Mark 2:23-28
23 One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. 24 The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” 25 He answered, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? 26 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.” 27 Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”

The disciples in this passage were very hungry and passing through foreign lands, and so they were picking some leftover heads of grain to eat, not having anything else to eat. In Deuteronomy 23:25, God allows for this kind of manual harvest, and in other parts of the Old Testament, God allows for people to harvest from others’ fields as an emergency food supply. So the disciples weren’t doing anything wrong by God’s standards.

However, the observing Pharisees, who have spent their whole lives mired in the letters of each and every Law, are scandalized. Their complaint is that the disciples are reaping grain (i.e., doing work) on the Sabbath, which is strictly not allowed according to the Law. (I read their complaint in verse 24 in the same voice as “Oohhhh! I’m TELLING!” They sound like a bunch of kids whining!)

But Jesus is ready for this criticism with a calm response. He cites the example of David and his companions, who were hungry and in need of emergency supplies, so they ate the holy bread in the temple. This probably scandalizes the Pharisees even more, but Jesus is making an example: when desperate times come, drastic measures have to be taken, and God realizes that. Even if it is holy bread, even if it is the Sabbath, God understands that we gotta eat–He created us, after all. He does not see providing for yourself in the direst of circumstances as a sin, because He knows your individual situation. (He does, however, see senseless robbery and other forms of needless victimization as sins, because those who rob and kill without absolutely needing to are needlessly hurting others.)

Established Christians often worry about “holiness” and acting in “reverent ways,” often to a fault. We can sometimes get so hung up in TRYING to worship and TRYING to stay holy that we forget to worship, or we hold ourselves back from something we really need. God established the Sabbath as a day to recuperate and get back in touch with Him, knowing that we humans need at least some downtime–He didn’t mean for us to stop ourselves from doing things we absolutely have to do. Working on a Sunday morning, for instance, feels especially isolating for a practicing Christian; we feel we’re torn from our worship. But if we’re pulling in a paycheck that our family cannot live without, then God understands that, and we are no less Christian for doing what we have to do to save and preserve our lives and the lives of our family.

It’s not up to us to judge each other for what we choose to do on the Sabbath. God will ultimately deal with us for everything we have chosen to do in our lifetimes. What is important is using the Sabbath for what you need most: worship, rest, and whatever else your life demands of you. The rest of the week is enough of a pain without putting so many regulations on Sunday–which is what Jesus is saying in the last two verses of this passage.