Daily Devotion for Lent 2015 Day 6

Daily Devotion for Lent

Tuesday, February 24, 2015, Day 6

Mark 3:1-6  (NRSV)

The Pharisees would have been considered spiritual leaders and keepers of the Law during first century Judea.  In fact, they were likely at odds with the Herodians - or the supporters of King Herod.

"The Pharisees and the Herodians Conspire
Against Jesus" by James Tissot

The Pharisees did not believe that one should heal on the Sabbath.  Most healers in that day charged for their services and so it became easy to not allow healing because they did not want the exchange of money.

Yet Jesus did not charge the man.  Why would they be so blind to what Jesus was doing?

It would be hard not to acknowledge that he was doing good things - but he was just not doing them in the way that they would like.  This made them bitter - you can see how they are not very spiritual at this point.

Jesus even asks them if it is lawful to save a life or kill on the Sabbath.  They are silent and when he goes against their ruling of how one should obey the Sabbath, they conspire to do the very thing that Jesus asked them about.

You can see the awful irony within these few verses.

This leads me to wonder about my own sense of righteousness.  Am I missing how God is working in people's lives because it is not being done in the way that I would expect?

Prayer by Teresa of Avila, 16th Century, Spain:

Govern all by your wisdom, O Lord, so that my soul may always be serving you as you would will, and not as I may choose.  Do not punish me, I beseech you, by granting that which I wish or ask, if it offends your love, which would always live in me.  Let me die to myself that so I may serve you; let me live for you, who in yourself are the true life. Amen.



Picture by James Tissot [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons