "not lawful"?
The "house of God" David entered was not the temple. It was the tabernacle, and the loaves he took there were no ordinary food.
The ark was at Kirjath-jearim, while the tabernacle was at Nob, where the priests were as well. David came there, on the run from the king's anger and starving with hunger. He arrived on the Sabbath day, when the priests had changed the twelve loaves of showbread ("the bread of the face," or "of the presence"). God had told them to place these loaves on the golden table in the holy place every Sabbath. David asked the priest for some of the old loaves for himself and his companions. This was a bold thing to ask. The holy bread was unleavened, anointed with pure frankincense, and one of the most holy fire offerings to Jehovah. Only the priests ate it, and only in the holy place.
The Lord picks a case with no wriggle room. David broke a written statute, not a rule the rabbis had added. So what justified it?
This was not a doubtful point. It was not a question of human additions to the law, or of how people read the law. It was direct opposition to the statute in Leviticus. But how, then, could the Lord justify this? Was it just because they were hungry? Were they so far from any other help that setting aside the law was justified in their case? And was every hungry man entitled, along with David here, to set it aside?
Several things about that moment made it unlike any other hungry man's claim.
Strictly speaking, it was unlawful for David and his men to eat this bread, for it was the property of priests only. But there are matters that make a difference. First, the priesthood had seriously failed in Israel. Second, the tabernacle service was in the wrong place, not the place God had chosen. Third, the ark was not present. And fourth, the true king was in exile and hungry because of persecution. This last matter alone was reason for Ahimelech's giving the bread to David. The question of genuine need takes precedence over mere formal exactness.
The nation had driven God's anointed king out. One writer says that fact changed the standing of the holy bread itself.
David was rejected and on the run. Then the holy things belonging to the ceremonies God gave Israel stopped being holy. The sin was David's rejection, and this made the consecrated showbread common... The rejection of God's anointed had profaned all. This is the thought our Lord expressed to the Pharisees. They had rejected Him. They had no love for Him nor cared for Him. These hypocrites talked about keeping the Sabbath while they were rejecting the Lord of the Sabbath. How ridiculous!
So the charge of law-breaking lands back on the accusers.
Was this a sin? It was Saul's and the people's sin that there was no bread for David. It was their sin that the true anointed was an outcast. Their wickedness made common the bread that was holy at a holy time. If it had no sanctity in the presence of a rejected David, how much less in the presence of a rejected Christ?
Why did the priest hand over holy bread at all? One writer points to God's own grace behind the act.
The elect king is now rejected. He goes to the priest, who gives him the holy bread. This is the sovereign grace of God. God rises above the ordinances connected with blessing when that blessing is rejected — when He Himself is rejected in His chosen one, and in the power of His testimony. When this is the case, He sets faith above ordinances in His sovereign grace.
What was true for David is truer still for the One standing in front of the Pharisees.
Even this rule had to give way before the pressing need of David, the Lord's anointed... The true Lord's Anointed is "greater than the temple," even though that temple and its arrangements were important. David was in rejection when the incident took place, and our Lord was the rejected One when He spoke in Matthew 12. In these circumstances the needs of the Lord's Anointed came before legal regulations.
- Bread — twelve loaves stood before God's face. Priests changed them each Sabbath, and only priests ate them, in the holy place.
- Rejection — David ate that bread as the anointed king in exile. The nation's sin in casting him out is what made holy bread common.
- Grace — God did not defend His own ordinance against His own anointed. His sovereign grace rose above the ritual and set faith above ordinances.
- Need — genuine need came before formal exactness. At that time the priesthood had failed, the tabernacle stood in the wrong place, and the ark was missing.
- Greater — One greater than David and greater than the temple stood in front of the Pharisees. Their charge against His hungry disciples convicted them instead.
Or have ye not read in the law that on the sabbaths the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless?
The Pharisees had just accused the disciples of breaking the sabbath by picking grain. Jesus answers them from their own Scriptures. His second example is the stranger one. A whole class of men work every sabbath in the temple, and Scripture calls them guiltless.
Jesus could have pointed out that no written law forbade what the disciples did. Instead He sends the Pharisees back to the Scriptures they claimed to know best.
The human way of answering the objections of the Pharisees would have been to tell them that there was no law forbidding the deed done by the disciples. In a few words He might have informed them not only that their traditions had no authority, but also that they had sinned by adding to the Word of God. However, this is not the way divine wisdom chooses to silence their accusations... He wields once more the Sword of the Spirit and answers their unscriptural objections by His scriptural assertions.
The priests were not bending the rules on the sabbath. Their work went up on that day, and sin was the reason.
