In John 5:16 we are given the reason that Jesus was being persecuted: because he was doing ‘these things’ on the Sabbath. What were ‘these things’? He healed a cripple, and commanded the man to pick up his sick bed of 38 years and try out walking for a change. As we read through the Gospels we see the pervasiveness of the sort of petty hatred that looks for the most trivial of infringements, and applies the most excessive of responses. The Pharisees wanted to kill Jesus.
The petty haters saw a wonderful and miraculous act of healing. Their response was not wonder at a miraculous healing, nor was it gratefulness for a man released from 38 years of bondage. Rather, it was condemnation for carrying a bedroll as he walked for the first time in nearly 4 decades. Not only that, but they persist, they want to know who was behind this heinous crime. They need to know the object of their condemnation.
This is our human inclination too: to accuse, to pursue, to condemn. And yet, we know that it is the Devil who is known as the Accuser. We too could pursue to the death those who infringe our carefully constructed personal lawbook. And this is the problem with the Pharisees. They aren’t policing the law, they are policing their own additions to the law (Matthew 15:2-3). Our personal lawbooks always favour us at the expense of others, and brook no mitigation. But Jesus, the fulfiller of the law did not break the law. Carrying a bedroll on the Sabbath could not be a sin, because Jesus commanded it of the cripple. Jesus actually told the cripple to sin no more, so he was and is clear that sin is sin and must be repented of. It is impossible to keep God’s Law without us adding to it. And, of course, how dare we add to God’s Law. But that is what we do, for the sole purpose or making us look better and others look worse.
As we look at the world around us we see the pervasiveness of hatred: differences are sought out, enlarged, and leveraged in order to allow us to hate. Jesus came to save us from our own condemnation; he loved us by taking all the just punishment for our sins, that all those who believe in him will not perish, but have eternal life. How can we then add requirements on top of that which Jesus has paid for? Instead, let us rejoice in our forgiveness, our release from bondage, our clean sheet in Christ Jesus. Let us rejoice in the forgiveness that others can and do receive. (That is the real point of the Prodigal Son story – the ungratefulness of the brother when he sees forgiveness in action.)
There is no law against acts of kindness. Let’s love and live, by God’s grace, through his Spirit, as Jesus did. Let us make love and kindness pervasive in a world that desperately needs it.