Labor Justice Archives - Renewed Heart Ministries

Christianity, Liberation and Justice

Posted on August 21, 2025 by Herb Montgomery

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Christianity, Liberation and Justice

Herb Montgomery | August 15, 2025

If you’d like to listen to this week’s article in podcast version click on the image below:

Our reading this week is from the gospel of Luke.

Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.” But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?” When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing. (Luke 13:10-17)

The Jewish weekly Shabbat (Sabbath) is a sacred day of rest and spiritual renewal observed from sunset Friday evening to sunset Saturday evening. Part of the biblical creation story, Shabbat commemorates the seventh day when God ceased from creating and declared the day holy (Genesis 2:2–3). It is one of the central practices of Judaism and is both a commandment and a gift.

For some observers today, Shabbat begins with lighting candles to mark the transition from the ordinary workweek to sacred time. Then follow blessings over kiddush (wine ) and challah(bread), and a festive meal with family and community. Observant Jews typically share three meals over the course of Shabbat, and the day is filled with songs, prayers, and Torah discussion.

The essence of Shabbat is rest. Traditional observance includes refraining from work and creative activities called melachot, which include things like cooking, writing, or using electronics. This pause from productivity is not merely about abstaining from labor: it is about making space to be present with God, with others, and with oneself.

Shabbat is also a time for worship at the synagogue, including communal prayer and the public reading of the Torah. It provides a weekly opportunity for spiritual reflection, physical rest, and deepened human connection.

More than just a day off, Shabbat is seen as a foretaste of a world still future—a day of peace, joy, and completeness. In Jewish tradition, keeping Shabbat is meant to be more than an obligation: it is intended to be a delight.

There was an original justice component to the Shabbat as well.

Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.” (Exodus 20:8-11)

Think of the Sabbath commandment in Exodus in the context of a narrative about liberated slaves who are being re-enslaved by Babylon. Scholars believe the Torah as we know it reached its final form through a process of redaction and compilation during the Babylonian exile. It served a purpose much like the establishment of the 8-hour workday, which emerged from the labor movements of the 19th Century. During the Industrial Revolution, workers often faced grueling 10 to 16-hour shifts. In response, labor activists began demanding “eight hours for work, eight hours for rest, and eight hours for what we will.” The movement gained momentum in the U.S. with nationwide strikes, including the 1886 Haymarket affair in Chicago. Although progress was slow, the 8-hour standard became law for federal workers in 1912, and in 1938, the Fair Labor Standards Act established the 40-hour workweek as a national labor standard in the United States. The Sabbath commandment also has a history in a kind of labor justice. In the Exodus narrative, they are establishing a 6-day workweek. Notice that the Exodus Sabbath commandment isn’t so much aimed at employees as it is aimed at employers. It’s not telling employees to rest, as much as it forbids employers from denying their employees rest. In its original context, the Sabbath was about justice and liberation.

But in our reading this week, the Sabbath had become an excuse to object to Jesus’ justice and liberation work. The Sabbath had become an obstacle to justice and liberation, not a conduit for achieving it. Mark’s gospel even tells a story about how folks were waiting for Sabbath to end so they could come to Jesus for healing and liberation:

That evening after sunset the people brought to Jesus all the sick and demon-possessed. (Mark 1:32)

This is a history often repeated: something that was originally intended to be life-giving evolves over time into a death-dealing tool oppressors use to keep oppressed people in their places, denying them justice, and obstructing their liberation.

Can you think of other things that have followed this same evolutionary path? I love that this week’s reading shows Jesus liberating a woman in an act of transgression against the oppressive norms of his own context. He values the woman’s liberation as paramount. It reminds me of a passage in Peter’s epistle:

Above all, love each other. (1 Peter 4:8)

Above all.

Provocative Black intellectual and philosophy professor at Union Theological Seminary Dr. Cornel West has often said, “Justice is what love looks like in public.” In situations where there’s a scale of competing values, we must esteem how we choose to exercise justice (the public expression of love) above all else.

