This semester I am taking a class called Luke and Acts and everyday we have passages we have to read and post about. Today's reading really stuck with me and i thought i would post here what I wrote. Let me know what you think.
In the passages of Luke 6:1-11, Luke is telling two stories of Jesus breaking the mosaic law of working on the Sabbath. To me these stories amplify the corruption within the Jewish religion/tradition. The people and the religious leaders became lost in the religiosity and no longer sought to have a relationship with God as Moses and Joseph. The idea that God loves rules and in order to be good and righteous one must follow every rule, no matter how ridiculous they became. When Jesus poses the question of what is better to do good or to cause harm, and stating that if one does not do good they are doing harm shows that God will not care if one breaks the law by helping or healing another human on the Sabbath, or picking some food to eat when one did not have time to prepare before. This passage also reminds me of the good Samaritan parable. Religious leaders passed by a man who was in need of help because if they were to touch him they would be unclean and unable to do their duties in the temple, while a Samaritan (who was enemies with the Jews) stopped to help him. In that situation I believe that God would have wanted the leaders to stop and help him even if it meant they would be "unclean" even so He could have made them clean again so that they could do their duties as well. I believe in these stories a lesson we could learn is that God is not about rules and regulations but about us, people, His children. We use religiosity to worship God and to remind us of who He is and of His reverence; however, when we become consumed by it then our actions become obsolete.
The thoughts I had from the first verses tie into the ones of Luke 6:30-36, where Jesus is speaking and He is telling them to love one another and to do good to those who hate them. That would be, and is, difficult for everyone. It is easy for us to love those who love us. But as Jesus pointed out even sinners do that. He has called us to be set apart, in those days and even today one of the most radical thing one could do is to love those who despise them.
I think as humans it is easier for us to live by rules and follow those than it is for us to just love. We become lost in the rules of religion thinking that it would be enough, if we do all of this and kind of love everyone then we have done good enough. Like what Scott Evans talked about last week with the prodigal son and the brother being lost in the field trying to earn everything. Maybe if we are in the field long enough and produce enough crop and work really hard, then maybe God will be pleased. When instead He is wanting us to come home, live in relationship with Him and love Him because if we truly love God then all of the work/deeds will become natural to us. The only question i can think to ask is: why is it so easy to just follow rules and step by step instructions instead of learning to love everyone?
