The Pulpit Commentary — Luke — Volume 1 — Section 168

that one , , , should perish." "God so loved the world . . . that whosoever believcth •.. ehould not perish." 'l'be fa.lien house may be down beyond recovery; not so the human eoul. In the gospel of Josue Christ the way ot restoration is revealed. By the power of the Holy Spirit the soul that hM fallen Lhe furthest ma.y be raised up nga.in, and be restored to the favour and the likeness and the service of Gr,d. By true penitence and genuine faith we ma.y lay hold on eternal life; and when the heart heeds the voice of its merciful J1'ather summoning it to return, and when it hastens to the feet of Jesus Uhrist and seeks in him a Refuge and a Saviour, and when it lives a new life of faith and love and hope in him, it is restored to all th:i.t it once was; and the reaf.oration of that soul is great.--C. Vere. 1-19.-Tlie Lord of the Bribbath, and hia work. We have just seen how Jesus treated with deserved dishonour the tradition of the elders about fasting. He showed his disciples a more excellent way. Fasting is not an end, but only a means to an end, and this is the restoration of the soul to fellowship with its Saviour. In this wa.y should Christia.ns use fasting. And now we pa.as on to notice how on sabbath-keeping tradition aga.in intruded itself and made cumbrous additions to the Mosa.ic command- ment. Our Lord once more, as we shall see, set at nought the tradition, while he held firmly by the Mosaic Law. The evangelist groups two sabbath-scenes for us in the history here-the first in the corn-fields, the second in the synagogue, but both illus- trating our Lord's sabbatic principle and practice. As the most interesting method of considering the subject, let us notice- I. THE PHABIS.UO PRINCIPLE J.BOUT SABBATH-KEEPING WAS THAT MAN WAS MADE FOB THE DAY, NOT THE DAY FOB THE MAN. (Vers. 2, 7.) 'l'hese reput.edly religions men had a certain idea a.bout the da.y. They must have a. holy day, and so it must be so sacred that all work shall be deemed unlawful, lest it should be secularized. What they objected to in the first case was not the plucking of the ears of corn, but the rubbing of them in the hands. This was a violation of their tradition. In the second ca.se they objected to work on the sabbath day, even though it took the form of heal- ing. Their ideal wa.s, therefore, a day of such physical inactivity as would refuse to minister to man's hunger or to man's healing. The fa.lla.cy underlying this idea was tha.t work is in its essence a secular thing, and that i<lleness is somehow sacred. To declare this emphatically, they were ready to rebuke hungry men for satisfying them- selves in the corn-fields, and to deny healing to the ma.n with the withered arm because he presented himself for it on the sabbath day. The day above the man, then, was the Pharisees' notion. Hunger and helplessness must be endured in order that a day of pretentious idleness may be presented to mankind. Healthy desire must be stifled, longing for power and self-help must be denied, that a sufficiently idle sabbath may be secured. The apotheosis of idleness, the vindication of indifference,-all this and more is involved in the Pharisaic criticism of Christ and of his disciples. Now, it is important to bring out clearly how contrary to God's idea. all this is. Work is not secularizing in itself. The infinite Father never cea.ses working, but his work is sacred all through the year. Of course, men may secularize themselves by the selfishness of their work, but they may secularize themselves as really by the selfishness of their idleness. An idle day is not likely to be a holy one; a busy day may bo most holy if the ilory of God and the good of souls be kept steadily in view. II. CHRIST'S BETTER PRINCIPLE OF SABBATH-KEEPING IS THAT THE DAY IS MADE FOB IIIAN. (Vere. 3-5, 9.) Hence necessity must be recognized as a law for the sabbath, Even the ceremonial rite should give way before the needs of human nature, as the ea.so of David's hungry men being saved from famishing by a meal of shewbrcad indi- cates. Hence the hungry disciples, in rubbing the corn in their hands, were vindicated by that sublime necessity which recognizes no higher law. .Ag:i.io, in the case of tha helpless follow-man whose right hand was withered, our Lord is clear that the sa.bhath should be a day for saving life, and not for 11llowing it to perish. In other words, Christ would devote the day to man's salvation, while the Pharisees were prepared to sacrifice the man to the peculiar sacredness which they thought belonged to an id.le day. But if the day is thus a means towards man's good, is he to employ it as he pleases? Is every man to be lurd of the sabbath by doing as he likes upon it? This would be a. dangerous prerog11tin• t.o give to men. Not every one is fit to exercise it. The Phari•  TIIE GOSrEL ACCORDHIO TO ST. LUKE. [on. Vl, 1-4\J,