“Still on the job”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Wednesday, May 7, 2025
Luke 4:38-44 (Forward, p. 9) CEV p. 1061
The jury is still out on this one, namely the kind of people who give their everything to whatever task is at hand, whether it’s their work or employment, or volunteering to coach minor league hockey, or helping out their neighbours or at church. Some would highly praise them for it and mention as particularly worthy of imitation. Others, however, might suggest that those people should have been a bit more balanced, a little less gung ho in the giving of themselves. In fact, these folks might even label such people as excessive or extreme.
Well, given this latter opinion, Jesus certainly comes across as anything but balanced. He comes across, by their estimation, as excessive and extreme, especially in today’s passage. It is the Sabbath, the day of rest, a day given over to worship (and little else), and already He has broken the rules by ‘working’, that is, healing a man with an evil spirit. Now He comes ‘home’, home to Simon Peter and Andrew’s place, and even here His work doesn’t let up. Simon’s mother-in-law was sick, laid up in bed with a high fever, and so Jesus immediately goes to her and heals her.
But that wasn’t all: as soon as the sun had set, and the Sabbath was over, countless people—not wanting to violate the Sabbath—came to Jesus with their ailments to be healed and delivered. So, even the near approach of nightfall didn’t cause the demands to let up.
The next morning, probably even before sunrise, Jesus went out to a secluded place, a place where He could be alone. (Mark tells us that it was in order to pray.) However, even there, He was sought out by the crowds, clamouring for His help. In fact, they tried to prevent Him from leaving that particular locale. But Jesus knew that He had still others He needed to reach with His preaching of the Good News, and so He pressed on, and on and on. Jesus kept on with the job, you might say. He didn’t give up on
them, and neither does He with us. He might be characterized as ‘unbalanced’, but it is all for us. Thanks be to God.
Forward notes: “At daybreak he departed and went into a deserted place. And the crowds were looking for him; and when they reached him, they wanted to prevent him from leaving them” (verse 42).
“Sabbath is one of the most difficult spiritual practices. It is also one of the most important ones. The technologies that help us do so much also make it difficult to disconnect and put some distance between ourselves and our work. So often, we convince ourselves that we just don’t have the time to step back from our list of tasks to rest and dwell in the presence of God.
“This passage, like so many others in the gospels, makes it clear that Jesus saw regular time for rest as an essential part of being human. Over the course of his three years of preaching, teaching, and healing, Jesus regularly went out into the desert to rest.
“The description of an interrupted sabbath in today’s passage is comforting to me. It reminds me that even our Lord faced interruptions in his attempts to rest. The lesson for me is that Jesus never gives up on the practice. He keeps going out to deserted places to make time for rest.”
Moving Forward: “How will you practice the spiritual discipline of sabbath this month?”