The priestly service of sacrifice did not stop on the sabbath. The morning and evening sacrifices were even increased (Num. 28:9-10). Here man's sin was the cause, but it was also the grace of God that provided for that sin. This whole sacrificial system was a picture of what was coming. It was much older than the law, going right back to the gate of Eden. When the legal system was set up, the sacrifices were built into it, but they stayed a constant, though hidden, witness to the grace running through every earlier age. Wherever the two clashed, the "sign" of the legal covenant gave way to it, as here... The temple itself called for this breaking of the Sabbath, for the glory of Him whose home it was, and for the sake of people who could be kept in relationship with Him only in this way.
Sin set the timing of that work.
The priests did a very important work upon that day. They offered sacrifices on that day because there was sin. The people's sin demanded work that, by the letter of the law, would look to a Pharisee like a breach of it. Whatever the law may claim at other times, if God's people have sinned, the sacrifice cannot wait.
Jesus uses a blunt word here: the priests "profane" the sabbath. By the Pharisees' own reasoning these men were law-breakers. The law itself says otherwise.
On top of this, the priests worked on the Sabbath Day to offer sacrifices. They were blameless in doing so, even though by the legal reasoning of the Jews they would have been guilty of profaning the day.
The reason is that two claims of God met, and one outranked the other.
If the law and the first day of the seventh month come together, as here — if the service of the Temple, and the Sabbath are in collision — the claim of the law must give place to that of that mystic day, and the Sabbath yield to the Temple — as we learn from Matthew 12:5.
Look at what that arrangement shows about God's priorities.
In those days the Temple set the Sabbath aside. That is, the priest did the work of the Temple on the Sabbath day. In other words, the service of grace won out over the demands of law.
Notice which kind of command Jesus treats this way. Now try His reasoning on a different commandment.
The Lord's answer is remarkable. He does not rebuke the Pharisees here, as He does elsewhere. Instead He shows that the sabbath and other ceremonial rules had been set aside for good reason, and that someone greater than any duty of the sabbath was standing there. Could God say, I am greater than a moral commandment? Would that be a divine way of putting things if it were a question of hating a brother or coveting another man's wife? Such a thought would revolt at once. But that is the Lord's reasoning as to the sabbath.
The priests' sabbath labour was never the point in itself. It was a pointer, and the Pharisees had missed the One it pointed to.
Or had they never considered that on the sabbath days the priests carried out the work assigned to them in the temple? In fact, their work was a picture of the work of Christ Himself, God's great high Priest. They did not know Him, or His truth and grace, and they had no excuse for it. For One had come among them whom they should have recognized as being, not only greater than the sabbath, but greater than the temple.
- Read — Jesus meets their objections with Scripture. He sends them back to the Law they claimed to guard.
- Work — The priests' sabbath duties were no loophole. Sacrifices even increased that day. Sin was the cause, and God's grace was the provision.
- Blameless — By the Pharisees' own reasoning these men profaned the sabbath. Scripture calls them guiltless. Where temple service and sabbath clash, the sabbath gives way.
- Grace — That order is the lesson. The service of grace won out over the demands of law, long before Christ came.
- Greater — The priests' work pictured Christ's own service. One greater than the temple was standing among them, and they had no excuse for missing Him.
But I say unto you, that there is here what is greater than the temple.
Jesus walks through grain fields on the Sabbath, and His hungry disciples pick heads of grain. The Pharisees call it lawbreaking, but His answer says nothing about the rule — it points to the Person standing in front of them.
The temple was not one holy building among many. God had named it as His own dwelling.
Had they not also considered that the priests carried out their appointed work in the temple on the Sabbath? In fact, their work pictured the work of Christ Himself, God's great High Priest. They had no excuse for their ignorance of Him, of His truth and of His grace. For One had come among them whom they should have recognised. He was greater not only than the Sabbath, but greater than the temple. This is a tremendous statement, because God appointed the temple as His dwelling. Only God Himself is greater than His dwelling.
Strip the building of God's presence and it is only stone.
I suppose the verse shows us this. If the temple's own claims required breaking the Sabbath, they would never have judged the Lord, who was greater than the temple, had they seen His true glory. "Greater than the temple" means the glory of His person. The glory is what gave the temple its importance, and the glory coming back is what will give it importance in the future. But here was God present with them, manifest in flesh.
The temple, its sacrifices and its ceremonies were pictures pointing forward. A picture cannot outrank the thing it pictures.
And now we have the PERSON Himself walking there, wonderful beyond compare. Shall we have the priests paying homage to the One greater than the temple, greater than the sacrifices, greater than the types and shadows? All this that lay before His eye was only the shadow. He was the SUBSTANCE. Without Him they would never have existed, just as a shadow could not exist without the substance that casts it.
This claim does not stand alone. The same chapter also measures Him against Israel's prophet Jonah and its wisest king, Solomon. Each comparison points to a different part of His work.