Our reading this week is about the tension between a person’s liberation and the way a religious institution (the Sabbath) was interpreted to oppose that liberation. The Christian faith tradition also has a long history of using its interpretations of our sacred texts to stand in the way of people’s liberation from injustice. Christianity has always had a dual witness regarding oppression: some advancing it, some fighting it. From the first generation in Acts to today. Some Christians have, Bibles in their hand, opposed the abolition of slavery here in the U.S., or women’s liberation from patriarchy, and the LGBTQ community’s work toward a more equitable society. Liberation and justice are deeply intertwined concepts, each depending on the other to be fully realized. Liberation speaks to the process of freeing individuals and communities from systems of oppression—whether political, economic, racial, gender-based, or religious. Justice, meanwhile, ensures that this freedom is not only achieved but sustained through structures that affirm everyone’s dignity and rights.

Historically, liberation movements have risen in response to injustice. I’m thinking of the Civil Rights Movement, Indigenous resistance to colonialism, the fight for women’s rights, and more. Each of these efforts began with a deep yearning for freedom but ultimately sought a more just society—one in which the systems that produced inequality were dismantled and replaced with equitable alternatives.

Justice is not simply the punishment of wrongdoing; it is the active creation of conditions where wrongs are less likely to occur. It involves redistribution of resources, access to education and healthcare, protection of rights, and the amplification of marginalized voices. Justice requires us to confront power and privilege, especially when they are used to exclude or dehumanize.

Liberation without justice can be fleeting. If a people are freed from one form of domination only to be subjected to another, their liberation is sham. Similarly, justice without liberation is a lie. You cannot have true justice while people remain trapped in systems that deny their full humanity.

Spiritual and philosophical traditions around the world affirm the essential link between liberation and justice, Christianity with its complicated oppressive history among them. The call to “let the oppressed go free” is not merely a metaphor; it is a summons to act in solidarity with the poor and the excluded. Our gospel must unequivocally state that justice is love made public and embodied in social, economic, and political transformation.

True liberation and justice require more than empathy. They demand action. They challenge us to listen deeply, to learn from those on the margins, and to use our resources and influence in ways that help us all reimagine a better world. It is not enough to hope or pray for a just society; we must build it, piece by piece, policy by policy, relationship by relationship.

In this sense, liberation and justice are ongoing journeys. They are the work of communities committed to healing, truth-telling, and the shared belief that another world is possible and a just, compassionate world that is a safe home for all is worth fighting for.

Discussion Group Questions

1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s podcast episode with your discussion group.

2. How does your practice of Christianity lead you to support justice and liberation, rather than stand against it? Share and discuss with your goup.

3. What can you do this week, big or small, to continue setting in motion the work of shaping our world into a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone?

Thanks for checking in with us, today.

I want to say a special thank you to all of our supporters out there. And if you would like to join them in supporting Renewed Heart Ministries’ work you can do so by going to renewedheartministries.com and clicking donate.

My latest book Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political and Economic Teachings of the Gospels is available now on Amazon in paperback, Kindle and also on Audible in audio book format.

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Thank you for listening to The Social Jesus Podcast. If you enjoyed this podcast please take a moment to like and subscribe and if the podcast platform you’re using offers this option, please leave us a positive review. This helps others find our podcast as well.

You can watch our YouTube show each week called “Just Talking”. Each week, Todd Leonard and I take a moment to talk about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and social justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also do more than just talking. If you teach from the lectionary each week, or if you’re just looking for some thoughts on the Jesus story from a more progressive perspective within the context of social justice, check it out, you might like it. You can find JustTalking each week on YouTube at youtube.com/@herbandtoddjusttalking.

Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment.

And if you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.

Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.

I love each of you dearly,

I’ll see you next week.

New Episode of The Social Jesus Podcast

A podcast where we talk about the intersection of faith and social justice and what a first century, prophet of the poor from Galilee might have to offer us today in our work of love, compassion and justice.

This week:

Season 2 Episode 34: Christianity, Liberation and Justice

Luke 13:10-17

“Our reading this week is about the tension between a person’s liberation and the way a religious institution (the Sabbath) was interpreted to oppose that liberation. The Christian faith tradition also has a long history of using its interpretations of our sacred texts to stand in the way of people’s liberation from injustice. Christianity has always had a dual witness regarding oppression: some advancing it, some fighting it. From the first generation in Acts to today. Some Christians have, Bibles in their hand, opposed the abolition of slavery here in the U.S., or women’s liberation from patriarchy, and the LGBTQ community’s work toward a more equitable society. Spiritual and philosophical traditions around the world affirm the essential link between liberation and justice, Christianity with its complicated oppressive history among them. The call to “let the oppressed go free” is not merely a metaphor; it is a summons to act in solidarity with the poor and the excluded. Our gospel must unequivocally state that justice is love made public and embodied in social, economic, and political transformation.”

