Why did Jesus heal on the Sabbath?

Hear the indignant words of the ruler of the synagogue as he cries from his pulpit, "There are six days in which men ought to work; in them therefore come and be healed, and not on the Sabbath Day." What had aroused the man's wrath? A poor creature bowed down with a sore infirmity had dragged herself to the synagogue on that Sabbath, for Jesus was there. For eighteen years she had suffered, bound by Satan, and never once during those weary years had she been able to raise herself to look at the heavens above her. What cared the great man in the pulpit for her? She was only a woman, unattractive, deformed, a cripple. But to the Lord she was a daughter of Abraham, a needy woman held by Satan's power, an object of mercy with longings for deliverance from the fetters that bound her. He interrupted the service for her sake, He broke in upon its miserable formality and called to her. He singled her out and addressed her personally in that crowded congregation, saying, "Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity." And He did more, He laid His hands upon her, not one hand but both, and immediately she was made straight and glorified God (Luke 13:11-17). — Such was Jesus!

The Lord spoke of the woman as a daughter of Abraham. This involves more than a natural relationship, but the relationship of true faith (Gal.3:7). After eighteen years of bondage to Satan, should she be kept under this bondage because it was the sabbath day? The Lord knew how to express matters in such a way as to show up the cruelty of mere religious prejudice.

But this produces indignation in the synagogue: for it is the sabbath; and a man must not use the power of God upon the sabbath day! What! the Lord says: is it to preserve the rest of God unbroken, to keep a daughter of Abraham in bondage to Satan? Notice the emphasis He lays upon this, that she is a daughter of Abraham. How unseemly for one who inherits Abraham's faith to be kept bowed together; and this is, doubtless, how we are to take Christ's plea for her, as in the case of Zacchaeus afterwards (Luke 19:9). This perfects the picture: work there is none, but God's work, and the synagogue in vain would tie His hands. It was, in fact, but loud-voiced hypocrisy: for they had no difficulty in leading away their beasts to the water. They only prized man at less than the beast.

It was the Sabbath-day: the Jews draw attention to the fact, and the Lord takes up the blessed character He had as Son, and says: "My Father worketh hitherto and I work." How can God rest where sin is? where misery is? He cannot have His rest in a world like this. Christ had come to work: but what makes it so blessed, beloved friends, is this truth, it was not man's work and man's strength; the Father and the Son are the workmen in our salvation. God might have cut off Adam and Eve, and there would have been an end of them in righteousness, but His nature would not let Him do that. He sets about to work; we see the Father and the Son working in grace; the Son had come to work. Instead of cutting off the sinners or leaving them to their wretchedness, God had made Himself a workman in His grace, and the whole thing was changed. The law required man to work, just as the Pool of Bethesda required a man to be quick enough to get himself into it. But in the gospel, it is God who works: "My Father worketh." What an answer to their wretched malice, in accusing Him of breaking the Sabbath! The Father and the Son working in grace to save man, because God had no rest when he was in misery and sin. But though a vivid picture of the principle of grace in teaching, the Lord goes beyond this, and shows it is really life-giving.

Grace had come (John 1:17), God Himself was present in grace; and this grace was free to do good on the sabbath. The Lord's true rest is the exercise of His love in the midst of evil. The Pharisees thought nothing of doing evil provided that their traditions were observed. God held Himself at liberty to do good; and for this reason the Lord heals the withered hand, calling the Jew's attention to this great principle in a formal way.

Jesus knew their machinations (Luke 6:8), but was not to be diverted out of His course of "doing good." He bade the afflicted man to rise and stand out in the midst in sight of the whole company. Then the Lord, desirous of awakening the dormant consciences of the Pharisees and scribes to a sense of their own guilty motives, asked them, "Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath or to do harm? to save life or to kill?" (Mark, Luke). To this piercing question, which exposed the hidden sophistries of their minds, they had no reply, and were dumb before Him. They had reasoned within themselves that, since the commandment of God forbade all work on the sabbath, Jesus, by healing the withered hand, would be working, and therefore breaking the sabbath. But the Lord's words put the matter on a different plane altogether. The question was not, as they supposed, one between activity and passivity; it was between doing good and doing harm, between saving a life and destroying a life by refraining from saving it. The law of God was given for the repression of evil, not for the repression of good. "There is none good save one, that is, God," and it is inconceivable that He, "the Goodness of goodness," would promulgate a law which would prevent the doing of good. Indeed to refrain from doing good when opportunity is offered is to display unlikeness to God. "Whoso has this world's good, and sees his brother have need, and shuts up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwells the love of God in him" (1 John 3:17)?

We have seen that the sabbath was made for the purpose of ministering to the needs of men. Now the Lord in the synagogue encountered a man who was in manifestly serious need. But his need meant nothing to the Pharisees compared to their zeal for the sabbath day. Knowing His compassion, they suspect that He will heal the man in spite of their opposition. He does not tell the man to meet Him elsewhere out of sight of the Pharisees, but makes a decided issue of the matter. For they were contesting God's right to show mercy. Having the man stand forth, He asked them a simple question that was fully to the point. Did the law allow one to do good on the sabbath days or to do evil? -- to save life or to kill? So far as they were concerned, they would rather see one die on the sabbath than to see him healed. They would not answer, for they knew that an answer either way would incriminate them, unless they gave up their foolish prejudice.

Now another matter concerning the sabbath brings out even more glaringly the bitter animosity of the Pharisees against Him. Though He had reminded them that the priests carried out their duties for the help of Israelites on the sabbath day, yet the Pharisees were adamant in their opposition to His healing on the sabbath. They raise the question as to whether it is lawful to heal on the sabbath days, since a man with a withered hand is present. But their object is to accuse Him. He answers by referring to their own practice. For them to rescue a sheep out of a pit was certainly harder physical work then for Him to heal, yet they would do this on a sabbath day. If a sheep should be shown such consideration, how much more so should a man, who is of far more value! He finalizes this with the emphatic announcement, "it is lawful to do well on the sabbath days." What honest man could dare to object to this?

His words are followed by suitable action. Before them all He tells the man to stretch forth his hand, and it is immediately healed. God's own rights of showing mercy on the sabbath day had been challenged for He was healing by the power of God. Therefore He confronts the Pharisees with their own folly, no matter how greatly it will increase their hostility.

A man is present with a withered hand. They desire now to find some new ground of accusation again Him. Their first attempt had failed. He had read their evil thoughts, and by His answer He had shown that He anticipated the question they now put to Him, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?" Awful motive, which stands alongside of the question, showing the depths of Satan "that they might accuse Him." The question also discloses the fact that they believed in His healing power. We may well imagine the scene in that synagogue. The Lord in His divine calmness, the unfortunate man with the withered hand, the malicious, accusing Pharisees with their Satanic desire. And now the stillness broken by His voice, "What man shall there be of you who has one sheep, and if this fall into a pit on the Sabbath, will not lay hold of it and raise it up?" There was no answer; of course none could stand up and declare he would not deliver his one sheep out of the pit. "How much better then is a man than a sheep! So that it is lawful to do well on the Sabbath." What a divine logic! How unanswerable this statement!

(1) Once more the sabbath question is brought up; and this time, by the Lord Himself. In it they would set God against Himself, and make His statutes prohibitory of the profit to men they were intended to secure. He takes this up therefore in the house of one of their rulers and a Pharisee. A man is there before Him who has the dropsy; and He asks the question which was not then for the first time asked, but which they had never answered, "Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath?" But they are silent. Then He makes divine power give the answer, surely an unbribed one: He takes and heals him, and lets him go. God has decided.