The Withered Hand - Matt 12:9-14; Mark 3:1-6; Luke 6:6-11

Continuing on the theme of the Sabbath, but I don’t think on that same day, Jesus came to a synagogue, presumably to worship, “and there was a man there which had a withered hand.” The Pharisees are always right there to see exactly what Jesus does and find fault with it, regardless of what it is, “and they watched him, whether he would heal him on the Sabbath day; that they might accuse him.” The IM comments, “In Mark 3:2, the Greek word translated ‘watched’ implies that the Pharisees were scrutinizing Jesus with malicious intent. They had come to the synagogue not to worship, but to find fault.” Mark and Matthew differ as to who spoke first, the Pharisees questioning Jesus is He will heal the man, or Jesus. Mark records Jesus asking the Pharisees “is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath day, or to do evil? To save a life, or to kill.” The IM teaches, “Some rabbis had determined that only in emergency situations was it permissible to save a life on the Sabbath. Of course, it would have been just as unlawful to murder on the Sabbath as on any other day. Yet Ironically, after the Savior did good by healing the man’s hand, the very people who thought He was guilty of breaking the law- and who imagined themselves the keepers of the law- began on that Sabbath to plot how to destroy Jesus.”

The question remains, is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath? Or to do evil? The Pharisees just refuse to answer, and JTC comments, “They held their peace, for the question was double-edged. To reply in the affirmative would have been to justify the work of healing; a negative answer would have stultified them.” They couldn’t answer in a way for them to be right because they were clearly wrong. Matthew quotes the Savior as continuing, “What man shall there be among you, that shall have one sheep, and if it fall into a put on the Sabbath day, will he not lay hold on it, and lift it out?” This is an interesting concept, especially for me when it comes to working on Sunday and all that. The sheep still fall into ditches, the cows still need to be milked, people still get sick, and people still stay sick. I was very blessed to almost always be able to go to Church on Sunday despite working almost all of them. So that begs the question, what should we do on the Sabbath? The IM teaches, “One way to ‘do good’ on the Sabbath is to ‘go to the house of prayer and offer up thy sacraments…, and to pay thy devotions unto the Most High.’ Other ways of doing good on the Sabbath ‘may include praying, meditating, studying the scriptures and the teachings of latter-day prophets, writing letters to family members and friends, reading wholesome material, visiting the sick and distressed, and attending other Church meetings.” Keeping the Sabbath day holy is like so many other commandments, some specifics are given but then the rest we have to work out for ourselves. We are asked not to shop, not to go to the beach, not to work if we can avoid it, to go to church, etc. But there are so many other facets of what we can do with our time, can we watch tv? Can we swim in our own pool? Can we spend time with friends? There are a lot of things, and we have to work that out with the Savior as we grow spiritually.

Jesus looked around at the people “with anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts.” I think we just have to, again, stop and think “if there was a man who was healing people (not like faith healers, but physically and visually fixing the problems that people have and the results are immediate and complete) wouldn’t I in the very least NOT try to kill him?” Surely anyone capable of performing those acts would have the power of God, and if they could cure someone instantly from major infirmities, then surely he could cast those infirmities on to me, if he so chose. It’s one of those situations where you have to take a step back and think “hmmm… how Satanic would a person have to be to not recognize the power of God, even if it’s just to be afraid of them?” Talk about hardened hearts.

The Lord sees that the Pharisees are refusing to answer, rendering the discussion over. Jesus “saith unto the man, Stretch forth thine hand. And he stretched it out: and his hand was restored whole as the other.” The Pharisees are not pleased, and they “went forth, and straightway took counsel with the Herodians against him, how they might destroy him.” A little bit of Jewish background here, remember how much the Jews hated other Jews who worked for the Roman government as tax collectors, or “publicans?” Now imagine a group of people who openly supported the Romans and specifically Herod Antipus, the Roman leader of the Jews at the time. The Pharisees are so angry with Jesus that they team up with these guys, called Herodians, to work their plan. JTC says, “So bitter was their hatred that they allied themselves with the Herodians, a political party generally unpopular among the Jews. The rulers of the people were ready to enter into any intrigue or alliance to accomplish their avowed purpose of bringing about the death of the Lord Jesus. Aware of the wicked determination against Him, Jesus withdrew Himself from the locality.” We can say, “if Jesus really is the Son of God, then he doesn’t need to leave just because people want to hurt him.” Or we can say that him leaving because of death threats prove that he was scared of dying or that he could have been overpowered and killed, so he wasn’t the Son of God. For this we have to look back at the temptations of Christ. One of the temptations was for him to throw himself off the wall of the temple and be saved by angels. Similarly this would have been a temptation to have angels come protect him from the Pharisees. However, to be obedient, Jesus did not ask for divine intervention when it was contrary to Heavenly Father’s will. Jesus did not want to make a scene or to have supernatural power “save” him from these people. He was asked by God to be meek and just walk away, so he did. He could have called down fire from heaven and destroyed all those wicked ones around him, but he didn’t, he walked away in meekness like his father asked him to.