Available on all major podcast carriers and at:

https://the-social-jesus-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/christianity-liberation-and-justice

Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political & Economic Teachings of the Gospels.

by Herb Montgomery

Available now on Amazon!

In Finding Jesus, author Herb Montgomery delves into the profound and often overlooked political dimensions of the gospels. Through meticulous analysis of biblical texts, historical context, and social discourse, this thought-provoking book unveils the gospels’ socio-political, economic teachings as rooted in a profound concern for justice, compassion, and the well-being of the marginalized. The book navigates the intersections between faith and societal justice, presenting a compelling argument for a more socially engaged and transformative Christianity.

Finding Jesus is not just a scholarly exploration; it is a call to action. It challenges readers to reevaluate their understanding of Christianity’s role in public life and to consider how the radical teachings of the gospels can inspire a renewed commitment to justice, equality, and compassion. This book is a must-read for those seeking a deeper understanding of the social implications of Christian faith and a blueprint for building a more just and inclusive society.

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Category: Esights, Liberation Theology Tags: Ecological Justice, Economic Justice, Feminism, gospel, Immigration Justice, Labor Justice, Lectionary Reading, LGBTQ Justice, Liberation Theology, Racial Justice, Sabbath

The Sabbath and Social Justice

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Herb Montgomery

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The Sabbath and Social Justice

Herb Montgomery | May 31, 2024

If you’d like to listen to this week’s article in podcast version click on the image below:

Our gospel reading this weekend is from the gospel of Mark:

One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?”

He answered, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions.”

Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for humanity, not humanity for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Sovereign even of the Sabbath.”

Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, “Stand up in front of everyone.”

Then Jesus asked them, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?” But they remained silent.

He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored. Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus. (Mark 2:23-3:6)

Both stories in this week’s reading revolve around how the Sabbath was practiced in Jesus’ society. These stories also have deep social justice lessons for us today. Let’s begin with the Sabbath commandment in Exodus:

“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to your Sovereign God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. For in six days your Sovereign made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore your Sovereign blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. (Exodus 20:8-11)

This passage begins with the word “remember.” The people in the story had been recently liberated from slavery in Egypt, and one of the very first lessons they learned in their wilderness travels was the Sabbath (Exodus 16). The text in Exodus 20 is reminding them of the lessons they had just learned and instructing them to not forget.

For our purposes, these Sabbath lessons were social justice lessons. They were about labor justice. Everyone was entitled to time to rest and be restored. No one was to be forced to labor unceasingly. To put this in language that we might understand today, the Sabbath was a command directed toward employers, not employees. Employers were to remember that they were once slaves in Egypt. I do wish that the passage admonished them not to even have slaves because they knew what it was like themselves to be slaves. But instead it admonishes them make sure they give their labor force time off (“your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns”). It reminds them that they knew what it was like to be slaves.

This brings to mind the historical accomplishments of labor movements and labor unions in our society today. One of those accomplishments is the eight-hour work day, which U.S., labor movements worked for as early as 1836. Another of these accomplishments is the five-day work week. Where the Sabbath commandment limited the 7-day work week to 6 days, here in the U.S. we’ve been able to begin the work week on Monday and mark the end on Friday. We see the five-day work week adopted as early as 1926 by Henry Ford in his automobile factories. By 1940, the Fair Labor Standards Act established the 40-hour workweek and two-day weekend across the United States. This was a landmark labor justice accomplishment. This is the spirit in which we should consider the Sabbath of Exodus. The God of the Sabbath is on the side of labor justice. The God of the Sabbath commandment in Exodus is the liberator of slaves (Exodus 20:2), protector of labor (Exodus 20:8-11), and even rested themself once at the end of creation (vs. 11).

In our global economy today where capitalism reigns supreme, our economy depends on a never-ending, always-expanding growth. But eternal growth is not sustainable. Balance requires ebb and flow, action and rest, growth and contraction, tides going out and tides coming back in. We cannot always be producing. There must be time for rest, too.