There are three "greater" passages in this chapter: "greater than the temple" (v. 6), "greater than Jonah" (v. 41), and "greater than Solomon" (v. 42). He was "greater than the temple" because the revelation of God was shining out from Him at that moment. The display of light is the thought in the temple. "Greater than Jonah" relates to the effect of His death, and "greater than Solomon" to the glory that resulted as the fruit of His death.
Jesus had just recalled David eating the holy bread while he was a hunted fugitive. The point is not that David bent a rule. Israel had cast out God's chosen king, and that rejection had already made the nation's holy things common.
As the rejected one — though God's anointed king — David had to enter the house of God and do what was not lawful for him to do... When David was rejected and on the run, the holy things tied to the ceremonies God gave Israel stopped being holy. The sin was David's rejection, and this made the consecrated showbread common... The rejection of God's anointed had made everything common. This is the thought our Lord expressed to the Pharisees. They had rejected Him. They had no love for Him and did not care for Him. How ridiculous for these hypocrites to speak of Sabbath-keeping when they were rejecting the Lord of the Sabbath!
Because of who He is, His disciples were safe. His answer also warns anyone who uses religious rules as a weapon.
He Himself was greater than the temple; and He was also Lord of the Sabbath. So even if His disciples were guilty — which they were not — He was above the rules and principles they claimed such zeal for. They were His followers, and He would deal with them. Mercy was not in their thoughts at all... It is the same today. People press a zeal for position and principle in a spirit that is the very opposite of Christ, and the very opposite of the character and nature of God.
- Greater than the house. Only God is greater than His own dwelling. So this claim sets Jesus above every holy thing Israel had.
- Greater than the glory. The building mattered because God's glory was there. Now that glory stood among them in flesh, and they missed it.
- Greater than the shadow. Temple, sacrifices and ceremonies were only shadows. He cast them, and without Him they would never have existed.
- Greater, and refused. As with the rejected David, refusing God's anointed made every holy thing common. Here Sabbath-keepers were rejecting the Lord of the Sabbath.
- Greater, and merciful. He answered by shielding His hungry followers, not by defending the rule. Zeal for principle, pressed in a spirit unlike His, is opposite to God's own character.
But if ye had known what is I will have mercy and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless.
Religious teachers had just accused Jesus' hungry disciples of breaking the Sabbath. He answers them with a line from the prophet Hosea, and the fault He names is ignorance, not bad logic.
Hosea spoke those words to people who were careful with ceremonies and corrupt in life. Older translations put the line as "I will have mercy, and not sacrifice," which is how the writers below quote it.
Both Ephraim and Judah (Hosea 5, 6) had badly corrupted themselves. Yet at the same time they seem to have been very careful to keep their sacrificial ceremonies, as if outward forms could win God's favour. "Therefore," says the prophet, speaking in Jehovah's name, "… I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings." (Hosea 6:5-6.) That is, character and state counted for more before God than outward observances. And that character and state came from knowing Jehovah as a God of mercy. The observances were worthless unless they showed a spiritual condition.
Commentators differ on how to read the sentence. Some read it as God preferring kind deeds to ceremony. Others read it as God claiming His own right to show mercy.
God had promised that when man had no resource left, He would use His right to show mercy. So the Lord was among Israel not to receive sacrifice, but to show mercy. Some see the passage as a rebuke to religious formality and ceremony. This promise of mercy, rather than that rebuke, seems to be what it means.
The verse does not call the men forgiven. It calls them guiltless. That verdict rests on who stood with them.
He reminded them of what David and his companions did when they were hungry. He also reminded them that the temple service even made the priests break the Sabbath, and yet they were blameless. Further, He Himself was greater than the temple, and He was also Lord of the Sabbath. So even if His disciples were guilty — which they were not — He was above the rules and principles they claimed such zeal for. They were His followers, and He would deal with them. Mercy was not in any of their thoughts.
Jesus points back to David, who ate the consecrated bread while Israel had no place for God's anointed king.
When David was rejected and on the run, the holy things of the ceremonies God gave to Israel stopped being holy. The sin was David's rejection. That is what made the consecrated bread common, as David told the High Priest (1 Sam. 21:5). The rejection of God's anointed had made everything common. This is the thought our Lord expressed to the Pharisees. They had rejected Him. How ridiculous for these hypocrites to talk about Sabbath-keeping when they were rejecting the Lord of the Sabbath!
These men would rather leave real need unhelped than let anything touch their day.
See here how hollow and worthless man's Sabbath keeping is! Those religious guides would rather let the disciples starve than have anyone touch their Sabbath. They would let a man carry his withered hand to the grave rather than have him healed on their Sabbath. Sadly, it was indeed their Sabbath, and not God's. His rest could never fit with hunger and withered hands… They did not understand one thing: legal rules must give way when God's grace meets human need.
