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A Sabbath Day's Journey

By: Rev. Paul Landgraf
What is a Sabbath day's journey? First of all, it is a Jewish expression. We measure distances in meters or yards. The Jews had a certain distance that they could walk on Saturday before it would be considered work. So their synagogues that they went to on Saturday could not be very far away. The word appears only in Acts 1:12 and indicates a distance of about three-quarters of a mile.

With that in mind, I think it is important to remember the origins of Christianity. Just because we have an Old Testament, it does not mean that we call it the 'Outdated Testament'. Much of the Old Testament has a literary structure that we are not aware of because of our modern emphasis on chapter and verse divisions. Within many of these blogs, I try to get the reader to see a bigger picture, a larger perspective that often includes the Old Testament and the environment that was present when the New Testament was seeing the Light of the day.

Second, a Sabbath day's journey is intentionally short. These 'journeys' with a text, almost always one of the three readings for that Sunday, are deliberately brief discussions. This blog was never designed to be a comprehensive look at any text. Sometimes a specific word is studied in detail. But, as a whole, a blog entry, by itself, is meant to be quite brief.

Finally, since the term 'Sabbath day's journey' appears in Acts, it is meant to appeal to a wide variety of people. This blog is meant for those who cannot come on Sunday mornings. And it is also for those who do come on Sunday mornings but would also like a further study of the text. It is also for those who live somewhere else in the world (besides Drake and Freedom, Missouri, USA) and would simply like a further study of the text. It was meant to get these different groups of people to start thinking about the biblical texts. Part of the reason for this blog is that I am not able to have a bible class on Sunday mornings with either congregation, and so, to have a blog like this seemed like a good idea. I hope it is helpful for you, in whatever situation you may be.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. And thank you for taking the time to read this!

July 31st, 2021

7/31/2021

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As always, the Old Testament reading is connected to the Gospel reading of the New Testament. And the next three weeks are quite special in that the gospel text is from the Gospel according to John. This happens at no other time. And the Gospel according to John is exceedingly special, and so that will be the focus here, at least for the next three weeks.

The other gospel accounts are very similar to each other and are often called the ‘synoptic’ or the accounts with a similar viewpoint. But the Gospel according to John is so special that it often uses more library space than the space devoted to the other gospel accounts.

When examining the differences between those three accounts and the Gospel according to John, there is a lot that could be said. And many of the people who examine those differences go to various libraries and schools and examine those differences to their depths. But the first people to hear about those differences did not go to schools and libraries, but they went to churches—and not only churches, but to synagogues as well. The context of those places is significantly different in those two places than that of the school or the library. The ultimate focus of both the church and synagogue should be a gracious LORD.

Within such a context, it may be helpful to see this fourth gospel account as a modified ‘word of exhortation’ or ‘word of encouragement’. This is a Jewish type of message, one that people would expect after the ‘Old Testament’ readings. The entire Epistle to the Hebrews (see Hebrews 13:22) may be considered an actual word of exhortation, and Paul’s speech in Acts 13 is called the same thing (see Acts 13:15).

It seems like there are two basic parts to a word of exhortation, the word of the Lord that is laid out at the beginning, and the exhortation that comes from that word that appears at the end. There are some similarities in the Hebrews and Acts texts that may point to these two transition points: ‘Thus he has said … therefore, do not….’ These points are found in the following verses (and are sometimes translated in a way that does not make these words obvious): Acts 13:34 & 40; Hebrews 4:4 & 10:35

The Gospel according to John lays out a word, and words are certainly special at the beginning of the account [see John 1:1-14]. And the two words of the first phrase, that of the word section, they also appear at a major division in this gospel account, that of the end of chapter 12 and the first part of chapter 13 [see John 12:50].

But this gospel account as a ‘word of exhortation’ falls very short if you were expecting some kind of exhortation at the very end. An overwhelming amount of the text is given to the emphasis on the word.

There are some commands given in the last chapter of this gospel account. It may be interesting to see some of these commands (given in a somewhat-literal translation) in John 21:
​

Verse 6            Jesus to his disciples   ‘Cast the net in the right side of the boat, and you will find.’
Verse 12          Jesus to his disciples   ‘Come, breakfast.’
Verse 15          Jesus to Peter              ‘Feed my lambs.’
Verse 16          Jesus to Peter              ‘Shepherd my (little) sheep.’
Verse 17          Jesus to Peter              ‘Feed my (little) sheep.’
Verse 19          Jesus to Peter              ‘Follow me.’
Verse 22          Jesus to Peter              ‘You, follow me.’

There is a lot of repetition here, but that is okay. Although all the commands are directed to the people of that time, the three central commands seem to be the most important. But the really important words given in this account are eternal. Jesus said, in the last verse of the text for today [John 6:35], ‘I am the bread of life.’ He did NOT say that he WAS or WILL BE the bread of life. That is a big difference. 
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