In his book Sabbath as Resistance, Brueggemann writes,

“In our own contemporary context of the rat race of anxiety, the celebration of Sabbath is an act of both resistance and alternative. It is resistance because it is a visible insistence that our lives are not defined by the production and consumption of commodity goods.” (Sabbath as Resistance: Saying No to the Culture of Now, p. 32)

In our reading from Mark this week, Jesus’ disciples pick some grain to eat as they walk on the Sabbath. This story establishes for Jesus’ followers that Jesus views the Sabbath not as an end in itself but as means to an end. In other words, the Sabbath was not the priority. The person was the priority that the Sabbath was instituted to protect. The Sabbath was made for humanity, not humanity for the Sabbath. Whenever any practice, Sabbath included, become death-dealing, we must reassess it and give way to more life-giving interpretations of it.

This section ends with a reference to resistance literature from the time of the Maccabean revolt: the book of Daniel and the Son of Man figure in chapter 7. In Daniel 7, the Son of Man is a symbol of liberation from oppressive, violent, and unjust empires. Mark’s gospel repeatedly refers to Jesus as Daniel 7’s Son of Man. It places the Sabbath under the Son of Man’s resistance and liberation jurisdiction and restores the Sabbath to the liberation and labor justice purpose we read above in Exodus. We see the Sabbath’s original intent even more when the commandments of Exodus 20 are repeated in Deuteronomy 5. Here the Sabbath is directly tied to liberation and justice:

“Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as your Sovereign God has commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to your Sovereign God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns, so that your male and female servants may rest, as you do.Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that your Sovereign God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore your Sovereign God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.” (Deuteronomy 5:12-15)

The second story from our reading this week is about Jesus’ encounter with the man with the withered hand. In Jesus’ society, like today, there were ways of interpreting Sabbath observance that were life-giving and liberating, and that promoted and protected aspects of social justice. There were also ways of interpreting Sabbath observance that were oppressive and caused suffering. Mark’s gospel introduces those interpretations as early as chapter 1:

“That evening after sunset the people brought to Jesus all the sick and demon-possessed.” Mark 1:32

In Mark 1, the people don’t bring the sick to Jesus to be healed until the Sabbath is over. Rather than the Sabbath being a means of liberation, it is an obstacle to their liberation and they must wait until it’s over to reach life. This contradicts the Sabbath’s original purpose in the Torah. We should read Jesus’ question “Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?” in that context. Jesus is asking what the Sabbath in the Torah is really about: giving life or dealing death?

He could have heard the man with the withered hand in private and not created a scene, but in public defiance and as an act of civil disobedience, Jesus uses this moment to not only heal the man, but to also confront the system and those complicit in keeping people subjugated. We cannot forget the contrast Mark is making here between the synagogue rulers complicit with the Roman empire and Mark’s association of Jesus with Daniel’s Son of Man, who would liberate the people from oppressive, violent, and unjust empires. In Mark’s story, the Sabbath should not be an obstacle to people’s liberation that keeps them suppressed. The Sabbath is a time for restoration, liberation, healing, and a reconnection with life and those things which are life giving.

How might this inform our own justice work as Jesus followers today? Are there times when we have interpreted our Jesus following in ways that have become death dealing for our society? Is our practice of Christianity socially life-giving? Are we obstacles to those around us working toward a more just, safer, compassionate society with room for everyone or are we, like Mark’s Jesus, standing up to those obstacles and being conduits of love, life, and healing?

Where are we in the way? How can we get out of the way and come alongside, choosing to recognize those working to make our world a safer place for everyone, and adding our energy and effort to their work? Are we making it harder or easier to shape our world into a more socially just form? These Sabbath stories in Mark call each us to reassess our Jesus following and make sure we too, like the God of the Sabbath and like the Jesus in the gospel stories, are on the side of the oppressed, marginalized, and subjugated, working for a more just world.

Discussion Group Questions

1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your discussion group.

2. Are there Christian practices today that you feel are obstacles to peoples liberation rather than a source of liberation and justice? How might these practices be reinterpreted in more life-giving ways? Share and discuss with your group.

3. What can you do this week, big or small, to continue setting in motion the work of shaping our world into a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone?

Thanks for checking in with us, today.

As always, you can find Renewed Heart Ministries each week on X (or Twitter), Facebook, Instagram and Meta’s Threads. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts.

If you would like to listen to these articles each week in podcast form, you can find The Social Jesus podcast on all major podcast carriers. If you enjoy listening to The Social Jesus Podcast please take a moment to like and subscribe and if your podcast platform offers this option, consider taking some time to leave us a positive review. This helps others find our podcast as well.

