Daily Reading
First Reading
Colossians 1:21-23
And you who were once estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his fleshly body through death, so as to present you holy and blameless and irreproachable before him— provided that you continue securely established and steadfast in the faith, without shifting from the hope promised by the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven. I, Paul, became a servant of this gospel.
Psalm
Psalm 54:3-4, 6 and 8
For the insolent have risen against me,
the ruthless seek my life;
they do not set God before them. Selah
But surely, God is my helper;
the Lord is the upholder of my life.
With a freewill offering I will sacrifice to you;
I will give thanks to your name, O Lord, for it is good.
Gospel Reading
Luke 6:1-5
One sabbath while Jesus was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked some heads of grain, rubbed them in their hands, and ate them. But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” Jesus answered, “Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and gave some to his companions?” Then he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the sabbath.”
Reflection
Friends, again and again in the Gospels, Jesus is portrayed as violating the sacred command to rest on the seventh day. For example, he often cures on the Sabbath, much to the dismay of the protectors of Jewish law.
And then in today’s Gospel, after his disciples pick grain on the Sabbath, Jesus declares himself “lord of the sabbath.” It’s hard to express how breathtaking this claim would be for a first-century Jew to make. Yahweh alone could be assigned the title “lord of the sabbath,” so what is Jesus implying?
In short, he is claiming that he is above their rituals, even perhaps the defining practice of pious Jews, because he is the Lord. Thus the rules must be placed in subordination to the kingdom of God, the kingdom that the Lord Jesus is ushering in even here and now.