This answer was not invented on the spot. Jesus had used the same line of Hosea earlier in Matthew.
"But go and learn what this means, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice." There is the keynote to all God's ways. Did you think God wanted something from you to put things right?… Now go a little further. You find it comes out in the twelfth chapter, where He was blessing and healing on the Sabbath Day.
The warning does not stop with those men.
How easy it is for us, who live in the full light of grace today, to fall into the same mistake. How easy to forget that we are called to show God's heart of grace among people who claim His name, and before an evil world.
- Not known — Their failure was ignorance. Hosea's line was already in their own Scriptures: character counts for more than ceremony.
- Mercy — Mercy is God's keynote. He shows it where man is helpless, instead of taking offerings from hearts far from Him.
- Guiltless — The disciples were not just excused. One greater than the temple stood with them, and He is Lord of the Sabbath.
- Common — David's rejection made even the holy bread common. Rejecting God's Anointed emptied the old order in the same way.
- Condemned — A religion without mercy will starve the hungry to guard its day. In the end it sentences the innocent.
For the Son of man is Lord of the sabbath.
Hungry disciples pick grain on the sabbath, and the Pharisees accuse them of breaking the law. Jesus answers them from Scripture, then ends the argument with a claim about Himself. Everything turns on that last word: the sabbath has a Lord, and He is standing in the field.
The words sound simple. But they claim an authority no one before Him ever held.
Remember, this Lordship meant more than Adam's rule over the lower creation. This was Lordship over a divine institution, which Adam never had. The Son of man had power on earth to forgive sins. He also had power on earth to regulate the sabbath, for, as Peter said to Cornelius, "He is Lord of all."
He does not say "the Christ" or "the Son of David" is Lord of the sabbath. The title He picks belongs to Him as a man among men — and, at this point in Matthew, as the man they are rejecting.
He accepts His rejection. But He defends His disciples in front of men who boasted and argued about the Sabbath, while they were dishonouring the Lord of the Sabbath… This is the glory of His person as the rejected, suffering Man. As such, and not only as God, He is above the Sabbath Day — its Lord.
Another writer ties the title to Psalm 8 and the dominion it gives Him.
The Son of man holds dominion over all men, according to Psalm 8. So He must be Lord of the sabbath, and free to deal with it as He wills. Who were the Pharisees to challenge His right to do this? — even though He had come among men in the form of a Servant.
Verse 8 begins with "For" — it is the reason the disciples go free. If the day has an owner, then the owner, not the Pharisees, decides what may happen on it.
He is not only greater than the temple. He who in grace became the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath. If He is Lord, then He is the One to regulate and to order, and to say what should and should not be. David was the anointed king. If he was in a position where he had no food, what was the showbread worth to God while His own "anointed" was in need? If that was true of the picture, what of the Lord Himself?
(Older translations read "Lord also of the sabbath"; the ESV reads "lord of the Sabbath.")
The sabbath was not just a day off. It was the sign of God's covenant with Israel. Commentators see that whole order giving way here, because Israel was pushing out the One it pointed to.
So with a rejected Messiah, the old things were gone. The Son of man was Lord of the sabbath. God was working in grace, and the old things really had passed away… For the rejected Messiah the sabbath was gone, and rest was over for the world. God worked in grace and mercy, and He took no rest while man was in sorrow. The Son of man, the glorious One, was above the rules of the sabbath, its Lord, the head of the new creation.
Another writer states it plainly. The Lord sets aside the sabbath as the sign of the covenant with Israel. The first day of the week — resurrection day — becomes the day that belongs to His people (The Christian's Friend).
This Lordship is not only about a past institution. The real rest has not yet arrived.
The ideal sabbath is still to come. In the letter to the Hebrews, the apostle first shows that God's rest did not arrive in Old Testament times. Then he declares, "So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God" (Heb. 4:9). The Son of man is Lord of that Sabbath rest, for He is the true Joshua, who leads His own into that rest and keeps them in it.
- Lord, not lawbreaker. Jesus does not excuse His disciples on a technicality. He claims authority over the sabbath itself — an authority Adam never had.
- Lord as Man. He claims the sabbath as "Son of Man": the rejected, suffering Man who, by Psalm 8, holds dominion over all men. His lordship rests on the glory of His person, not only on His deity.
- Lord who decides. If He owns the day, He alone decides what happens on it. The Pharisees argued about a sign while dishonouring the One it pointed to.
- Lord over a closing age. Israel refused its anointed King. So the sabbath, the sign of the covenant, gave way, and the first day of the week — resurrection day — became the Christian's day.
- Lord of the rest to come. A sabbath rest still remains for God's people, and He is the One who will bring His own into it and keep them there.