More rules...

"Looking around at them with anger and grieved at the hardness of heart, Jesus said to the man, 'Stretch out your hand.'"
Mark 3:5

Pray-As-You-Go asked a ponderous question with this reading today. What caused the hardness of the Pharisees' hearts and could that happen to us? Wow, that's not something I admit I've thought about. They were the leaders of the faith, the Higher-Ups, the guys in charge. What caused them to totally miss this guy with the withered hand and concentrate only on the fact that Jesus healed him on the sabbath? Couldn't they see how diminished his life was with this disability and how better he would be with two good hands? What was it about them that prevented them from going there? I'm thinking they were very comfortable within the rules of the faith and those rules gave them a sense of security. After all, in those days it was all about obeying the rules to being able to justify yourself before God. Here comes this guy, Jesus, who is disobeying the rules and making good things happen in the process. What would that do for those who depend on the rules to look good themselves? Compassion could fly right out the window in that case, couldn't it? And what about us? Do we get so caught up in the rules that we lose compassion and concern for those who we perceive breaking the rules? Are we so concerned about our own well-being that we can't look beyond ourselves to the needs of others? Can we ever look into the eyes of real, live human beings and see their Divine spark or do we just see them as threatening rule-breakers? It isn't a stretch to see this scenario playing out in our country right now.  Where are we with it? Love, heidi