During His public ministry our Lord was repeatedly accused of breaking the Sabbath; and on such occasions He vindicated Himself in one or other of two ways.
I. Sometimes He stood upon His rights as a Divine Being to work at any time for the welfare of men. That was the course which He adopted when, in answer to those who sought to slay Him because He had healed the impotent man on the Sabbath day, He said, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." A reply which not only made Himself equal with God, but cast a new light upon the meaning of the creation week. For it could have no pertinence to the case in dispute, unless its significance be something like this, "We are living now in the seventh day of the creation week. This is the time of Jehovah's rest." We have now no work of creation going on; no special additions have been made to the various orders of animals on the surface of the earth since man appeared; and in that sense God has been resting. But though He has not called anything new into existence, He has been continually at work in upholding all that He has made, and He has put forth special remedial efforts for the restoration of man to the state in which he was formed at first, but from which he fell by his own sin. If therefore, during the Sabbath of creation's week, and while God is resting, He can yet put forth special exertions for the redemption and education of man, I am only following on the same line when, on the Sabbath of an ordinary week, I put forth my energy in the restoration of the impotent man to health.
II. At other times the defence of the Lord was based on the nature of the works which He had performed. He held and taught that it was lawful to do good on the Sabbath day. Nay, He went further, and declared that there is a class of duties which we not only may, but must,perform on that day. It was ordained at first for the benefit of man, and therefore it was never intended that it should operate to his detriment; whenever, therefore, an injury would be inflicted on a fellowman by our refusing to labour for his assistance on the Sabbath, we are bound to exert ourselves, even on that day, for his relief. So by His sharp incisive logic our Lord cut away all the traditional ivy-growth which had so largely covered the primal ordinance of the Sabbath, and restored to it its own primal beauty and benevolence.
W. M. Taylor, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xi., p. 103.
References: Mark 2:27. C. Girdlestone, Twenty Parochial Sermons,p. 245; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xix., p. 228; vol. xxi., p. 92; G. Brooks, Five Hundred Outlines,p. 257; M. R. Vincent, Three Hundred Outlines on the New Testament,p. 32; see also American Pulpit of the Day,vol. i., p. 258. Mark 2:27; Mark 2:28. A. Barry, Cheltenham College Sermons,p. 46; Christian World Pulpit,vol. xi., p. 103; Homiletic Magazine,vol. xi., p. 95; G. E. L. Cotton, Sermons and Addresses in Mar thorough College,p. 296.