You can watch our new YouTube show called “Just Talking” each week. Todd Leonard and I take a moment to talk about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also do more than just talking. If you teach from the lectionary each week, or if you’re just looking for some thoughts on the Jesus story from a more progressive perspective within the context of social justice, check it out, you might like it. You can find JustTalking each week on YouTube at youtube.com/@herbandtoddjusttalking. Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment.

And if you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.

Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.

I love each of you dearly,

I’ll see you next week.

New Episode of JustTalking!

Season 2, Episode 15: Mark 2.23-3.6. Lectionary B, Proper 4

The Sabbath and Social Justice

Each week, we’ll be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also do more than just talking.

If you teach from the lectionary each week, or if you’re just looking for some thoughts on the Jesus story from a more progressive perspective within the context of social justice, check it out, you might like it.

You can find the latest show on YouTube at:

New Episode of The Social Jesus Podcast

This week:

Season 1 Episode 8: The Sabbath and Social Justice

Mark 2:23-3:6

“Are there times when we have interpreted our own Jesus following in ways that have become death dealing for our society? Is our practice of Christianity socially life-giving? Are we obstacles to those around us working toward a more just, safer, compassionate society with room for everyone or are we, like Mark’s Jesus, standing up to those obstacles and being conduits of love, life, and healing? Where are we in the way? How can we get out of the way and come alongside, choosing to recognize those working to make our world a safer place for everyone, and adding our energy and effort to their work?”

Available on all major podcast carriers.

Or here:

https://the-social-jesus-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/the-sabbath-and-social-justice

Now Available on Audible!

Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political & Economic Teachings of the Gospels.

by Herb Montgomery, Narrated by Jeff Moon

Available now on Audible!

After two successful decades of preaching a gospel of love within the Christian faith tradition Herb felt like something was missing. He went back to the gospels and began reading them through the interpretive lenses of various marginalized communities and what he found radically changed his life forever. The teachings of the Jesus in the gospel stories express a profound concern for justice, compassion, and the well-being of those in marginalized communities. This book navigates the intersections between faith and societal justice, and presents a compelling argument for a more socially compassionate and just expression of Christianity. Herb’s findings in his latest book are shared in the hopes that it will dramatically impact how you practice your Christianity, too.

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Category: Esights, Liberation Theology Tags: Ecological Justice, Economic Justice, Feminism, Immigration Justice, Labor Justice, Lectionary Reading, LGBTQ Justice, Liberation Theology, Racial Justice, Sabbath, Social Justice

Our Collective Thriving

Posted on August 19, 2022 by Herb Montgomery

Herb Montgomery | August 19, 2022

To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here.

The stories this week point us to prioritizing the needs of people to thrive. Survival isn’t enough. We are worth more than that. We are also worth more than a few people in society thriving while the rest of us simply survive (or don’t even do that.) This week’s story also calls us to attend to things that enable all of us to thrive together without anyone being marginalized.

Our reading this week is from the gospel of Luke:

On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.

Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

The Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?”

When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing. (Luke 13:10-17)

This week, let’s begin by intentionally rejecting antisemitic interpretations of this week’s reading. This passage isn’t a Christianity-versus-Judaism argument against the Sabbath. It represents an argument within Judaism and among Jewish people about what constitutes valid Sabbath observance and what actions violate the Sabbath. Remember, Jesus was an observant Jew remember (see Luke 4:16). It’s telling that this passage ends with all the Jewish people agreeing with Jesus’ interpretation of how Sabbath observance should meet people’s needs. This story is not anti-Jewish, nor is it anti-Sabbath.

In Luke’s Jesus story, there is a social debate on what permissible actions on the Sabbath should prioritize. Judaism has always justified temporarily setting aside Sabbath restrictions for any condition that was life-threatening. So whatever people needed to survive was always permitted on the Sabbath.

In this week’s reading, we encounter a condition that is not life-threatening but that the story paints as preventing the woman from thriving. (I’ll address the ableism about this in a moment.) This story is one of the healing stories in Luke’s gospel that creates a tension of priorities, pitting people’s needs for thriving and not simply surviving against the demands of Sabbath observance. This theme recurs across the canonical Jesus stories (compare Luke 14:1-6; Mark 3:1-6; John 5:1-9; and John 9:1-7).

Economic and Labor Justice

Consider the Sabbath commandment we read in Exodus:

Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.

Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns.

For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. (Exodus 20:8-11)

Inherent in the original Sabbath institution was an element of economic and labor justice for workers. Today I would argue that one day is not enough to ensure laborers, workers, or employees are not being exploited. I wasn’t alive in the time of Exodus, but I would guess that it was only a start back then too.

Also notice that the Sabbath commandment in Exodus does not put the onus on children, slaves, animals or vulnerable immigrants to refuse to work for those subjugating them. This would only place undue stress on them, adding moral implications to something which they had no choice about.

No, the commandment is rather addressed to parents, masters, and livestock owners. To apply this to our context: the Sabbath commandment does not tell employees not to work for their employers on the Sabbath. The commandment tells employers not to exploit their employees and not make their employees work on every day of the week. If someone is working on the Sabbath, the person responsible is their employer who demands that labor be done, not the employee faced with the choice between observing a Sabbath or putting food on their family’s table.

As the gospel of Mark reminds us, “The Sabbath was made for people. People weren’t made for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27-28).

This is a deeply Jewish theme of contrasting people’s strict religious observances with their actions about others’ concrete justice needs. We encounter this contrast of values and priorities all the way back in the prophetic justice tradition of the Hebrew scriptures:

“The multitude of your sacrifices—

what are they to me?” says the LORD.

“I have more than enough of burnt offerings,

of rams and the fat of fattened animals;

I have no pleasure

in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.

When you come to appear before me,

who has asked this of you,

this trampling of my courts?

Stop bringing meaningless offerings!

Your incense is detestable to me.

New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—

I cannot bear your worthless assemblies.

Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals

I hate with all my being.

They have become a burden to me;

I am weary of bearing them.

When you spread out your hands in prayer,

I hide my eyes from you;

even when you offer many prayers,

I am not listening.

Your hands are full of blood!

Wash and make yourselves clean.

Take your evil deeds out of my sight;

stop doing wrong.

Learn to do right; seek justice.

Defend the oppressed.

Take up the cause of the fatherless;

plead the case of the widow. (Isaiah 1:11-17, emphasis added)

Today, I think this still tracks. We still see in our communities some of us who can be very intentional about our observances within our religion while we ignore the social justice concerns of others. Christians can sometimes be among the worst offenders in this.

But the last thing to note this week is that this is an ableist story.

The intention of the Jesus story is to portray a Jesus who sought to liberate people from suffering, whatever the form of that suffering. I’m thankful for this. We must also understand our own ableism: it includes the presumption that all disabled people want to be cured. They don’t. Some people who live with disabilities see their disability as part of the variety within humanity’s potential, not as something “wrong” with them that needs to be “fixed.” This can be very difficult to get folks without disabilities to understand. As the colloquialism states, fish don’t know they’re wet. People who aren’t disabled often don’t perceive the assumptions that their own experiences cause them to make about people with disabilities.

Consider that the gospels’ solution is never to change the society that people who are living with disabilities are living in so that they do not experience discrimination, marginalization, or exclusion. The gospels’ solution is always instead to transform the disabled person, to align or harmonize them with their society so that the social, religious, political and economic stigmas attached to their disability are no longer present. The action restores the person with a disability to their community rather than calling the community itself to change and either challenging or rejecting the stigma.

Some will challenge my critique here, and that’s okay. But the question we have to ask in each story is where is change taking place? Is the person with the disability being transformed or is the society those people live in being changed? In some of the stories an argument could be made for both, but in every story the person with the disability experiences a change to remove the stigma applied to them.

This is one shortcoming of the Jesus stories that Jesus followers must acknowledge and it doesn’t mean these stories have no value. What it does mean is that we can still highly value the Jesus story and note where we could do better today. The ethical spirit of Jesus that we love so much also sets us on a trajectory toward telling more life-giving stories that don’t marginalize anyone, including people who live with disabilities.

HeartGroup Application

1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your HeartGroup.

2. Share an experience where you were faced with a conflict between concrete physical needs and honoring religious observances or practice. Discuss with your group.

3. What can you do this week, big or small, to continue setting in motion the work of shaping our world into a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone?

Thanks for checking in with us, today.

Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.

I love each of you dearly,

I’ll see you next week